Thursday, July 14, 2011

The Pursuit of Happiness

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness"--- Declaration of Independence.  

Hello readers.  Welcome to my heart. Lets begin.

Now, our forefathers has exposed a secret desire in all of us.  The pursuit of happiness.  And, I love the word choice because its so flawed. :D No disrespect to them, but, you'll understand after I'm done. 

So, dictionary.com defines pursuit as:the act of pursuing. An effort to secure or attain; quest.
As you can see, terrible word choice.  Because as many of us have discovered if you've lived any measurable time on this beautiful corrupted Earth, HAPPINESS cannot be securely attained.  We can be happy on Monday and miserable on Friday.  OH, even better, we can be happy Monday morning and miserable Monday night! I'm a monster with analogies so lets get into some.  

The pursuit of happiness is like chasing a kid that cannot sit still.  Or even cuter, a very hyper puppy.  We can catch it, but whenever its ready to move again it just darts out of our grip.  Even threatening it doesn't work all the times.  I remember my beautiful and wonderful friend Tisha once quoted something she heard, "Happiness depends on happenings, joy depends on God."  And as you can imagine, it rocked my world.  Because it does.  A lot of miserable people are miserable because of things that happened to them. And a lot of people are happy because happy things have happened to them. Natural response, I mean? Come on. You find $100 every two weeks, that's a reason to be happy.  You finally find a boyfriend that treats you right, that's a reason to be happy.  You are finally accepted by some friends, that's a reason to be happy right?  Like how I'm tossing this ball up in the air? Now let's crack that bat on it.  

What happens when your car breaks down and you HAVE to get it fixed, no money?  What happens when you lose ALL of your money?  What happens when that boyfriend dumps you? Cheats on you? What happens when those friends betray you? Stab you in your back? Sale you over for 30 pieces of silver? 
Hey, news flash to the newbies who doesn't know this, but LIFE HAPPENS!  Stuff happens. And if we're living off this happiness kick, then we're in for a rollercoaster way of life, a bumpy road in an old car, a jog through rough terrain.  

So, what's the other half of that quote?  But joy depends on God.  Now I can't leave you without introducing you to a beautiful part of my Father.  Joy.  I could end it right there, but I'll continue.  

Joy is obtainable.  Psalm 19:8 The precepts of the LORD are right, giving joy to the heart. Joy can be securely attained because God can be securely attained in our hearts.  He is the giver of that joy.  And it can be so internalized that NOTHING can touch it.  Paul wrote a lot of his letters when he was in prison.  And he was just this old chipper church planter in prison writing to all his friends about talking about Jesus and how thankful he was.  Paul was in touch with this thing called joy. He knew he lived for a higher purpose.  He had tasted a sweetness that the world can't offer us, that our happenings can't offer us.  He tasted God in a heavenly realm to where he was separated from this world enough so that his happenings couldn't effect what was securely attained in His heart.  HALLELUJAH!!!!! 

(I literally screamed that).

So with the security of joy, its becomes instead of a roller-coaster, but like Aladdin's magic carpet.  It becomes the Mercedes Benz with the great shock system, so those bumps on the road doesn't rattle you.  Or those $200 running shoes that you can't feel every rock that you step on.  Because there will be rocks, and there will be bumps, but what you're riding in determines the ride.  So, let's try the Pursuit of Happiness JOY.