Just because His Spirit makes it accessible doesn’t automatically mean we are going to experience it. As with all the "fruit of the Spirit", it is dependent upon our friendship and our acknowledgment of the Lordship of Jesus. We have to act in dealing with the things that steal away our joy.

A wonderful by product of our salvation is joy. "Joy unspeakable and full of glory – full of glory – full of glory – joy unspeakable and full of glory, oh the half has never yet been told" – as the old song goes.

Joy comes from something that has changed in us, way down deep in the inner most part of our soul. Way down there it’s as if there is a 3-way switch.

I don’t have to tell you much about unhappiness since we have all been its victim. When you look in the mirror you can see it in your eyes, the set of your face, the tilt of your head, it’s even there in the slump of your shoulders. Unhappiness is a heavy burden.

Happiness is a lot more fun! It’s a lot like a piece of cherry pie with a double scoop of vanilla ice cream.

However, like the pie, happiness is not a lasting thing. Happiness is a bit fickle. There are many situations that cause happiness to evaporate faster than a drop of water on a sidewalk in Phoenix.

The last setting on this 3 way switch is - JOY!

We cannot fully experience and understand joy until we have accepted Jesus and are in a growing relationship with Him.

Joy is a fruit of the presence of the Holy Spirit in our life.

Gal 5:22 says, "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy…."

Joy is a wonderful way to live. It’s not as unstable as happiness. Circumstances don’t have to affect our joy in the Lord.

Joy is a stabilizing part of our life despite negative circumstances. Whatever happens we can continue to experience joy knowing the Lord Jesus is with us.

My purpose in this message is to help us to grow in and experience joy to the fullest.

For some of us our joy may be like a waterbed; comfortable, relaxing, and warm, but leaking. If it’s not taken care of, soon we will be sleeping on the frame.

In Philippians 4 Paul mentions 5 things that can cause our joy to leak away like the water from a waterbed. See if any of these is affecting your level of joy. If so, get to work soon in patching up the holes. The first thing that can cause us to lose our joy is:

Phil 4:2 says, "I urge Euodia and Syntyche to iron out their differences and make up. God doesn't want his children holding grudges." (THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language © 2002 by Eugene H. Peterson. All rights reserved.)

Without having been there or knowing these two women I assure you they were not experiencing joy, and it was taxing the joy level of the Church.

Tough relationships can and often do affect our joy. When we find ourselves in the midst of a difficult relationship, one or both of the parties need to be aware our joy is at stake.

Relationships are tough. It’s amazing we get along as well as we do, and we might not if it were not for the Holy Spirit living within us. Think of all the things that could cause us to have tough relationships:

Now if we are in a relationship that is headed south, here’s an opportunity to grow in the Lord and restore joy in our lives. Do something to resolve the situation. If you cannot, ask for help. Euodia and Syntyche were past resolving this and needed help.

The second thing that can take away our joy is found in Philippians 4:6.

"Don't fret or worry. Instead of worrying, pray. Let petitions and praises shape your worries into prayers, letting God know your concerns." (THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language © 2002 by Eugene H. Peterson. All rights reserved.)

The joy robber here is:

One might want to say to Paul, perhaps under their breath, "What do you mean? You aren’t married. You don’t have teens in your home. You don’t have grown children. Your parents aren’t aging. You aren’t facing a lay off. And did you hear about Katrina, did you hear what that horrible storm may do to the price of oil? What do you mean don’t worry?"

Paul may not have had teenagers, but he had joy. He’s telling us when we grow in our Lord; joy can begin to replace worry!

Get this into your noggin: God cares about us! He wants us to succeed. He is there to hear our prayers and answer them. God hasn’t saved us to simply leave us here to worry and fret!

Think for a moment about your biggest worry in life? Name it! Get a fix on it. Now ask yourself these questions:

•What good has it done to worry about it?

•How much joy have you lost by worrying about it?

•Isn’t our God bigger than your worry? – Hand it over to him right now!

Paul gives us two options. The first is to continue to worry and watch our joy level fall to zero at an alarming rat. The second is to pray, knowing God listens and watches our joy grow as worry fades.

There’s another thought found in verse eight and it suggests another source of leaking joy:

Philippians 4:8 says, "Summing it all up, friends, I'd say you'll do best by filling your minds and meditating on things true, noble, reputable, authentic, compelling, gracious — the best, not the worst; the beautiful, not the ugly; things to praise, not things to curse." (THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language © 2002 by Eugene H. Peterson. All rights reserved.)

The issue here is:

Have you ever considered this? The things we allow to fill our minds can be joy producers or they can be the cause of joy getting away from us.

What do we fill our mind with? Where are we allowing our thoughts to go?

Don’t shake your head at me too hard, but I enjoy a good ol’ George Jones country song once in awhile.

However, almost all my CD’s in my car are either sermons or Christian music and my radio station is set to K-Love. Why? I want my thoughts to be on the Lord and his glory and praise. I want to be reminded of his wonder, and aware of his presence. I want my time when I’m alone in my car to be a worship experience.

Where our thoughts are will determine our joy altitude.

Gentlemen, let your thoughts be only for your wife, don’t let them drift; they have no right to be for anyone else. You know what I mean.

Ladies, let your thoughts be only for your husband, don’t let them drift; they have no right to be for anyone else. You know what I mean.

If our thoughts are where the Holy Spirit directs them, we are growing and joy is consuming our life.

Yet if our thoughts are out there where they do not belong, then here is a challenge to grow in Jesus, as we obey the Spirit and move past these areas, recapturing our joy.

We need to take the next step in growing in Jesus, friends. We need to, with the help of God, keep our thought life under control.

Listen to 2 Corinthians 10:5: "We are destroying speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God, and we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ." (NASB)

There’s a fourth joy robber implied in verses 10-11:

"I'm glad in God, far happier than you would ever guess — happy that you're again showing such strong concern for me. Not that you ever quit praying and thinking about me. You just had no chance to show it. Actually, I don't have a sense of needing anything personally. I've learned by now to be quite content whatever my circumstances." (THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language © 2002 by Eugene H. Peterson. All rights reserved.)

The source of joy loss here is:

This is one of our greatest obstacles to joy in America today.

Scott and Freedom went to Guinea as bible translators. You won’t find Carnival Cruise Lines with a lot of their fun ships going there. We are talking primitive. We’re talking spiders, insects, snakes, and all types of creepy critters that live in that humid land.

The only thing that flushes in some regions of the country is your face from the heat. Running water is in the stream. A microwave is thought to be just a small greeting.

Why did this couple come home happy and full of joy? How come they returned with a smile?

Is it a life of deprivation that will bring us joy? Is it a life of wealth that will bring us joy?

Is it a life of just getting by that brings us joy?

No to all three.

Learning to be content with where we are and what we have at the moment brings us joy because or relationship with Jesus - regardless of our current status - is bursting all about us, like fireworks on the 4th of July.

•If we have nothing, can we pray for something? Sure we can.

•If we are rich, should we give it all away and be poor? We don’t have too.

•Can we pray for more if we’re just getting by? I hope we will because God wants to bless us.

When we have Jesus we have everything eternity has to offer us.

Contentment is a beautiful way of life. It’s joy producing.

On the other hand, jealousy, envy, and discouragement with what we have and don’t have will cause joy to shrivel up and die in us.

If your joy is ebbing away, take a look at contentment. A lack of it will sour you to the core, but prayerfully seeking God to become content will bless your life refilling it with joy in Jesus!

A fifth source of leaking joy is implied in what Paul says in verse 14:

"Yet it was good of you to share in my troubles." (NIV)

These Philippians Christians had been generous. And the opposite of generosity – and a real joy robber, is:

Joyful people are generous rather than stingy people.

Jesus once said, Acts 20:35 – "It is more blessed to give than to receive."

As our journey with Jesus continues, we begin to act like He acts, think like He thinks, and do what He does. Jesus isn’t stingy. He’s generous. He gave his all for us. His life has changed ours. His life is still changing ours.

I recently was chatting with a Christian friend who, by the way, is so full of joy that I shake his hand a little longer to get a bit of his extra. He doesn’t need all that joy! J He shared with me how one of the families he goes to church with is getting by but things were tight. He overheard the husband say recently that he hadn’t been able to take his wife out for a meal in months. My friend sent them a $20.00 gift certificate. Another family was having some troubles and their phone was disconnected, so he sent them a $50.00 bill. There was another person in need and I don’t recall why, but he sent them a $50.00 bill too.

Then my friend shared with me that he had just received a huge bill in the mail for $9000.00. He wasn’t sure how to pay it. Than at a class reunion, one of his former classmates told him how much he appreciated him and that he had been an inspiration to him. The classmate told him how he had heard that a member of this friend’s family had been ill. He told him that when the medical bills arrive, he should just send them to him. God had blessed him and he wanted to bless his former high school pal.

Be generous! Don’t be stingy. Help your brothers and sisters when it’s appropriate. Do good things with the blessings God has given to you. Share. Bless. You will get far more from sharing than what you give.

We all know that the Siletz Church was burned to the ground. Thank you all for sharing in the check we mailed them. God will bless your generosity!

While we praise God for what we have, we need a new building, with more visibility and a parking lot, and no stairs. Thank you for over $6100.00 since January. God will bless and reward your generosity!

Be generous. Trust in God. You’ll experience joy. This Jesus adventure is more fun than raking leaves up in a pile and then running and jumping into them and messing them all up.

Joy is a wonderful way to live our lives.

But here’s a word of caution: Just because His Spirit makes it accessible doesn’t automatically mean we are going to experience it. As with all the "fruit of the Spirit", it is dependent upon our friendship and our acknowledgment of the Lordship of Jesus. We have to act in dealing with the things that steal away our joy.

For as we draw closer to him, chat with him, read his biographies, and his words, as we hear others talk about him, as we hear testimonies of how lives have changed because of Him, we begin to and continue to change, to look more like him, to bear a family resemblance, to act more like him, to think more like him, to grow into his likeness.

Now isn’t that "Joy unspeakable and full of glory..."?

Copyright © 2005. Alan Walker is minister of the Arcata Church of Christ in Arcata, California. Used by permission. Permission is granted by the author and by The Preacher's Study to use this document in total or in sermon preparation in the context of the local congregation only. Publishing it in a book, on the Internet, or any place beyond the local congregation is prohibited.