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Why is Joyfulness Difficult
Philippians 4:4
If you were to describe your walk of faith, would it be a walk of joy or would it be something else? And if you’re not sure if it would be a walk of joy, why?
What makes it hard to be joyful? To be happy as a Christian? Is it the challenges we face in this world? We have, you know, our bodies are broken. We live in a sinful, broken world. Is it the challenges we face to living out our faith? Is it the consistent, plaguing guilt of knowing that we sin against God day after day?
What is it? It’s important for us to think about whether or not we’re living this joyful life because scripture again and again, God in His Word, would have us be joyful.
In, Philippians chapter four. Here in Philippians, God, through Paul says,
Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice. (Philippians 4:4)
And this is like a jumping for joy, joy. This is what God wants for us. And if God wants us to be filled with joy, we should think about what’s keeping us from that. Maybe sometimes when we see the challenges in this world, maybe sometimes that’s all we see and we don’t see beyond it. Maybe it’s because when the law pricks our conscience and helps us see our sin, and that’s a good thing, maybe we just stop there and don’t go to the next step of the gospel.
It could be a variety of things, but whenever we find ourselves lacking that joy, we need to come again to the cross, lay our sins before Jesus, and hear again the good news. Yes, you and I have sinned, and we do struggle with sin every day. But Jesus took that away. When you’re baptized into Christ, his life now covers you. When God sees you, he sees you through Jesus. And Jesus is God. God sees you through himself. He doesn’t see a speck of guilt, a speck of shame. Who you are now is someone redeemed in Christ. That’s your identity, that’s your eternity. And you may struggle with sin now, but there will be a day when you are free from it. And if that’s how you’re going to live someday, that’s also who you get to know you are today. Yes, you have challenges in this life, but they don’t win. You win in Jesus. Yes, there are things coming against you, but you have a strength that is stronger than yourself because you have God being for you.
There are so many challenges in this world, yes. Things that make it difficult to be a Christian and just to be a human. But we have a God and a gospel that overcame. We have a good news that is about overcoming death to bring life. We have a Savior in Jesus who overcomes the world. He promised that.
So let’s go again to the gospel. Let’s look again at Jesus and we’ll find we have every reason to rejoice.
