All normal people want to be happy. Aristotle observed that happiness is the goal of human life. For our Americans, the pursuit of happiness is even enshrined as a self-expressive and unreliable right in the Declaration of Independence. We can all agree that we want to be happy, but it's much harder to find a consensus when we ask what happiness is and how we can achieve it.
For Americans (and most of the West), despite their differences of opinion about the finer details, happiness is closely related to being faithful to ourselves in accordance with our own mind and personal fulfillment. For example, 84% of Americans.”believe “The best goal in life is to enjoy it as much as possible.” 86% believe that in order to be satisfied you need to “pursuing the most what you want.” 91% assert that “the best way to find yourself is to look inside you.”
“The more you worship yourself, the less you become. You become shadows, ghosts, your own crippling.
These ideals are part of the cultural atmosphere we breathe, and we see them embedded in the whole of popular culture. One song on Disney's “Mulan” soundtrack advises listeners: The 1994 animation “Thumbelina” is sung by narrator Jackiemo.
On her hit song “The Voice In in,” Christina Aguilera countered the listener and said, “Look inside me… just trust your voice.”
Humorously as theologian Thadeus Williams I'll observe“There are enough targeted self-worship pop songs to fill a year-long playlist. Listen to songs about backing authority, that your wild dreams will all come true, that being Supergirl, or that the animal goddess roars the people's expectations for breakfast.”
Along a similar line, TV producer and screenwriter Shondalimus Fight“Happiness comes from living the way you want it to, as your inner voice says to you.
Apple co-founder Steve Jobs in Stanford University's opening speech I said The alumni said, “And most importantly, they have the courage to follow your mind and intuition. They somehow already know what you really want to be. Everything else is secondary.”
For Christians, this advice based on God's sovereignty has an element of truth. Our individual personalities, interests, and desires are part of the person God has made us (see, for example, Psalm 139:13-16; Jeremiah 1:5). These are all signs (though not necessarily definitive) of the goals and dreams we pursue in life. As Dallas Willard I'm writing“Because we are God's co-workers, our desires and desires are… important to God, and for us God's plan (Corinthians 3:9 kjv)” in particular Frederic Bookner observation“The place where God calls you is where your deep joy meets the deep hunger of the world.” It goes too far to make this a universal principle, but in God's sovereignty, many Christians have found this to be true.
The important difference between Christians is that our desires and goals must be submitted to God's will and direction, and that the way we pursue them must be in line with the Bible.
As Thomas Tarrant comment“When our desires are at the heart of God, they are good and play the intended role. But when they are self-centered, when our desires are captured in the fallen world and the sinful nature (flesh), they are evil. These are called disorganized love.”
Even Christians need to regularly assess our desires to ensure that they are not the fruit of disability love. Martin Luther states that with the fall, our human nature is “deeply bent into itself,” and therefore “not only directing God's greatest gift to ourselves,” “to evil… seeking everything for itself, even God.”
This is why self-focused approaches to happiness always fail, especially when God is excluded. Our Falling Pride, Timothy Keller I'm writing“We work under the illusion that we have the ability to run our own lives, achieve a sense of self-worth, and find a purpose large enough to give the meaning of a life without God.” Furthermore, “If we look to some created things to give us the meaning, hope, and happiness that only God himself can give, it ultimately fails to save and destroy our hearts.”
Actor Jim Carrey was once insightful I made a comment In an interview, “Everyone becomes rich and famous and I think we can see everything they dream of, that's not the answer.”
Shalom's Road
If happiness does not reach by chasing our minds and being faithful to ourselves, how can we get it?
The Bible's concept of happiness is best captured by the Hebrew word “Shalom.” His New Testament counterpart is “eirēnē”. Both are often translated into English as “peace.”
Philosopher Nicholas Walterstorff proposes that better translations of Shalom are “prospering.” He said, “To experience Shalom is to thrive in all relationships: to thrive with God, my fellow man, non-human creations and myself.”
Because both us and creation fall, the new heaven and the earth will not experience happiness to the fullest extent (Revelation 21). However, the Wolterstorff category includes key elements for experiencing happiness in our daily lives. We'll explore each of the following in a simple way:
Relationship with God
Our relationship with God is fundamental and thrives in two other categories: Self and Others.
In the early chapters of Genesis, God discovered that humans were designed to exist in relation to humans, and that relationship was cut off due to the rebellion of the first couple (Genesis 1-3; Romans 5:12). As a result, humans are born into a “dead” world [our] Violation and sin” (Ephesians 2:1).
But the Father sent his Son to save mankind, so we now “have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 5:1). Because of this restored relationship, Christians now “in the heavenly realm with all the spiritual blessings of Christ” (Ephesians 1:3). We unite with Christ and draw life from Him through the Holy Spirit (John 7:38; 14:16-18; 15:4-5).
Christians can thrive as humans because we can know and love God, as we can achieve the ultimate end we were created. Blaise Pascal said he was insightful:
Humans once had real happiness, but now only marks and traces of the sky remained on him. …But all of these are insufficient. Because infinite depth byte can only be satisfied by an infinite and immutable object, namely God Himself.
Our relationship with ourselves
As mentioned before, for autumn, our humanity has become “deeply bent in itself.” Romans 1 explains the degeneration that occurred. Our thoughts have become wasted and our hearts have become darker. We became idolaters and God handed us over to evil. We are “full of all kinds of evil, evil, greed, descent” (Romans 1:29).
These evils have led us in the opposite direction of prosperity. Cornelius Plantinga Jr. said, “Not only is God violating his laws, but he hates sin more effectively, but because it breaks peace, because it breaks the way things should be assumed.”
To reverse what was lost in autumn and bring us back to the place of wholeness, God will salvation and regenerate us, making us a new creation (Cor. 5:17). We have a “new self made like God in true righteousness and holiness” (Ephesians 4:24:24). This new self is “updated with knowledge of its creator's image,” and we say. [God’s] Images by the power of the spirit” (2 Corinthians 3:18).
This redness is a continuing source of peace and joy for our followers. Because we are “a reminder that we are more sinful than we ever believe and that we are flawed ourselves.
Relationship with others
Just as the falls destroyed our relationship with God and our relationship with ourselves, it exploded our relationship with others as well. After Genesis 3, we find that shame and responsibility have been distorted by the harmony that Adam and Eve enjoyed (Genesis 3:7, 12). Instead of living in God's intended unity and mutual support, humanity has become more susceptible to hostility, division and violence (Genesis 4:8; 6:11–12).
The Bible testifies that in Christ the “splitting of hostility” between people is broken (Ephesians 2:14). Through his death and resurrection, Jesus creates “one new humanity of ourselves” (Ephesians 2:15), and invites us into a new family where earthly differences do not divide us. Paul reminds us that “there are no Jews, no Gentiles, no slaves, no freedom, no men or women.” In this new community we learn to burden each other (Galatians 6:2), forgive one another while we are allowed (Colossians 3:13), and spur each other “toward love and good deeds” (Hebrews 10:24).
When we come to Christ, the Holy Spirit shapes us like Jesus and begins the process of sanctification so that we are not focused too much on our own agenda (2 Corinthians 3:18; Philippians 2:3-4). In the process, we experience more shalom in our relationships with others.
Trevor Hudson Description of this change Particularly appropriate:
We feel [our heart] Being more open to others than ever before. It is no longer bent on its own. We begin to realize that our neighbor, as we have, is infinite, invaluable, precious value in God's eyes. There is a new kindness with others, especially in moments of failure and struggle. …We know intuitively that we are an unbroken connection with God's heart, along with our neighbors and with the whole of creation.
There can be more to say about how God restored Shalom to the three relationships that he considered, but the important thing is that these are the true sources of our happiness. Thus Thadeus Williams concludes: “The more you worship yourself, the more you become. You become yourself. You become shadows, ghosts, yourself. You will feel as if you stare at the mirror longer and deeper, looking for answers, and looking at the “scream.” This is a strange paradox of self-worship. ”
This article was adopted from that post It originally appeared In WorldView Bulletin Substack.
