Sharing the happiness of God, part 22, etymology, source, and happiness in suffering.; John 15:11.

Title: Sharing the happiness of God, part 22, etymology, source, and happiness in suffering.; John 15:11.

 

e. Happiness is knowing that I can’t control my surroundings, but there is One who is in control of it all and He will work these things for my good if I love Him.

together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.

ROM 8:28 And we know that God causes all things to work

 

This is not letting go and letting God, but rather a comfort that comes from Him that whatever you can’t find resources to accomplish that He will. This is not a promise to the lazy, but a promise to the weak, as we all are, who is not lazy.

 

There is a purpose with little doctrine or a lot, and that is pursuing God’s interests.

 

ROM 8:38 For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers,

 

ROM 8:39 nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

 

2. Etymology of “happiness” and its cognates in the New Testament.

 

 cara,[chara] - noun = joy, delight, gladness, happiness.

 

 cai,rw[chairo] - verb = to rejoice, to be glad, to be joyful, to be happy.

 

 maka,rioj[makarios] - adjective = a joy or happiness that results from residence in God’s plan, usually translated, “blessed.” [verb “makarizo” is also used].

 

Makarios is a word with great depth of meaning. It reveals to us that a blessing is something that you have the capacity to enjoy, therefore, true blessing is the happiness of God. Some people count a certain person or thing or situation a “blessing” when it will eventually only make them miserable, therefore it is not a blessing at all.

 

3. Happiness must come from doctrine and the filling of the Holy Spirit.

 

John 15:11 "These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made full.

 

 “These things” refers to all the principles of mystery doctrine spoken by the Lord in the upper room so far, starting with the foot washing.

 

Perhaps the greatest and most succinct way of recalling what has been taught so far is His outline of the spiritual life for the Church that will result in fruit bearing and impersonal unconditional love.

 

With love comes a lack of MAS. With love comes recognition of value and potential in another. With the soul free from competition, free from mental attitude sins, free from self-absorption, which gives great capacity for life.

 

 Agapan: A mental attitude impersonal, unconditional love from mature virtue that recognizes the value of an object, producing a self-sacrificial preference and regard for its benefit even if hated. It is without sin and is not motivated by any affection or attraction.

 

John 17:13 "But now I come to Thee; and these things I speak in the world, that they may have My joy made full in themselves.

 

ROM 14:17 [happiness from FHS]

for the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.

 

ROM 15:13 [happiness from faith in the word of God]

Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.

 

The God of hope is a title that relates God as the One who can and will deliver your future. Hope is faith and confidence in the future where God will continue to provide for you and deliver you from all calamities as He has done in the past.

 

Matt 6:32-33

For all these things the Gentiles eagerly seek [security for the future, i.e. exodus generation]; for your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added to you.

 

GAL 5:22-23

 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.

 

Phil 1:25

And convinced of this, I know that I shall remain and continue with you all for your progress and joy in the faith,

 

COL 1:9 For this reason also, since the day we heard of it, we have not ceased to pray for you and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding,

 

COL 1:10 so that you may walk in a manner worthy of the Lord [abiding in Him, in the sphere of love], to please Him in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God;

 

COL 1:11 strengthened with all power [FHS and PM of BD], according to His glorious might, for the attaining of all steadfastness [secure foundation] and patience [waiting on the timing of God]; joyously

 

COL 1:12 giving thanks to the Father [the result of reaching the super-grace life], who has qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints in light.

 

You inheritance and your qualification for it will not become a reality to you, nor will it become a part of you, if you are not filled with the knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding. Joyously giving thanks is a reciprocal happiness to God after He has shared His happiness with you.

 

4. Happiness results from faith in the unseen, but which God’s word says is real.

 

John 20:29

Jesus said to him, "Because you have seen Me, have you believed? Blessed are they who did not see, and yet believed."

 

Blessed is that happiness that results from residing in God’s plan for your life.

 

2 Cor 5:7

for we walk by faith, not by sight

 

ROM 8:24 For in hope we have been saved, but hope that is seen is not hope; for why does one also hope for what he sees?

 

ROM 8:25 But if we hope for what we do not see, with perseverance we wait eagerly for it.

 

2 Cor 4:16 Therefore we do not lose heart, but though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day.

 

2 Cor 4:17 For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison,

 

2 Cor 4:18 while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal.

 

GAL 2:20

I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me, and delivered Himself up for me.

 

HEB 10:38 But My righteous one shall live by faith;

And if he shrinks back, My soul has no pleasure in him.

 

HEB 11:1 Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

 

HEB 11:27 By faith he [Moses] left Egypt, not fearing the wrath of the king; for he endured, as seeing Him who is unseen.

 

1 Peter 1:8

and though you have not seen Him, you love Him, and though you do not see Him now, but believe in Him, you greatly rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory,

 

5. God’s happiness does not diminish in times of underserved suffering.

 

HEB 10:32 But remember the former days, when, after being enlightened, you endured a great conflict of sufferings,

 

HEB 10:33 partly, by being made a public spectacle through reproaches and tribulations, and partly by becoming sharers with those who were so treated.

 

HEB 10:34 For you showed sympathy to the prisoners, and accepted joyfully the seizure of your property, knowing that you have for yourselves a better possession and an abiding one.

 

HEB 10:35 Therefore, do not throw away your confidence, which has a great reward.

 

HEB 10:36 For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God, you may receive what was promised.

 

COL 1:24

Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I do my share on behalf of His body (which is the church) in filling up that which is lacking in Christ's afflictions.

 

2 Cor 6:1And working together with Him, we also urge you not to receive the grace of God in vain — 

 

“grace of God in vain” - Grace has been revealed but rejected and so it has not become a part of the soul.

 

2 Cor 6:2 for He says,

"At the acceptable time I listened to you,

And on the day of salvation I helped you";

 

behold, now is "the acceptable time," behold, now is "the day of salvation" — 

 

2 Cor 6:3 giving no cause for offense in anything, in order that the ministry be not discredited [living in your virtue before the unbeliever],

 

And now we have a list of various pressures that God allows that we may be tested. You can only overcome pressure with the Oval Office - the command center where Jesus Christ and God the Father use the doctrine that is built up within your human spirit, which is what we call the edification structure of the soul.

 

People cannot look inside you and see your soul. Your soul is hidden from view.

 

In order to reveal to the worlds, both men and angels, the beauty and power of BD within, God turns the believer inside out by allowing pressure.

 

Naturally, God will not give more than you are able to bear, but:

 

When you have capacity, pressure becomes a wonderful thing in which you express the doctrine you have been learning, and therefore pressure becomes a source of happiness.

 

2 Cor 6:4 but in everything commending ourselves as servants of God, in much endurance, in afflictions, in hardships, in distresses,

 

 “commending ourselves as servants of God” - to stand with God as ministers; to demonstrate ourselves as ministers of God’s reflected glory.

 

A minister in this context is every believer. Every believer is in full time Christian service as a servant to God. A believer can be a good servant or minister, or a bad one, but as one placed in union with Christ he is a full time minister, whether he recognizes it or not. This phrase means to stand with God with common principles and thoughts and to project them to the worlds as ambassadors of the same. In the hope of this there is suffering that results in pressure.  

 

2 Cor 6:4 but in everything commending ourselves as servants of God [demonstrating ourselves as ministers of God’s reflected glory], in much endurance, in afflictions, in hardships, in distresses,

 

2 Cor 6:5 in beatings, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labors, in sleeplessness, in hunger,

 

Suffering is designed by God to be a great blessing to the believer. God wouldn’t let us suffer in time if it was not His plan and it didn’t have a good purpose - searching for Him.

 

In this passage endurance or faith rest comes in nine areas. All of these nine areas have the same structure.

 

All nine areas of testing are put in prepositional phrases; en plus the locative case, which means “in the sphere of…”

 

In the sphere of means that it wraps itself around you. Don’t fear it, and don’t run away from it, in these things your happiness that you share with God will come to fruition.

 

a. “In the sphere of afflictions” — qliyij[[thlipsis] means the closing in of the walls until they crush you. This is a word which means pressure, mental pressure, from distressing circumstances of life. Mental pressure reveals the ECS, the beauty of the new man in the soul.

 

b. “In the sphere of hardships” — avnagkh [anagke] which means to compress, it means compulsion, it means to use torture, to be bullied, to have people intrude upon your own volition, your privacy.

 

The noun is actually used for some form of compulsion which can be threefold: loss of freedom, being bullied, being bullied.

 

These are gradations of loss of freedom. Loss of freedom simply means sticking their nose in your business. Being bullied means they are trying to force you into a false system. Being tortured, of course, is obvious. This should be translated ‘in the sphere of compulsions.’

 

c. “In the sphere of distresses” — stenokwria[stenokoria] which means excruciating pain of soul or body. It means anguish, distress or troubles.

 

This is a general term for trouble, the other two were specifics; “and in general troubles of life.” God has so designed something whereby you can reflect His glory.

 

d. “In the sphere of beatings” — plhgh[plege] means wounds, blows, bruises. In other words, it refers to violence. The believer priest is going to be subjected to various types of violence.