4. The Fight For Joy

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Welcome to the prod cast where we prod the sheep and beat the wolf. This is episode 4 the fight for joy

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Introduction the fight for joy if You were to have asked me in seminary

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What would be the most offensive topic that I would ever have to preach on I may have said abortion or transgenderism or something?

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Like that of that ilk I would have been shocked However to discover that one of the most difficult topics that I would ever be called to preach upon was joy

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Something so central to the Christian life But yet something so few of us actually seem to have on a daily basis and what

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I found At least over the last several years is that if you simply declare what the

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Bible says about joy It will leave many questioning their faith and wondering if they're even a

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Christian Now what I would like to do in this particular Episode is to address this topic head -on

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I'd like to begin by demonstrating why being offended by the Bible in this particular area is so necessary and how

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We cannot allow joylessness to become an acceptable sin, but I also Want to show from Psalm 42 how

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David teaches us to fight for joy Which has been one of the most important lessons of my life

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So with that let us begin with the need for offense Everyone who claims to be a

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Christian will be and very well should be offended on a regular basis by the Word of God This is in fact the way that we grow

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This is how we mature even if we don't like it and while we hate being offended personally

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We must remember that before we knew Christ we spent every waking moment of our lives offending a holy

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God Even now in our new creation status We still return to our sin like a dog returns to the vomit

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We give ourself over to things that we have no business being owned by so I think

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That it's time for us to embrace the fact that his word Needs to offend us

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Especially the parts of our life that are still at odds with him. Let me frame it this way

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The question is not if the word will offend our sinful nature It's merely a question of when and how we will respond when it does

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Will we will we respond with humility and repentance turning to God for our sanctification or?

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Will we respond with anger and apathy? Excusing those parts of the word that that chafe against our sin and excusing them as though They don't really apply to our lives.

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They don't really apply to us Which actually gets at the heart of the matter from my experience reformed

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Evangelical Christians who have been shaped by the good old doctrines of the Reformation no longer balk at the obvious sins

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They're they're no longer distressed when a pastor says that the Bible calls sodomy and abomination

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That it's punt that it's punishable by death or abortion a capital crime They know full well how disgusting and abhorrent those sins are and that's a good thing because those sins are

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Listed in that way in the Bible, but what I found to be equally true is how easily reformed serious and theologically astute

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Christians will dismiss things like joy Joy as it's clearly stated in the

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Bible is a fruit of the Spirit Galatians 5 22 that means that it's not a mere suggestion of the

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Spirit It's not simply good advice from the Spirit when it makes sense of our circumstances

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It is a spirit raw Certainty for all who are indwelled by him.

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It's a staple of the regenerate man It is as natural to the Christian as apples are to an apple tree

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But even more so and when we choose to live our lives in ongoing bitterness anger depression and anxiety and you name it

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We're not only choosing second best. We're choosing sin Perhaps a sin that's more palatable to the reformed religious psyche but no less offensive to the holiness of God a

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Joyless Christian is a contradiction in terms biblically speaking

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This means that we must repent of our joylessness It also means that we must fight actively for joyfulness

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We must as God elected Christ bought spirit and dwelled believers be growing over the course of a lifetime in our experience of the height depth and breadth of joy

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We are called to have joy in all circumstances Philippians 4 for especially in trials and tribulations

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James 1 2 3 4 because we know that this joy produces an eternal reward

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Romans 8 18 1st Peter 1 8 through 9 and It's a reward that grumbling complaining sadness and depression cannot earn for us

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Proverbs 17 22 Think about it in regards to the Trinity. The Father is the most joyful being

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Imaginable and he is the one who made us in his joyful image That means that we've been made to be like him by having joy

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Think about the Son the Son is the all joyful Savior who had joy even while enduring the shame of the wretched cross

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Hebrews 12 2 and Again, since we are called to imitate the Son and we're called to imitate his joy

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Even when this awful world wields its ugly worst Think about the Holy Spirit who promised to produce joy in us until Christ returned.

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He wasn't lying about it He wasn't confused about his plans and he isn't too powerless to accomplish this is he of course

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The problem is that we have become accustomed to particular sins that we call

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Acceptable sins that we're okay living with and not dealing with which leads to our second point acceptable sins

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The simple and unavoidable and often inconvenient truth is that Christians were made to have joy

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There are no acceptable sins that allow us to pass That it give us a pass to sit in our negativity

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We are not allowed to indulge our grumblings or to feed into our despair the same

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Lord who calls the murderer to repent is the same Lord who Admonishes the curmudgeon to lay down their anger and the complainer to give up their grievances the same

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Holy God who abhors child sacrifice rightfully So is the same

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Lord who commands his children not to sit down in their sorrows? The question is not what does the

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Bible say about joy? It's actually plain and obvious what it says about joy. The real question is whether or not we will believe it

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The question is whether we will orient our lives around biblical truth

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Will we repent when our life is out of alignment with the biblical vision? Will we search the scriptures to give us help and aid in doing this?

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Will we employ what scripture says and do what scripture says as an act of repentance?

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These are the right and proper questions that we should be asking and these are the questions that this post is intended to address

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Essentially if you were to boil all of this down into a single question, it would be this How can we have joy even in miserable and awful?

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Circumstances because if we can have joy there Then we can have joy all the time

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Again, we know the Bible commands it now The question is how do we do it and the remainder of this episode is going to be looking at that We're gonna explore some tools that David gives us in Psalm 42 that if we will just follow

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These three simple tools that David lays out it will change our life and we will have everlasting

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Never fading joy. So with that I want us to look at the setting that David is writing in and then we're gonna explore the three

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Tools that David gives every single believer to fight for joy The setting of depression

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The psalmist begins with vivid imagery describing his depressed state.

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It's clear that he's not happy He's not in a joyful state. He is ridden with misery crumbling under the weight of the pain that he is actually feeling

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Listen to the words that he says as a deer pants for the water brooks. So my soul pants for you

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Oh God and We can't romanticize this or make it into a Hallmark card

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David is comparing himself to a deer in mortal anguish a Beast so deprived of essential water that it can no longer stop its body from panting

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Hours have gone by at this point Well, it's been frantically searching for water panic has now set into the bones of this poor beast so that the creature

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Cannot even help using essential energy that it needs to stay alive in labored frantic breathing

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That is the kind of situation and that is the animal that David is comparing himself to this frantic anxious deer

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And we probably be right to ask why is David so anxious? Why is he in despair?

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What what is frustrated his soul to the point of tremors? Is it the stock market?

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Is it the economy? Is it the line at the grocery store? Is it a condescending spouse or an unruly child or is it just a habit of David's to have a disconsent?

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discontented spirit, of course not He's not anxious about worldly things.

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He's actually anxious because he feels like God is distant from him and That thought was bringing him grave distressing

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He tells us that his soul is thirsting after God. His body is longing to be in the sanctuary of God verse 2

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His only food has been the tears that he cried in the presence of the wicked who hate his

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God That's verse 3 and he wants nothing else than to leave the filthiness of this world the pain the misery the heartache and all of the drama that he experiences in this life to be in the presence of God and Let's just be honest if you're going to be anxious about anything that is an incredible thing to be exasperated for in Comparison to all of the things that normally make us anxious

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But I want you to notice that David does not accept this Even even as it seems like it may be a kind of wholly

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Anxiety. He does not make excuses for himself If ever there was a sanctified sort of sadness

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This would be it if there was if glorified gloom could actually be a thing

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This would qualify if there was ever an anxiety or a frantic

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That God himself would look down upon and say you know what they're trying really hard here

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I'm gonna overlook this this would be the one and Yet David sees right through it for what it really is and he's not going to allow it to fester inside of his soul for even a moment and We should see it for what it is and we should not allow it to fester inside of us either all despair all anxiety all

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Abiding sadness no matter how we spin it no matter how we justify it no matter how holy we think it is all of it is a refusal to hope in the

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Living God and There's nothing redeemable about it Nothing that we should allow about it.

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No Acceptableness in it. It is a sin standing alongside all of the other sins as well and David Puts it forward

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When he puts forward a threefold strategy on how to actually combat it and he begins with questioning himself

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That's step one question yourself David does not assume that he is thinking clearly in his depressed condition.

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He doubts himself He doubts the kind of ways that he's speaking to himself He doubts the damaging self -talk that got him in this depressed condition in the first place and is going to keep him in this wretched state moving forward if David is going to find healing.

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He cannot accept himself. He cannot accept his emotions He cannot accept where he is.

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He has to reject it and begin questioning himself. That's the first step he does not assume that there's any inherent righteousness in his over spiritualized belly -aching and He proceeds immediately

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Not to give himself excuses, but to interrogate himself He puts himself on the witness stand.

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He grabs hold of himself and silences himself and he begins taking control of the line of questioning as Martin Lloyd -Jones once famously said about this very passage

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He said have you realized that the most of your unhappiness in life is due to the fact that you are

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Listening to yourself instead of talking to yourself Let me say that again

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The most of your unhappiness in life is due to the fact that you are listening to yourself instead of talking to yourself

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You see up until verse 4 David was the one who was listening to his flesh instead of speaking to it his flesh his inner self was the one who was crying out in agony and Bellowing and beleaguered beguilement and it was not until verse 5 that David understood

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The problem was actually him. He was the issue He found out the secret which is that he should not be listening to himself any longer

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His flesh was doing all the talking but none of it was producing anything good

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And if he was going to have relief from his sad condition It would have to come from him speaking instead of listening and the same is true for you and I today

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Our minds are our own worst enemies Our self -talk is more polluted than a toxic waste dump the internal chatterbox that is constantly tearing you down Mocking you casting judgment on you and speaking all manner of evil against you is the problem

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You are not made to be held captive to the ravings of a madman Anymore than you were made to take counsel from a discontented soul you are the one that needs to start doing the talking and The listening time must now be over if you want to have joy

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This is what David understood he figured out that the first step to having joy was to grab his sinful self in hand and To start being the one who asked the questions.

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He said to himself Why are you in despair all my soul and why have you become disturbed within me?

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Again he immediately Recognizes the paralyzing effects that sitting down in sinful self -talk will have upon the human soul

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So he begins questioning that fruitless enterprise He pipes up to shut the whole thing down so that he could control the narrative moving forward

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He's not going to allow his flesh to speak another word. He's the one who is now talking

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He says why are you in despair my soul because he knows that despair is antithetical to God He tells himself why have you become disturbed within me because David knows that sitting in your disturbances is inviting perpetual pain

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David finally has seen how damaging it is to listen to yourself and sit down in your emotions and Anyone who does this will never be free

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Everyone who does this will always be shackled in anxiety and fear and the only antidote is to stand up To grab the sword to regain the narrative to be the one who is talking which leads to the second step which is strategy to Command yourself with the promises of God David not only silences the inner flesh monster with strong aggressive questioning

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He's also commanding his flesh with the promises of God He commands his soul saying this hope in God for I shall again praise him for the help of his presence

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David realized it's not enough to simply question yourself. You also have to command yourself

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You have to order yourself and demand that yourself be oriented towards hope

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You have to dictate the terms to your obstinate and rebellious flesh and force it to begin praising

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You have to challenge your flesh fight your flesh take an active role in defeating your flesh

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Knowing that joy will soon return when you do that Notice I want you to notice that David does not wait for his joy to come back before he begins getting to work

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He begins the work first He preemptively sends a surgical strike upon his own sin nature

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He charges up the hill of doubt and he plants the joyful flag Defiantly in the sullen sand because he knows that you can't sit down to have joy.

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You have to stand up David knows the promises of God and he knows that he is going to again praise the

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Lord He knows that God's Spirit is not going to tarry away from him forever He knows that God is going to give him the aid of his presence and he knows that the spiritual desert cannot last so long as he

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Stands up and takes charge of his sinful flesh and commands it back to the Lord knowing this

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Could actually show us why we remain in a joyless condition For far longer than we ever need to and it's likely because we simply are listening to ourself instead of talking to ourself

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We are letting our flesh dictate the terms and we are far too easily

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Convinced and fall under the spell of our flesh and surrender into the doubts and the sadness and the discontentment and the unhappiness

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Without ever lifting a finger of fight Could it be that if we would just fight ourselves question ourselves

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Command ourselves that we would hope in God like David and we would experience the true joy of repentance that David Experiences because this is what the text is saying if you want to have joy you have to fight if you want to be sad then sit down in it because you will be and And again, this is not an immediate

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Instant relief, but it is it does lead us to the final step which is to wait on God Strategy three abandon yourself and wait on God Once David realized that he could not trust himself any longer and they needed and that he needed to combat

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Himself with the truth of the gospel. The battle was almost over The only thing left for David to do was to keep on fighting until the

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Lord came through his goal was to abandon all hope that he could find hope inside himself and to Ferociously fight against his error prone ways until the

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God of hope came near to him again far from sitting inside of his sin and settling down into worry making excuses for his mood or Pretending that grumbling is some sort of sanctified normal David attacked his sin

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He attacked it until it finally relented and until his joy returned, which is the secret to having joy

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Joy is not a magical feeling that just happens with no effort. It takes hard work to have joy it is a devoted kind of hope in God that is only one on a battlefield if You are not willing and if I am not willing to fight our flesh to kill our sin and to Wrestle vocal control out of the hands of that that tyrant inner man.

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That's always accusing us. Then we will have no joy but We will have an inner critic

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We will have an inner judge that is unrelenting in his punishments. We will have an inner commiserator

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We will have an inner doubter We will have an inner fault finder and an inner liar and an inner cynic that keeps us

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Bloviating about our grievances instead of finding all of the manifold graces that God has given us in this life

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We have more than enough to be thankful for we have more than enough to be joyful for if we will stand up and fight

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Joy can be had in this life Joy can be had in the most toxic bitter and painful

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Circumstances the question that we have to ask ourself is this are we willing to do what it takes to have it?

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Are we willing to to fight in order to possess it? Will we overlook joylessness as an acceptable sin or will we run to the cross of Christ?

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Asking for forgiveness laying down our sin leaving without it and if we bring it back with us making war with it until it dies and Waiting on the joy of the

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Lord to fill our hearts. Once again, that is what I pray that you and I will do I pray

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That we will stop sitting down in our toxic emotions and that we will gain the gumption

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The courage and the conviction to fight for joy That's it for this episode of the podcast if you like what you heard

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I would ask that you share it with anyone that you think would be helped by it You can share it on all of our platforms social media and anything else.