Full and Lasting Joy

1 John 1:4
“These things I write to you that your joy may be full.”

“As Christian people we have no right to be in a state of melancholy or unhappiness because the world is as it is. We are not to just resign ourselves to the world as it is in its state and condition. The Christian is not in the position of just making the best of a bad life.

Consider 1st Corinthians 13, that great chapter on the theme of love. Why did Paul write it? The answer is, he had to write the whole chapter because he could not tell us in a sentence what love was. Likewise, we shall have to say a number of things in an attempt to define what it meant by joy. The joy about which the New Testament speaks is never something direct and immediate. It is a state which is the result of the interactions of various forces and factors playing upon the soul.

Here are the elements of joy:

Firstly, a state of complete satisfaction. Next, a spirit of exultation. The third element, a feeling of power and of strength. The joy of the Lord is your strength. There is only one thing that can give true joy and that is a contemplation of the Lord Jesus Christ. Joy, in other words, is the response and reaction of the soul to a knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ.”