May 13 - Psalm 1:1-2

Happy are those who …

delight … in the law of the Lord

Psalm 1:1-2

In the book I’m reading right now, Nancy Pearcey’s Total Truth, there’s a chapter entitled “Rediscovering Joy.”

Do you want a little more joy? Do you want your dreams to come true? Well Nancy Pearcey begins with the story of a man whose dream came true!

He got into the right college. He got into the right law school. He got the right job. He married the right woman. He had the right number of kids. He went to the right church. But he was still unhappy.

           

Have you ever felt like that? You keep working harder. You keep chasing happiness. You keep collecting more and more stuff. Maybe you even retire, hoping for a little more bliss. And still you’re not happy. How come?

Maybe you’re like the man in the story. He realized that he was living in two worlds. On the one hand, he lived in a world of faith and family. It was a good world, built on the foundation of honor and integrity. But then he did battle all day in a world of compromise. The goal of law – at least in his corner of the legal world – wasn’t truth and justice. It was winning and losing. All day he shielded facts, misdirected attention, and compromised his integrity. He was double-minded, double-hearted, and double-souled. He was not whole. And he was not happy.

Most of you are probably not lawyers. But do you compromise your integrity … even when you turn on the TV? We live in two different worlds, and we’re not happy because we’re not whole.  

Rediscovering joy begins with finding God’s light, truth, plans, and purposes in every part of our life.

How did the lawyer rediscover joy? He stayed a lawyer. But rather than trying and suing so much, he used every contact to counsel his clients on the spiritual principles that were causing their legal frustrations. And many of those people wound up not going to court. He may not have made as much money. But that’s not what life is about. He was suddenly and simply more whole … and more joyful.

In Christ’s Love,

a guy who wants to be

as joyful as a lawyer