Joy in the Journey

Obtaining the Joy of Jesus

Who’s your Treasure?

Orienting Life from Above

.Joy in the Journey is about the gladness of God’s nearness in the midst of life’s adventures.

Subscribe below to get email notifications of new posts. We post a few times a month. Thank you for reading.

Novels by the Author:

What happens when a professor figures out how to send messages to his younger self to try and avoid the suicide of his best friend? Did he change more than he bargained for? Beyond Time

By finding two undelivered letters in a old shack deep in the woods, Cassie and Daniel unknowing set off a series of events which uncover a plot to wipe out a whole family Hope Remains

Keep Seeking the Kingdom, Orienting Our Lives from Above

Rhythms: UP (What in the World am I Doing for Heaven’s Sake?)

November 22, 2021 robuck4@aol.com 3 Comments

Live with the End in Mind

So far in UP we’ve looked at the exceedingly lavish love of God: God’s Amazing Love

We’ve determined how necessary it is for our vitality: God’s Essential Love

And become aware of what threatens us knowing it: What Hides God’s Love

We’ve marveled at the reality of our union with Christ. learning to trust that He indwells us: Christ Lives in Me and that we’re

also in Him: Raised up with Christ

We’ve established that we were created to only be satisfied when God is our highest joy: Who’s your Treasure?

And, we’ve seen how Jesus wants us to share His joy in how we love: Obtaining the Joy of Jesus

Let’s now look at how we can orient each day around these spiritual realities?

Orienting Our Days

Therefore if you have been raised up with Christ, keep seeking the things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth (Colossians 3:1-2 NASB).

In the above verses, Paul gives us a framework for how to position our minds in a way which will change how we view and live each day.

Since we, as children of God, are in Christ, we’ve been raised up with Him. Though physically we still reside on earth we’re to keep seeking His will and we’re to set our minds on things of eternal value.

This type of living keeps us in the flow of Jesus’ joy.

But, how does it play out on a Monday afternoon?

Keep Seeking

From our position in Christ, we’re to continually seek what’s on God’s heart. As Jesus demonstrated, we’re to aim at doing God’s will above our will. Even in the midst of carrying out our day to day responsibilities, we’re to require God’s glory in all we say and do.

In the fray of the day, what we experience in front of our eyes can consume our focus and energies. But, as our days unfold, we’re to strive for seeing and doing what has long term, eternal value in every situation.

This mindset is impossible without a moment by moment dependence upon Christ’s Holy Spirit within. It also requires a growing confidence that, as we focus on heaven, God will take care of us.

Jesus said it in Matthew 6:33, “But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.”

We’re to pray, “Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” (Matthew 6:10 NASB).

As we go, we keep seeking the things on God’s heart, leaving the rest in His hands.

Setting Our Minds

As we keep seeking God’s will, we’re also to set our minds from the eternal position we now have in Christ. This means orienting our minds from above, seeing all of life from a long term view.

What a different perspective!

From our eternal orientation, we look at every moment, every person and every choice differently. Since people have eternal souls, they rise to the top of our priority lists.

We desperately need the Holy Spirit to guide and strengthen us in our interactions with others. As Peter put it in I Peter 4:11, Whoever speaks, is to do so as one who is speaking the utterances of God; whoever serves is to do so as one who is serving by the strength which God supplies; so that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom belongs the glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.

Setting our minds on things above, means speaking words of life and loving the folks God places around us in His strength. Living today with eternity on our minds, keeps God’s purposes at the forefront. We continually say, “Lord, what’s next?”

Story:

Once upon a time there was a man who was hostile toward God’s plan. It wasn’t that he hated God, he just didn’t realize what God was up to. Out of his confusion, this man played a part in the murder of many folks who were following Jesus Christ.

In a very startling way, Jesus intervened and showed this man that He was Lord. This man believed and spent much time alone with Jesus, growing in the sweetness of intimate fellowship with Him.

This man began living his life from an eternal perspective, seeking God’s will above his own. He learned to trust God when it came to his own welfare. This produced a freeing joy, which overflowed into rejoicing, in spite of his difficult circumstances.

This way of enjoying Jesus, no matter what happened, characterized this man’s life. He just had to tell others. He spoke and wrote about his hope of heaven and how he was experiencing eternal life even on earth.

Over time, his outspoken ways caused him to be thrown in jail. But even in prison, he continued to experienced the joy of being with Jesus. Because of his faith, he cared more about eternal matters than his temporal welfare. From his prison cell, he wrote:

Now I want you to know, brethren, that my circumstances have turned out for the greater progress of the gospel, so that my imprisonment in the cause of Christ has become well known throughout the whole praetorian guard and to everyone else, and that most of the brethren, trusting in the Lord because of my imprisonment, have far more courage to speak the word of God without fear. Some, to be sure, are preaching Christ even from envy and strife, but some also from good will; the latter do it out of love, knowing that I am appointed for the defense of the gospel; the former proclaim Christ out of selfish ambition rather than from pure motives, thinking to cause me distress in my imprisonment. What then? Only that in every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is proclaimed; and in this I rejoice (Philippians 1:12-18 NASB)

Of course, this man was Paul.

From the above verses, we see an excellent example of seeking the things of heaven above the circumstances of earth. Paul’s excitement and joy stemmed from the fact that his difficulties were producing eternal results.

Paul sought God’s kingdom above all else. He oriented His life from above; living from the long view of eternity.

Conclusion

C.S. Lewis once wrote. “Aim at Heaven and you will get Earth ‘thrown in’: aim at Earth and you will get nothing.” [1]

We’re not to get so wrapped up in the temporal things of this world that we lose focus on what’s most important.

We need to continually ask ourselves: What in the world am I doing for heaven’s sake?

We can trust the details of our lives to Jesus, freeing us to seek God’s glory as we love the folks He places in our paths.

The challenge is to live each moment of our earthly lives with the end in mind, asking how our words and actions impact eternity?

Live with the end in mind.

Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through Him to God the Father (Colossians 3:17 NASB).

Prayer

Lord, thank You for wanting me to find joy right now in how my story ends in eternity with You. Thank You that, because I’ve been raised up with Christ, I’m in position to take the long view, to see things from Your eternal purposes. Please allow me to see each person from the standpoint of their journey with You, even if they don’t have a relationship with you yet. Also, please help me see the opportunities to bring You glory in everything I do, even in the most mundane endeavors. Thank you Father.

Personal Study

Highlight Matthew 6:19-34

Explain it in your own words

Apply it to your life

Respond to God in prayer

[1] The Joyful Christian, C.S. Lewis, B&H Publishing Group

Previous posts in the UP series:

Obtaining the Joy of Jesus

Who’s your Treasure?

.Joy in the Journey is about the gladness of God’s nearness in the midst of life’s adventures.

Subscribe below to get email notifications of new posts. We post a few times a month. Thank you for reading.

Novels by the Author:

Beyond Time

Hope Remains

Complete Joy, Connecting Love and Joy, The Joy of the Lord

Rhythms: UP (The Source of Jesus’ Joy)

October 19, 2021 robuck4@aol.com 6 Comments

But of the Son He says,

“Your throne, O God, is forever and ever,
And the righteous scepter is the scepter of His kingdom.
“You have loved righteousness and hated lawlessness;
Therefore God, Your God, has anointed You
With the oil of gladness above Your companions” (Hebrew 1:8-9 NASB).

Jesus has been anointed with the oil of gladness (exultation and extreme joy).

As we grow in our knowledge of God being our Highest Joy, we will look at how Jesus’ glad heart strengthened Him and gave Him courage. And we will look at how we’re fueled by the nearness of Jesus and His joy.

In spite of what He faced, even on the cross, Jesus’ life was marked by joy and gladness. And we’ve been called to follow Him and learn from His life, as we depend upon His Spirit within.

What can we learn about His Joy, which He says completes our joy.

The Joy of Relationships

Relating – a connection between.

Out of the depth of love within the Trinity, man was created and given the breath of life. We were created for fellowship and relationship with God. And, as amazing as it seems, God delights in our connection with Him.

In fact, Zephaniah writes that our connection with Him causes the Lord to rejoice with shouts of joy. [1] We actually bring joy to God.

This helps bring clarity to the following verses in Hebrews: Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God (Hebrews 12:1-2 NASB)

Reconciling our connection with Him was the joy set before Jesus.

Knowing His death on our behalf would re-establish our broken relationships with God because of our sin, gave Jesus joy, a joy which fueled His endurance on the cross.

Consider Jesus’ words to His disciples the night before He went to the cross: “If you keep My commandments, you will remain in My love; just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and remain in His love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. This is My commandment, that you love one another, just as I have loved you (John15:10-12 NASB)

His command – Love others as He’s loved us.

His reason – That His Joy might be in us and that our joy might be complete.

It may seem strange from an earthly perspective, but realizing the complete joy of Jesus seems to have everything to do with loving.

Love and Joy are tightly coupled. They appear together at the beginning of Paul’s list of the fruit of the Spirit. [2]

True, lasting joy doesn’t spring from earthly happenings, but rather from the depth of love in our relationships.

Paul wrote about it:

But even if I am being poured out as a drink offering upon the sacrifice and service of your faith, I rejoice and share my joy with you all. You too, I urge you, rejoice in the same way and share your joy with me (Philippians 2:17-18 NASB).

For who is our hope or joy or crown of exultation? Is it not even you, in the presence of our Lord Jesus at His coming? For you are our glory and joy (I Thessalonians 2:19-20 NASB).

In fact, he tells us to always rejoice in our love of God.

Finally, my brethren, rejoice in the Lord. To write the same things again is no trouble to me, and it is a safeguard for you (Philippians 3:1 NASB).

Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice! (Philippians 4:4 NASB).

Story: I remember a tough day in the early nineties when our kids were small. My wife had just found a nest of mice in her clothes drawer. Our dryer was broken. I had some high priority work issues, along with the normal challenges of parenting four children.

After disbursing of the mice, I was hanging up our wet towels and blue jeans on the clothes line, trying to formulate a plan for fixing what else was broken.

Then it hit me. Like an apple bouncing off the head of Isaac Newton, I was awakened.

What happened with the mice and the dyer and how my work issues were resolved was very temporal, what really mattered was how my wife and my relationship survived the strain. She was in distress over finding rodents in our room.

Our relationship, and how I loved her through the difficulties was much more important than solving the problems.

When I finished hanging up the clothes, I sat down to unpack what seemed to be a huge paradigm shift. Could relationships and loving be the key to life?

Jesus’ answer to the Pharisees, from Matthew 22:36-40, came to mind. “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” And He said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the great and foremost commandment. The second is like it, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets.”

Then I thought of the ten commandments and how they are all about loving God and loving others.

Since then, though I’ve forgotten the focus for great chunks of time, I’ve been intentional about having a love first mindset. I will testify that when this focus is operating as it should, I have unexplainable joy.

Conclusion

Jesus’ life was marked by joy. And, as we look deeper, we see a definite connection between love and joy. It was His love for us, and our reconciliation with Him which gave Him joy on the cross. In fact, it fueled His endurance.

On the night before Jesus was crucified on our behalf, He gave His disciples a formula for experiencing His joy. The secret – loving others as He’s loved us. If we do this, we will remain in His love and our joy will be made complete.

Paul also experienced the joy of sacrificial love. He equated joy with being poured out like a drink offering and he called the Thessalonians his glory and joy. Paul also commands us to be full of joy in our love for the Lord.

Joy, which satisfies our longing hearts doesn’t come from fighting for ourselves. In fact, it’s just the opposite. Our experience of joy is directly related to how we love.

Prayer

Lord, You’ve awakened me to the tight connection between love and joy. Thank you. Please stop me quickly when I forget and try once again to derive my feelings of being okay from my circumstances. Please keep my heart in a love first mode, realizing all along that any loving I do must come from You. I pray the people I love would recognize You in every word and deed.

Amen.

Personal Study

Highlight Hebrews 12:1-3

Explain it in your own words

Apply it to your life

Respond to God in prayer

[1] Zephaniah 3:17

[2] Galatians 5:22-23

Previous posts in the UP series:

Who’s your Treasure

.Joy in the Journey is about the gladness of God’s nearness in the midst of life’s adventures.

Subscribe below to get email notifications of new posts. We post a few times a month. Thank you for reading.

Novels by the Author:

Beyond Time

Hope Remains

Satisfying Joy, The Lord our Joy, The Source of all Joy

Rhythms: UP (Who’s Your Treasure?)

September 21, 2021 robuck4@aol.com 4 Comments

Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in or steal; for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also (Matthew 6:19-21 NASB).

Baked into the heart of every human is the unaltered desire to find a lasting joy to satisfy our empty souls. This longing, this need for satisfaction, is so strong we won’t give up the quest, though we may die trying. The problem is we look for satisfaction in all the wrong places.

Wasn’t it the Rolling Stones who could get no satisfaction after trying and trying and trying?

King Solomon tried all manner of worldly delights to satisfy his emptiness.^[1] Denying himself nothing he saw around him, he concluded that it was all “vanity and striving after the wind.” Ecclesiastes 2:11b (NASB)

Trying everything, but failing to find joy, Solomon was left hopeless and despondent. “I hated life, for the work which has been done under the sun was grievous to me, because everything is futility and striving after wind.” Ecclesiastes 2:17 (NASB)

He would later conclude, that God has set eternity in the hearts of men.^[2] Solomon had the means to attempt anything the world had to offer to fill his need for satisfaction. None of it worked. At the end of his search, he hated life because he recognized the utter futility of trying to fill the eternal hole in his hearts with anything around him.

God designed our hearts for joy. We’re to be fulfilled by God Himself, the fullness of all joy,[3] not in having a better life.

Until we realize true joy and fulfillment comes from God Himself, our lives will be endless pursuits of fleeting, temporal, pleasure which lead only to idols and addictions.

We must all ask ourselves – What is our treasure?

Is there something we’re looking forward to, or hoping for, which we believe will finally bring fulfillment and lasting happiness? Completing college? Getting married? Buying a house? Getting out of debt? Getting promoted at work? Having children? Starting a business? Publishing a book? Having good health? Having grandchildren? Retiring? Winning the lottery?

These can be good things, but will they provide lasting fulfillment?

Desiring happiness is not a bad thing, but true joy is a by product of our relationship with God through Jesus Christ. It’s built into our design by the Intelligent Designer.

But, how can we walk in a growing awareness that God Himself is our Highest Joy when all around clouds the truth?

Awakened

Truly realizing God Himself is the Great Satisfier of our Soul is something God Himself must reveal to us. If this is our desire, to believe He’s our Highest Joy, He will awaken our hearts to a deeper and deeper understanding and lead us into days of sustained Joy in Him.

Paul prays that the eyes of the Ephesians’ hearts would be enlightened to the marvelous spiritual truths of the gospel. [4]

God Himself is our Great Reward. Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your very great reward Genesis 15:1b (NIV).

Joy is fully experienced in the presence of God. In Your presence is fullness of joy; Psalm 16:11b (NASB).

Jesus satisfies our deep hunger and thirst. I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me will not hunger and he who believes in me will never thirst (John 6:35 NASB).

If any man is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture said, ‘From his innermost being will flow rivers of living water’ (John 7:37b-38 NASB).

Chew on these and other truths from Scripture which tell us God Himself will fill us to overflowing with lasting satisfaction. Ask Him to make these words come alive in your heart so that they will progressively govern how you live every moment.

Story: Disillusioned, hopes crushed, my fragile world was crumbling around me. What I thought would bring lasting happiness left me disheartened, disappointed and empty. I felt like a failure – rejected and unloved.

This describes several “low” points in my life. I see now how I’d set my affections on God’s benefits rather than on God himself. At the time, I was miserable. But looking back, I see these very hard times as severe mercies.[5] Each played a part in further dislodging, me from an entrenched disillusionment.

These were extremely difficult times, but, looking back, totally worth it.

The fundamental truth in the human existence, that God Himself brings us the lasting satisfaction we so desperately need, is becoming REAL in my soul.

From time to time I still struggle. I put feeling good and having worldly peace above God Himself. But more and more these struggles are short lived. God is awakening me and bringing me back to the knowledge that NOTHING fully satisfies me but HIM.

Conclusion

Where we are is not as important as where we’re headed and Who we’re with. Where are we headed? What’s our aim, what motivates our heart as our treasure?

Idealistically, we long for our lives to go smoothly. We’d love to have our bills paid, be in good health, have stuff that’s not always broken and get along with the people who matter most to us. These are all wonderful things, but we must recognize two things about these life goals.

First of all, these longings for our circumstances to go smoothly almost never work out as we hope.

Secondly, even if they did, our inner longings would still ache and scream out for satisfaction.

Let’s recognize now that God Himself is Who we’ve been searching for all our lives. He’s our Reward, our Pearl of Great Price, the Bread of Life, our Rivers of Living water filling our souls to overflowing.

We need to believe this and ask God to awaken our hearts to the reality that He’s our Highest Joy.

When we find ourselves longing for lesser treasures, let’s acknowledge it, confess it and turns our hearts quickly back to seeking Him above all else.

Prayer

Lord, it’s so amazing that you created me for fellowship with You. It’s profoundly simple, that the key to life is being with You. Yet, it’s also so difficult when my heart drifts to what I see around me. But you are showing me more and more, in the depths of my soul, how complete I am in You. I can rest now and enjoy who You, no matter what I face. Thank You for the loving way You show me when I stray, tenderly pointing me back to You.

By Your Spirit, please keep me on the path of seeking You as my Treasure every moment of every day.

Amen.

Personal Study

Highlight Matthew 13:44-46

Explain it in your own words

Apply it to your life

Respond to God in prayer

[1] Ecclesiastes 2:1-10

[2] Ecclesiastes 3:11

[3] Psalm 16:11b

[4] Ephesians 1:18

[5] I first heard this term from a book entitled A Severe Mercy by Sheldon Vanauken

Previous posts in the UP series: