Speaker 1: Hey, this is Stephen Ferdick. I'm the pastor of Elevation
Speaker 1: Church and this is our podcast. I wanted to thank
Speaker 1: you for joining us today. Hope this inspires you. Hope
Speaker 1: it builds your faith. Hope it gives your perspective to
Speaker 1: see God is moving in your life. Enjoy the message. Look,
Speaker 1: I want to preach about joy today and I want
Speaker 1: to get there from a story and then share several
Speaker 1: scriptures with you can't tell your story. I just got
Speaker 1: a new car last year. I drove a Nissan Maxima
Speaker 1: for ten years before I bought this new car. I
Speaker 1: loved my Nissan Maxima. My car before this Nissan Maxima
Speaker 1: was a Nissan Maxima. That's how much I liked my
Speaker 1: Nissan Maxima. I maximized the Maxima and it was very
Speaker 1: good to me. Only thing that I ever remember happening,
Speaker 1: other than the time it cut off in an intersection,
Speaker 1: was that one day I was driving down the road
Speaker 1: a few years ago and my stereo system started doing
Speaker 1: strange things. It started skipping around to different tracks without
Speaker 1: me telling it too, and the volume kept increasing and decreasing,
Speaker 1: and so then I would put it back on the song.
Speaker 1: I wanted to listen to, and I would turn down
Speaker 1: the volume or turn up the volume, depending on it
Speaker 1: would go both ways without me telling it too, without
Speaker 1: me turning the knob, and it happened for about ten
Speaker 1: to fifteen minutes straight one day that I was driving,
Speaker 1: and it seemed like my speakers in my car had
Speaker 1: a mind of their own. So I thought maybe my
Speaker 1: Maxima got a demon, and then I looked in the
Speaker 1: backseat and realized it wasn't a demon. It was my
Speaker 1: daughter that she had the center console down and I
Speaker 1: never rode back there, so I didn't realize that all
Speaker 1: the years that I've had this car, you can control
Speaker 1: the volume and skip tracks from back there. And she
Speaker 1: was laughing, and Graham was back there and he was laughing,
Speaker 1: and they were controlling something from the back that I
Speaker 1: was trying to deal with in the front, and they
Speaker 1: thought it was so funny, and I told him stop
Speaker 1: that it's annoying. When I figured out what they were doing,
Speaker 1: two or three minutes later, there goes the volume up
Speaker 1: and down again. There goes track two, track three, track four. Again,
Speaker 1: it's on shuffle. And I turned around and said, I'm
Speaker 1: telling y'all stop, I don't like it. It was maybe
Speaker 1: cute the first time for you, but it's really driving
Speaker 1: me crazy up here. Stop and a few minutes go
Speaker 1: by and it starts happening again. I pulled the car
Speaker 1: over the third time. I pulled the car over the
Speaker 1: third time. I'm Providence Road. I said, let me explain
Speaker 1: something to you, I said, Passengers, in this maximum, I'm
Speaker 1: the driver. That means I'm the DJ. I get to
Speaker 1: choose what comes on this stereo and how loud it
Speaker 1: is because the driver gets to be the DJ. I
Speaker 1: want to preach to you for about thirty seven minutes
Speaker 1: today about back seat DJs, because I suspect that there
Speaker 1: are some things in your life that are being controlled
Speaker 1: from the back seat, that are being controlled at a
Speaker 1: level that you're not realizing that they're being controlled. And
Speaker 1: I believe that today God is going to use me
Speaker 1: and trust me. I've studied joy has become more important
Speaker 1: to me every year that I've been alive. I feel
Speaker 1: like in my twenties I just cared about accomplishing. In
Speaker 1: my thirties, I've been figuring out, what's the point if
Speaker 1: you don't enjoy it? What's the point in doing something
Speaker 1: awesome if you are not in a position to appreciate
Speaker 1: the accomplishment because you constantly need more. And I spent
Speaker 1: my twenties and maybe the beginning of my thirties just
Speaker 1: trying to get more, more, more. Sometimes that meant more popularity.
Speaker 1: Sometimes that meant more impact. Sometimes that meant more influenced.
Speaker 1: Sometimes that meant more money, more resources, more friends, more
Speaker 1: phone numbers, more connections. But lately I've been asking the
Speaker 1: Lord for more joy, and it sent me on a
Speaker 1: scriptural trajectory, and I want to bring you into it today.
Speaker 1: Would it be all right if we talked for a
Speaker 1: little while today about what's controlling your joy? Amen? I'm excited.
Speaker 1: Do you feel my enthusiasm? James? Chapter one, Verses two
Speaker 1: through four. We'll start here. I believe there are some
Speaker 1: things that are destroying your joy that you were unaware of,
Speaker 1: and James is going to teach us how to develop joy.
Speaker 1: Very different than discovering joy. Discovering joy means it's waiting
Speaker 1: somewhere and you got to find it. It's waiting in
Speaker 1: your next career move, it's waiting in your next relationship.
Speaker 1: It's waiting somewhere. You're not right now, But James is
Speaker 1: going to show us something that may be familiar to
Speaker 1: a few of you, but it is very strange if
Speaker 1: you consider what he's actually saying. And I'm going to
Speaker 1: just read those verses, those three verses to you, he says, James,
Speaker 1: Chapter one, verus to consider it pure joy, my brothers
Speaker 1: and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds. That's
Speaker 1: not where I was looking for joy. By the way,
Speaker 1: that's not what I was praying for, hoping for, asking for. Anyway,
Speaker 1: this is what the Bible says. He said, consider it
Speaker 1: pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials
Speaker 1: of many kinds. Because you know that the testing of
Speaker 1: your faith produces perseverance, Let perseverance finish its work so
Speaker 1: that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.
Speaker 1: I'm glad he's specified because the first thing I want
Speaker 1: to mention to you today, all of these points they
Speaker 1: kind of follow the theme of DJ. So the first
Speaker 1: one is the distinction of joy, the distinction of joy
Speaker 1: knowing what it really is, understanding the nature of it.
Speaker 1: And James helps us to do that first bite, helping
Speaker 1: us to understand that there are trials of many kinds.
Speaker 1: That's what verse two said the old King James Pastor
Speaker 1: Mickey preached from said divers trials because I have learned
Speaker 1: that we're not all going through the same thing, but
Speaker 1: we are all going through something. And how many know
Speaker 1: that there are as many different kinds of trials as
Speaker 1: there are different drinks at Starbucks, as there are different
Speaker 1: colors of paint at home depot. I found out that
Speaker 1: there are trials that are associated with plenty. There are
Speaker 1: trials that are associated with poverty. I always understood the
Speaker 1: first one because everybody understands that being broke is a battle.
Speaker 1: But management of resources can, in its own way, test
Speaker 1: a part of your character that if you're not prepared
Speaker 1: to have it tested, it can create a lot more
Speaker 1: problems than financial poverty. In fact, financial riches can create
Speaker 1: relational poverty if there is not the emotional maturity to
Speaker 1: help us to steward with understanding what we've been given.
Speaker 1: I'm appreached today. If y'all come along with you, it's truly.
Speaker 1: There's single people trials, there's married people trials. There are
Speaker 1: trials that are associated with loneliness, and there are trials
Speaker 1: that are associated with companionship. There are many kinds of trials.
Speaker 1: There are many different That's what James is saying. He's
Speaker 1: making a distinction, that there's different kinds of trials, And
Speaker 1: some of us are like, well, can I try a
Speaker 1: different kind of trial? Like can I trade trials? Like
Speaker 1: you're talking about rich people trials, I'd like to try
Speaker 1: those for a little while you're talking about married people trials.
Speaker 1: I'd like to try. I think I'd be good at
Speaker 1: those trials. I think I'd be better prepared for those trials.
Speaker 1: But we never again, after the year that we had
Speaker 1: last year, get to associate joy with status or success,
Speaker 1: because we have now seen it. No matter or how
Speaker 1: great your name is in the eyes of people, you
Speaker 1: can still want to take your very own life because
Speaker 1: joy is not a product of what people say about you.
Speaker 1: Joy is not a product of how people hold you
Speaker 1: in esteem or in disregard. And so there's different kinds
Speaker 1: of trials. Added to that, most of us don't understand
Speaker 1: the distinction between a temptation and a trial. The language
Speaker 1: that James uses in this biblical writing, the common Greek
Speaker 1: of his day, allows for both. When he says trials
Speaker 1: of many kinds, he could just as easily be referring
Speaker 1: to economic hardship or persecution that many of this diaspora
Speaker 1: of tribes scattered abroad who were believers in Jesus were experiencing,
Speaker 1: or he could be talking about temptation. And it is
Speaker 1: important to know the distinction between the kind of trials
Speaker 1: that you will experience in your life, Otherwise you might
Speaker 1: spend years blaming the devil for your bad decisions. There
Speaker 1: are different kinds of trials. Some of our trials are
Speaker 1: the result of evil in the world, and that results
Speaker 1: in all kinds of different warfare that we could study
Speaker 1: for weeks about. Some of our trials are the results
Speaker 1: of things that we did contrary to our inner wisdom.
Speaker 1: There are many different kinds of trials, and if you
Speaker 1: don't know the difference between a temptation and a trial,
Speaker 1: you will try to use the wrong tool on the trial.
Speaker 1: Because when tempted, the Bible teaches resistance. When you are
Speaker 1: tempted to step outside of the God given means by
Speaker 1: which you've been empowered to meet your God given desires,
Speaker 1: the strategy, the tool, the technique is resistance. When you
Speaker 1: face a trial, however, not a temptation, but a trial,
Speaker 1: often the key is not resistance but acceptance. And this
Speaker 1: was important for me to see the distinction because a
Speaker 1: lot of times I'm accepting what I should resist and
Speaker 1: resisting what I should accept. It is taking me time
Speaker 1: to learn the difference, is taking me prayer to learn
Speaker 1: the difference. It's taking the other's community to learn the difference.
Speaker 1: I'm having to get into the Word of God to
Speaker 1: know the difference so that I can approach my trials
Speaker 1: with wisdom. In fact, that's what James one to five says,
Speaker 1: and it's connected to this passage, even though I never
Speaker 1: thought it was. It says, if any of you lacks wisdom,
Speaker 1: you should ask God, who gives generously to all without
Speaker 1: finding fault, and it will be given to you. Now,
Speaker 1: if you want to flip the flow this year, just
Speaker 1: to James one to five. Instead of asking everybody around
Speaker 1: you what you should do, start with the source, Start
Speaker 1: with the solution. We're talking about your problems with people
Speaker 1: who are powerless to fix them. It's making you feel worse,
Speaker 1: it's making them feel worse, and everybody's frustrated. So I
Speaker 1: need the wisdom to make the distinction, to know the
Speaker 1: trial that I'm in. God is this one that you
Speaker 1: want me to fight or do you want me to
Speaker 1: do what the Parables said to do one time with
Speaker 1: the weeds that were growing up alongside the terars, and
Speaker 1: leave it alone and let you deal with it. There's
Speaker 1: a distinction. There's different kinds of trials. Some of the
Speaker 1: stuff that I'm dealing with as a parent right now
Speaker 1: is just called puberty. You can't cast it out, you
Speaker 1: can't annoy it, you can't instruct it. It's a different
Speaker 1: kind of trial. It's just life. Some of the stuff
Speaker 1: I'm dealing with right now is a temptation. Some of
Speaker 1: it is, actually, I believe, from the pit of hell.
Speaker 1: Not that the devil is like personally a sign to me,
Speaker 1: but just some stuff is evil against my purpose. And
Speaker 1: don't give yourself too much credit, because a lot of
Speaker 1: us like to think that the devil had nothing better
Speaker 1: to do than give us, you know, a flat tire,
Speaker 1: and I think the devil is much busier than that.
Speaker 1: I think a lot of it comes down to distinguishing
Speaker 1: the type of trial that I'm in, which helps me
Speaker 1: to understand the distinctions between joy and pleasure. Oh, you
Speaker 1: know those little church signs that they do. I think
Speaker 1: we should get one. By the way, at elevation the
Speaker 1: church signs where they change the letters and they put
Speaker 1: up the little quotes. Yeah, I like this. I think
Speaker 1: we should get one. How many vote we get a
Speaker 1: church signed. Let's have our first ever church voted elevation
Speaker 1: church vote. We should get a church sign and we
Speaker 1: could put stuff up there like this. I saw this
Speaker 1: one day. It said no Jesus, no Joy, but it
Speaker 1: was felt k n ow Jesus. So the first one
Speaker 1: was no Jesus, you don't have Jesus, you don't have joy.
Speaker 1: K and oh Jesus, k and ow Jesus, kN ow joy.
Speaker 1: And I thought it's cute, but it's it's not true.
Speaker 1: No Jesus, no joy. There's a lot of things you
Speaker 1: can enjoy without Jesus. Christy Kreme tastes good whether you're
Speaker 1: saved or not. My taste bloods didn't get saved. It's
Speaker 1: fun to talk bad about people whether you're saved or not.
Speaker 1: Only differences. And this is important is that the quality
Speaker 1: of the joy becomes more important than the quantity of
Speaker 1: the joy. You also hear preachers say stuff like this,
Speaker 1: God doesn't care if you're happy. He just wants to
Speaker 1: make you holy. And I can't believe how many people
Speaker 1: will say amen to some business like that that you
Speaker 1: would never feel about your own kid. How many parents
Speaker 1: do we have in the house, and how many of
Speaker 1: you don't care if your kid is ever happy in
Speaker 1: life at all. I'm gonna call child Protective Services on y'all.
Speaker 1: I ain't no good good father. No, he's a good father,
Speaker 1: good gift. So I never got that. And I never
Speaker 1: really understood the distinction between joy and happiness, because like,
Speaker 1: there's not a difference in the Biblical language. It's not
Speaker 1: difference like in English we have like phar real happy,
Speaker 1: which is like dancing happy, and then in Hebrew they
Speaker 1: had happy. It's the same word, it's blessed. It's the
Speaker 1: same word as joy. When James says counted joy, he
Speaker 1: means consider yourself supremely happy literal translation. So we need
Speaker 1: to make the distinction, I guess between generic joy and
Speaker 1: Jesus joy because he said verse two, consider it pure joy.
Speaker 1: The way my mind works, if there's such a thing
Speaker 1: as pure joy, there must be another kind of joy.
Speaker 1: I kind of cheated that a little bit. It's more
Speaker 1: a grammar issue because the literal translation is count at
Speaker 1: all joy, so he doesn't say pure joy. I got
Speaker 1: a verse for this, though, Let me do it from
Speaker 1: a Let me do it from Hebrews chapter twelve. I've
Speaker 1: always loved this picture of joy because it helps me
Speaker 1: to make a distinction between joy and pleasure. Okay, pleasure
Speaker 1: can be associated with joy, but joy is not dependent
Speaker 1: on pleasure. This is the second thing I want to
Speaker 1: talk about. I want to talk about the direction of joy.
Speaker 1: The direction of joy. We're talking about backseat DJs, right,
Speaker 1: We're talking about how sometimes we find our joy controlled
Speaker 1: by circumstances and situations. But Jesus gives us a picture
Speaker 1: that stands contrary to the cultural expectation of joy. And
Speaker 1: I promise I'll read the scripture in a minute. But
Speaker 1: I just want to tell you so much and don't
Speaker 1: know where to start, where to stop. It's just it's
Speaker 1: all in me today. There seems to be right now
Speaker 1: more than there was like when my grandparents. We're thirty
Speaker 1: and forty, there seems to be a pressure for us
Speaker 1: to always feel pleasure. It's no longer just a desire
Speaker 1: that we have that we want to feel good. It's
Speaker 1: almost like the way that social media has constructed our
Speaker 1: viewing experiences of other people's lives through the filters of
Speaker 1: their most desirable moments. There is something wrong with me
Speaker 1: If I am not constantly happy all the time. That's
Speaker 1: a problem with me because I am not genetically predisposed
Speaker 1: to be happy. I'm just not. I've found that out
Speaker 1: about myself early in life. I am not like one
Speaker 1: of you who just finds reasons to smell roses, who
Speaker 1: just finds reasons to be happy. Some of y'all appreciate
Speaker 1: the rain, appreciate the sunshine. The rain makes you feel relaxed.
Speaker 1: The sunshine makes you feel active. You can find the
Speaker 1: joy in everything. I am not of your species, and
Speaker 1: frankly you make me sick. But joy is something different,
Speaker 1: because the pressure to feel pleasure is part of the
Speaker 1: reason why we feel so miserable. And now we are
Speaker 1: living in the midst of a generation that thinks that
Speaker 1: joy is associated with a feeling in your flesh. And
Speaker 1: it can be, but it doesn't have to be. It's
Speaker 1: important that I say it can bring a feeling, but
Speaker 1: it doesn't start with the feeling. This is where we
Speaker 1: flip the flow. Can we flip the flow if anybody
Speaker 1: flipped the flow, it was Jesus. Here he is up
Speaker 1: on a cross. Here he is mocked, and his reputation
Speaker 1: is beyond repair. Here he is being spat on and
Speaker 1: condescended to by the ones that he created. And the
Speaker 1: writer of Hebrews, whoever he was, says, we need to
Speaker 1: fix Hebrews twelve to two. Our eyes on Jesus, the
Speaker 1: pioneer and perfector, or the author and finisher. Either translation
Speaker 1: is acceptable of our faith. H for the joy set
Speaker 1: before him, he endured the cross. Now this is where
Speaker 1: my message really happens. Okay, what have you set before you?
Speaker 1: That is what your joy is connected to what you
Speaker 1: have set before you. And I'll break that down the
Speaker 1: best that I can. Joy is a point of view.
Speaker 1: Joy is a way of looking at things. This helps me.
Speaker 1: I don't know about you, but it sets me free
Speaker 1: from feeling the need to feel a certain way. We
Speaker 1: got so many people quitting their jobs because they're unhappy
Speaker 1: and not really understanding that sometimes joy is not the
Speaker 1: absence of sadness or the presence of the spectacular. And
Speaker 1: all we need to look at is that one verse
Speaker 1: where it says that Jesus for the joy that was
Speaker 1: set before him. I want to use that as a
Speaker 1: picture for a moment. He set joy before him, so
Speaker 1: in order to endure the cross, that's the next part,
Speaker 1: enduring the cross scorning as Shane, he didn't find joy
Speaker 1: in the event. He found joy in the guaranteed outcome
Speaker 1: of the event. He did not find joy in the
Speaker 1: feeling of hanging on the cross. It wasn't like because
Speaker 1: he was the son of God that the nails, you know,
Speaker 1: transcended the laws of pain and the material laws of
Speaker 1: the universe. It was just as painful, but because of purpose.
Speaker 1: You understand, it's very different to go through pain with
Speaker 1: purpose than pain without purpose. It's the difference between Graham
Speaker 1: jumping on my back he's only ninety pounds and me
Speaker 1: not knowing that he's gonna jump on my back and
Speaker 1: me feeling like every disc just slipped like I'm seventy
Speaker 1: three years old in my lower back. And the difference
Speaker 1: between me putting ninety pounds on the bar to squat it.
Speaker 1: If I do it on purpose, it's a warm up weight.
Speaker 1: If I don't expect it, it might take me down
Speaker 1: to the ground. Same weight. But what I was ready
Speaker 1: for when Jesus hung on the cross. He wasn't surprised
Speaker 1: by the shame. He wasn't surprised by the suffering. He
Speaker 1: wasn't surprised by the pain. He wasn't surprised by the jeering.
Speaker 1: He wasn't surprised by their saliva. He wasn't surprised by
Speaker 1: the blood. Joy is a focus before it's a feeling.
Speaker 1: If you came to church just to hear that, I
Speaker 1: promise you got your gas money's worth. Joy is a
Speaker 1: focus before it's a feeling. And so while we're chasing
Speaker 1: a feeling called joy, God has given us the ability
Speaker 1: to choose not our feelings. You ever tried to choose joy?
Speaker 1: I saw it on Pinterest. I tried it. It sucked,
Speaker 1: it didn't work. Then I felt guilty because I couldn't
Speaker 1: find joy, and it made me feel less joy. So
Speaker 1: now I'm in a joyless pit of joylessness. It is
Speaker 1: cyclical joylessness and shame is the difference between choice and consequence.
Speaker 1: Joy is a choice, really because some of the trials
Speaker 1: that people go through are actual mental illness, and it's
Speaker 1: kind of hard for them to just feel happy because
Speaker 1: they got a good parking space and no matter how
Speaker 1: much you tell them to feel happy, be happy, you know,
Speaker 1: be happy, feel happy, counter blessings. James doesn't say counter blessings.
Speaker 1: This is in a nursery rhyme. It's a Bible scripture.
Speaker 1: He said, count it all joy. He said, learn how
Speaker 1: to flip. You might not know this statement, but there's
Speaker 1: a there's a statement in financial terms, it's an income statements.
Speaker 1: It's got your your income on one side, your expenses
Speaker 1: on another. James says, if you can learn to put
Speaker 1: some of the stuff in the income column that you
Speaker 1: thought was an expense, some of the stuff in the
Speaker 1: blessing column that you thought was a burden. If you
Speaker 1: can flip the flow, you actually have more joy than
Speaker 1: you're aware of. But you're not gonna get it by
Speaker 1: praying for a feeling. You're going to get it by
Speaker 1: making choices. Joy is not a choice. In fact, the
Speaker 1: worst way that I can get more joy is to
Speaker 1: focus on getting more joy. The best way to st
Speaker 1: being happy is to ask yourself the question am I happy?
Speaker 1: And see? I don't remember my grandparents ever talking about this.
Speaker 1: If they did, I don't remember it. I never remember
Speaker 1: my grandmother my grandfather talking about are we really happy.
Speaker 1: They didn't think like that. There wasn't feeds and scrolling.
Speaker 1: There wasn't. There wasn't all this other stuff to make
Speaker 1: them feel unhappy at a moment's notice. There wasn't. There
Speaker 1: wasn't an infinite supply of unhappiness in their pocket in
Speaker 1: the form of a device. They didn't have that, So
Speaker 1: they focused on something else. What was it? What is
Speaker 1: it that brings joy? If I focus on it, I
Speaker 1: know it is not. It's not looking around, how are
Speaker 1: they doing? What do they think? Where'd they go on vacation?
Speaker 1: Where's your thinking? Where's he going on? What's she wearing
Speaker 1: when she is? What do they think about me? That's
Speaker 1: not gonna do it, he said for the joy set
Speaker 1: before him. So I can't be looking all around and
Speaker 1: expecting to have joy. I can't be judging my situation
Speaker 1: according to other people's calling and expect to have joy.
Speaker 1: I can't be judging my gift compared to other people's
Speaker 1: talent and expect to have joy. I know is so
Speaker 1: cliche because we say it every week, but nothing destroys
Speaker 1: joy like comparison. The life you've got some of you
Speaker 1: would be so enjoyable if only you didn't do this
Speaker 1: while you were living it. If only you didn't do this.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's hurting my neck just to do it.
Speaker 1: To illustrate to you, imagine what is doing to your soul.
Speaker 1: You can't have joy that way. It is destroying your joy.
Speaker 1: You're praying for more joy, and yet you are destroying
Speaker 1: the joy God has given you, the joy of your salvation,
Speaker 1: the joy of your calling, the joy of your assignment.
Speaker 1: God give me more joy. Well, it's a decision not
Speaker 1: to have joy. That's the worst way to get joy,
Speaker 1: the decision of what I'm going to focus on. And
Speaker 1: I can't get it like this. And I definitely can't
Speaker 1: get it like this looking at what's behind me. I
Speaker 1: can't look back. Remember when God called Moses at the
Speaker 1: burning bush and he said his name, he said, I
Speaker 1: am not I was. Remember he said, I am not,
Speaker 1: I will be. There's something to that. There's something to that.
Speaker 1: It's echoed by David in Psalm sixteen. He says, in
Speaker 1: your presence is the fullness of joy. Presence. Everybody say
Speaker 1: that word presence. The gift of joy is found in presence,
Speaker 1: But that doesn't mean in church. That's not what it
Speaker 1: means to say, in God's presence is the fullness of joy,
Speaker 1: because God would never limit his presence to a building.
Speaker 1: It doesn't mean when you're doing everything right, then you're
Speaker 1: gonna feel happy, because God is not going to reward
Speaker 1: you based on behavior. That's not the good news of
Speaker 1: the Gospel. The Gospel is for sinners. The Gospel is
Speaker 1: for the weak. The Gospel is for the lame, The
Speaker 1: gospel is for the broken, The Gospel is for those
Speaker 1: who feel ashamed. That's not what it means. In your
Speaker 1: presence is fullness of joy. That means joy can only
Speaker 1: really come to my life when I am focused on
Speaker 1: what God is doing in this moment. And I cannot
Speaker 1: focus on what God is doing in this moment in
Speaker 1: my life if I'm consumed with what He's doing in
Speaker 1: somebody else's or if I'm still in regret and bitterness
Speaker 1: about what happened three years ago, or three months ago,
Speaker 1: or even three minutes ago. A lot of our lack
Speaker 1: of joy is really not about possession. It's about position.
Speaker 1: What I mean is this, He set joy before him.
Speaker 1: It's not a question of God's presence. His presence is everywhere.
Speaker 1: It's not a question of God's presence. You don't have
Speaker 1: to ask him to be with you. He already is.
Speaker 1: It's not about God's presence, It's about yours. Are you
Speaker 1: present in this moment? Are you present in this trial?
Speaker 1: Are you present in this worship service? Well, if you
Speaker 1: are giving praise for a second, we need this lesson friends, family, brothers, sisters, brethren, sister,
Speaker 1: and mother's, father's children. We can't go to a concert
Speaker 1: anymore without trying to capture it, and I can't enjoy
Speaker 1: it because I'm too busy trying to post it. Kids
Speaker 1: do something cute? Capture it? Well, you can't, but you're
Speaker 1: also gonna kill it. There is no quicker way to
Speaker 1: kill your kid's cuteness than trying to capture it. I
Speaker 1: swear demons come out when you start trying to capture
Speaker 1: stuff to post it. God knows your heart and he
Speaker 1: sends something to your iPhone I don't know, and it
Speaker 1: shoots beams into your children and they start. Can I
Speaker 1: show you a picture real quick. I don't like to
Speaker 1: be too indulgent in these sermons, but show my family off.
Speaker 1: But this is just a quick picture of us on
Speaker 1: vacation before Christmas. Look at that here's another picture. I'll
Speaker 1: show you a couple just so you can see. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna tell you something that you wouldn't see if I
Speaker 1: put those on Instagram. Go back to the first one again. Please,
Speaker 1: that one looks happy, right, and go to the other one.
Speaker 1: Can go to the other one. That one looks sad.
Speaker 1: Let me take something that's not my sad face. M hm.
Speaker 1: That's my RBF. That's my resting Bible face. That's my
Speaker 1: really blessed face. That's my focus face. That's when I
Speaker 1: was getting the sermon flip the flow at TGI Friday's
Speaker 1: in the Miami International Airport in the d concourse. I'm
Speaker 1: happy the other one put the other one out. I
Speaker 1: was so mad at Abby. That was the seventeenth time
Speaker 1: I've tried to take a selfie of us, and I
Speaker 1: wanted to throw her in the ocean by the time
Speaker 1: it was over. Not in a playful way. Let's see.
Speaker 1: I'm just trying to get us in this series to
Speaker 1: start take it down, start looking beneath the surface and stuff,
Speaker 1: to stop looking at the surface of stuff, and to stop,
Speaker 1: you know, discerning. I found out that you can miss
Speaker 1: joy because you're looking all around you can misjoy because
Speaker 1: you're looking behind you. But here's the thing, you can
Speaker 1: also miss joy because you're trying to look too far ahead.
Speaker 1: It's an equal danger. And some of you, while I
Speaker 1: was preaching the part about looking around, you're like, nah,
Speaker 1: I'm good, bro, I'm like fifty three. I don't do
Speaker 1: that anymore. And when I was telling my looking back,
Speaker 1: you're like, yeah, I already dealt with my stuff back there.
Speaker 1: It's fine. But what you do is you look so
Speaker 1: far forward like I was doing the other day driving
Speaker 1: that new car I told you about, and I can't
Speaker 1: get anywhere without a GPS. What it embarrass you for me?
Speaker 1: If I told you I was going to my mom's
Speaker 1: house in town and was following the GPS, that's how
Speaker 1: bad my son of direction is. This true story. And
Speaker 1: I slammed into the back of another car because I
Speaker 1: was looking three turns ahead and not looking three feet ahead.
Speaker 1: And it might be destroying your joy. Not that you're
Speaker 1: like comparing, or not that you're regretting, but maybe you're
Speaker 1: just trying to get so far out there, you know,
Speaker 1: like my retirement is down, you're twenty four, it'll catch
Speaker 1: back up. It's a lot of time, you know, But
Speaker 1: for those of us who need to plan, he didn't
Speaker 1: say in your plans this fullness of joy. And you
Speaker 1: can't even really affect the future from anywhere but the present,
Speaker 1: and it's alwayted energy. So this is my year of presence,
Speaker 1: trying to figure out what it means to find fullness
Speaker 1: of joy in God's presence. And in order to find
Speaker 1: fullness of joy in his presence, I have to bring
Speaker 1: my presence to my real life, not my presence to
Speaker 1: some imaginary scenario, but the real life that God has
Speaker 1: given me right now. And you know what's great about it.
Speaker 1: Let's go to Psalm sixteen for just a moment, and
Speaker 1: I promise I'll start closing this. Are you enjoying this
Speaker 1: teaching today? Is this blessing your life? Touch somebody and
Speaker 1: say this is my happy face? Because I was focused.
Speaker 1: I was happy because I was focused. The other one,
Speaker 1: I was trying to show something to the world that
Speaker 1: wasn't real. I was thinking maybe I could get some
Speaker 1: likes on this, and so I wasn't focused on what
Speaker 1: was right in front of me. But Jesus, for the
Speaker 1: joy set before him, endured. He didn't enjoy the cross
Speaker 1: us he endured the cross because of joy set before him.
Speaker 1: And now I want to give you the whole sermon. Okay,
Speaker 1: here's the sermon in a sentence. Hadn't you been preaching
Speaker 1: for thirty five minutes? Yeah, but I hadn't said anything yet.
Speaker 1: Here's the sermon in a sentence. You cannot choose joy.
Speaker 1: You can only choose your priorities, and your priorities control
Speaker 1: your joy. You can't choose joy anymore than you can
Speaker 1: just you think you can choose joy. It's like trying
Speaker 1: to choose the weather. What you can choose is your priority,
Speaker 1: and your priorities will ultimately control your joy. Psalm sixteen.
Speaker 1: Put it on the screen for me verse when I
Speaker 1: started verse five, Please, the Lord is my chosen portion.
Speaker 1: See the word chosen. It means I have decided to
Speaker 1: make God the most important thing in my life. I
Speaker 1: don't want to leave that to abstract because what does
Speaker 1: that mean? Read the Bible first thing every morning? Maybe,
Speaker 1: but it means more than that His will is what
Speaker 1: I want. His ways are higher than my waves. So
Speaker 1: the Lord Yahweh, the Great, I am the ever present
Speaker 1: help in time of trouble. He is my chosen portion.
Speaker 1: I've looked at everything else that this world offers me
Speaker 1: to enjoy, and yes, I can enjoy things that aren't
Speaker 1: necessarily spiritual, but I do not need them to survive.
Speaker 1: And I will not attach my joy to a temporal
Speaker 1: pleasure anymore because I tried that. I tried that. I
Speaker 1: cheered for the Clemson Tigers when they were three and eight,
Speaker 1: and when they won the second national championship in the
Speaker 1: last few years, people were coming up to me saying congratulations.
Speaker 1: I was like, for what, I enjoyed the game. I
Speaker 1: watched the game. I mean I liked it. I enjoyed
Speaker 1: the forty four to sixteen victory. But I didn't need
Speaker 1: college boys in Spandex to give me a reason to live.
Speaker 1: That is not my priority. I can't invest my joy
Speaker 1: in what people I don't know do with an oblong
Speaker 1: object made out of pigskin converted into leather with some
Speaker 1: stitches for four fifteen minute increments, It's the wrong priority.
Speaker 1: I enjoyed it, but my joy is not in it.
Speaker 1: Last week, I told you something very powerful about your heart.
Speaker 1: I said, when you know where it comes from, you
Speaker 1: know how it comes out. When you know where it
Speaker 1: comes from, you know how it comes out. This is
Speaker 1: what I want to tell you this week. Where it
Speaker 1: comes from determines when it runs out. This is the
Speaker 1: source of your joy. The way you can know that
Speaker 1: is what are my priorities. Psalma said, The Lord is
Speaker 1: my chosen portion. And here's something Jesus said that I've
Speaker 1: been thinking about all week. I've been meditating on this.
Speaker 1: He said, Abide in me my words. Abide in you.
Speaker 1: You bear much fruit. Sometimes you're going to get cut on,
Speaker 1: but you'll never be cut off. If you abide in
Speaker 1: me and my words, abide in you, there will be
Speaker 1: a constant flow of joy. Like the vine and the branches.
Speaker 1: You're going to have what you need. The joy is
Speaker 1: going to flow from a place of your rest and
Speaker 1: trust in me, not in your own effort, and not
Speaker 1: in just certain things that happen. If they happen, is fine,
Speaker 1: But don't confuse the icon with the cake. Abide in
Speaker 1: me my words, Abide in you. Many says something in
Speaker 1: John fifteen eleven. Please I have told you this so
Speaker 1: that my joy may be in you, and that your
Speaker 1: joy may be complete. The Lord said, a lot of
Speaker 1: us are settling for partial joy, partial joy, and we
Speaker 1: equate joy with the absence of sadness. Joy is not
Speaker 1: the absence of sadness. If it was, Jesus couldn't have
Speaker 1: had it on the cross. He said, I want my
Speaker 1: joy to be in you, but you've got to own
Speaker 1: it because to just say, well, Jesus is my joy,
Speaker 1: it doesn't really get to the heart of why we
Speaker 1: could know Jesus and still not no joy, because it's
Speaker 1: a decision. When I give the wrong things too much
Speaker 1: priority in my life, then those priorities control my joy.
Speaker 1: If my priority is recognition, then RECOGNI mission controls my joy.
Speaker 1: When people recognize me, I will feel happy about it.
Speaker 1: If my priority is recognition. If my priority is convenience,
Speaker 1: then when something is inconvenient, the inconvenience will steal my joy.
Speaker 1: But it really didn't steal my joy, did it? Because
Speaker 1: I let it drive and whatever is driving the car
Speaker 1: gets to DJ. So the Lord told me in preparing
Speaker 1: this message that we've got some back seat DJs that
Speaker 1: have been controlling our joy, our feelings, our finances, our
Speaker 1: bank accounts, our status, our standing, our situations. And today
Speaker 1: God wants you to tell some of the things in
Speaker 1: your life that have been controlling your joy from the
Speaker 1: back seat. You are not my God, you are not
Speaker 1: my vine, you are not my source, and you don't
Speaker 1: hold my joy. Joy is something deeper than how I
Speaker 1: feel about it. Joy is something deeper than what I
Speaker 1: post about. Joy is something deeper than the way it
Speaker 1: feels right now, I am setting joy before me. I'm
Speaker 1: resetting my warnings. Now. When I do that, my joy
Speaker 1: flows not from what it is, but from who God is.
Speaker 1: To me. This is the duration of joy. And when
Speaker 1: my joy is running out, give me my point, my
Speaker 1: last point. The duration of joy is because it's coming
Speaker 1: from the wrong place. Where it comes from determines when
Speaker 1: it runs out. And I wonder, where's your joy today.
Speaker 1: I had to study this hard because I struggle to
Speaker 1: enjoy my life. I really love my family, I really
Speaker 1: love my church. I love what I get to do.
Speaker 1: It's a blessing and a privilege. But I have to
Speaker 1: admit to you that sometimes I have been guilty of
Speaker 1: enduring something that God has given me to enjoy, and
Speaker 1: every time it happened, it was because of my priorities.
Speaker 1: Your priorities control your joy. You can try all you
Speaker 1: want to be happy, happy, happy, and the quick hit stuff,
Speaker 1: the quick fixed stuff. It'll get you through the next
Speaker 1: few hours, but where it comes from determines when it
Speaker 1: runs out. There is a well that never runs dry.
Speaker 1: There is a joy. There is a deep, abiding sense
Speaker 1: of joy that is available to us that we have
Speaker 1: not been accessing. And what we're praying for more of
Speaker 1: God is waiting for us to order our lives around.
Speaker 1: My joy is too important for me to leave it
Speaker 1: up to whether or not today goes well, or whether
Speaker 1: or not they speak to me, or whether or not
Speaker 1: it turns out well. Is too important. I can't afford.
Speaker 1: I'm getting older now. I'm not a twenty five year
Speaker 1: old anymore. I'm a distinguished thirty eight year old full
Speaker 1: of wisdom, and I can't afford to just give my
Speaker 1: joy away just any time. I can't afford to have
Speaker 1: these back seat DJs just change in the temperature of
Speaker 1: my life. I can't. I can't afford to just let
Speaker 1: my emotions control my joy. So I want to pray
Speaker 1: for people today. Play something more interesting, that's boring. I
Speaker 1: want to pray for people today is just one chord.
Speaker 1: Pray for people today who have allowed your joy to
Speaker 1: be controlled by something other than the priority of God's
Speaker 1: presence in your life, and you want me to pray
Speaker 1: for you to experience a vital connection to God in
Speaker 1: the coming six days until we meet again. Please stand
Speaker 1: if you want me to pray for you about that.
Speaker 1: I've been allowing my joy to be connected to things
Speaker 1: that can't sustain me. There's so much more that I
Speaker 1: wanted to share with you, but I feel like I
Speaker 1: was able to present this word to you on a
Speaker 1: level that if you can just receive that much of it,
Speaker 1: So flip it instead of going, Lord, I need more joy,
Speaker 1: like it's gonna come raining down in the form of
Speaker 1: candy pellets. Instead of praying, God, give me the wisdom
Speaker 1: to when things come in my life to count it joy,
Speaker 1: to consider it joy because I know that the testing
Speaker 1: of my faith produces patience. Teach me God to set
Speaker 1: joy before me like Jesus did, like the Psalmist did.
Speaker 1: He said, the Lord is ever before me. He is
Speaker 1: on my right hand. I will not be shaken in
Speaker 1: your presence. Is the fullness of joy. And watch this
Speaker 1: at your right hand, pleasures forevermore, not the kind to
Speaker 1: come and go, not the kind that leave you feeling
Speaker 1: worse afterwards. Not the kind that leave you sick afterwards,
Speaker 1: not the kind that make you feel bad about it,
Speaker 1: shameful about it afterwards, perpetual pleasantness in the presence of God, Father.
Speaker 1: I thank you for each person who you brought here today.
Speaker 1: Maybe they've been in that season of mourning you are in.
Speaker 1: I in mourning. Thank you that your word says that
Speaker 1: weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes with
Speaker 1: the morning. And we bless you because what that means
Speaker 1: to us today is that in everything that is happening
Speaker 1: in our life right now, there is an opportunity for joy.
Speaker 1: I confess to you before these people, God that I
Speaker 1: need this message more than anybody who heard it. I'm
Speaker 1: preaching this today God because sometimes in my life I
Speaker 1: have set things before me that had no place being
Speaker 1: my priority, and every time I did, I was disappointed.
Speaker 1: And every time I did, I got a hit, but
Speaker 1: it didn't fix anything. So this week, would you show
Speaker 1: us what's truly important. Would you help us to see
Speaker 1: our lives with the wisdom that only you provide. Help
Speaker 1: us to understand that joy does not come from better circumstances.
Speaker 1: Joy does not come from human acclaim. Joy comes from
Speaker 1: ordered priorities. We want to seek first your kingdom. We
Speaker 1: want to know what matters to you, and we thank
Speaker 1: you for it in Jesus' name. Amen. Well, I hope
Speaker 1: you enjoyed the podcast today. If you did, there are
Speaker 1: just a couple things I'd love for you to do.
Speaker 1: Number One, subscribe to our show. That way, the most
Speaker 1: recent episode will always be in your feed, waiting for you,
Speaker 1: ready when you are. And Secondly, if this ministry has
Speaker 1: impacted you and you'd like to help us continue to
Speaker 1: reach others, you can click the link in the description
Speaker 1: and you can give now and I'll see you next
Speaker 1: time on the Elevation Podcast