As a father and husband one of my greatest pleasures is seeing my family joyful. The laughter of my wife and children reaches down deep inside me and awakens my soul. There is no greater pleasure, it is a double joy for me.
When they are happy, I feel it, I partake with them and I am happy in their happiness.
Love abounds between us when their joy is mine and my joy is theirs.
Love does not seek it's own private limited happiness but instead seeks it's joy in the joy of others.
This is the way God loves us.
God is most glorified when we are most satisfied in him.
The chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy him forever.
Oswald Chambers-My Utmost for His Highest
God is Honored when we delight in Him. Worship is a way of gladly reflecting back to God the radiance of his worth. Worship is an end in itself. It is the final end for which we were created. We get the joy in Him, He gets the honor from us. Worship must be honest, pure, and from the heart.
The minute you turn your eyes in on yourself and become conscience of experiencing joy, it is gone. The secret of joy is self forgetfulness.
True worship is simply delighting yourself in God's presence without the need to validate yourself by delighting in God's presence correctly.
Loving God and delighting in Him should be the work of our lives. The hope of Heaven brings joy and joy brings strength.
J. I. Packard
The joy of the Lord is your strength.
Nehemiah 8:10
To keep joy in worship we must not let our worship decline to performance, not let our childlike awe and wonder be choked by unbiblical views of virtue, and not let poetry and music about our relationship with God shrivel up and die.
If you come to God doubtfully offering Him the reward of your fellowship instead of thirsting after the reward of His fellowship, then you exert yourself above God as his benefactor and belittle Him as a needy beneficiary-- that is evil.
The only way to come to God in worship is to come to him needy because his presence is fullness of joy.
“Without the heart, it is no worship; it is a stage play, an acting a part… We may be truly said to worship God, though we [lack] perfection; but we cannot be said to worship Him if we [lack] sincerity.”
Stephen Charnock
Our joy is not static. It fluctuates with real life. It is vulnerable to Satan's attacks. The preservation of our joy in God takes work. When Satan huffs and puffs and wants to blow out the flame of or joy, we have our endless supply of kindling in the word of God.
The joy of the Lord will arm us against the assaults of our spiritual enemies and put our mouth out of taste for those pleasures with which the tempster baits the hooks.
Matthew Henry
Lift up your voices and open your hearts and enjoy God. You have a capacity for joy that you can scarcely imagine.
Out of Faith grows the flower of Joy!