Praying To Rejoice
By Abraham Israel
Is your life bulging with excitement, virility and fruitfulness?!--Or is it dead, dull, sterile, frigid and barren, like most churches!
Also in some religions the sadder you are, the more religious you are considered to be. But we Biblically consider that you're not very spiritual unless you're happy, victorious and joyful. Praise the Lord!
Many times we become stressed when we let ourselves to be influenced by the gloomy surroundings that surrounds us.
Things might not have been working out well as you have thought it will turn out to be, do not worry for God is much more involved and interested in turning both the good and bad things that have happened and are happening against you to work together in to a good foreordained plan of success because of your love towards God.
The only person who can stay happy in this stressful world is the person who have learned to trust God and believe that nothing bad can ever happen to him apart from the will of God. They will be always peaceful with a tranquil heart.
Happy people always enjoy life. Every new day should be the happiest day of our life because we need to remember that every day with Jesus is better than the day before!
Many times in our soul we might feel dull, sombre and depressed for no reason at all. These are the ways in which the enemies of our souls who are Satan and his demonic cohorts try their best to make us succumb and fall in to the trap of unbelief and deep sadness against God. Even Jesus felt many times like this and the highest peak of stress he faced was just before His death when He began to be sorrowful and deeply distressed and said to the disciples, "...My soul is exceedingly sorrowful, even to death. Stay here and watch with Me.” (Matt 26:38). Even Isaiah the prophet described Jesus as, "A man of sorrows [because of carrying] our sorrows." (Isaiah 53:3, 4). Because He has carried our sorrows, now we do not have to carry our own sorrows, but we can choose to carry the sorrows of others like Jesus did. So the depression that attacks you is not the will of God and so should be resisted. At the same time, friendship doubles our joys and divides our grief. So understand and learn to carry other people's sorrows as they come in to contact with you.
The following Poem beautifully describes the way in which we should carry others sorrows and experience the heavenly reward of joyful heaven on earth,
You too can joy with others share
And heal the hearts to you laid bare
If you'll but pour the oil of Love
He'll give you from His Heart above.
The time to rejoice is now,
And the place to be joyful is here,
And the way to rejoice is to make others happy
And we'll have a little joyful Heaven right here!
God gives us His joy the most when we choose to serve others inspite of our own need. We will be able to rejoice the most when we choose to think about others and forget about ourselves. Never forget, joy that isn't shared dies young.
Have you ever thought why God allows sorrows if He could stop it from coming to us altogether after we are saved. The one main reason is, we will never be able to appreciate Joy until we have known Sorrow! So we need both in human life to experience God's goodness. But the balance lies in positioning ourselves in such a way that we should learn to resist sorrow with God's joy.
Jesus resisted sorrow by going in to the Presence of God to pray and de-stress himself. This should be our response too. When we cry out to God and de-stress ourselves in His presence, He will give us His beauty for ashes, oil of joy for mourning, garments of praise for the spirit of heaviness, so that we might become a glorious plating of the Lord and become trees of righteousness for the GLORY OF GOD (Isa 61:2-3)!
Jesus and Apostle Paul were exemplary examples of how they did not depend on just happiness but went further to receive God's joy constantly in their soul. Joy is received in our souls deep from the recesses of our heart, in which God who is enthroned in heaven also resides in the humble heart that has accepted Him through Jesus. Happiness is based on happenings, Joy is based on having Jesus within us. Joy is a rainbow in our heart that says all is well inspite of all the floods and storms that we have faced and keep facing in order to see a bright future custom designed by God for us. Joy within us also conveys that God is happy with us and is in serious buisness to keep His promise of a good success and the hoped end that He had promised us, and that we too look eagerly forward to experience in the end (Jer 29:11).
Apostle Paul advised all believers to "Rejoice in the Lord always." (Phil 4:4). Rejoice means, "to release the Joy that is already with in your spirit-man." The God of hope who resides in our spirit-man releases His joy in to your soul when we keep our eyes on Him in trust and faith (Rom 15:13). So once we connect to God, He will be giving us His heavenly joy to make us glad. In other words, Joy is the flag which flies from the castle of our heart when we are in constant communion with King Jesus who is in residence there.
Say it out loud, "I AM Too blessed to be stressed!"
The shortest distance between a problem and a solution is the distance between your prayer times.
The one who kneels to the Lord can stand up to anything. Why worry when you can pray.
"Most people are about as happy as they make up their minds to be." - Abraham Lincoln
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