The Joy of Prayer!

I went to a prayer time with believers from Immanuel Baptist Church and was encouraged by many graces!

One joy was hearing other people be passionate about prayer, hearing godly content, praying for things that I am burdened for and then even hearing new prayer requests.  Much joy!

Then there's the joy of God's presence and sensing that He is going to answer these prayers!

Have you been praying?  Have you been pursuing the joys there?

The Joy of Giving!

Paul tells us that the Macedonians gave beyond their means!  Have any of us ever even done that?

There is joy that they had.  They gave themselves first and then to the cause of helping the poor in Jerusalem.

Then we can start talking about the eternal joys of being rewarded in Heaven by storing up treasures in Heaven! Have you even considered that when you think about giving?  Jesus wants us to think about rewards to help motivate us to give more and more and more!

The Joy of Turning from Sin!

The joy of repentance cannot be overstated.

There is a clean conscience that makes the heart glad.

There is the knowledge of knowing that sin is not your master now and never really was in Christ!

There is the freedom from guilt and condemnation and shame!

There is the knowledge that you're not going to hurt others again, or at least as often!

What do you need to repent of today?  Why wait for joy?

Give yourself happiness now by repenting from your sins today!

The Joys of Life! There are so many!

Hello world!  Are you joyful today?  You should be!

I'm not saying if you have a serious trial in your life that you should be glib.  But you should rejoice if you know Jesus Christ!!!  Being enthralled with all that Christ gives and offers for the future should overwhelm us!

If you're not overwhelmed, will you take a minute right now and dwell on all that Christ has done and will do?  Will you treasure just His character?  Will you tell others about His love?

The Joy of the End Goal of our Faith

The end goal of our faith is to marvel at Jesus.

Have you marveled today?

The Joy of Technology!

I am amazed at the gifts of technology. I can access any information at any time in just a few seconds!


Are you thankful for this gift of grace?

The Joy of Work!

Jesus is so amazing in His grace that He not only saves us, He sanctifies every area of life and redeems it, gives it purpose!

For example, think of your work.  When you clock in, who are you working for?  If you're a mother at home, who are you working for when your kid wakes you up at 6:30am?  If you're not sure, let me exhort you in seeing that as believers, we're working for Jesus!  Every task is sanctified.  Every responsibility is holy and eternally significant.   

Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ.  Colossians 3:23-24

You're not at work for a boss or a family member--primarily.  The primary employer, boss, supervisor is JESUS.  That perspective should change everything!  He wants to accurately assess and reward everything you do!  That means every attitude and action is able to be affirmed at the Day of Judgment!  Every service and speech is special!  There are no irrelevant itineraries on your schedule.  Jesus infuses meaning into every aspect of life!

And we should be joyful about that!  We shouldn't fear God's coming judgment.  The inheritance is meant to inspire.  The reward is meant to revive you!  The promise of repayment is meant to instill hope and motivation.  Are you joyful with your work?  Are you thinking about pleasing Jesus with every task on your plate?  If you're not, repent today!  Make work joyful!  Make your job joyful!  Make your day joyful!

Redeem it by shifting your focus on Jesus!

I Love Texting!

The joy of texting is so widespread! Who doesn't like to receive a text from a friend or spouse?

The Joy of Diverting the Eyes

So with the warm weather approaching, so does the flood of temptations to have the eyes dwell over women's bodies' parts.  I wish that women knew what modesty is, so that men could have some help!

Men will lust after real women's bodies' parts, fake women's bodies' parts like mannequins, pictures of real and fake womens' bodies' parts, and even cartoons of womens' bodies' parts.  We will lust after images in our heads from lustful looks a decade old.  We're tempted by the flesh!

So why do we do it?  We're seeking joy.  Men are tempted to believe that we'll find pleasure in seeing the top of a breast or the roundness of a bottom.  How pathetic.  It really is.  The look should not thrill us.

But why should it not?  Because we're stealing.  We're not glorifying God.  It is a good thing to have a pleasure from looking at beauty.  But that object of passion must be the spouse!  Not your brother's spouse!

And we're so guilty throughout out lives.  Jesus did not come to die on the cross merely to remove wrath.  He wants to rewire wants.  He wants to change our eyeball patterns by changing our hearts, and natures.  And He has if you've repented and believed.

Have you felt the weight of temptation increase with warmer weather?  We need to feel the weight of the word even more!

We must give an account of everything we do in the body, whether good or bad.
I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you.
You were called to purity, not impurity.
If your eye causes you to sin, gouge it out!
How can a young man keep his way pure? By guarding it according to your word.
The grace of God has appeared, teaching us to renounce ungodly passions and to live self-controlled lives.
Make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue.
Do not even consider how to gratify the cravings of the sinful nature.
You have died to sin.

And with the eyeballs specifically, I think of Job:  I have made a covenant with my eyes that I will not look lustfully at a woman.  Have you made a covenant?  Have you promised to be pure with your eyes?  Are you diverting or divulging looks?

If we're honest, we probably failed today.  But tonight is new grace and mercy!  Tomorrow is a day of victory.  We must be confident that we can be satisfied with Christ and dissatisfied with crap.  We can be passionate about the Lord and dispassionate about lust.  We can be fixing our eyes on Jesus and not on womens' bodies' parts.

Do you agree?  Do you see diverting of the eyes as joyful? 

The Joy of Honesty!

Confessing your sins to other brothers, having no secrets is so relieving!

I have lusted.  And Jesus has forgiven me.  I can fight with my eyes.
I have hated people in my heart.  And Jesus has covered over those wretched moments.  I can love!
I have coveted in my heart.  And Jesus has satisfied me.  I can be content.
I have judged people unfairly.  And Jesus sets me free.  I can love, accept and be slow to analyze!

What do you need to confess?  How have you been hiding sin?  What needs to happen for you to be honest?

We have all sinned.  There are no stones in hand.  Jesus is eager to free us through confession, through honesty.

If you don't feel like you have an opportunity to share your struggles, I would love to listen and pray with you.

Call me!  502.714.1529.
E-mail me!  fightforjoy@gmail.com
Facebook me!  www.facebook.com/fightforjoy

The Joy of Knowing You're Forgiven

For date night this past Friday, Beth and I went to hear Peter Kreeft, a "Catholic Evangelical", speak supposedly on C.S. Lewis.  He spent more time on discussing joy in philosophical manners.  I did think it was helpful to apply Aristotle's four questions to the category of joy:

What is it?
What is it made of?
What's the purpose of it?
What's it good for?

But during the question and answer session, I tried to pose to him a question about the joy of knowing that your sins are forgiven being a richer, more robust picture of the gospel, having joy in KNOWING you are justified with God through faith in Jesus Christ.  I tried to contrast this gospel with the message of Catholicism, which does not give that eternal security so sweet to Evangelicals.

Now we're not talking cheap grace when we talk about eternal security.  We don't mean that you can pray a prayer when you're 9 and live like a heathen and then know you're going to heaven because of a decision you made (even if sincerely made) back in the day.  No.  That is no gospel at all.  That is heresy.

But there is a confidence in knowing that your sins have been forgiven that enables you to experience such joyful, sanctifying grace!  I can walk in freedom!  I don't need sacraments to inch away at my sins.  No!  I have the true Jesus of Nazareth saying, "It is finished!"  I tried to tell that picture to another Catholic neighbor. She didn't respond to it.  But I want people to be amazed at grace!  There is a joy in absolutely knowing and feeling and sensing and comprehending sin is no longer my master!  Jesus is!

The Meaning of Joy

I hear Christians often try to approach the word joy as a deeper happiness or an even deeper pleasure.

I see the three terms as synonymous.  There is no holier category.  God’s word uses the three to express the delights that can be found in God and in the world. 

What do you think?

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How Anger Can Kill Joy Left and Right

So Jonah is like the epitome of joylessness.  He's so angry that God is going to show compassion towards the people of Nineveh that he tries to escape even the task of preaching to them.

God tries to humble him through some whale incarceration.  But that act only gets Jonah to go through the motions--instead of preaching a message of judgment with anticipation that they will repent!  Oh the joys he could have had in excitement to see an entire city of 100,000 people repent!  When is the last time you saw 100,000 people humble themselves because they saw how wretched their sins were?

So Jonah misses out there.  He then can't even be humbled by God's grace in the people of Nineveh.  He wanted judgment.  And isn't that how people are sometimes?  They would rather cry out for wrath than to see mercy handle the situation.  And if we're honest, do we ever secretly rejoice when someone "gets what they had coming"?  I think there is greater glory in being happy when people are spared from judgment through repentance and faith in Jesus Christ.

But then Jonah gets all angry about the plant that God made grow and then wither away.  God asks the best question:  "Do you do well to be angry?"



And that question has been helping me to avoid anger towards my children or anyone else.  Little good ever comes from my anger.  Almost never.  So I have come to see that when I sense that temptation to get angry, God is saying, "Is that really doing well?  Is that going to help you?  Is that really beautiful?"

And that is my question for you:  who are you angry with?  Are you so consumed with your own rights and expectations and preferences that you are carrying around anger and bitterness?  Do you need to see how futile your anger is?  Are you missing out on the joys of graces that God is giving all around you?

Don't let anger murder your happiness.  It does not do well for yourself or anyone else.

Lust Leads to Hell and Not Happiness

I met two men at the Speedway gas station on Poplar Level Road. They were looking at a smutty magazine and talking about women's body parts as if they were items on a buffet:  there for the taking.

I think I felt the Spirit telling me, "Be bold!  Talk to them."  So I passed over the gasoline median and said to Chuckie, the one standing outside his car, "Did you know that lust will send you to Hell?"

He replied, "Excuse me?  What did you say?"  I repeated it and explained that Jesus said, "If anything causes you to sin, cut off your right hand...For it's better to enter heaven with one member than it is to enter Hell with both."

I then talked about how Jesus is willing to forgive us of all our sins if we do two things:  repent and believe.

It turns out that Chuckie has a possible 20+ prison sentence hanging over his head.  We discussed how Jesus can sustain him through taking responsibility for his crime, how Jesus can help him persevere through all trials, etc.

I also felt compelled to bust out some freestyle gospel rap to try to make the message more understandable and also relevant in their minds.

We prayed for their lives, I invited to come to our home on Sundays when we gather to learn more about Jesus.  I then felt compelled to give them 20 bucks to communicate the grace of God--it's a gift--nothing we can do to earn His forgiveness and love--all of grace!

May they see Jesus as their happiest satisfaction and treasure.  He is wanting to free people from Hell and their Hellish desires.

Finding Joy in Judgment

So I had a performance appraisal at work on Friday.  There were 20 different categories that my enrollment manager and director of enrollment were charged to evaluate and then rate me on a five category scale:

Role Model
Advanced
Proficient
Developing
Not Acceptable

So I was shooting for Role Model in every category.  I even made a video of it to really think of examples of role models.

I was sad, though, to find my overall appraisal was Proficient.  Now Proficient is in the category of Standard Employee, versus an employee who is Above and Beyond as the best and Area of Concern as the least.  So it's a little bit better than the middle.

I was very sad, actually.  I feel like I do come to work everyday and try to work heartily as working for the Lord--and not for man.  So why did it bother me so much that I was not evaluated the way I thought I should have been?

What a sobering reality!  To be judged and evaluated and come up short from expected marks!  I began to think more about the Day of Judgment when I stand before Christ and He perfectly evaluates every aspect of my mind, my heart, my words, my actions, my looks, my hands, my interactions, my everything.  How I will not hear role model then!

So, I began to think:  where's my fighting for joy mentality now?  Why is my soul downcast?  I have to fight for joy in judgment.  I have to work at seeing all the happiness in evaluation and scrutiny.  I have to revisit my motivations to ensure that I am working for Jesus--and not the mere approval of my managers.  I have to humble myself to receive feedback--not so that I can merely be seen better by them--but to really surrender myself to every governing authority as coming from God.

Everything my mangers pointed out had some form of merit and should be seen as opportunities to rejoice that I am get to grow in character.  I can be transformed through this evaluation process for my good.

Most people think of judgment as all bad--as oppressive.  And I admit I felt that way at first.  But with more meditation, evaluation is not the Old Testament law.  I'm not merely crushed by it.  I CAN be a role model by God's grace.  And more importantly, I can hear a positive appraisal on the Day of Judgment.  But God will accurately evaluate me and ensure that I am clearly perceived by His judgments.

For the time I work at the University of Phoenix, I want to make sure that I am quick to listen to all feedback and attempt to improve at my position so that I can be pleasing to Christ--even when I don't fully agree with the feedback.  I want to be quick to make adjustments and develop professionally so that I am fighting for joy that can exist and does exist in judgment.

May God enable all people to be humble and happy to receive judgment!