Everyone wants joy.
All of us, I think, want to live fulfilled lives. But joy means different things to different people. It can be pretty difficult to maintain a positive attitude when all hell breaks loose in your life. Who do you know that is good at smiling while suffering? It’s tough.
One person wrote, “Finding joy is a challenge for me. I’m not naturally an upbeat person; I’m more of a melancholy. When I talk about joy, I’m not doing so from the perspective of a generally peppy person who never has a bad day. Joy is the settled assurance that since God is in control of all the details of my life, everything, eventually is going to be alright, so I make the choice to praise God in every situation.”
So what is joy?
Joy is more than happiness, just as happiness is more than pleasure. Everyone wants pleasure – pleasure makes me feel good. More deeply, everyone wants happiness – it makes my life brighter. Most deeply, everyone wants joy.
Generally speaking, Pleasure is in the body. Happiness is in the mind and emotions. While Joy is deep in the heart, the spirit, the center of the self. The way to pleasure is indulgence. Your body craves the pleasure of good food, human touch, hugs, kisses and the warmth of a fire. The way to happiness is lightheartedness. Your mind and emotions desire the laughter of friendship and the fun of good times. But your spirit, the deepest well of the human, craves the presence, and the light of the joyous Holy Spirit. The way to joy is the Holy Spirit.
Pleasure and happiness are not necessarily bad, but they are often a substitute for spiritual joy. Thomas Aquinas once said that, “No one can live without joy. That is why one deprived of spiritual joy indulges in personal sensual pleasures.” People substitute other stuff for the joy of the Lord. If Jesus does not consume your life, something else will! We must choose Joy: Because neither happiness nor pleasure is ever enough.
Again let me ask, “What is joy?”
There are three words we need to discuss in order 
to understand Joy. The first is the word “joy” itself. In the Greek New Testament Joy is χαρά (chara). The second word is Grace. In the Greek it is xáris (charis) (they are cognate words meaning that linguistically they come from the same original root word), meaning “good will;” Because God is favorably disposed toward us he offers us grace. The third word is Gift. In the Greek it is χάρισμα (charisma), meaning “a gift, or favor.”
Let me see if I can put it all together for you. The origin of joy is the Grace of God, which he offers as a gift… because of Jesus Christ, God looks favorably upon us and grants us the Gift of grace and the Holy Spirit. When we experience God’s Grace and receive God’s Gift, God enables us to experience joy in the deepest recesses of our soul! Joy comes as a gift directly from the Grace of God.
So how do you get the gift of joy? You must surrender your soul to the Holy Spirit. You should try it. Millions of people for thousands of years have tried the experiment, and not one of them has ever been cheated. All who seek, find—this is not just a promise about the next life, to be believed by faith, but a promise about this life, to be proved by experience.
In the very act of self-surrender to God there is joy. We’ve all known people who are cold, suspicious, mistrusting, unable to let go. These people are miserable, wretched. They can’t find joy because they can’t trust. You need faith to receive the gift of God’s grace, in order to find joy.
Here’s why we smile while suffering: We smile because we have received God’s gift of grace and we are bound for glory! That is why
We Dance, Even in Our Trials! 1 Peter 1:6
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In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, if need be, you have been grieved by various trials”
I want to introduce you to another Greek word. . The first is the word was “joy” χαρά (chara). The second word was Grace; xáris (charis). The third word was Gift; χάρισμα (charisma). But the fourth word is what this message is all about. The fourth word is Rejoice. In the Greek it is xaírō (chairo), meaning “to be glad and rejoice.”
But, if you’ll notice in verse six, we don’t just rejoice, we “greatly” rejoice. When I say “greatly,” I’m talking about a rejoicing that is walking and leaping and praising God! In the original language, greatly means “leaping, springing up, bubbling up!” I don’t mean to go all Pentecostal on you, but I think I see the Apostle Peter dancing in the isle! It’s a jubilation! The Spirit of the Lord has got a hold of Peter!
1 Thess. 5:16 commands us to “Rejoice always.” Joy is the inner glow in our spirit, while rejoicing is the outer expression of Joy. Abiding joy in the Lord should be the aim of every Christian.
Philippians 4:4 commands us to “Rejoice in the Lord always, and again I say rejoice.” This is a commandment, repeated twice for emphasis, so that we will not shrug it off. It is a command that we must deliberately choose to obey, especially when we’re in difficult circumstances. It has to do with our attitude which depends on submission to the Holy Spirit. The choice to rejoice often goes deliberately against how we feel. When we go through trials, we are faced with a decision: Will we obey this command to rejoice in the Lord or will we allow ourselves to be swept along by our feelings?
Let me give you three pointers for smiling while suffering and rejoicing in trials.
#1. Remind yourself that your trials won’t last much longer. In verse 6, Peter phrases it this way. Dance with me, rejoice greatly, because trials are only “for a little while.” Just remember, this won’t last forever. This too shall pass. Trust in Jesus and wait it out. There is hope for tomorrow, because on our tomorrow, Jesus is coming again.
#2. Remind yourself that trials are God’s tools to meet your needs. That little phrase in verse six, “if need be,” indicates that there are special times when God knows that we need to go through trials. Sometimes trials discipline us when we have disobeyed God’s will (Ps. 119:67). At other times, trials prepare us for spiritual growth, or even help to prevent us from sinning (2 Cor. 12:1—9). We do not always know the need being met, but we can trust God to know and to do what is best. Therefore we dance with Jesus, through trials.
#3. Remind yourself that it’s OK to weep and still rejoice. Peter was not unrealistic about how difficult our trials may be. In our verse, he calls them “grievous trials.” The word means “to experience grief or pain. It’s interesting that the shortest verse in the Greek New Testament is, “Rejoice always” (1 Thess. 5:16). The shortest verse in the English New Testament is, “Jesus wept” (John 11:35). They are not contradictory! Our Savior could weep and yet have the fullness of joy, even as He faced the cross (John 15:11).
We would misapply Peter’s words if we took him to mean that a Christian should never feel sadness or grief. To rejoice in the Lord does not mean that we deny our feelings or that we stoically endure our trials by ignoring how much we hurt. To deny that our trials are painful is to make them even worse. Christians must accept the fact that there are difficult experiences in life and not put on a brave front just to appear “more spiritual.”
Here is something you may, or may not know. Rejoicing is a spiritual weapon to fight off attacks on our mind. It’s like anti-venom from a poisonous snake bite. Rejoicing is not about trying to pretend you’re not in pain. It’s believing that when you do rejoice … the peace of God which surpasses all understanding will visit you when it would not otherwise.
We Dance Because We are Growing Deeper 1 Peter 1:7
“that the genuineness of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire, may be found to praise, honor, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ”
Nobody knows all that is in store for us in heaven, but this we do know: Life today is a school in which God trains us for our future ministry in eternity. This explains the presence of trials in our lives. Do you want to know why you should dance for joy when trials come?
Trials test us. Trials test the genuineness of our faith. Do you want to know who the real Christians are? They are the ones hanging tenaciously to their faith when trials come. Too many professing Christians have a “false faith,” and this will be revealed in the trials of life. I’m not saying you won’t doubt or struggle, or even question God. But once you walk through the fiery trial and make it out the other side, you can say, “hey! I just learned something about myself! My faith is genuine!”
Testing is precious. Our tested faith is much more precious than gold. Peter illustrated this truth by referring to the goldsmith. No goldsmith would deliberately waste the precious ore. He would put it into the smelting furnace long enough to remove the cheap impurities; then he would pour it out and make a beautiful article of value. That’s why testing is precious because of God is making something precious of us.
Testing is glory. When we pass the test; when we see Jesus face to face; then our faith will receive praise, honor, and glory. Our trying experiences today are preparing us for glory tomorrow. While we may not be able to rejoice as we look at our trials today, we can rejoice as we look ahead.
We dance because we are born for glory, kept for glory, and being prepared for glory.
We Dance Because We are Going for Glory! 1 Peter 1:8-9
“Whom having not seen you love. Though now you do not see Him, yet believing, you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory, 9 receiving the end of your faith—the salvation of your souls.”
We don’t have to see it to believe it! I love the way Peter wrote this verse. I’m pretty sure he had doubting Thomas in mind when he wrote it. Our love for Christ is not based on physical sight, because we have not seen Him. It is based on our spiritual relationship with Him and what the Word has taught us about Him.
Some people cannot believe in a God that they cannot see. But it turns out that our ability to grasp abstract ideas like an invisible God and the power of invisible faith, are marks which only the highest functioning hearts and minds possess. It also turns out that our ability to maintain a love connection with a God we cannot see is also a mark which only the deepest hearts and minds possess. We don’t have to see it to believe it.
So here is what happens to average, everyday folk when they believe in a God they cannot see, and love a Jesus whom they have never met… Their hearts are filled with an unexplainable joy!
We don’t have to see it to rejoice in it! Read verse 8 again, and you’ll see Peter dancing in the aisles! “yet believing, you rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory.” Let me tell you about the kind of Joy that Jesus gives. It is Joy inexpressible. It is so powerful that we can’t even explain it! We are dumfounded by it. But there is more! Our rejoicing is full of glory! This is a superlative word which means incredibly glorious, filled with splendor; It is a word which describes incredible happiness like praising Jesus, extolling God, celebrating the Holy Spirit. This joy is the most potent antidote to depression, the most amazing supplement to health, and the most incredible ride of a lifetime! You have got to get some of this. It turns out, there’s enough to go around for all of us!
Though we don’t see it now, we will get it in glory! One of these days soon we are going to experience the end of our faith. We are going to see Jesus face to face, and the joy that we experience then will make the trials in this life pale in comparison. There is nothing like seeing Jesus!
To rejoice in the Lord always is an attitude of contentment and hope that transcends circumstances. The joy Paul is exhorting us to is decidedly not the kind of joy the world offers.
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