“The Bible insists that joy is more than a feeling: it’s an action. We don’t just sense joy; we embody it by how we respond to the circumstances before us.” Margaret Feinberg
The past few years – yes, years – I have struggled to understand the concept of joy. Although the Word of God refers to joy numerous times, I somehow still struggled to grasp it. Even more convicting, I didn’t always experience the joy the Bible speaks of in my everyday life, and I wasn’t sure what to do to get it.
After studying the Word, I realised that joyfulness as the Bible describes it does not refer to simply being happy or glad. It runs much deeper than that. Biblical joy is joy that infiltrates every aspect of your existence, including your marriage. It is not dependent on circumstances, events or actions, and it cannot be quenched.
In Psalm 4:7 it is written: “You have filled my heart with greater joy than when their grain and new wine abound.”(NIV – study Bible). The emphasis in this verse is on the word ‘heart’. The heart is the centre of the human spirit and the source of our emotions, thoughts, motivations, and actions, and therefore the place where our joy originates and resides. Proverbs 4:23 says that we must guard our hearts, since it is the wellspring of life.
The purpose of a spring is to sustain whatever is stored in it. Importantly, it can only bring forth what is stored within. If what it contains is good, it will bring forth good, and if evil, it will bring forth evil. We are the guardians of our wellspring. It’s our responsibility to ensure that the contents of our wellspring – our heart – do not become contaminated.
So, how do we fill our hearts with joy? This is where obedience to God comes in. Psalm 19:8 says, “The precepts of the LORD are right, giving joy to the heart. The commands of the LORD are radiant, giving light to the eyes.” (NIV). In other words, if we keep God’s commandments and align our lives with what the Word says, we will experience joy. Over time, we build up a reservoir of joy in our hearts that brings light to our lives.
This realisation brought me to the conclusion that the joy that is spoken of in the Bible is not of this world. Nothing or no one in the world can give us the everlasting joy of God’s Word. And no substitute that the world may offer comes close to it. Pure joy comes directly from God.
To experience this joy, it’s vital that you engage with, meditate on, and obey God’s Word regularly. When you do this, you will fill the wellspring of your heart with Godly thoughts and desires. What’s more, the Holy Spirit will help you retrieve and draw strength from this stored-up knowledge to face life with confidence. As it is written in Nehemia 8:10 “…for the joy of the Lord is your strength.”
Biblical joy is rooted in the realisation that through Him we already have victory – not victory as the world may see it, but victory in heaven’s eyes. It’s the type of joy that makes us feel safe and protected, providing a refuge from which we can do life.
In what way does all of this influence your marriage? To sustain joy in your marriage, you need to learn, obey and store up God’s commands relating to marriage. After all, as the Designer of marriage, God knows what your marriage needs to flourish.
This may sound like work and effort, and it is. But not in the way you may think. The ‘work’ is simply to let go, sit down at the feet of the Designer, and listen to what He has to say about marriage – how you must speak to and of one another, how to act towards your spouse when you feel you’ve been wronged, how to do deal with life’s challenges together. Then, you must guard this knowledge so that it does not get contaminated with what the world says your marriage must be like. In other words, it’s about listening, being obedient and guarding. When you do this, you’ll experience joy in your marriage, even when things aren’t perfect – and as we all know, they seldom are.
True joy has nothing to do with your own strength and knowledge. It’s all about God and allowing Him to shape all your thoughts and actions through His Word. When you do this, the joy of God will spill into every aspect of your life, including your marriage.
Questions to think and talk about:
- Do you live out your relationship as a joyous couple? In what ways?
- How can you be more joyful as a couple?
- What are the obstacles in your relationship that hinder joy and how can you address these?