Be Happy

“A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a broken spirit saps a person’s strength.” (Proverbs 17:22)

Food For Thought: We love our rights! In fact, one of our most treasured national documents is called the Bill of Rights. We’d fight to the death for these rights…the right to free speech, to bear arms, to own property, to worship according to the dictates of our conscience….the right to choose between Pepsi and Coke, to have our steak well-done, medium or rare, to drive a Ford or a Chevy, to vote Republican or Democrat. And right at the top of our list of treasured rights is the right to be happy: The right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

If you were to ask 10 people what they wanted out of life, it’s likely that 9 of them would mention happiness somewhere close to the top of their list. And if you were to ask them what it would take to be happy, their anwers would typically fall into these categories:

• Money. Most people believe they are just a few more dollars away from happiness. Some years ago, U.S. News & World Report ran a study on the elusiveness of money in achieving the American dream. The study reported that households with incomes under $25,000 would need $54,000 a year to achieve the American dream. And those who made $100,000 would need $192,000. In other words, when money is involved, the American Dream is always twice the distance away.

• Possessions. A lot of people believe that if they had a nicer home, a more expensive car, the latest designer clothes, the newest, coolest techno-gadgets, they’d be well on their way to happiness. You’d think garage sales would dispel that notion forever!

• Power. Some people believe that having a prestigious job, or a life in the spotlight, or the admiration of the masses is the key. It seems like celebrity is the god we worship these days, and far too many people would do just about anything, and I mean anything, to get their fifteen minutes of fame.

• Relationships. And then there are those who think that having friends, or a spouse, or a different spouse, or to be able to have kids, or just to get the kids out of the house will make them happy.

But no matter how we define happiness, the fact is, most people never achieve it. As Psychiatrist Thomas Szasz said, “Happiness is an imaginary condition, formerly attributed by the living to the dead, now usually attributed by adults to children and by children to adults.”

A recent opinion poll found that only 20% of Americans consider themselves to be happy. What’s odd about that is that we’re living in a time when we make more money, have more things, have greater opportunity to attain influence, exert personal power, and can surround ourselves with any number of relationships, and yet we’re unhappier than ever.

That begs the question: Is happiness possible? Should we even pursue happiness? Does God want us to be happy? Is a cheerful heart even possible, or was the writer of Proverbs just teasing us?

My answer to that is, yes, happiness is possible. I just think we’re looking in the wrong place for it. I would suggest we go back to God’s “user’s manual for life,” the Bible, to discover what true happiness really is and how to get it. God’s Word has a lot to say about it, and we would do well to start our pursuit of happiness by pursuing what the Bible reveals about it.

Now there isn’t enough room in this blog to adequately cover God’s truth on the subject, so let me just get to a bottom line for what it takes to be a happy person and to live a happy life. Ecclesiastes 2:26 sums it up pretty well:

“To the person who pleases him, God gives wisdom, knowledge and happiness.”

We can learn a lot about happiness from this one little verse. From it, obviously, we discover that happiness is possible. We also learn that God desires to give it. Furthermore, we can extract from the verse the definition of happiness: Pleasing God. What is happiness? It is living my life in such a way that I bring a smile to God’s face. Not only that, we learn that it’s okay to desire it, to pursue it, since God gives its. And finally, the verse teaches us how one can go about attaining happiness, and it’s very simple: By reordering your life to please God.

There you have it! Do you want to be happy? Live your life to please God. Do you want to be happy today? Then today, reorient your life to please God. Do you want to be happy right now? Do what pleases God: Repent of your sin. Invite Christ into your heart as Lord of your life. Share the Good News with someone who doesn’t know Christ. Reject impurity for a life of holiness. Begin to honor God with your money. Take on the attitude of a servant—help someone who cannot repay you. Start forgiving the people who have hurt you. Stand up for the poor and defenseless.

In a nutshell, put God’s kingdom first in everything you think, say and do, and he will add all the ingredients that go into making a happy life…best among them being the joy of the Lord.

Prayer: Lord, today I want to please you in every way…in what I do, in what I say, even in every thought that flows through my brain. Help me to put your kingdom first in everything. Through every detail of my life, may your kingdom come, may your will be done just as it is in heaven. And I would ask you to give me a double portion of the wisdom, knowledge and happiness that your Word promises. Amen.

One More Thing… “A man is happy so long as he chooses to be happy, and nothing can stop him. (Alexander Solzenitsyn)