Express Your Joy to God

In this series, Thriving in God's Garden, we are learning this week about joy. We know now that abuse steals our joy, and hardships can cause it to falter. But trusting in God to restore our joy always brings about positive results. Today, we look at ways to express our joy to God.

Cecil the Seasick Sea Serpent
When I was three years old, I received a much-anticipated gift at Christmas: Cecil the Seasick Sea Serpent. For those of you who aren't quite as old as I am, Cecil was a cartoon character, and I desperately wanted him.

My dad took a home movie of me when I discovered Cecil under the tree. You've never seen a reaction quite like mine on that day. I flapped my hands like a hummingbird's wings and ran in place as if I were standing on hot coals. Then, I began jumping up and down, and the grin on my face nearly split my head in two.

My reaction to Cecil was an excellent example of what joy looks like. Ever since then, when I get really excited about something that makes me joyful, I break into the Cecil Dance.

Life can suck the dance right out of us.
We are born to experience the type of joy that I felt over Cecil's arrival on Christmas. But devastating experiences, such as childhood sexual abuse, dometic violence, or traumatic events can drain the joy completely out of us.

And we don't have to be victims of abuse or trauma to have our joy dampened by all of the rules and regulations imposed on us as children. Grown-ups tell us not to run, not to shout, not to jump up and down when we're excited. We're taught to keep our mouths shut and to act like little ladies and gentlemen.

Many of us struggle with depression, because we have never been allowed to let our joy shine. We go to lackluster jobs that we hate, socialize with people who bore us, and deny ourselves many pleasures, because we've been taught that it's wrong to kick up our heels and giggle.

Show God your joy.
There are many ways to express the joy that God gives us. Psalm 66:1 (NIV) tells us, Shout with joy to God, all the earth! Sing the glory of his name; make his praise glorious! Psalm 149:3 (NIV) says, Let them praise his name with dancing and make music to him with tambourine and harp.

If you can't do the Cecil Dance around other people when you're happy, at least show God that you're joyful behind closed doors. During your prayer time, thank him for the countless blessings that you receive every day. If you don't feel blessed, remember that every breath you draw is a gift from God. Start there.

Before long, you'll begin to realize that you're whistling a little tune or humming to yourself. Because when you're thankful, joy bubbles forth.

Find ways to pop the cork and let your joy bubble over. Maybe you can join the church choir or play an instrument in the band. Music is a powerful way to express our joy. My favorite way to express joy is to play hymns and praise music on the piano.

If music isn't your strong suit, perhaps you can express your joy through art. Painting, drawing, sewing, embroidering, knitting, scrapbooking, beading, and many other crafts provide us with an outlet for creativity. In my opinion, creativity is merely the outward expression of our inner joy.

Not a musician or an artist? How about dancing? You don't have to be Ginger Rogers or Fred Astaire to express the joy you feel. Just crank up the radio in your own house and start jumping around. Let the music lead you, and before you know it, you'll be grinning.

I hope you're getting the picture about how to generate joy and how to express it to God. Tomorrow, we'll look at ways to share our joy with others.

Today's Challenge
In your prayer time, tell God thank you for all that he does to bless you. Then, find a way today to express your gratitude to him through music, art, or dance.

God's Joy Sustains Us Through Hard Times

We continue this week with thoughts about joy in my series, Thriving in God's Garden. Yesterday, we learned that we find joy when we develop a relationship with God. Today, we consider how our joy may decrease during hard times.

God's joy sustains us through hard times.
After we have left an abusive relationship and struck out on our own, we may still encounter hardships. Having the faith to follow God does not guarantee that our lives will become nothing but sunshine and roses.

Habakkuk 3:17-18 (NIV) reminds us that there will be hard times. But it also points out that God will still be our source of joy when those times come:

Though the fig tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, though there are no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will be joyful in God my Savior.

Our level of joy can rise and fall.
After I divorced my first husband, I felt relieved to be freed from so many years of abuse. But, I also struggled with difficulties that threatened to steal my joy. For the first time in years, I had a full-time job. I felt completely overwhelmed by a workload that should have been shared by three people.

My children were thrust into the world of the latch-key bunch, and they endured battles of their own. My son got knocked off his bicycle on his way to school by a hit-and-run driver and ended up with a broken wrist. All of the kids struggled with the inevitable adjustments that go along with divorce and relocation.

The life changes we were experiencing caused all of the children and me a great deal of pain, and at the time, we weren't exactly whistling Dixie over it. During hard times, our joy may decrease for a while. But if we have a solid relationship with God, we can learn how to restore our joy.

Gratitude helps us to restore our joy.
When I looked back later at incidents, such as my son's broken wrist, I began to understand that knowing God made things a little easier. I thanked him for resolving problems for us and providing for our needs. Whenever I thanked God, I felt a little happier. And suddenly, for the first time in my life, I began to connect gratitude with joy.

If we look up joy in the Bible, we can find countless verses where thankfulness and joy go hand in hand. Many of the Psalms are based on this combination. Psalm 21:1 (NIV) reads, O Lord, the king rejoices in your strength. How great is his joy in the victories you give! Giving God thanks for our daily victories fills us with joy, even when life is difficult.

So, we know that leaving behind abusive, neglectful relationships can increase our joy. And relying on God to restore our joy, both in good times and in bad, is the best source of renewal. Tomorrow, we will look at ways that we can express our joy to God.

Today's Challenge
Are you going through a hard time right now? God promises to restore your joy. Look in his Word for references to joy and thank him, as the psalmist did, for your daily victories.

Our Joy Begins with God

Yesterday, I expressed my opinions about losing our joy as a result of choosing to remain in relationships with abusive or neglectful unbelievers. Today, we look at how God grows joy in our hearts as we continue with our series, Thriving in God's Garden.

God gives us strength.
After we have found a safe place that is free from neglect and abuse, we must turn to God for strength as we wait for his joy to fill us. While we are recovering from the wounds of abuse, God gives us strength. He promises in Nehemiah 8:10b (NIV), Do not grieve, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.

When I left my first marriage, I didn't feel as if I had any strength left. I had not understood beforehand how much grief I would experience. Losing a marriage causes a phenomenon known as the death of a dream.

When we first get married, we dream about a lovely life that will go on forever. We expect happiness with our spouse, and we build goals based on our expectations. When marriage ends in divorce, that dream gets shattered. Suddenly, we don't know who we are or why we're here.

For months after my divorce, I lived like a sleep-walker, stumbling around in the dark. I had no direction and no clue how to start my life over again.

God knows the way.
God knows where he wants us to go and how he wants us to get there. His Word can shed light on the path we are supposed to follow. Our joy begins to grow when we decide to follow God, wherever he leads us.

Psalm 16:11 (NIV) reads, You have made known to me the path of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence, with eternal pleasures at your right hand.

I was really struggling to understand my next step in that confusing new life as a single mother. So, I prayed for direction, and God led me to a nearby church. There, he sent me to play with the handbell choir, where I began to make new friends.

I went to church one Sunday morning and stood at the front with the rest of the handbell players, concentrating on ringing my bells. I looked up and noticed that the people seated before me were all smiling and nodding their heads. Joy radiated from them.

Suddenly, joy enveloped me. I began to smile for the first time in months over something that brought me delight. At that moment, I understood God's promises to fill me with joy, in spite of the sorrows I had experienced as a result of abuse.

So, dear reader, we can see that after we leave unhealthy relationships, our joy begins with knowing and following God. Tomorrow, we will look at how God sustains us through tough times with the promise of his joy.

Today's Challenge
On a scale of 1 to 10, how would you rate the level of joy you are feeling today? If it is low, go to www.biblegateway.com and look up the word joy. You will find countless verses to remind you that God is the source of all joy.

Why Don't We Feel Joyful?

We continue this week with my series, Thriving in God's Garden, with a look at joy. As a fruit of the Spirit of God, it can make our lives more beautiful, and it spills over onto others when we share it. However, I meet more people whose lives are devoid of joy than the ones who are bubbling over. Many ask me how to find it, and I would like to share my thoughts.

What is joy?
The dictionary defines joy as:

1. the emotion of great delight or happiness caused by something exceptionally good or satisfying; keen pleasure; elation;

2. a source or cause of keen pleasure or delight; something or someone greatly valued or appreciated;

3. the expression or display of glad feeling; festive gaiety; and

4. a state of happiness or felicity.

These four definitions can help us understand that there are differences between the source of our joy, the emotion of joy that we experience, ways of expressing our joy, and a state of mental and spiritual contentment that comes when the first three are appropriately experienced.

Eeyore Christians
I get really tired of hearing other believers say with a deep sigh and furrowed brow, "I'm joyful." Their lives are a mess, often because their most important relationships are in crisis. They have become confused about feeling joy and receiving joy. They think that all they need to do is accept joy from God, and they will feel it in their broken relationships. This is a myth.

Our source of joy begins with God.
We will never find true joy in this lifetime if we don't have an intimate relationship with God. With that in place, we are capable of actually feeling joyful in our relationships with others. The only problem we run into is when we try to force ourselves into or to remain in relationships with people who are not helping us to maintain the joy that God gives us.

We can think of joy as water. God holds the water pitcher. We hold out our cups to him, and when they overflow, we can pour off some of our water into others' cups.If our cup is empty, we cannot refresh ourselves, nor can we pour one for others. All we can do is tip the cup and pour out nothing.

When we're dry to the bone due to a lack of joy that begins with God, our lives become a constant struggle. We cannot work on relationships, because we are so spiritually thirsty. Joy is as critical to survival as water, air, and food.

We can express and receive joy if we know where to pour it.
When we meet people who are bubbling over with joy, it is because they have been filled with God's Spirit. It is also because they have learned where to pour it.

Like our water pitcher image, their cups are brimming over, and the pitcher just keeps refilling them. God is that source of joy, and he promises to fill us with his Spirit. Psalm 23:5 (NIV) reminds us, You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil, my cup overflows.

This is an ideal image that we can strive for in our own lives. Imagine feeling giddy with joy, even while eating dinner with the person who hurts you the most. These verses sustain us when we are struggling, reminding us that God does not abandon us. His water pitcher is always full, and he keeps pouring until our cup overflows.

But notice that this verse doesn't say that we should make sure that we're sitting in the presense of our enemies at every meal. I can't think of a better way to destroy my joy than to force myself to spend all of my waking hours with people who would love to destroy me.

God calls us to do many things, and one that most people don't think about is that we are supposed to fiercely guard the Spirit that lives within us. St. Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians 6:14-18 (NIV):

Do not be yoked together with unbelievers. For what do righteousness and wickedness have in common"? Or what fellowship can light have with darkness? What harmony is there between Christ and Belial? What does a believer have in common with an unbeliever? What agreement is there between the temple of the living God and idols? For we are the temple of the living God. As God has said: "I will live with them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they will be my people. Therefore, come out from them and be separate," says the Lord. "Touch no unclean thing, and I will receive you. I will be a Father to you, and you will be my sons and daughters," says the Lord Almighty.

My life was once so joyless, I wanted to die. It wasn't until I realized that forcing myself to remain in relationship with unbelievers was draining all joy out of me. When I separated myself from them, I felt joy for the first time in decades.

Relationships with unbelievers can rob us of our joy.
Imagine if we each had a plastic cup for receiving a drink of water, but we cut the bottom out of it. That seems like a really dumb thing to do if we're thirsty, doesn't it?

But countless Christians are holding out their God-receiving cups with the bottoms cut out of them. God's pitcher keeps pouring in joy, but their life choices continue to destroy their ability to hold onto it.

Marriage seems to be a place where Christians haven't figured this out. They think that a relationship devoid of intimacy with an unbeliever is where they must remain, because they made a vow to God.

Please don't get me wrong here. I believe it is important to do what God tells us and to keep our promises. I hate divorce as much as the next person. But I don't believe that Christians who are married to unbelievers are supposed to martyr themselves over a marriage that is dead. These people are so devoid of joy, it breaks my heart.

They fail to see the harm that their spouse and their marriage is causing them. They don't understand that a neglectful or abusive spouse is an unfaithful spouse, whom Jesus tells us we may leave in Matthew 19:9 (NIV): I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, EXCEPT FOR MARITAL UNFAITHFULNESS, and marries another woman commits adultery.

Guilt-ridden, misinformed Christians read that line which tells them they will become adulterers if they divorce and remarry. What they miss is the phrase that comes in between: except for marital unfaithfulness. Emotional neglect or physical abuse are both forms of marital unfaithfulness. No Christian is expected to stay in a marriage with a spouse who is unfaithful. Period. They may choose to stay, but expecting to experience joy in the process is just not logical.

Many survivors of childhood abuse wind up in marriages with partners who emotionally neglect them or physically abuse them. The wounds of marital emotional neglect run much deeper than the scars of physical abuse. I know. I've been there. I would rather be beaten daily than neglected. Emotional neglect leaves us so drained of all joy that we can barely put one foot ahead of the next.

What is really sad is that these victims of marital neglect beat themselves up daily. They blame themselves for the marriage conflict, feel consumed by guilt for feeling angry about the situation which they believe God wants them to remain in, and struggle with perfectionism and control issues as they attempt to change their mates.

I lived like this for years in my first marriage, and I can honestly say that I was a shriveled-up sponge on a desert floor. There was no joy in anything, because my cup was empty, and my lifestyle just continued to drain away whatever joy God had to give.

Patch up your bottomless cup to find joy.
It is my opinion that the only way to restore our bottomless cup is to step back from a relationship that continues to eat away at our vessel. God has the ability to patch up any mistakes we've made along the way. And without that other person continually destroying our cup, God can refill it. When he does, look out!

For the first time, we understand what true joy really feels like. A cup filled to the brim and overflowing is evident in a person's life. He walks with a bounce in his step, whistles while he works, greets everyone with a broad smile, and laughs without reserve.

So, if we look like Eeyore and tell others that we're full of God's joy, we'd better prepare ourselves for a surprise. Somewhere along the way, a person with some guts will tell us that we're full of something else.

It wasn't until I quit lying to myself and to the world about being joyful that I was able to step out of that cup-destroying relationship and let God fill me up. Then, from a distance, I could see the truth about the realities of my broken marriage. God restored my cup, filled me with joy, and showed me the stupidity of dining regularly with my enemies. Today, I know what it feels likes to receive God's joy, to experience it with a husband and friends who love me deeply, and to share it with others. I pray that for you, too, dear reader.

Today's Challenge
God is our source of joy, but our relationships determine how easily we keep our cups full. If you're in a draining relationship, step back and figure out why you're allowing someone to cut the bottom out of your soul. Look at yourself and think about changing you, not the other person.

Love Your Neighbor As Yourself

This week, we have learned that God loves us so much that he gave up his only son to die for us. Therefore, we have good reason to love him in return for his graciousness to us. We are called to share that love with all people and to pray for those who have hurt us. Today, I would like to look at what it means to love our neighbors in my series, Thriving in God's Garden.

The Golden Rule
When a teacher of the law asked Jesus which commandment was the most important, this was his response. "The most important one," answered Jesus, "is this: 'Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.' The second is this: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no commandment greater than these." (Mark 12:29-31 NIV)

Love your neighbor as yourself has come to be known as The Golden Rule. There is no greater law that governs how people are supposed to treat one another. So what, exactly, does it mean to love our neighbors as ourselves?

Do you love yourself?
Many people who have suffered the trauma of childhood sexual abuse or domestic violence have very low opinions of themselves. They find it difficult to love themselves, because they either feel degraded and ashamed of themselves, or they have been brainwashed into believing that they are worthless. In order to love others, we must first learn to love ourselves.

This means that we actually accept the love that God has to offer. And when we reach out and take it from him, we love him back by changing the way we live. We give up habits that would make God feel unwelcome in our homes. And we turn away from any lifestyle that would harm our bodies. After all, God's Spirit lives inside of us when we become Christians, so we really need to keep ourselves pure.

Love people who aren't easy to love.
So, if we're behaving ourselves so that we can feel good about our lives, we can learn to share God's love with others. Most of us have no difficulty loving our children or our pets. Some have a little trouble loving spouses. Many of us struggle when it comes to loving certain neighbors, because they aren't exactly easy to love.

We used to have a neighbor who drank together with her adult children every night. While we were trying to sleep, the neighbors were shouting obscenities at one another and breaking beer bottles in their backyard. After many sleepless nights, Joe went to ask them to quiet down. That lasted about ten minutes.

The next night, we decided it was best to call the police. After a cop arrived to tell the neighbors to take their party inside, we could hear them bickering about who caused the problem and speculating that we were the people who had turned them in.

It was difficult to be pleasant to this woman, because she was drunk and surly at night and then withdrawn during the day. Nevertheless, we tried our best to be good neighbors to her. When I picked vegetables from the garden, I shared them with her. I baked cookies for her children and gave her books I had finished reading. I can't say that we ever became friends, but I tried my best to love my neighbor.

Today's Challenge
Is there someone in your life who needs to feel God's love? Perhaps there's a co-worker, a neighbor, a child down the block, or an elderly person who needs to feel a connection to God through you. Take time today to speak with that person, offer them a small gift, or do a chore for them. By loving someone else, you will find that you love yourself a little bit more in the process.

Love Your Enemies

We continue today with our series, Thriving in God's Garden, a study based on the fruit of the Spirit as described in Galatians 5:22. This week, we are learning about our love relationship with God and with others. Today, I would like to discuss how we can love our enemies.

What does the Bible say about love for our enemies?
Luke 6:27-28 (NIV) reads: But I tell you who hear me: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. Jesus spoke these words to his disciples to make three points:

1) We should never treat others spitefully, even when they abuse us;
2) We should love everyone; and
3) We should go the extra mile to express love to our enemies.

How can we protect ourselves from further abuse?
When I used to read this passage, my warning signals began going off. I knew that if I expressed love in practical ways to the abusive people in my life, they would come after me like a pack of wolves on an injured sheep.

We often mistakenly interpret this message to mean that we must put ourselves into a relationship with people who abuse us. This is not what Jesus meant. We can love them from a distance, and Jesus gave us examples of how we might do that.

Show your enemies your love in appropriate ways.
For women who have been victims of domestic violence or adults who suffered childhood sexual abuse, expressing love to their abusers can be difficult. But it is not impossible.

First, let me say that there are ways to express love to abusers that I would not recommend. If your expression of love results in your abuser verbally abusing you, emotionally destroying you at every opportunity, physically harming you, or taking advantage of you sexually for their own gratification; you should immediately remove yourself and any children from such a situation. Every individual's emotional, physical, sexual, and spiritual safety must be considered first.

Many abusers do not have the skills to live within a relationship without hurting or using others. Therefore, we must be careful to protect ourselves when we express love to them. If we are kind to them, and in return we receive more abuse, it may be time to step back and wait. In some cases, our abusers may never respond appropriately, but at least we can say we have tried.

When we are in a safe place and free from further abuse, we can find ways to express love to that person who hurt us. From a human perspective, this can feel impossible. But if we pray and ask Jesus to help us love, we may be surprised by what happens.

At first, loving our enemies begins with a lessening of the hatred and anger we feel toward them. Over time, we let go of our need to control the situation or to seek revenge. Eventually, with God's help, we can get to the point where we actually wish only good for our abusers.

When we get to that point of recovery, we can find ways to do good for our abusers and to bless them. Here are some practical ways we can bless our abusers without getting hurt again. We can:

-Stop bringing up the past and recounting all of the horrific things our abusers did. We can talk about our pain with a counselor or with God, and then let it go.
-Pray that God will bless our abusers with the fruit of the spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.
-Send our abusers simple cards of encouragement with loving Scripture verses included.
-If our abusers are incarcerated, we can send them gift packages that are provided by the prison system. These include food items, books, and games.

Don't use love to control outcomes with your enemies.
We learned in our previous series, Removing the Roadblocks to Forgiveness, that we are the last person our abuser needs to point out how he should change. If his heart is ever open, he may accept correction from someone else. This is not a job that we should take on.

Remember, the only person we can ever change is ourselves. So when we send cards or gifts, our underlying purpose must be only to express love, not to force an outcome that we desire.

When we express love to people who hate us, curse us, and do all kinds of evil things to hurt us; there is no longer much room in our hearts for returning the evil. It's hard to hate someone while expressing kindness to them. This is why Jesus encourages us to love everyone. It's a great antidote for getting stuck in a place of bitterness and revenge.

Today's Challenge
Take some time to think about how you might safely express love to someone who has hurt you. Make a list of ideas and share it with a counselor or trusted friend. Ask them to help you sort out which ideas would be most helpful to your enemy without jeopardizing your safety. Take action to express love in one way to your enemy when the timing is right.

Do You Love God?

In our current series, Thriving in God's Garden, we are focusing on the topic of love this week. Yesterday, we took time to think about the depth of God's love for us. Today, I would like to reflect upon what we are doing with that love.

Love is a two-step process.
When God sends love our way, it's the beginning of a process. Until we accept his love and return it to him, the process is incomplete. Think of someone serving a tennis ball to us, which we just stand and watch without even attempting to hit it back. We aren't in the game until we return the love that God volleys our way.

If God's love is so wonderful, why are so many of us standing with our arms dangling at our sides, watching it pass us by?

True Love versus Love Myths
As survivors of childhood sexual abuse, we frequently confuse our need for God's love with our need for reassurance and safety. We have been lied to about what love is through the perverse actions of people who were supposed to love and nurture us.

If the abuse doesn't leave us confused about love, we are further bombarded with fairy tales about handsome princes when we're little. As we grow up, chick flicks send us the mythical message that we'll be happy if we find the perfect husband.

Without a clear understanding of God's love, we may blunder into unhealthy relationships and marriages. When we don't find the mythical love that we thought was ours for the taking, we blunder back out of those relationships through divorce. And if we don't take the time to understand God's true love along the way, we may blunder through numerous marriages and divorces.

So, if mythical love is all wrong, how do we find our way to the true love that only God can offer us?

Godly men set great examples.
A healthy earthly father exhibits the fruit of the Spirit, as we learned yesterday. He is loving, joyful, peaceful, patient, kind, good, faithful, gentle, and self-controlled. If he is walking with God, he reflects God's character. Does this describe your father?

If you did not grow up with this type of father, I hope that God sent other men throughout your childhood to model these character traits for you. God sent me a neighbor, a cousin, a teacher, and a bus driver who were all excellent examples of the way a father should love his children.

So many single mothers worry that their boys need a good male role model around. But I believe it's just as important for girls to have a godly man in their lives, because it helps them to learn how to accept God's love throughout their lives. It also teaches them what to look for in a mate.

How much do you love God?
Today, I would like you to think about how much you love God. This can be a really difficult concept for people who have been abused by their fathers or other men in their families. Sexual predators made it really tough for us to love or respect God, our heavenly Father.

For years, I struggled with this concept of returning God's love. I knew that he loved me, but I could never seem to connect with him in a way that felt as if we were in a relationship.

And then I began watching movies which Joe brought home: Matthew and The Gospel of John , both produced by a company known as The Visual Bible. They are word-for-word portrayals of the Bible's descriptions of Jesus' life here on earth. They show clearly how much Jesus loves us.

In Matthew 22:37 (NIV), Jesus told his disciples, "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.'" As I watched Jesus loving his disciples, and the disciples crying over him during the crucifixion, I recognized for the first time what it would feel like to be in a love relationship with God. It moved me to tears.

Today, if you visit my house, you may find one of these movies playing in the background as I sew, clean, or cook. The Gospel messages serve as constant reminders that God offers the only true love there is. And they help me remember that it's safe and reassuring if I return that love to him.

How do we love God?
We can return God's love by praying to him, singing to him, standing in his presence, entering into a place of silence with him, listening to his voice, and appreciating his Word. In response to his love, we may shout, dance, clap, or laugh. His love may inspire us to write poetry, compose music, paint pictures, or create beautiful things that reflect that love.

We don't have to wait until we're in church to show God how much we love him. Imagine how awful we'd feel if we could only express love to others for one hour each week. We can love God all day long every day.

Today's Challenge
You may love your spouse, your kids, your cat, or even your possessions. But how much do you love God? Take time today to think about this, and if you're struggling with this concept, read the Gospel of John or watch The Visual Bible movies. Afterward, write in your journal about how God's Word changed the way you express love to God.