When you’re a kid, happiness is just something you expect. You believe that the whole world was created to make you happy. You learned that when you were a baby — when you cried, people came running with bottles, and blankies, and back rubs and anything to make you happy so you would go back to sleep, and they could keep doing what they were doing. Happiness is natural.
But then at some point, everyone stops catering to your every whim. And by the time you’re a teenager, happiness seems impossible. The whole world is conspiring against you being happy. Your parents start laying down rules that were specifically designed to make you as miserable as possible. Your girlfriend dumps you. Your coach benches you. Your first-choice college rejects you. Happiness is unreachable.
Then you become a young adult, and you’re out on your own, and you discover that you can feel happiness through the right experiences. Backpacking through Europe. Bungee jumping off Victoria Falls. Maybe even substances or sex. Happiness seems possible.
But then you grow up a little bit, and you realize the happiness you get from all experiences just doesn’t last. You think happiness is still possible, but you start to think maybe it’ll come through success. A successful career will make you happy. A successful marriage will make you happy. Happy, successful kids will make you happy.
And then you get old, and your marriage gets stale, and your kids move away, and your company forces you into early retirement. And you finally give up, and you’re like, “Well, I guess I’m never going to be happy.”
Is that really the kind of life God designed us for? No? So what’s the problem?
The problem is that we’re always seeking happiness in things, and experiences, and people, and circumstances. To us, happiness is like a drug. It’s a temporary high, and you’ve gotta get another hit of happiness every few days, or every few hours. We’re always wondering where we’ll score our next hit.
C.S. Lewis experienced that. He was always trying to find happiness in different things. And once he found something that gave him joy, he would binge on it. Kind of like when you find a show you like, so you stay up all night for a week watching all 8 seasons on Netflix. Lewis discovered a book from Iceland that he loved, so he started reading every Icelandic book he could find. Pretty soon he ran out of Icelandic books that were translated into English, so he taught himself Old Norse language so he could read more.
He did that with books, and music, and friends. But whenever he found something to make him happy, it would lose its effect over time. The drug lost its potency. The high wasn’t so high. And that’s what led him to this huge discovery: he realized that there was something behind all those things that made him happy.
All those things weren’t the source of happiness. They were meant to lead him to the true source of happiness. As he said in The Weight of Glory, “Those things are not the thing itself; they are only the scent of a flower we have not found, the echo of a tune we have not heard, news from a country we have never visited.”
That’s not to say that we shouldn’t enjoy the other things, but the things aren’t what ultimately make us happy. They’re only pointing us to the ultimate thing.
An ancient songwriter discovered the same thing. The author of Psalm 128 experienced God’s blessing in his work (“You shall eat the fruit of the labor of your hands; you shall be blessed, and it shall be well with you”), his family (“Your wife will be like a fruitful vine within your house; your children will be like olive shoots around your table”), and his fellowship with fellow believers (“The Lord bless you from Zion! May you see the prosperity of Jerusalem all the days of your life!”), but he still understood that they were only the scents of the flower, not the flower itself.
He said, “Blessed is everyone who fears the Lord, who walks in his ways!” (Psalm 128:1). Which tells us that we’ll never be happy by seeking happiness. The Bible never says, “Blessed are those who seek to be blessed.” Seeking happiness is like trying to find the end of a rainbow — it’s always moving. Happiness comes from seeking God.
That’s a revolutionary thought for most people. Since the day Adam and Eve talked to the serpent in the garden, Satan has convinced us that there’s a huge canyon between holiness and happiness. He’s convinced us that you can’t have both at the same time. But the author of Psalm 128 radically disagreed. He said the way to be happy is to seek God.
As he said it, fearing God. Acknowledging God as your creator and your sustainer. Praising him for his glory and power and majesty. Receiving his grace that was given through his son Jesus, when he died on the cross to take the punishment you deserve for your sin. Recognizing him as the king of the universe, and allowing him to be the king of your life.
Fearing God is different from being in fear of God. I love how it says in the old hymn Amazing Grace … “Twas grace that taught my heart to fear, and grace my fears relieved.” You’ll only know how to truly fear God when you’ve experienced his grace through Jesus Christ, because his grace is what drives out your fear of him. His grace is what allows you to trust him, and believe him, and lean on him. It allows you to make him the center of your existence. And that’s where you’ll find happiness that lasts more than one good day.
As another songwriter said it, “Blessed (same Hebrew word!) is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night (“the law” isn’t just the 10 Commandments, it’s the whole Bible. All of God’s revelation about himself.) He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers” (Psalm 1:1-3).
The author was being blunt. He never said the tree would be yielding fruit all the time. It “yields its fruit in season.” There are going to be seasons in life that are fruitful, where everything will be going great. It’s going to feel like you’re succeeding in everything without even trying.
And then there are going to be seasons that are barren and fruitless. You’ll feel like you’re banging your head against a brick wall, and no matter what you try, nothing will get better. There’s going to be tragedy, and loss, and frustration.
You’re going to weep, and mourn, and maybe even yell. But underneath it all, you’ll be blessed. You’ll have this deep, profound, unshakeable happiness and contentment and joy and power. How? Because your roots will be sunk down in the river. You’ll be “planted by streams of water.”
You’ll have Jesus. He’s your happiness, your contentment, your joy, your strength.