Rejoice in the Lord! II

Dear friend, I am so glad to talk to you through „Daily Word for Spiritual Edification”.

Yesterday we spoke about the significance of joy and about the desire of God for us to serve Him with gladness and to come before His presence with joy.

  «Because you did not serve the Lord your God with joy and gladness of heart, for the abundance of everything, therefore you shall serve your enemies, whom the Lord  will send against you, in hunger, in thirst, in nakedness, and in need of everything; and He will put a yoke of iron on your neck until He has destroyed you» (Deuteronomy, 28:47-48).

This passage of Scripture also talks about God’s desire for us to serve him with joy and gladness. And right in this same passage we are told one of the bases for and one of the sources of our joy: a source of God’s joy in our hearts is the things He has done for us. Things that happen to us and around us must not determine whether we have joy or not! When we contemplate on the things that we do not have in our lives, the spirit of heaviness and depression starts to press us down. But when we meditate on the things that God has abundantly blessed us with, our hearts are saturated with joy.

Unfortunately, too often we do not think about the good things God has done for us and we also often forget to thank God for all those things that He has already given us; it is more natural for us to think and talk about the things we are still lacking, where we are failing miserably, and then sadness and sorrow come. But God says that if we won’t learn to appreciate what we already have, to rejoice about those things and enjoy them, a curse would come. The lack of joy brings a curse into a person’s life.

Dear friends, God once again delights to tell us to serve Him with gladness. Jesus once told His disciples:

 «Nevertheless do not rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you, but rather rejoice because your names are written in heaven» (Luke, 10:20).

If your name has been written in the Book of Life, if you are a child of God, then you are also a co-heir of Christ. And it is more than enough reason to motivate any of us to rejoice and thank God for every day of our lives.

May your every day be filled with the joy of the Lord!
Blessings to you!

Pastor Rufus Ajiboy