Quotes about Joy

The happiest people in the world are those who have a deep, gratitude-drenched relationship with Christ.

Anyone who waits for happiness will never be happy.

Emily peered at him and frowned, then began to dance on the grass. "Okay, Daddy," Emily said. "When you're ready to dance with me, this is what you do. First, you put your right hand around my waist like this, then hold your other hand out like this. Then we sway back and forth to the music." Face animated, she gestured gracefully while talking, lost in the moment

God loves a cheerful giver" (2 Corinthians 9:7). This doesn't mean we should give only when we're feeling cheerful. The cheerfulness often comes during and after the act of obedience, not before it. So don't wait until you feel like giving—it could be a long wait! Just give and watch the joy follow.

When we fail to acknowledge God as the Source of all good things, we fail to give Him the recognition and glory He deserves. We separate God from joy, which is like trying to separate heat from fire or wetness from rain.

She was home (in Heaven). She was with the Person she was made for, in the place that was made for her.

Christ is the desire of nations, the joy of angels, the delight of the Father. What solace then must that soul be filled with, that has the possession of Him to all eternity!" —John Bunyan

C. S. Lewis put it this way: We are halfhearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at sea. We are far too easily pleased.5 Even many Christians have settled for a life of unsatisfying material acquisitions, like making mud pies in a slum.

I'm not always happy, any more than I'm always holy. But by God's grace, I'm happier in Christ now than I've ever been.

We don't pretend all is well. But knowing God's commands to rejoice in him through his all-sufficient power, we meditate on his Word and call on him to impart his gladness to us. In time God exchanges our natural responses with his supernatural, joy-giving presence. Sometimes sorrow and joy do battle; sometimes they coexist, but when our hearts and minds are on Christ, joy is never far away:

Good-hearted laughter is a tribute to the happy God, who created laughter and delights to enter into it with us.

Romans 8 contains a powerful theology of suffering. There's the groaning of those dying without hope, and in contrast, the groaning of those in childbirth. Both processes are painful, yet they are very different. The one is the pain of hopeless dread, the other the pain of hopeful anticipation. The Christian's pain is very real, but it's the pain of a mother anticipating the joy of holding her child. It