Be Filled With Joy... Series Two

To be filled with Joy is when our spirit becomes one with the Lord. You see Joy is a spirit to spirit experience, it has to do with settling the accounts of your life with God. It touches your soul in a way that you can no longer deny the changes going on within you, and it opens your eyes to see the extraordinary things that God is doing around you. It is the greatness of God revealed in your life, that developed in you over a period of time.

Joy is confidence, certainty, resolution, and submission, it more than happiness, or pleasure. Joy does not come out of thin air, it is a state of ones heart that develops and matures, a heart not being afraid of endings or beginning, and is open to embrace all of life with joy. Joy is realizing what you can or cannot do, it is a settled state of the soul, it accepts the fact that you can't fix everything, change someone, or please everybody. Joy is loving, and expressing, who you are, what you stand for, and in whom you believe in. Joy is the best make up and wardrobe to wear each day.

In James 1:2 it says, "Consider it pure Joy whenever you face trials of many kinds," another translation says, "Whenever trouble comes your way let it be an opportunity for Joy." He did not give us a command to be happy, or say we should always have a smile on our face, he knew only his Joy could make us walk with our head held high, and allow us to face each day with a confidence and assurance that he in control. His Joy is the calmness in the center of the storm, the anchor that keeps us in place when everything around us is being swept away and broken in pieces. It's the holy spirit working on the inside, so that we can spread his Joy and encourage others despite our own afflictions, battles, or circumstances.

An old Cherokee Expression says, When you do things from your soul, you feel a river moving in you, a joy. Allow yourself to trust joy and embrace it. You will find you dance with everything. Gloom we have always with us, a rank and sturdy weed, but joy requires tending.

The more I study on Joy, the more I am filled with it, that is what joy requires. It is making sure the enemy knows it is being well guarded and always being tended to by the word of God, prayer, and by a soul totally sold out for him. The spark of life is within each of us, and to create a lifetime of joy ,we simply need to to live a soul centered life that is filled with the Joy of the Lord.

Prayer: Dear Lord, please become the center of my Joy today.
Make my spirit one with yours so I may know true Joy in my life and for myself. I want your greatness to be revealed in my life, I want to walk in the full confidence of your joy, with my head held high no matter what circumstances I may be facing. I know that as long as I have you in my life, I will also have your Joy, as well as your strength... Amen

Encouragement From My Heart Devotions 2008

Join me next Sunday for Series 3: The Joy Snatchers