Life Outside The Amusement Park - 8

Under non-Christian broke forth with you division everybody wants a good few truly find it.

Why is having is so elusive Dr. Jerry marsh is what Jesus had to say in his business at seven about living a life of happiness.

As David introduces message life outside the amusement park. Well, there's a book that was written some usual call amusing ourselves to death seems to be what happens to so many people in our culture today.

But the Bible gives us some insight into the kind of life that really brings joy to our hearts. This is kind of a letter from the manufacturer if you want to know the truth.

Here's the one who created you is the one who brought you into this world are giving you some some help on how to live a joyous happy life Bibles together the Matthew chapter 5 as we begin this week happiness. Some Englishmen flowed about us as Americans. He said trouble with you Americans is that you have to be so confounded Lee happy all the time you've dedicated yourselves to The Pursuit of Happyness, you boast about it as an alien will write as though happiness were the supreme and absolute goal of all existence.

Surely there are more important things in life and just be happy but you know what he was right. It is an American thing.

Can you believe it when you stop and think about it. It's kind of silly is right alongside life and freedom.

We put in our Declaration of Independence The Pursuit of Happyness Americans are endowed with certain inalienable rights, among which are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, and some friends. I know have been living in light of the Declaration of Independence at the highest level every day of their life as Americans is devoted to the pursuit of happiness.

Isn't it strange to watch how they go about it. One man buys a dozen homes to be happy and another man goes out into the wilderness to live as a hermit, one woman becomes a nun and another woman becomes a harlot. One young man thinks happiness is bodybuilding and another tries to find it by destroying his body with drugs. One couple thinks happiness is children and they have eight of them, and another is convinced that children will get in the way of their happiness and they go childless. Malcolm Muggeridge into writing called the conversion a spiritual journey wrote these words about The Pursuit of Happyness.

He said of all the different purposes set before mankind. The most disastrous is surely The Pursuit of Happyness slipped into the American Declaration of Independence, along with life and liberty as an inalienable right almost accidentally at the last moment happiness he said is like a young beer fleet and beautiful hunt him and he becomes a poor frantic wary after the kill, just a piece of stinking flesh." CS Lewis in his satire called Screwtape letters has the arched devil Screwtape advising his devil apprentices concerning how they are to go about deceiving the people and he tells them that the way you do. It is this through an ever increasing craving for an ever diminishing pleasure that he said is the formula of destruction and ever increasing craving for an ever diminishing pleasure.

What I like to call this message. If I could is life outside the amusement park and the reason I chose that title is because of the parable that I read which probably is the key to what I'm going to be talking about in these next weeks, for it defines soul very sharply. The two concepts of happiness that are known to man today.

The parable was written by a girl named Gloria and she wrote the parable of herself. But listen to her words. Many times I have felt as if I am trapped on a huge roller coaster that goes up and down and round and round. Sometimes I managed to escape and get off the mad ride, but I'm still in the amusement park outside the park. The world looks exciting, but it's too risky. I'm not sure that I could survive. So the amusement park remain still the biggest attraction for everyone is being persuaded to stay inside and get back on the roller coaster that I still think of people in the past to have gone outside the amusement park. They are the ones who seem to truly seek for God with all their heart and mind and soul and body, and are fully prepared to give it all up. They are the ones who live uncompromising lives and don't feel the grip of money. The pressure of society to weaken the desire for goodness the punctured self-discipline. The crushing fear of the future. The horrible death. The threat of injustice, the need of security. The rule of self. They don't struggle for faith, hope and love, faith, hope and love out of them and through them. It seems from my viewpoint inside the amusement park that those who live on the outside are those who are totally free and I would like to live out there. She wrote, but I feel the grip of money. I feel the pressure of society.

I am not strong enough to stand up for what I believe partly because I am not even sure what I believe my discipline is worthless inconsistency myself inspires action to satisfy myself. I am not happy. I wish I could live in uncompromising life outside the amusement park.

I wish it, and yet I fear it at the same time life outside the amusement park. Neil postman wrote a book a few years ago called amusing ourselves to death about the lifestyle of the American people, you know, even among Christians. If were honest. If we do not really have a vital relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ. We can spend our lives on the roller coaster trying to deaden the pain of an empty life. Matthew chapter 5 there is an entire discourse from the lips of Jesus on happiness is in what we call the sermon on the Mount and most folks have said the sermon on the Mount is the essence of the Christian faith and life and everybody believes that the Beatitudes are the essence of the sermon on the mount.

So what were talking here is the essence of the essence of the Christian life. The very core of the very center of what Jesus said was the values of the kingdom, and in these 11 verses the word blessed occurs. Nine different times. Some modern translators have changed the rendering of the Greek word Makarios from blessed to the word happy blessedness has kind of a richer, deeper, larger spiritual meaning than happiness, but they come together in this teaching the word blessed in the Greek language is the word which means a blessing that kind of goes along with being in God in the beginning of the use of the word was never attached to anyone but the God lesson God's then in the New Testament we read it twice concerning our God.

First Timothy 111 says the glorious gospel of the blessed God also in first Timothy chapter 6 in verse 15 we read the blessed and only potentate, the King of Kings and Lord of lords. If you read the book of Matthew chapter 5 verses one through 11, you will notice that the little word are in all of the verses is in italics, which means that it is not really in the text is added by the English translator to give fluency to the reading of it. So in essence, there is no verb in the Beatitudes. If you were to read it correctly, it would read like this blessed the poor in spirit blessed those who mourn blessed those who hunger and thirst after righteousness blessed the merciful and on through the text. It is an exclamation of exquisite joy and happiness for those who possess these qualities and we remember, don't we. In reading the Psalms that once in a while that were jumps out of the psalmist mouth. For instance, do you know someone that goes like this all the bliss of the man who walk not in the counsel of the ungodly, blessed is the man who walk not in the counsel of the ungodly, happy, blissful, exquisitely happy is that man for this one and Psalm 32 20, the bliss of the man to whom the Lord does not impute iniquity. Can I get a witness to that one, aren't you glad that God doesn't keep the page in his record book that has all your sins listed on it after you once came and applied the blood of Jesus Christ to and the writer of the Psalms is it this way all bliss blessedness is the man's who does not have iniquity applied to his account, so this is the form of expression that the Lord Jesus used.

We call it the blessings the Beatitudes someone is called the B happy attitudes.

The blessings of true happiness, and I want to talk with you about them because they are truly incredibly unique. The greatness of the Beatitudes is not that they are some wistful glimpse of some future day they're not golden promises of some glorious future time.

They are shouts of joy and happiness that nothing in the world can ever take away and are available to us now. And Jesus says if you want to truly be happy, here's the formula and willing to take each of these one at a time when you talk about them the keys to true happiness in preparation.

In doing that, I'd I'd like to take just a few moments today and share some general thoughts about this section of Scripture that will lay a foundation for our next weeks of study.

I have four or five things I want to say first of all I think this needs to be down at the very bottom of all of our discussion and that is that the pursuit of true happiness is part of God's purpose for you.

He doesn't want you to pursue it. He wants you to have it may seem a little strange because I know a lot of folks who aren't really sure, Christians are supposed to be happy and looking at them there an advertisement for their philosophy. They are convinced that true holiness produces a dour look that in order for someone to really be godly as the look like a reject from a pickle factory and you know them, don't you run into them. The fact that we would laugh in our church would be greatly offensive to such person, for they are absolutely convinced that holiness and unhappiness are synonymous. I'm reminded that CS Lewis one time said a schoolchild was asked what he thought God was like in the child answered that so far as he could make out. God is the kind of person he was always snooping around to see if anyone's enjoying himself so that he can put a stop to it.

Have you ever known anybody to follow that philosophy that's kind of the way a lot of folks think about God what you know this, Jesus whose words we have quoted here today is the same Jesus who said, I have come that you might have life and that you might have it more abundantly. The joy of the Lord Jesus is the desire he has for each and every one of us. Whenever I think of people who like to cast Jesus as a sorrowful sad player on the pages of the New Testament. I have to believe in my heart there reading some other book than the one I've been reading for. What do you do with the winsome Jesus of the New Testament, the man of Nazareth, who took such great delight in all the simple pleasures that were around him came eating and drinking so much that his enemies said he was a glutton and a wind River. Remember that the Jesus who in his life is recorded for us in the Gospels enjoyed wholesome activities, who was at home at a wedding, enjoying himself at a banquet was always seemingly the center of the gathering of friends in anyone's home mingled with publicans and sinners and attracted little children to him. Now that's a thought is you notice that there are certain kinds of people that draw children to them. And there are others that scare them away.

Jesus attracted children to his knee, and I don't think I'm reading too much into the story when I tell you that he had an awesome sense of humor because of the translation out of that culture into ours. We may not always see it but do you remember the word picture that he painted on one occasion a ludicrous word picture of a man with a plank hanging out of his eye painfully squinting as he tries to remove the speck of sawdust from the Ibis brother, I tell you, when Jesus told that story in those days there were some people who put their hands over their mouth and turned their heads so that they could hide the sticker in the giggle, Jesus, God him with his sense of humor. So when the bloodhounds of a sad life trying to paint Jesus into this morbid picture that so often we see even in the portraits that are made of him. I have to tell you, they haven't read about the Jesus I know who wanted us to find happiness so much that in the sermon on the mount. He devoted all of these verses tell us what it means to truly be blessed so I want to just go on record today is saying to all of us him to remind myself again. I know in my heart that Jesus Christ wants David Jeremiah to be a happy man. He wants me to walk with joy in my spirit and have a smile on my face. Not a silly superficial kind of ecstatic sentimentalism, but a deep-seated joy that can come only from him and he wants you to have that joy to he wants you to know that kind of happiness. I was rather shocked in preparing for this message to read a book that someone had given me on the subject of happiness written by rather well-known writer someone whose name you would know if I told you who has taught us much about the Christian faith, and when in the introduction to his book. He was explaining why he would pick such a subject in his older years right unhappiness.

His explanation was that looking back on his life. Even as a Christian leader he had discovered that there were far too many places where he was profoundly unhappy you know as I travel and talk with people in the evangelical church and as I meet often with evangelical leaders, even here in our own community and as I examine my own life that is statement which is far too true for many of us. God wants his people to be a happy people.

The Christian life is joyous existence and for us to live in any other way is to fall beneath the level that God intended for us all. If you don't have a sense of humor.

We ought to put you on the priority prayer list because without sense of humor and without an ability to laugh. Life can be very long, very long indeed.

The second thing I want you to notice that The Pursuit of Happyness according to Jesus statements is a journey inward is not an outward thing is we so often would purported to be, let me tell you what Jesus said about the truly happy people. His list does not include one single reference to health or wealth or work or put income or financial security or home or love or even friends.

Jesus knew that while all of these things often accompany happiness. They do not ever produce it and so listen to his list so completely reverses the world standards all the bliss of the poor. All the bliss of the hungry and thirsty happiness of the persecuted call the bliss of the sorrowful these are such startling contradictions to the world standards that no man can hear them for the first time without a sense of shock and amazement. Who is this one who speak so strangely about happiness these Beatitudes are a set of paradoxes to be human mind. They I believe were meant to destroy all the foolish illusions that had grown up in the minds of the people of Jesus day were looking for a kingdom that development dominion and prosperity in Jesus is. Let me tell you about the real kingdom it is not out there in dominion and prosperity is in your heart and the heart and let me tell you about the kinds of attitudes which properly understand will bring true joy and happiness to an individual. I read them and read them over and over again and I have to tell you that my words today may have the same impression on some of you that I'm sure our Lord's word had on the people of his day. I'm sure that some of the people get discussed. Have someone stand in front of them and read this list and say at the core of this list is true happiness was like throwing cold water on the hot enthusiasm they had for material prosperity and kingdom dominion so I want you to know that to find true happiness. You will get it at that party. Let me tell you it will be there you will find misery. There, but you will find true happiness. Thirdly, the pursuit of true happiness is not a goal. It's a byproduct. I think that's important because if were not careful we can make happiness. Our goal, and it will never come to us.

Those who pursue happiness as their goal. Very seldom find it.

Happiness is the byproduct of finding something else you statement to you tell me who you think might send this. This is the statement I think I must be the happiest man in the world I have never met anyone who is had as much fun as I have had anything medicine well. Was it a playboy who had run the gamut of sexual pleasure trotted around the globe in a kind of bohemian existence. Was it an adventurer who had visited the jungles of South America or scale the slopes of Mount Everest could have said, I think I must be the happiest man in the world I have never met anyone it was had as much fun as I have had the mentor said that is Christian missionary Frank Lauterbach, who spent his whole life. Teaching literacy to the backward peoples of the world. Dr. Levesque never went looking for happiness, but he found happiness is the byproduct of a search for something more in one of his writings, he said you cannot describe the delight of people when they first discover that they can read men go hysterical and women began to weep for joy. There could not be any other work in the world which could possibly have brought me so much happiness. I truly believe I am the happiest man in the world. No one could ever have as much fun as I had Gina what I know people like that you know people like that. If you look at the outer shell of their life. The things we normally evaluate wonder those people really be happy when you get to know them. There is kind of an inner joy that is things he has to clean exuberant and you realize that they have found the core of what it means to truly be happy in the Lord Jesus Christ you may not write anything else down.

I say today, but this is a statement worth writing down is not my word, but it is one I will never forget. It goes like this. If more people would get a divorce from themselves. They might learn how to live happily with someone else. See true happiness often short-circuited because if it is an inward journey. We have never taken the trip number fourth and last pursuit of true happiness will lead us ultimately to Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ was a supremely happy man. And there's no doubt about the fact that there could be observable reasons. As we read the record in the Gospels and we could say. By reading the record of his life in the Gospels will hear some things I can think that would've made him happy. For instance, he had good relationships and close friends. His time in his life even had a few creature comforts, not always in that most of the time, but on occasion he did. He was entertained in his life by some very wealthy people who cared for him and he had the opportunity to do what he loved to do, which is as a matter of great pleasure. For those of us who have been privileged to do what our heart loves to do.

He could teach he could heal. He had fellowship with friends and with disciples.

All of these doors were open to him for his enjoyment and for his pleasure. But now with me for a moment all through the final months of the ministry of Jesus Christ.

One by one.

Doors of outer pleasure and happiness were slammed shut in his face you read the passion narratives in the four Gospels. You can literally hear the doors going shut until at last they slammed the door in the upper room is brief ministry. By all outward standards is a failure what he has to look forward the next day is the cross the Roman crucifixion's closest friends were a source of joy to him either have betrayed him, deserted him or denied him there in the atmosphere of the gathering gloom at the end of his life there in the upper room. Jesus said this to his disciples these things I have spoken unto you, that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be full that intrigues me all the support systems. God, all the doors to outward happiness slammed shut and I hear the master say. And now gentlemen, what I want you to know is the secret of my joy so that your joy might be full. Can you grasp in your imagination. Men and women of man about to die.

The most terrible death talking of his joy was gladness and that is happiness. There are only two explanations for a man like that either he is crazy mad or he knows something. Most of the world does not yet know and we know the answer to that window at the core of his life was the joy of being in the center of his father's will. He said my meat is to do the will of my father Jesus learn how to live every day for the joy of being in the center of his father's in the words of the fifth chapter of Matthew, he will teach us the building blocks for true happiness in our life. Some of you were going to be a little bit threatened by this, maybe even now you're threatening me. Now you're saying well. As I review this list looks to me like a lot of things that the change in my life for me to be happy, don't throw anything away yet because you see what Jesus is talking about is the outward stuff the inward attitude of heart that makes it possible for you. Like Paul to say I have learned how to be content, whether I am bound. Whether I have little I am a happy man. True happiness is at the center of life or maybe I can say is true happiness is outside.

We hope you enjoyed today's Turning Point, weekend edition with Dr. David Jeremiah to hear this. Another Turning Point programs or to get more information about this ministry. Simply download the full Turning Point in my burlap is not device.

Visit our website at Jeremiah.old/radio that Jeremiah.org/radio. You can also view Turning Point television on friend is channel 7 to Sunday morning. Tonight at on a CCTV Sundays at 6:30 AM and Friday are things at one we invite you to join us again next weekend is Jeremiah. She is another powerful message from God's word. I'm Turning Point, weekend edition thanks for taking time to listen to on friend teaching