100% Happy. 100% Sad.

Something that our host here is Romanian casually said when we got here has stuck with me for a while now. When asked how he was doing that day, he replied with his typical response: “I am 100% happy and 100% sad.”
His words hit me. I loved that response.

He continued with a basic explanation: “How can I be happy when half of our group is unjustly stuck in a quarantine and isn’t allowed to leave the house? How can I be sad when half of us are getting to be out on the streets every day telling people about the good news of Jesus?”

I was struck by the simplicity and also the profound validity of his statements. What he had just explained was a brief summation of what it looks like to live a life on earth.

Nothing will be whole or complete until we are in Heaven. At the same time we get direct access to Holy Spirit in our minds and our bodies on earth and we have direct access to God and Jesus. We have full access to tap into the wholeness and completeness and goodness of the Father. At the same time, we live on earth where death, sadness, and incomplete things are a trademark.

100% happy. 100% sad.

“They will perish, but you remain; they will all wear out like a garment. You will roll them up like a robe; like a garment they will be changed. But you remain the same, and your years will never end.” -Hebrews 1:11-12

How do we live in the tension of consistency with the Father and yet inconsistency in regards to everything else on earth? I’ve sat in this tension a lot. Truthfully, it can be hard to look at earth and not long for heaven.

I think we are supposed to long for heaven, and at the same time long for the people of the earth to know the promise of goodness, wholeness, and consistency in the character of the Father that we know ourselves. What better reason to get out of bed every morning than the hope of sharing the Truth of the gospel.

For me this week, this very tension has me diving into the concept of joy, and how it relates to being a human being on the earth with a spiritual being living inside of me.

When I looked up the biblical definition of joy this is what I found: “Joy is a feeling of good pleasure and happiness that is dependent on who Jesus is rather than on who we are or what is happening around us. Joy comes from the Holy Spirit, abiding in God’s presence and from hope in His word.”

Joy is a feeling but it is DEPENDENT on who Jesus is.

May I remind you: “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.” -Hebrews 13:8

Joy is not dependent on what is happening around us. Joy is abiding. We’re not chasing a feeling we’re chasing a Father that is already walking towards us.

I get a weird uncomfortably when someone describes me as “happy all the time.” How absolutely far from the truth. To live a life that is chasing the feeling of happiness is to strive for an insatiable goal.

To live a life that is striving to know the heart of the Lord, will be a life that sporadically results in joy as a promised byproduct.

“If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full. This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.” -John 15:10-12

To be a Christian is not to desire a feeling, it is to desire a person. The person of Jesus Christ.

Lord, may I desire to know Your heart for me,
May I look at Your people with Your eyes,
May I walk in to a room with a desire to know more than to be known,
Overall would I strive to fully desire You and not anything You could give me.