0:04

Welcome to Gospel in Life. Our

0:06

culture places so much faith in

0:08

empirical reason, technology, and personal experience

0:10

that it's easy to wonder, does

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something as old as Christianity have

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any relevance to the problems of

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modern life? This month,

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Tim Keller invites us to consider

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how Christianity is more relevant than

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ever in offering answers to the

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deepest longings of our hearts. Blessed

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is the man who does not walk in

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the counsel of the wicked, or

1:00

stand in the way of sinners, or

1:03

sit in the seat of mockers, but

1:06

his delight is in the law of

1:08

the Lord, and on his law he

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meditates day and night. He

1:13

is like a tree planted by streams of

1:15

water which yields its fruit in season, and

1:18

whose leaf does not wither. Whatever

1:20

he does, he prospers. Not

1:23

so the wicked. They are

1:25

like chaff that the wind blows away. Therefore the

1:27

wicked will not stand in the judgment, nor

1:29

sinners in the assembly of the righteous. For

1:32

the Lord watches over the way of the

1:34

righteous, but the way of the wicked will

1:36

perish. Pray with me

1:38

for just a second. Lord,

1:47

may the words of my mouth and the meditation of

1:50

all of our hearts be acceptable in the Lord's word. eyesight.

2:01

Oh Lord our rock and

2:04

our Redeemer. In

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Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Now,

2:14

and until recently, most

2:17

cultures put a

2:19

lot of stock in its ancient

2:21

traditions. It also put a lot of value

2:25

on its former and previous generations

2:27

and even its older folk because

2:30

for many many years all

2:32

cultures believed that wisdom was something

2:34

that was accumulated over the ages

2:36

and therefore it cherished its ancient

2:38

traditions. But

2:41

we live in a modern

2:43

age and the modern age is

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characterized by an unparalleled scorn of

2:48

the ancient, an unparalleled scorn of the

2:51

past. And

2:55

now how do we define modern? It

2:57

kind of goes like this. The cultural

2:59

historians will tell you somewhere in the

3:01

18th century there was the French Enlightenment

3:03

over here and there was German idealism

3:05

over here and British empiricism over here

3:07

and they all kind of coalesced into

3:10

the modern mindset which says human

3:13

reason and empirical investigation now

3:17

that will get us the

3:19

truth. Human reason and

3:21

empirical investigation now we have the tools

3:23

with which we will really be able to

3:26

solve the problems and mysteries

3:28

of life. That's what we were

3:30

told. That's what we've been told for a couple hundred years. Now

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let's ask ourselves how have we done? How have

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we done? Have we in our

3:42

modern advanced age with all of

3:44

our technology and with all of

3:47

our empirical investigation have we really

3:49

made progress when

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it comes to the problems and mysteries of life?

3:55

I think all of us would say right

3:57

off the bat that Technology

4:00

has made life in this world

4:02

physically safer, and that's great. Physically

4:04

safer, that's very important. And

4:07

I think we can also say that there has

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been a reversal of many

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of the grosser social inequities like

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slavery, it's largely been abolished. And

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yet, though our ancestors

4:20

had few or no economic choices like we

4:23

do, few

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or no political freedom like we do, though

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they had no vacations, no

4:30

health benefits, they

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had such a short

4:36

life expectancy. In spite of all that,

4:38

let's ask ourselves, are we happier than

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they are? Are we happier

4:43

than they were? Have

4:45

we in our modern age, with

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all of these tools, actually made

4:50

any progress at all? In fact,

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if you read the journals and the diaries of

4:57

our ancestors, ask

4:59

yourself this, do you see

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in those journals and diaries as much self-pity?

5:05

Do you see as much boredom? Do you see as

5:07

much meaninglessness? Do you see as much despair? I

5:13

think nobody could make a case that

5:17

we are any happier than they were, but you

5:19

could make a very, very, very good case that

5:22

they were happier than we. I'm

5:25

not trying to make a case either way. What I'm

5:27

trying to say is the Bible has said from

5:30

the beginning that

5:33

human happiness is

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not subject, is

5:38

not addressed at all by

5:41

empirical investigation or technology, it's not addressed at

5:43

all by psychology or sociology, not really. It's

5:45

not addressed at all by urban planning or

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political science or biochemistry, not really. They're fine,

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they do all sorts of great things, they

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make the world more comfortable, physically.

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They get rid of many of the grosser social

5:58

inequities, but the Bible has always... That that's

6:00

what makes you happy or unhappy.

6:03

The issues that make you happy

6:05

or unhappy are profoundly cosmic and

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profoundly spiritual. And I've been unchanged

6:09

for millennia. On

6:12

I like to do the small is the go

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to. One of the most ancient and I'm almost

6:16

famous. Ancient texts in in

6:19

or in the world and I just

6:21

have other sounds very well known, very

6:23

famous our like you with me to

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take a look at the same syntax

6:28

and bring them to bear on what

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we call the problems that we have

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now that we were supposed to have

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addressed, supposed to have made progress against

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because now we know in a way

6:40

that our ancestors didn't but we haven't

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made any of their progress. And

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today first question is. What

6:48

is the Bible tell us about the

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issue of happiness? Are you? Have you

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in this modern world? Learned how to

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become happy and stay happy? I have.

6:57

There's nobody here that think that's a

7:00

trivial question that has beneath you. Somehow.

7:03

Because. If you read the psychology books

7:06

on the urban planning books in a

7:08

sociology, books in the by of even

7:10

a biochemistry books and a political science

7:12

books missiles how's your books You know

7:14

what the really about how they got

7:16

big words oh they've got. Prepare for

7:18

a Paradigms Paradigms. But

7:22

they're all about the problem. Or

7:25

not happy? How can we be happy? And

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listen as we take a look and see what

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the bible says here out to say to my

7:33

Christian friends. Don't you

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think as you read the Somme you

7:37

may read so many times as a

7:39

very famous on Don't you think as

7:41

we go through these biblical principles you

7:44

may have heard them before. He may

7:46

have heard the many times. But ask

7:48

yourself a question all through this teaching

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if I really know this. Why

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am I so unhappy? or

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ask is a mask especially i'm

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asking people who say, I'm a

8:01

Christian, I believe the Bible, I know these ancient

8:03

texts. I ask you to ask

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yourself, am

8:08

I a fundamentally and consistently happy

8:10

person? And if not, how

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come? Would you

8:15

please answer that question all during? Don't

8:17

sit there and say, well, I've heard him say that before.

8:21

Or I've heard somebody else say that before, I've read that before.

8:23

Yes, I know that. Don't say

8:25

that. Say this every

8:27

time, say, if I know that, has

8:30

that made me a fundamentally and consistently

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happy person? And if not, why not?

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Now, Psalm 1 is,

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in a sense, the gatekeeper

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for the entire Bible, and

8:44

especially the entire book of Psalms. It's

8:46

often been considered by many students

8:48

and scholars to be a kind of

8:50

summary Psalm for the whole book. And

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so its principles are extremely basic

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to everything in the Psalter and everything in

8:59

the Bible. And I've listed off

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the four principles that I'd like to draw out

9:03

of this text that address the issue of why

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people are happy or not happy. And

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they're listed on a sheet of

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paper at the end of your order of worship.

9:15

Number one, this text tells us,

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this passage tells us that happiness

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is possible. Blessed,

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the word blessed, of course, means joyful. It

9:26

means fulfilled, it's satisfied. Blessed is

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the man who does these things.

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And so the first thing we

9:35

see from this text is that

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blessedness is possible, that happiness is

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possible. That's a staggering statement. That's

9:41

a thunderous statement. Now, what

9:44

do you think of that statement? It's

9:46

a way of testing where you are. Is

9:48

there anybody here who thinks, well, that's not so

9:50

staggering. Happiness is possible. I

9:53

came out on a Sunday morning to be told this. If

9:59

you don't think that's staggering, If you don't listen

10:01

to that and say, I hope so. If

10:04

you say, well of course happiness is possible, it

10:06

tells you something about you. Let me tell you

10:08

what it tells you. Almost

10:13

all of us, unless you've had

10:15

an unusually harsh childhood, almost all

10:18

of us start out thinking that

10:20

happiness is natural in life.

10:23

Yes, of course there's unhappy people, but they've screwed up.

10:28

Most of us start out thinking that

10:30

happiness is natural. And

10:34

you know, as you grow up, you hear all

10:36

these dire warnings from your parents. How

10:38

hard things are out there, and you better

10:40

save that money instead of spending it like

10:43

that. And you think, if I'm good enough,

10:45

if I'm smart enough, if I'm hard working

10:47

enough or whatever, you know, happiness

10:50

is natural. There's people out there who aren't happy,

10:52

but they

10:54

just screwed up. That's

10:56

where we start. And

10:58

as time goes on, we migrate. And

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after a while, we begin to, as we see and

11:04

experience more and more of life, we begin to

11:06

realize that happiness isn't anywhere near as easy as we

11:08

thought. And

11:10

after a while, we begin to realize that

11:12

the most successful, most of the most successful

11:15

people, most of the most experienced

11:17

people, most of the most gifted people, are

11:20

the most cynical. Even

11:22

the most successful people, go to them and find

11:24

out. If you know any of them, you know

11:26

that they

11:29

are the most cynical about the prospect of happiness.

11:32

The great literature of the world is

11:34

tragic literature. Look, here's Shakespeare. Here's Much

11:36

Ado About Nothing, a wonderful play. Here's

11:38

Hamlet. Is

11:42

life more like Much Ado About Nothing or more like Hamlet? What

11:44

do you think? That tells me how

11:46

much of life you've actually had. Is

11:49

life really like Much Ado About Nothing? In the end,

11:51

everybody comes back. Everybody's happy.

11:53

In the end, everybody gets the person they want to

11:55

marry. In the end, the person who thinks everybody thinks

11:57

is dead is alive. Or

12:03

is life more like Hamlet, everybody

12:06

dying disappointed in the last scene? Listen,

12:10

you need the literature of much ado

12:12

about nothing to get through life. It's

12:16

wonderful, a wonderful play. But

12:19

when you stand in the presence of Hamlet or

12:21

Macbeth, you know

12:23

that you're standing in the presence of a

12:25

much more profound mirror of what things are like.

12:29

Is life more like much ado about nothing or

12:31

like Hamlet or Macbeth? What

12:34

is life, Macbeth? Life

12:36

is a walking shadow, a poor

12:39

player that threats and

12:41

struts his hour upon the stage

12:44

and then is heard no more, a tale told

12:46

by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying

12:49

nothing. Oh,

12:53

you see, that's awfully bleak. All right, fine,

12:55

yes, it's pretty bleak, but here's much ado

12:57

about nothing and here's Macbeth and Hamlet. Is

12:59

life more like that or more like that?

13:01

What is it? Don't you

13:03

see, the

13:05

people who see most deeply into life, the people who

13:07

have even been the most experienced, even the people who

13:09

are the smartest, the people who have gotten to the

13:12

top, the people who have got the money,

13:14

got the fame, all the things you think will make you

13:16

happy, go to them and ask them. We

13:20

start out thinking happy is natural. We end up

13:22

thinking happiness is unachievable. And

13:25

so we've actually got four kinds of people. We've got

13:27

the people who think happiness is natural, unless you're stupid.

13:33

You're very young either or you're very

13:35

inexperienced or you've had a temporarily unbelievably

13:37

charmed life. And

13:40

over on this corner, we have the people who think

13:42

that happiness is unachievable. They tend to be the best

13:44

thinkers. And

13:48

in the middle, most of us are actually migrating from one

13:50

to the other and we're kind of too busy to really

13:54

notice how tragic and

13:56

dangerous life is until it kind of comes up and

13:58

grabs us. And then there's

14:00

a fourth group. The

14:02

people who understand what the Bible says, one

14:05

of them is described in this psalm, because

14:09

the Bible says, and

14:12

Christians who understand what the Bible says

14:14

believe, that happiness is neither natural nor

14:16

unachievable, it's possible. It's

14:19

possible to be, in this world, a

14:23

fundamentally and consistently happy

14:25

person. As the

14:29

old hymn goes, peace, perfect peace in this dark

14:31

world of sin, the blood

14:33

of Jesus whispers peace within. Happiness

14:37

is possible, that's the first point, the

14:39

first principle, it's possible. A

14:42

radical statement. Secondly, now,

14:45

before we get to the second or the third, right

14:47

away, naturally, the

14:49

human inquiring mind asks, inquiring

14:51

mind asks, if happiness is

14:54

possible, why so

14:56

few people have it? And

14:59

the answer of the text and the answer of the Bible

15:01

is because people seek it

15:03

wrongly. And there's two common mistakes,

15:05

the next two points are two

15:07

common mistakes that virtually everybody falls

15:09

into unless God comes and opens

15:11

their eyes to it, that

15:14

we fall into and therefore we're never happy. The

15:18

first mistake and the second principle and the

15:20

outline is that real

15:22

happiness, the happiness that's held out and offered

15:24

by the Bible, the happiness that's offered by

15:26

God, is a fundamental happiness,

15:28

not a superficial happiness. You

15:30

see, it tells us that

15:33

the happy man, the godly man,

15:35

is like a tree. Verse

15:38

3, planted by streams of water which

15:40

yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does

15:42

not wither. Now, look at that, what a wonderful

15:44

metaphor. This tree

15:46

is subject to seasons. It's

15:50

not always fruitful, it's not always

15:52

blossoming, it's subject

15:54

to seasons, the winter or a very

15:56

dry summer. seasons,

16:00

it feels them. It's not always bearing

16:03

fruit, it's not always productive, it's

16:05

not always looking green and wonderful. And

16:09

yet, this particular tree is unlike

16:11

many other trees because it's been

16:13

planted on the

16:15

riverbank, and its

16:17

roots have access to a constant

16:20

and unremitting stream of water

16:23

that's there even when the heat

16:26

comes, that's there even when the

16:29

drought comes. That's the image. What's

16:31

the point? The point is this. The

16:35

first major mistake that we make is we try

16:37

to find our happiness in circumstances. The

16:40

first major mistake we make is we think

16:42

that happiness is found in the externals. We

16:45

expect it to come raining down onto us, and

16:48

yet the Bible says the secret of

16:50

happiness is if you find your happiness,

16:52

if you seek your happiness in externals

16:54

and circumstances, you'll screw up because

16:57

real happiness is found under

16:59

you, inside you,

17:02

where your roots are. Let me

17:04

put it a couple of different ways. Happiness

17:07

is never, does

17:09

never consist in what happens to you but

17:12

by what you are. Your

17:14

happiness does not consist in what happens

17:16

to you but in what you are.

17:18

Do you remember the

17:21

old couplet? Two

17:23

men looked out through prison bars. One

17:26

saw mud, the other stars. You ever heard that?

17:29

Two men looked out through prison

17:31

bars. One saw mud, the other

17:33

stars. What's the difference? Circumstances identical.

17:35

Same bars, same prison. What's the

17:38

difference in the men?

17:40

Isn't that common sense? Well,

17:42

yes, I guess it's common

17:44

sense and yet we are

17:46

like a

17:48

tree that's not planted by the stream. A

17:51

tree that's completely dependent on what comes down from

17:54

outside, not what I draw

17:56

from the inside. Put it

17:59

another way. The Bible consistently

18:01

tells us that a human, that a

18:03

Christian, a godly person, a

18:06

Christian is not just a religious person, not

18:08

just a nice person, not

18:11

simply somebody who

18:13

is doing good things. A Christian is

18:15

someone who has been planted and rooted

18:18

into something beside him or herself. That's

18:22

the reason why the Bible talks about the new

18:24

birth. In 2 Peter,

18:26

which we looked at in the month

18:28

of August, says, we are made partakers

18:30

of a divine nature, partakers

18:33

of a divine nature. Something's

18:35

been planted from the outside into us. Something

18:40

has become part of us, something we are

18:42

rooted into God. Some

18:45

amazing thing has happened. We're going to look at that

18:47

next week because we're going to come back to Psalm

18:49

1 and ask ourselves what does it mean to be

18:51

planted? A Christian is not the

18:54

chaff which has no root. A

18:56

Christian is a tree. Something has

18:58

planted you in. Trees

19:02

can't plant themselves. Something

19:04

has come and planted you in and

19:06

now there is a power. Now there

19:08

is an outlook. Now there is an

19:10

understanding that wasn't there before and

19:13

that is where you draw and that's

19:15

where the happiness comes from. Put it another

19:17

way. You see what

19:19

I mean by saying it's fundamental? It's

19:22

fundamental. The tree experiences

19:24

affliction. It hurts.

19:27

It's affected by it. It doesn't always

19:29

bear fruit and yet it

19:31

gets leafed never withers. There's

19:34

a balance here. There's something here that people

19:36

don't understand unless you really dig in. First

19:40

Peter chapter 1 verse 6, the

19:43

classic text on this where

19:45

it says, Peter is

19:47

saying you rejoice in him though you are

19:49

now in great heaviness. The

19:55

word heaviness means in pain. The

19:57

word heaviness means in deep distress and turmoil.

20:00

And yet it doesn't say you used to

20:02

rejoice in Him, but right now you're in

20:04

heaviness. It

20:07

doesn't say you're rejoicing in Him and you're

20:09

avoiding heaviness. Two present

20:12

tenses. You

20:14

are in deep joy even

20:16

though you're in absolutely deep distress.

20:19

How could that be? Well, you know, the metaphor

20:21

is right here. Here's a tree in the drought

20:25

and yet no fruit, hurting,

20:28

grieved in a sense. And yet it's

20:31

leaf. It doesn't wither. It's

20:33

an evergreen tree because

20:36

its roots are down into something else. Why

20:40

does God allow suffering in the world? How

20:42

can one religion be right and the other's wrong?

20:45

Has science basically disproved Christianity?

20:47

Tim Keller addresses these

20:49

questions and more in his book, The

20:52

Reason for God. Drawing on

20:54

literature, philosophy, real life conversations and

20:56

potent reasoning, this book will challenge

20:58

you to gain a deeper understanding

21:00

of the Christian faith, whether you're a

21:02

believer seeking reassurance or you're reading it with

21:05

a friend who is searching for answers. When

21:08

you give to Gospel of Life during the month

21:10

of May, we'll send you two copies of The

21:12

Reason for God, one for you

21:14

and one to give to a friend who

21:16

is exploring Christianity. It's our hope that through

21:18

reading the book with a friend, you can

21:21

have conversations about the claims of the

21:23

Christian faith. The books are our thanks for

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your support of this ministry. To

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receive your two copies of The Reason

21:30

for God, simply make a gift

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at gospelonlife.com/give. That's

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gospelonlife.com/give. We

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also encourage you to check out our

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short podcast series, Questioning Christianity, for

21:41

people exploring the claims of the Christian faith.

21:44

To listen to this short series or share it with

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a friend, visit gospelonlife.com/questioning.

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That's gospelonlife.com/questioning.

21:52

Your gift helps the message of Christ's

21:54

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So thank you for partnering with us

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because the gospel... truly changes

22:01

everything. There

22:06

are people in the church who don't get this. There are people

22:08

in the church who say, here

22:10

you're a Christian and some terrible tragedies

22:12

happen to you. Well, smile and praise

22:14

God. Don't let it get to you.

22:17

I will go so far as to

22:19

say, not only is that radically unbiblical, but

22:23

it's unbelievably unhealthy. What you're really doing

22:26

is you are, if

22:28

you actually find Christians who go through

22:30

tragedy with very few tears, without much

22:32

grief, without falling on the ground, that's

22:36

not God's peace. That's not the joy we're

22:38

talking about here. That's the kind of brainwashing.

22:44

The tree, because it's

22:46

going through a season of dryness,

22:49

has to pull out of the bottom even

22:52

more. The tree, because it's going

22:54

through dryness, has to put its roots even

22:56

deeper down and draw even harder on it.

23:00

Anyone in this room who's ever actually

23:02

gotten this fundamental happiness knows

23:04

that that's exactly what happens. I

23:07

tell you, you don't

23:09

know what it's like to rejoice in the Lord unless

23:11

you're suffering. There's something

23:13

about the drought and about the fruitlessness of

23:16

your life that makes you, if

23:18

you're a Christian, put your roots down into

23:20

him in a way you didn't before. Happiness

23:26

that the Bible talks about is

23:28

fundamental happiness, not superficial happiness, not

23:31

a light-heartedness all the time, a jocularity

23:33

all the time. Not

23:36

a fun and frolicking type person all the time.

23:38

No, no. We're talking about

23:41

a joy that is permanent and

23:43

is overwhelming and is overlapping and

23:46

actually is stimulated by tragic

23:49

circumstances. Do you hear? That's

23:51

how you know whether you've got the circumstantial kind

23:54

of happiness, which

23:57

of course only rains down from above and sometimes it's just not

23:59

a joy. there or whether you've

24:01

got the fundamental happiness which is actually

24:04

stimulated by it. Those of you

24:06

who are in this have been in this boat you

24:08

know, you know it. Things

24:10

go wrong and you realize

24:12

I believe these things but do I really

24:15

understand these things and you go to him

24:17

and you put your roots down and suddenly

24:19

you begin to sense not the lack of

24:21

pain, not the lack of

24:23

grief, but an

24:25

overwhelming glory and joy that comes

24:27

up his hand upholds.

24:31

His right hand upholds me. There's a

24:33

place in one piece of literature where

24:37

a character is described like this. In

24:40

his face he saw at first only care and

24:42

sorrow though as he

24:44

looked he perceived that under all was

24:47

a great joy. A fountain of

24:49

mirth enough to set a kingdom laughing were

24:52

it to gush forth. There it is. There it is.

24:55

Underneath the care and the sorrow, deep

24:57

underneath there's a fountain of mirth

25:00

enough to set a kingdom laughing were it to gush

25:02

forth. It's under there. It's always under there. Happiness

25:06

is not based on circumstances. It's

25:09

not brought about by controlling your

25:11

environment but by controlling your allegiances,

25:14

which brings me to my third

25:16

point. This

25:20

text teaches us that there's a happiness that's

25:22

possible. There's a happiness that's fundamental, not superficial.

25:24

It's based on what you are, not in

25:26

your circumstances. If you seek it in your

25:28

circumstances you'll always be unhappy. Back and forth.

25:30

Manic. Third,

25:33

this happiness and

25:36

this is the height of wisdom and in some way

25:38

it's going to be my shortest point because

25:41

it's so wise and profound. It's all through

25:43

the Bible. It's there everywhere.

25:46

Everywhere you almost everywhere you see the word blessed

25:48

in the Bible, which is all over. It's

25:50

there. It's so obvious we miss it. Happiness

25:54

can never be found directly happiness

25:56

can never be gotten directly. Happiness

26:00

is always and

26:02

only a byproduct of

26:05

seeking something else more than happiness See

26:09

every place wherever whenever you see the word

26:11

blessed it never ever ever ever says blessed

26:13

is the one who seeks blessedness Blessed is

26:15

the one who hungers and thirst after blessedness

26:17

never never never ever It

26:19

always says blessed is he hungers and thirst

26:22

after something more than blessedness If

26:28

you've heard this before ask yourself right now if I

26:30

know this why am I not more happy? Seek

26:40

happiness Or

26:44

seek righteousness, which should you if you

26:46

seek righteousness more than happiness? You'll get

26:48

both if you seek happiness

26:50

more than righteousness. You'll get neither That's

26:53

the teaching of the text the

26:55

teaching of the text is the person who

26:57

is happy is always the one who has

26:59

stopped Trying so hard to be happy And

27:03

who's sat down and said what am

27:05

I really living for? What are my fundamental allegiance

27:07

is really what Jesus says It

27:10

says he says it in Matthew 6. He says

27:12

you who are worried Don't

27:14

have anxiety over these things but seek first

27:16

the kingdom of God in his righteousness What's

27:19

that mean seek first the kingdom of

27:21

God in his righteousness? He's

27:23

saying the reason you're unhappy is because

27:26

as we talked about

27:28

it in Jeremiah 17 you've made something

27:30

else your trust as Long

27:34

as you decide to seek

27:36

happiness as your highest priority. Why

27:38

is it that sometimes you cheat? Why

27:42

is it sometimes you lie? Think

27:45

about this Why is this

27:48

sometimes you do? Huh? Why is this sometimes

27:50

you break your promises? Why is it sometimes you have

27:52

standards and you break them? Why? Because

27:58

you're because in most of our cases

28:01

unless God comes and shows us another

28:03

way, the

28:05

normal and natural habit of our heart is

28:07

to say, I believe in principles, honesty is

28:09

a good idea, I believe in purity, I

28:11

believe in honesty and integrity, all these principles

28:13

are very good, but sometimes you

28:16

have to make an exception. What do you mean? It

28:19

means that there's one principle that's over all the

28:21

other principles and that is, I've got to be

28:23

happy. Oh, I

28:25

believe in telling the truth but not if I'm gonna have to

28:27

lose my job over it, I wouldn't be

28:29

happy. Oh, I believe in doing this but not

28:32

if I'm gonna lose that girl over it, I want to

28:34

be happy. I believe, what do you mean you believe? There's

28:36

only one thing that you believe and

28:38

that is that the top priority I'm

28:40

seeking is my happiness. Everything

28:43

else comes second and third. The Kingdom of God's great

28:45

but first seek happiness. Honesty

28:48

is great but first seek happiness and

28:50

the Bible says that though that's the fundamental bent

28:52

and bias of our souls, you'll

28:56

never find happiness that way. Jesus

28:59

says if you seek happiness it will always

29:02

escape you, it will always allude you, always.

29:06

If you make a happy marriage,

29:08

your number one priority, you will never have it.

29:14

If you make your

29:16

number one priority, a successful career, you never

29:18

have it because you will be killed by

29:21

the anxiety. People

29:26

say, I want to make this moment last

29:29

forever, go ahead, try and you

29:33

will see that you have polluted it

29:36

in far worse ways than if you didn't

29:38

realize this is an ultimate. Try

29:40

to be happy, make

29:43

it your main objective

29:45

in life and let me put it

29:47

another way. Is

29:50

God committed to your happiness? Absolutely and yet

29:53

if you come to him to make you happy,

29:56

you're coming to a false God. If you

30:00

say, well, I'm interested in this Christianity and

30:02

maybe I will come and bite on it

30:04

if I can see that it will

30:06

help me reach my goals and make me happy. You're

30:08

not coming to a God, you're coming to a butler.

30:13

Listen, either God exists or he doesn't exist.

30:15

If he doesn't exist, you can't

30:17

come to him for happiness, right? But if

30:20

he does exist, you have to realize you

30:22

must come to him because he created you

30:24

and therefore he owns you. And

30:27

to not come to him and obey him

30:29

would be an injustice. And

30:31

so the only way to come to God

30:33

rightly, the real God is

30:35

to come without conditions and to say,

30:37

forget happiness, I owe you everything. There's

30:42

only two ways to come to God. You

30:44

can come to God on the basis of saying, I owe

30:46

you everything, you owe me nothing. Or you can come on

30:49

the basis of saying, I'm going to come to you, but

30:51

then you owe me a lot. And

30:53

the only way for you to know on what basis you

30:55

have come is to see what

30:57

happens in

31:00

the bad seasons. When things go

31:02

wrong, do you get upset and

31:04

you say, what good did it

31:07

do me to come to church? What

31:09

good did it do me to read the Bible? You

31:11

know what that shows. You came to him

31:13

on the basis. I will do this

31:16

in this as you owe me. In other

31:18

words, my number one priority is happiness. And

31:20

I'm using God as a way to get there.

31:23

And as opposed to saying, my number one priority

31:25

is to serve God. And if happiness happens, great.

31:27

To the degree it happens, great. And

31:29

here's the irony. The less you're

31:32

concerned about your happiness and

31:34

the more you're concerned about him, the happier

31:36

you get. This is not a trick. You

31:38

can't say, oh, great. I got

31:40

it. I come to God and I say this and this

31:43

and this. You cannot bandy

31:45

with the omnipotent and omniscient Lord

31:47

of the universe. Name

31:52

it heaven, get earth thrown in. Name it earth, you

31:54

get neither. Happiness

31:57

is a byproduct. And

32:02

finally, happiness is

32:04

possible. Well, why don't most people have it?

32:06

Because A, we look for it in circumstances

32:08

and B, because we go after it directly

32:10

and we make it the non-negotiable. We

32:13

say, I'd like to serve God or I'd like

32:15

to be a good citizen or I'd like to

32:17

obey the Ten Commandments, but the non-negotiable is my

32:19

happiness. As long as the non-negotiable is the happiness,

32:22

you'll never get it. It has to be a

32:24

byproduct of making something else non-negotiable. It

32:27

has to work that way. Lastly

32:31

then, finally, we'll

32:33

see here that happiness is

32:36

not something that happens to you with something you choose.

32:41

You notice it starts off with a negative. Blessed

32:43

is the man who does not, does not, does

32:45

not. That proves that if

32:47

you want to be happy, you have to first see

32:49

things that you're doing wrong and make a change

32:52

of allegiance. If you look carefully

32:54

at the verbs, walk, blessed

32:57

is the man who does not, you

32:59

know, stand in it. It

33:01

talks about listening to the counsel of the

33:03

ungodly, which talks about the intellect. And then

33:05

it talks about walking in the way of

33:07

sinners, which is the behavior. And then it

33:09

talks about sitting in the seat of the

33:11

scornful. And in the Semitic language, where you

33:13

sit is where you belong. If you sit

33:15

with the men, if you sit with the

33:18

Greeks, if you sit with the Romans, if you

33:20

sit with the slaves, that's who you belong to.

33:23

That's what the word sit means usually in these

33:25

contexts. And so what it's really trying to say

33:27

is, first, do you

33:29

want to be happy? Let's

33:31

look at it negatively and positively. Negatively, you've

33:34

got to find out who

33:36

you belong to. Everybody

33:40

has to be converted, which means at

33:42

some point you have to see that

33:44

something else besides God is what

33:48

owns you. Something else owns you. Other

33:51

things own you. Christian friends,

33:55

when Paul says we're perplexed, but we're not

33:57

driven to despair. We're struck down, but we're

33:59

not. You know what

34:01

he's saying? He's saying, I am

34:03

like the godly man. I'm subject to seasons,

34:05

but I've got roots, which means, of

34:08

course, if my career is about

34:10

to go through a new barrier and

34:13

yet suddenly it gets

34:15

snatched, my success gets snatched away, if I'm

34:17

at the altar and suddenly the

34:20

person I'm supposed to marry doesn't even show up,

34:22

am I supposed to be happy about that?

34:24

No, why? I should be

34:26

downcast because these are desires that God

34:29

gave me, to be happily married, to

34:31

be vocationally fulfilled. But

34:33

Paul says, there's a difference between

34:35

making your spouse, trusting in your

34:37

spouse and making your spouse your

34:39

trust, right? There's

34:42

a difference between

34:45

wanting something and having it own you,

34:47

sitting in it, putting

34:51

all of your weight on it. That's

34:53

when you sit in a chair. And

34:56

if there's anybody here who says, you know, I've been

34:58

a Christian for a long time and I know that

35:00

I'm not a fundamentally and consistently happy person, then you

35:02

have to ask yourself this question. What

35:06

piper are you really dancing

35:08

to? Who calls the tunes in

35:10

your life? What owns

35:13

you? What do you belong

35:15

to? What are the

35:17

fundamental allegiances of your life? The

35:20

things that you listen to, the things that you walk in,

35:22

the things that you sit in? You've

35:25

got to start. You can't be happy unless you

35:27

start with a negative. You can't be happy unless you

35:30

see, not, not, not.

35:33

I've got to turn away from things that

35:35

have me by the heart, that have me by the mind.

35:38

I've got to turn away from things that

35:40

I belong to. And

35:42

even if you're a Christian by

35:44

saying, well, I believe all these things, you can

35:46

still be operating on the old ways. And

35:49

if you are not fundamentally happy,

35:51

the profound analysis of this point

35:53

is you are still

35:55

sitting in some other seat than

35:59

in God's lap. If

36:03

you're not just perplexed but you are in

36:05

despair. If you're not

36:07

just hurting but you are totally

36:09

destroyed, that's what Paul says, doesn't

36:12

happen. He's

36:14

not talking about brainwashing. I'm always

36:16

happy and he's not talking about being just in

36:18

despair. He says, I'm struck down but I'm never

36:21

in despair. Look at Jesus Christ.

36:24

Had great peace, great joy, the perfect relation

36:26

with the Father yet he was always crying.

36:29

There you have it. A

36:32

man of sorrow is acquainted with grief, never

36:34

in despair. And if you are

36:37

in despair, if life isn't worth

36:39

living, it means

36:42

you're sitting in some other seat. That's the negative.

36:44

But then there's the positive and here's the last

36:46

thing we say. His delight is in the law

36:48

of the Lord. You know

36:50

the trouble with this word law of the Lord, many

36:52

people think, oh well

36:55

that means he's

36:58

looking at the part of the Bible where the rules

37:00

are. No. The

37:02

word law of the Lord is not talking

37:04

about the part of the Bible where

37:07

you find the rules, it's talking about the whole

37:09

message of the Bible as your rule of life.

37:14

This is not a man who says, oh

37:16

yes, the laws of God. Honesty is the best policy

37:18

and I want to get on in life so I'm

37:21

going to be honest. That's not what he's saying. His

37:23

delight is in the law of the Lord. He can't

37:25

stop thinking about it day and night, all the time.

37:27

What is he looking at? He's

37:29

looking at the central message of

37:31

the Bible. The central message of the

37:34

Bible which we've been talking about all during this

37:36

service is

37:38

that that great powerful God sent

37:41

his son to die for you so that

37:43

great God can become your father. You know,

37:48

the parable of the prodigal son puts it all

37:50

perfectly. When the son

37:52

has left the father and he feels like his

37:55

life is falling apart, he comes back and he

37:57

doesn't ask for happiness. Remember? The prodigal son in

37:59

Luke chapter 15 he comes back

38:01

and he says father I have sinned in heaven

38:03

against heaven and in my sight just make me

38:06

a servant I don't want

38:08

comfort. I don't want happiness. I

38:10

owe you and

38:13

Then what happens? The

38:16

father once you come to God saying Forget

38:20

the happiness Forget the

38:22

joy forget doing all these wonderful things for me.

38:24

I owe you because of what you did for

38:26

me The

38:29

minute he comes to the father and says you don't

38:31

have to be my father anymore Just be my king

38:33

the king turns into a father and

38:36

he says get out the robe Put

38:39

a ring on him put my robe

38:41

on him kill the fatted calf. We're gonna have a party

38:44

He's my child and

38:46

that message that in Jesus Christ this

38:48

great king becomes your father Is

38:52

what you have to delight in? and

38:55

if you look carefully when it says he delights in the law

38:57

of the Lord and then it talks about The

38:59

godly man being a tree that puts down his

39:01

roots into the river. What's the river? What's the

39:03

water down there? It's the law of the Lord

39:06

He's delighting in it day and night. That's

39:09

how he keeps his leaf green even in

39:11

the heat Do

39:14

you know how to do that? Christian

39:16

friends, you know how to do that There's

39:19

a flute on the ground and might as well

39:21

be a pipe it might as well be a bear trap unless

39:23

you learn how to Play it. Do

39:25

you know how to play the gospel? You

39:27

know how to rehearse beauties? Do you know how

39:30

to talk to yourself about Luke 15 about about

39:32

the prodigal son? Do you know how to think

39:34

about and rehearse the beauties of it until it

39:36

makes your heart sing? Do

39:39

you delight in it day and night if you

39:41

do? You'll

39:44

be like Jesus Often

39:46

crying I'd tell you something the

39:48

gospel Christianity makes you a

39:50

sadder person and a happier person at

39:52

the same time You

39:55

get more sensitive. You know one of the ways that

39:57

non-christians have to deal with life because they don't have

39:59

this great consolation is they deny how

40:01

hard life is. They deny

40:03

it like me in my car. Kathy's

40:06

always saying to me, something's wrong with

40:08

the car. I didn't ever heard that knock

40:10

before. Everything's fine. Everything's fine. We can't

40:12

afford anything else. And that's

40:14

how many people... Listen, unless you have

40:16

this consolation in your life, that's how

40:18

you deal with life. It'll be alright.

40:20

That could never happen. I'm

40:23

sure it could never happen. You

40:25

kidding? Don't you

40:27

see? When you become a

40:30

Christian, you get this consolation and allows you

40:32

to be honest. It's no longer repressed how

40:34

hard life is. You feel the pain

40:37

of the world more than you did before.

40:40

But you've got a joy and a

40:42

consolation. My sins are pardoned. They'll never

40:44

be brought against me. And I'm

40:46

gonna go live with God forever in

40:48

a new heavens and a new earth

40:50

wherein dwelleth righteousness. You're

40:54

happier and sadder at the same time. The

40:56

happiness overwhelms the sadness. That's what it means

40:58

to be a Christian. And it comes by

41:00

learning to play the gospel. Listening

41:05

to it. Singing it to yourself. That's

41:08

the only way you put your roots down and deal

41:10

with the heat. Are you doing that? Can you do

41:12

that? See

41:14

the streams of living water. Remember

41:20

that hymn? See the streams of living water.

41:23

Well supply thy sons and daughters

41:25

and all fear of once removed.

41:27

Who can faint while such a

41:29

river ever flows their thirst to

41:31

assuage? Grace which like the

41:33

Lord the giver never fails from age

41:35

to age. You can be happy. It's

41:39

possible. Don't look to

41:41

circumstances. Don't seek it directly. Instead,

41:44

look at what you really really are living for and

41:47

accept and

41:49

admit your need for the great gospel of the

41:52

Lord Jesus Christ and learn to delight

41:54

in that and to play it and to listen to

41:56

it day and night. Listen, there's

41:59

probably some people people here who are irked at

42:01

me because you're in pain and you don't want to

42:03

get your hopes up. You

42:05

don't like me telling you it's possible to be

42:07

a fundamentally and consistently happy person. You

42:10

don't want to get your hopes up. I

42:12

will not apologize. I cannot recant. You

42:16

need this. Come

42:19

and get it. Let's pray. Father,

42:23

we pray now that you grant that

42:26

as we take this moment to consider what

42:28

you are going to be doing in our

42:31

lives. If we come to you and

42:33

seek you and not happiness, you

42:35

will show us how we can turn

42:38

away from the way of the world, from

42:41

the way, the counsel of the ungodly, from

42:44

the seed of the mockers and the scornful

42:46

and the light in the law of the Lord, so

42:49

that on it we can meditate day and night

42:51

and be like a tree planted by waters. Keep

42:54

our leaves green in your

42:57

son. In his name

42:59

we pray. Amen.