“Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!” – Philippians 4:4.
In this verse Apostle Paul gives a command to “Rejoice in the Lord Always, and repeats his statement in order to make an emphasis of the importance of what he is saying. The word ‘rejoice’, in Greek is “Chairo” and it means the following: To be cheerful, be happy, be well, be glad, be merry and to express continual joy.
Notice that the verse says rejoice IN the Lord. Someone might say how can I rejoice and be happy when I am going through such and such a thing, the last thing I want to do is shout for joy. This is why the verse says “Rejoice IN the LORD”. It does not say rejoice in your problems and struggles. We rejoice in the Lord. He is the same yesterday, today and forever. He does not change. He is with us and will never leave us nor forsake us. He must be the object and focus of our rejoicing. No matter what I might be going through, I will rejoice in my Lord and believe that He will take me through to the other side. This is what Paul and Silas did when they had been beaten and put into a jail in Acts 16:25, they rejoiced, prayed and worshipped God and God performed a mighty miracle of deliverance. Their attitude was one of rejoicing in the Lord and therefore no circumstance positive or negative could take that away.
Notice that the verse also says “Always”. Rejoicing in the Lord must be done always. This expression of Joy towards Him, cannot be just a Sunday thing or when everything is going well. It is a posture and an attitude we must learn to cultivate daily towards our heavenly Father. To always rejoice in the Lord is to not allow ourselves to be lead by our feelings, because if that is the case we will not rejoice in Him always and will only rejoice when we feel like it. Thus we discard the benefit that comes from rejoicing in the Lord Always. Does this mean that when things are going bad, I have to pretend and put on a happy face Pastor? No, but it does mean that you will not lose your joy. The Bible says: there is a time to laugh and a time to weep, a time to dance and a time to mourn. But as believers we can cry, and be sad in the natural but not lose our joy. And that is the key.
When it comes to our everyday living, tasks, demands and living for God, it is important that we do not allow the devil to steal our Joy. When you start losing your Joy, signals should be going off on the inside of you that something is not right. If not taken serious, the Christian life, family life and everything that goes along with that starts to become a burden, frustrating, hard and we are not much fun to be around. When we become grumpy, and do things with a bad attitude, and it is like we are doing it by force, it means we are losing the joy and must endeavour to get it back. If serving the Lord and going to Church, being a husband and or a wife, working in your business and so on has become a burden and you have lost the joy, I encourage you to heed to these warning signs and take back your joy. Put your focus back on God, get alone with Him and allow Him to refresh you once again and take your focus off the issues, your Joy will begin to come back.
The Bible says in Psalms 28:7 “The Joy of the Lord is my strength” Wow!! Keep your joy, do not let anyone, any circumstance or situation take it away from you.
King David said “Restore unto me the JOY of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me” Psalm 51:12.
It’s yours today in Jesus name. Prophesy, that your joy is back and here to stay!!
Ps Esteban