rejoicing

In Francis Chan’s recent book, “Crazy love: overwhelmed by a relentless God” he mentions that “rejoice in the Lord always” (Philippians 4:4) is a command from God. Thus, if we aren’t joyful we are saying that we know better than God, that we have a special dispensation to worry or be bitter because we know our circumstances better than God does.

Being a bit of a curmudgeon, I started to think of commands that might contradict this idea of being joyful all the time. When can we not be joyful? “Mourn with those who mourn” (Romans 12:15) came to mind… and that was it. The only time when we are allowed not to rejoice (that I can think of) is when someone else we know is in pain. And our own pain and stress do not excuse us from considering our own place in the higher purposes of God or from submitting ourselves to his sovereignty. We are not allowed the comfort of feeling sorry for ourselves.

Christian humility is not wallowing in depression and self-pity but accepting that God is truly working out his good for us in spite of the externals of our situation: “we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him” (Romans 8:28).

At the same time we are to see others’ pain through God’s eyes, to feel their suffering with his heart. And that should move us to pray, “your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”

Being a Christian is not easy. It means I can’t be self-centered, which is my default mode. It means that God still has a lot of work to do in me, work that he can’t do unless I continually submit myself to him and get out of my default mode on a regular basis. But I like the promised result: “The fruit of the Spirit is… joy.”