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Joy

Joy in the Bible is different than happiness or pleasure cause by your environment. Joy is not environmental. It is a vertical relationship. It is expressed in shouting and singing.

Joy is received when a person turns from death to life. It is a fruit of the Spirit. It is a companion of love and peace, but it is not love and peace.

We are told to “rejoice in the Lord always—again, I say, rejoice!” The joy that we are commanded to express always is in the Lord.

We are commanded to have this joy always. Is there a reason, biblically, to not have joy? Yes. We see it in Hebrews 12:5-11.
And have you forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons? “My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor be weary when reproved by him. For the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and chastises every son whom he receives.” It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline? If you are left without discipline, in which all have participated, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. Besides this, we have had earthly fathers who disciplined us and we respected them. Shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits and live? For they disciplined us for a short time as it seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good, that we may share his holiness. For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.
There it is. No chastening is joyous for the present, but painful. Afterwards, it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.

The reason we are chastened by God is that we have unconfessed sin. “But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin…If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:7, 9).

If we walk in the light, we will be in joy.

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