Finding Happy, p.2

What would make you happy?

A new job?   More recognition?   Winning the lottery?   Getting married?   Getting unmarried?   New car?   A thousand FB friends?   Losing weight?   Looking younger?   A baby?   A sane teenager?  Healing from an illness?   Hard questions answered?   Undoing past mistakes?   Freedom from addiction?   Finding a better addiction?   More time?   A new phone?

Some of these might help, but as one counselor said, most of these things can not make you substantially happier.

At the same time, Jesus doesn't condemn us for our desire to be happy.  He actually gave it to us.  Love this quote by Dallas Willard...

“The simple fact is that everyone does everything in order to be happy. You should never be ashamed of your desire to be happy. It is as natural as hunger.  God made you this way so that you would choose Him and His soul-satisfying pleasures in lieu of those which pass with the using and ultimately leave you empty and miserable. The alternative to resisting the passing pleasures of sin isn’t religious misery but relishing the permanent pleasures of God.”

So we've been on this journey to "find happy" in the Beatitudes of Jesus (Matthew 5:3-12).  I've been amazed at the simple and profound wisdom of Jesus.  When you think of happy as being a sense of well-being not dependent on circumstances, wow!  

This well-being is not a permanent possession of the proud.  But it is available to all who call on God from a humble heart.  

The kingdom of heaven opened (5:3)!  Comfort for sorrow (5:4)!  Inheriting the earth (5:5)!  Being satisfied with God's goodness (5:6)!  Receiving mercy (5:7)!  Seeing God (5:8)!  Being called a son or daughter of God (5:9)!

That might bring so much well-being you'd feel like dancing...