"...so glad you are happy...you both deserve it..."
The words on the wedding card started blankly back at me, as unsettling words tend to do.
I pondered what I had just written. Happy? Deserve? What do those words even mean?
I prayed that God would reveal to me why these words didn't sit well in my spirit.
God calls us to a life of weakness of the flesh, so He can fill in the gaps with His strength, that all might not see our own power, but the Christ in us. For His glory.
We are called to live in Him, to draw our every breath from Him. We are called to live in Him in entirety. Not in part.
We are called to serve, to love, to suffer.
Not to be happy.
To have joy, not a spirit of deservingness.
What do those words even mean? Are they Biblical?
I searched long and hard for answers.
A quick search of happy on Google revealed page after page of smiling yellow faces, and links to various dictionaries, thesauruses, and encyclopedias.
I don't just want the answers Wikipedia or Blue Letter Bible could give me.
No, my soul longed to be quenched by Devine revelation.
A quick search of happy on Google revealed page after page of smiling yellow faces, and links to various dictionaries, thesauruses, and encyclopedias.
I don't just want the answers Wikipedia or Blue Letter Bible could give me.
No, my soul longed to be quenched by Devine revelation.
There are many words that have been translated as 'happy' in the Scriptures. In a pure form, the word means joyous, joyful, blithe, cheerful, merry, contented, gay, blissful, satisfied. The word originated in the 1300's - which means that God did not put the word "happy" in the Bible. Man did.
That makes me feel a little better, but I wanted to go deeper still. So I pulled out the Strongs Concordance, and found that in the NIV, 'happy' occurs 20 times. In the ASV, it appears 24 times and in the KJV, it is used 25 times. Most of the versions use it in the same verses.
Now, I don't want to bore you with list after list after list of complied Holy Writ -although nothing would please me more, as that is how God usually talks to me: an all-out, page-turning, paper-cut-getting, whirlwind of Bible page-flipping. Seriously, it freaks me out - just ask Joan!
I just want to pose a question:
Are we every truly certain of the Biblical meaning of the words we choose to say (or write?) and do we truly mean them?
So as I drift off to a place of quietness, begging God to reveal more to me about this happy thing, my silent prayer is that you find the deeper meaning your soul is thirsty for, and that you allow God to move you.
Now, I don't want to bore you with list after list after list of complied Holy Writ -although nothing would please me more, as that is how God usually talks to me: an all-out, page-turning, paper-cut-getting, whirlwind of Bible page-flipping. Seriously, it freaks me out - just ask Joan!
I just want to pose a question:
Are we every truly certain of the Biblical meaning of the words we choose to say (or write?) and do we truly mean them?
So as I drift off to a place of quietness, begging God to reveal more to me about this happy thing, my silent prayer is that you find the deeper meaning your soul is thirsty for, and that you allow God to move you.
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