Why Am I So Unhappy? [50]

Host: TJ Freeman

Summary: In this episode of Back to Rurality, TJ Freeman discusses the societal misconception that happiness can be achieved through external circumstances. He argues that true joy, which transcends fleeting happiness, comes from a relationship with God and the transformation of the heart through Christ. TJ addresses the influence of social media, the degradation of rural social fabrics, and the true meaning of joy as a fruit of the Spirit. Listeners are encouraged to find joy by walking closely with Christ, addressing sins and lies, and focusing on the eternal perspective provided in the Bible.

Connect with Us:

• Website: backtorurality.com
• Social Media: Facebook
• Email: tj@brainerdinstitute.com

Transcript

You deserve to be happy. You should do whatever it is that makes you happy. If it feels good, do it. Sweetie, I just want you to be happy. Does that sound like a common theme in our society today? And yet it would appear we've got a pretty unhappy society. Just scroll through your Facebook feed once or twice and you'll see that that's true and you may be wondering, why don't I feel happy?

Shouldn't I feel more happy? Could a pill make me feel more happy? If I just had a change in my circumstances, then maybe could I finally be happy? You might be on that same desperate search toward happiness. Well, I've got something even better than that for you today, so stay tuned.

 Well, thank you for joining us for another episode of Back to Rurality. This is a podcast for Christians who live in places most of the world. Consider to be the middle of nowhere and don't have easy access to a healthy church. My name is TJ Freeman. I am honored. It's been one of the greatest privileges and delights of my life.

To lead a healthy church in a place most of the world thinks of as the middle of nowhere. And I am delighted to be able to talk to you today as we think together about what it means to feel right, living out here in a place like this, a lot of the times we don't feel right. I struggle all winter long to feel right.

I have even, don't tell anybody, okay? I've even bought one of those lamps that's supposed to have the kind of wavelength light that cheers you up when you're down in the wintertime. Don't ask me where it is, 'cause I don't even know. I don't think it worked very well. Taking the old vitamin D. Hey, certainly wouldn't discourage you from doing something like that.

But the truth is you're not gonna find happiness in your circumstances no matter what. This life is so stinking fickle. And you've been lied to a bunch. You know, advertisers for your entire life have been trying to convince you that their product or their service or their thing is the solution to all of your problems.

And do you know how they try to convince you of that? They try to stir up your problems. It's a proven marketing technique. You expose a problem and you whip that problem up into a big frothy soup of nastiness, and then here comes your product, your service, your idea, and it just makes the sky sunny and blue and the birds are singing and people are falling in love, and everything is wonderful and right in the world.

So, you go and get that product, you take that pill, you do that thing, and you find maybe there was a little bit of a, a flare up, a honeymoon, if you will, of using that product. But over time, the way you felt before is kind of the way you feel again. It's because there's nothing in this world that can satisfy you, and the world is trying really hard to get you not to believe that that's true.

And we tend to see our problems more clearly because they're constantly getting whipped up. And then we tend to put our hope in temporary things because that's what we're programmed from childhood to do. It's no wonder that we have such an unhappy generation, and I think it's getting worse. I mean, hand kids cell phone and lock 'em up in their room and leave them to deal with all kinds of the social garbage that happens on there.

Leave them to deal with the temptations that are gonna pull at 'em on there, isolate 'em even more. That sounds like stuff from the devil. I mean, that doesn't sound good at all. And I'm worried about where things are headed, especially in rural places. Rural places used to be held together by this kind of like social fabric, this moral underpinning that grandma passed down and the whole thing kinda worked.

But broadband internet has come in like a wrecking ball. It is just replaced kind of the, the way that grandma held society together by giving you the, the stink eye when you were doing something wrong. By there being an influence spiritually from a generation older than you. I mean, those kind of things. That's kind of a thing of the past now and today. It's a lot of influence from the world in rural places that rural places used to be somewhat isolated from. So I'm just trying to do what I'm telling you everyone else is doing.

I'm showing the problem and then I'm whipping it up into a nasty soup. But the solution is not a product or service or an idea that I have. In fact, the solution is radical transformation from the inside out that happens supernaturally. How do you like them apples? So let me explain. God made you for his glory.

He made you in his image and just like everybody before you and everyone who will come after you, you've rejected that in favor of sin. I don't mean you became a satanist, although some listeners may have. I mean that when God said, I want you to do this. I want you to think this. I want you to act this way.

You did something else instead. That's actually a rebellion against the one who made you in his image for his glory. In favor of your preferences, your desires, your will. We've all done it. We've done it because Adam's sin has been passed on generationally over and over again.

So that we are born with a sin nature, and we therefore sin. We're born sinners. That's why we sin, we rebel against God like that. Sin makes us incredibly unhappy. Sin is a lie. Sin is an exchange of what God has given and said is good for what we determine on our own is good. And I hate to break it down for you this way, but God who made all things and knows all things has a much better perspective on what's actually good than we do.

And so our sin has made us miserable. Without sin, there's not even death. Without sin, there's no disease. Without sin, there's no fighting or arguing. Without sin, there's no longing for lesser things that cannot satisfy. Sin is the problem that's messed all of this up. So if you want to find happiness, which by the way, really shouldn't be your ultimate goal, but more about that later, you are going to need to be reprogrammed from the inside out.

And by reprogrammed, I mean you need a brand new heart, to put it like the Bible does. You need a new heart. You need to be cleansed, washed of all of your sin through the blood of Christ, and God replaces your heart of stone with a heart of flesh. He gives you a heart that sees things as he sees them. He gives you a heart that wants to find your satisfaction, holy in him, and wants to live for his glory, which you were created to do, which brings you something way better than happiness.

You know what it brings you? It brings you joy. And that is part of the fruit of the Spirit. On the last episode, I was talking about the fruit of the spirit and how it's not some responsibility that we need to have this spiritual cornucopia where we're working really hard to show fruits. I wanna be a little loving.

I'll, I'll have a little peace, please. I'll take a little joy. Oh, I, nah, never mind. Patience. You can keep that. Can't afford that. It's not like that. The fruit of the spirit includes love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. You can look them up in Galatians five, and I just said them.

I meant to say it. You can look up the fruit of the spirit in Galatians five. It's all listed there, and we should see evidence of the whole thing in our lives. Last week we talked, or last episode we talked about love. Now we're talking about joy, which I'm arguing is better than happiness and joy is the kind of sense that you get as a follower of Christ, knowing that there is a sovereign God, who is good, who loves you.

Who's with you, whose promise never to leave you, who or forsake you. Who is working together all things for the good of those who love him and obey his commands. Who has gone to prepare a place for us in heaven because Jesus died for our sins and rose from the dead and is ascended and is ruling and raining right now has a wonderful purpose for your life.

And I don't mean that in the way that we say God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life. I mean, he made you for his glory. You're his workmanship, and he's got good works. He's prepared beforehand for you to walk in. You're not purposeless. You're not listless.

You're not left to find and discover the path you're supposed to walk or who you really are or whatever. You're made by God. Who loves you and who's with you and is going to use you and then is going to give you an in eternity that's gonna just blow your mind. That reframes everything. That's the kind of thinking that allows Stephen, the guy that we met in Acts chapter six, as one of the first deacons, who is then persecuted by people who hate the gospel.

And literally stone him to death just for preaching the good news. And he does it with a heart filled with joy. Looking at this glimpse he gets of Christ, just going, man, it's so worth it. This is what allows the Apostle Paul to say, to live his Christ to die is gain. He understands I've got something much better.

It even allows him to count all the good stuff he used to have as rubbish. He's got something of greater value, much greater value, and that gives him an abiding sense of joy. This is not just reserved for people like, like the martyr Stephen or the Apostle Paul, or some like super Christian. This is just normal biblical Christianity.

When you understand and meditate on the beauty of the gospel and the reality of Christ's kingdom and the part that you have in it. It reframes everything and that gives you a sense of abiding joy. So that when you face trial, you're comforted by the reality of who God is and where he is in the midst of it, so that when you see the world spinning out of control, you don't have to panic like everyone else.

So when you hear the advertisement saying, you've got all these problems in your life and this is a solution, you already know, Nope, that's a lie. I have something better. I've got all I need in Christ. I've got all I need in his word. I have something so much greater than any of this. That gives you an abiding sense of joy.

And so here's what I want you to think about this week. You as a Christian should be more joyful tomorrow than you were today. You should be more joyful a year from now than you were, today. Started doing math there, baby. And pastor math does not work out well. And here's a way that I can help you with thinking about joy.

In James chapter one, he says this weird thing. Consider it pure joy, my brothers, when you face trials of various kinds, that sounds like a contradiction. Pure joy versus various trials. They sound like they're at war with each other, but think of the first word he said. Consider it. Consider isn't like give it some consideration, like maybe you could land on that.

It's more like reconcile. Now I, let's be just like really honest here. I don't use my checkbook almost ever, and when I do. I'm not great at sitting down and figuring out does my column of what I think I spent match the bank's column of what they said I spent. That's a process called reconciliation. Man, I'm sure my grandparents and my parents were really good at that, and I'm probably the worst disappointment ever.

Not great at reconciling the checkbook, but I do understand the principle. If I say I have a thousand dollars, but the bank says I've got a dollar fee. Somebody's wrong. It's either me or the bank, and in this case, it could be either one of us. I could have made an error in my calculations. They could have made an error in their calculations.

The process of reconciliation or considering the matter helps you figure out where the discrepancy lies. So let's say the discrepancy was with me. I forgot that I had to go buy a new fridge and it cost me $9,999 and 50 cents. No, 98. See, I told you, pastor math, $9,998 and 50 cents, and I actually do only have a buck fitting, but I forgot about that fridge.

I didn't write it in my checkbook. That's when I consider it, or I reconcile. I see that error and I'm like, oh, yes, I am as poor as they said I am. On the flip side, it could be the banks error. And you've, you're going through and you're figuring out, oh, this charge right here was double entered. And so here's where the mistake is, and I actually have this much left.

Reconciliation helps you get to the truth of the matter. And that's what needs to happen between you and the Lord. When you think about your joy. So when you go through your list and you're like, I'm sad, I'm hurt, I'm depressed, I'm worried, I'm anxious, I'm whatever, just discontent. And you're, you're feeling those feelings and they have replaced joy.

They've displaced the joy in your life. You're not feeling joyful. So you go through and you reconcile, and God says on the other side, I'm supposed to have joy. So God's total at the bottom says, joy. My total at the bottom says, not joy. I gotta go back through line by line. In this case, we know the error is not with the Lord.

The error must be in my column somewhere, so I start thinking, what was it? Okay. This morning I got up and I, I was doing all right. I went to, to work right away. Oh yeah. I did not spend any time with the Lord. That's right. I slept in just a little bit and I missed my time with the Lord. And that might be, boom, right from there on.

My thinking was lousy the rest of the day. Maybe that's not the case. Maybe you're like, no, I got up. I read my Bible. I prayed. I prayed through my church directory. I, you know, I prayed for missionaries. Like I felt like I was really in it today. I got to work. Great time at work. I brought coffee for my coworker.

He or she loved it and they were thankful and I was high-fiving everybody. It was just sweet. And then there was that weird interaction with Bill after lunch. He made that comment that just, I, I couldn't, I didn't quite know what he was saying. I didn't think I agreed. It kind of hurt my feelings. Well, and then that report came in and I saw that.

I'm getting a budget cut, whatever, and I started to think about that thing right there. That's where my thinking got off, and I started feeling sorry for myself. I started putting too much weight in what Bill said. I started seeing my identity as a worker, not as a person, made in the image of Christ to show these people Jesus, no matter what my job description says, I'm actually here to show Christ.

I forgot that for a second. My joy started to be displaced and by the end of the day I'm feeling pretty lousy and you just gotta figure out where was that line item where I made the mistake. If you're struggling to find joy, you, you may have a really long list 'cause you haven't reconciled. A long time to figure out why your column doesn't match what God's column says.

You will drive yourself absolutely batty if you try to go back through and figure out everything that went wrong. Here's what you do. You just X out that whole thing. You go, I'm sure this is full of errors. I'm gonna start fresh. I'm gonna start fresh. I'm gonna say God's balance says joy. We're just gonna trust that and go with that, and I am going to make decisions.

Starting right now that keep me close to Christ. That remind me of what's really true. That keep my joy at the top of the column. Now, sometimes you can't do that because there's some kind of unresolved issue in the p revious column and that will rear its ugly head. You might need to go back and apologize to somebody.

You might need to go back and make things right with somebody who has something against you. Even if you don't think you did anything wrong, like the Bible says. You might need to restore a relationship. You might need to pay some debt. You might need to confess some sin. You might need to ask the people around you for some help moving beyond a sin or processing some things. That's normal. And that, again, normal Christianity.

This is part of the fruit of the spirit. You walk in joy because you're walking according to the truth instead of the lies. So if you're walking according to the lies in some way right now, that's why you're robbed of your joy and you need to work on, not the responsibility of being a joyful person, but on getting the truth into your heart and replacing what's what's wrong with what's right, with replacing the lie with what's true.

Just ask the Lord for help. Ask him to reveal things that shouldn't be there. Now I do wanna just make a quick note on some organic problems that could lead to something like a depression. A heavy season of the blues, whatever, or some circumstantial things that can be really visceral in a moment. I just wanna touch on those for a second.

Here's, here's what I wanna say about this. You could have some physical issue going on, you should go to the doctor and get checked out to see if there's something going on there. But you gotta be really careful 'cause the doctor has been sold a bunch of lies about how medicine can fix things and you might get sold those lies by that doctor and just get sucked into a belief that medicine is the solution.

I am not anti-medicine, but I am anti-medicine as a replacement for the hard work of just staying close to Christ and trusting him and walking through it, and I believe that you can walk through a physical issue with joy just as much as if that physical issue were not present. I believe that there can be some kind of mental thing going on.

That you can have joy through. And here's why, because God is not going to call you to do something that you with his help cannot do. So he's not going to let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But he's faithful and with a temptation he's gonna provide the way of escape that you can endure it. And it is possible to have an abiding sense of joy, even while going through some things, even physically that are causing that to be difficult.

Visceral life circumstance stuff. You just lost somebody, you just got a diagnosis. You have had years of addiction. You've become a Christian, you don't know how to shake it. I mean, there's, there could be lots and lots of things like that. To have joy as you walk through those things doesn't mean that you don't get sad.

It doesn't mean you don't weep bitterly. Mourning is real. And as Christians, we need to mourn with those who mourn. Lament is real. In the Old Testament, they would rip their clothes and put dirt on their head. Lament is just this visible life dominating feeling. To have a sense of abiding joy through that is to continue to replace your thoughts and your emotions with what's true about who you are in Christ, about what your future is really like and about how you can get through days like this in light of God's character and God's inclusion of you in his kingdom and the great grand, beautiful culmination.

So if you're scared of Revelation, maybe now's the time to get over that fear, because the Book of Revelation gives such beautiful, wonderful life, reorienting hope, especially when you get around like Chapter 21. Hmm. So sweet. I've given you a lot. Here we are talking about joy, and I believe that joy is possible.

Uh, not only that, I think joy is the essence of who we are as believers because it's part of the fruit of the spirit that God reveals in our lives because of the spirit dwells inside of us, and as you walk through hard things with joy. You will demonstrate God's glory there in the middle of nowhere that makes an actual difference.

Unlike all of the retailers and whoever else who are just trying to whip up problems so that people pay attention and follow their solution. You need to be a part of the solution by demonstrating a better kingdom. Because you have a higher hope and that is in Christ who is overall and in all, and it's all because of him and for him and all that stuff.

You get to make that known in your small town in a way that not many other people are doing. So go out there with joy for the glory of God. For now, let's get back to life, back to rurality.