Complete joy and the ten commandments

Down in My Heart Kind of Joy
Lesson 12
Complete Joy…Ten Commandment connection

Keep all that we’ve learned about joy in mind as we look at the Ten Commandments and draw a connection between joy and obedience.

Read Exodus 20:1-17.

For several weeks in Sunday School we had been reading and discussing the book Sinai Summit: Meeting God with Our Character Crisis by Rick Atchley. Each week we discussed a commandment and we got to the last one—“Do not covet your neighbor’s ____.” We talked about this commandment being different because it dealt with our thoughts, not our actions. And breaking this one can lead to breaking every other commandment! (The author pointed out that David coveted Bathsheba and that lead to breaking 7 of the 10!) Then it dawned on me that when we covet, we think we will be happier or find joy, if only we had _____. But the joy we are seeking is something only God can give us by spending time in His presence. When we seek joy in places other than God, it can lead to breaking every other commandment. This falls right in to what Jesus taught as the Greatest Commandment:

Read Matthew 22:35-40.

I have to put God as my first priority! When I do, watch what happens.

Read Matthew 6:33.

Jesus reminds us to seek God first, and our needs will be met—there is no need to worry or covet or steal or break any other command.

Then I thought of this verse. (This maybe one of those “joy” verses you were expecting!) It is short so I’ll give it to you.

Nehemiah 8:10b …for the joy of the Lord is your strength.

How can joy be strength? This was pretty profound to me! When I spend time in God’s presence and am filled with His joy, I gain strength to obey because He satisfies my desires! This led to a search and here are some other verses God lead me to.

Psalm 89:15-17 Happy are those who hear the joyful call to worship, for they will walk in the light of Your presence, Lord. They rejoice all day long in Your wonderful reputation. They exult in Your righteousness. You are their glorious strength. It pleases You to make us strong. (NLT)

There are several themes of our study that I want to point out here. First, did you notice the setting of joy is in His presence? Second, they rejoiced in Him because of His wonderful deeds. And third, they acknowledged God as the source of strength. I just love the last sentence! I am so weak, I’m glad it pleases Him to make me strong! I need Him so much! It pleases Him to make me strong because I am depending on Him in my weakness.

Read John 15:9-12.

When I spend time with Him, I hear God’s Word and gain strength to obey Him and remain in His love. When I obey, my joy will be complete! Wow! Which begs the question What does complete joy look like in my life? Stick with me and we will discover that, at least to some degree!

Read John 16:24.

As I try to obey and need help, I just have to ask! God will help me to obey so that my joy can be complete in Him. Then I will praise Him with joy for the mighty things He is doing in my life! Oh, I just love this next part!

Philippians 2:13. For God is working in you, giving you the desire to obey Him and the power to do what pleases Him. (NLT)

God gives me the desire to obey, the strength and power to accomplish it, and a complete greater joy to top it off!

I want to keep this in manageable chunks for a day, so come back for part two in the next lesson…

Heart question:
Am I content in God, or am I coveting ____ that gets me into trouble?

What priority does God have in my life?

Am I operating in God’s strength or my own?

SweetTate funny

SweetTate and SweetBoy are playing football on the wii. SweetTate said, "I want to be the tookers." He has said that for days and I have not had a clue what he was talking about. SweetBoy and I finally figured it out! When they are picking teams, SweetTate pointed to the team he wanted the "tookers." It is the Steelers. I finally got it! The stealers took something, so they are the tookers! haha

But what about trouble

Down in My Heart Kind of Joy
Lesson 11
But what about…trouble

We do live in the real world with real troubles, real hurts and life isn’t fair! Joy is still an option!

Read James 1:2-4.

Troubles—great joy?! Last time I checked this is not my first reaction to troubled times! But will I choose joy? Will I take the chance to seek God and be in His presence? A chance to joyfully praise Him for the work He is doing in my life? When I choose to do this, then yes, it is pure joy!

This is one of those times that it is good to practice being in God's presence and in His Word when life is good. Then when life is hard, keep at it. Even at the time if it is just out of habit, keep God's Word in your life. I recently read Corrie ten Boom's book, The Hiding Place. She has an amazing story of persecution and how God's Word and His love sustained her through it. Even to forgiving the concentration camp jailers who were so cruel. Beth's memory verse for this go round fits in here. It is Psalm 119:175 out of the Message:

Invigorate my soul so I can praise You well,
use Your decrees to put iron in my soul.

There is a verse that says the joy of the Lord is my strength (Nehemiah 8:10). Iron in my soul sounds like strength to me. That comes from His Word--His presence.

Read 2 Corinthians 8:2.

Remember that we will have trouble, but it does not have to interfere with being filled with abundant joy.

Heart questions:
How do I react to hard times?

Is there anything in the way of my experiencing God’s greater joy?

So here is where we have been. This joy is overwhelming! God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit—the presence of the Triune God is our lasting source of joy. We seek to be with Him in praise and instruction. Because of His presence, forgiveness and mighty acts, we shout with joy! Even when we don’t feel it, God fills us with joy. Now. What will we do with it? See you next time!

But what about stolen joy

Down in My Heart Kind of Joy
Lesson 10
But what about…stolen joy

Beware! Satan wants to steal our joy! One of SweetTate's favorite TV shows is Dora, the Explorer. There is a character, named Swiper, who likes to swipe things. When he comes to steal something, Dora and her buddy Boots say, “Swiper, no swiping!” Sometimes his plan is foiled. I wish it were as easy as saying, “Satan, no swiping!” God desires for us to have His Word such a part of our lives that we can combat Satan with it.

Read John 10:10.

Did you notice destruction is the enemy’s goal and his plan starts by stealing? He knows how powerful joy is. He is so envious and there is a lot he can not touch, like our salvation, but he can steal our joy. That is why he sets traps of sin for us to fall into. David fell into sin with Bathsheba (2 Samuel 11) and he wrote this Psalm of repentance…

Read Psalm 51:8, 12.

Satan steals our joy and tries to replace it with a counterfeit. I know there is no lasting joy except from God. Guard it! And if I do fall for Satan’s lies, come back and repent as David did. God will restore the joy of my salvation.

Heart question:
Has Satan stolen my joy?

Is there unconfessed sin that needs to be taken care of?

Praise Him for the joy of His salvation!

The Lamb has Landed!

I used to say that I grew up on the farm. I have no idea why. I only lived there for 4 years before we moved to the "big city." (And yes, Mom, technically it is still the biggest city I have ever lived in!) But no. I'm really a city girl. It doesn't matter how small--I like being able to walk to the post office, city hall, and the school. I am totally clueless when it comes to animals. So let the adventures begin! SweetBoy has a show lamb! Thankfully SweetHeart (and Papa) are ol' pros at this so we have some experience in the family.

Did I mention she is in the backyard? SweetBoy can see her from his bedroom window. She will fit right in with the horses next door. That is just how our tiny town rolls! SweetBoy has been SO excited for her to finally get here. For weeks he has been drawing up plans how the pen will be, saving for feed, buying supplies, or talking about all of the above and more! (Talking about it...does that surprise anyone who knows him?!) When the ag teacher drove up this afternoon with the lamb he said with a gleam in his eye, "You'd think I was Santa Claus the way those kids reacted." He made their day! Thanks Santa!

But what about when I'm just not feeling it

Down in My Heart Kind of Joy
Lesson 9
But what about…when I don’t feel joy

Whether it is a big move, strained relationships, a loss, or any number of other hurts, we all have times that we don’t feel joy. I am one who can get down, and if it is something I think I have the right to be depressed about, I just let go and fall into depression. (Never clinically diagnosed, but once it probably could have been.) In the middle of working on this, we had to put our dog to sleep. (That was about a year ago.) She had been my dog for almost 12 years, and it was really hard. (I understand if you are not a pet person, you probably can’t relate here, but go with me.) I cried for days, and really didn’t want to do anything but sit and miss Sadie. Then I remembered this lesson, and thought about how I should look to God for my joy and not let go into deep sadness. And He did. He comforted me like no one else could. I know that is so minor to other situations, but I know if He cares about the little matters, He will certainly care about the big ones!

So where is this in the Bible? Reading the story of Elijah, I noticed something.

Read 1 Kings 18-19. (Yes, that is chapters.)

Here are some highlights I want to point out about Elijah:
o Experienced God’s presence – 1 Kings 18:15
o Witnessed God’s marvelous acts – 1 Kings 18:18-39
o Heard God in a gentle whisper – 1 Kings 19:11-13
o AND had confidence and depression issues – 1 Kings 19:14 (for the fourth time)

So where was Elijah’s joy? From what we have studied, he surely experienced the lasting joy of God. I am no expert, but the best answer I can come up with is that maybe it was just not recorded. It is comforting for me to know that I can have times of depression and times where I don’t feel God’s joy. It is not something I want to do often. Others are watching how I react and depend on God. So for His glory I need to reflect His love and joy more often than not. But there will still be those down times, and from Elijah’s example, God can still use me mightily! I need to keep on seeking, keep on knocking, keep on asking and keep on knowing Him.

So does this mean I can’t be sad or upset in His presence? No. He wants me to bring Him all of my stuff. I know we read a lot already, but you have to see this.

Read 1 Peter 5:7.

He wants it all—the good, the bad, and the ugly. Go ahead. He can handle it! And He loves you so much!

Read Psalm 56:8.

Read Psalm 42 (focus on verse 5).

Read Psalm 126:5-6.


He cares—keeps tears, wipes away tears. He will lift you up and fill your heart with joy. Our hearts ache, but we always have joy.

Heart question:
What care do I need to cast on the Father who loves me?

Mostly birthday news

Wow! We have had an eventful couple of weeks! Last weekend we went to SweetHeart's hometown for his homecoming and 20th class reunion. We enjoyed the game and visiting with friends. SweetDoll had said she wanted a surprise party for her birthday. Well, that was going to be a trick to pull off being far from cousins and friends, and we don't know a lot of people here. But since we were going to be at hometown anyway...we invited some friends and took some cousins with us to the park and had a surprise party there! SweetDoll didn't have a clue until we pulled out the party stuff to decorate the table. (Meme totally made it a party with the decorations!) That was fun to surprise her and play with friends!

There are several family birthdays within these couple of weeks, so we just had a birthday bash for all of them while we were visiting. Here are the birthday girls--the twins, Meme, Aunt J, and SweetDoll.

This week for SweetDoll's actual birthday...(my kids are masters of stretching out their birthdays!) Granny came for lunch at school. Then it just happened that her class was going on a field trip to a local corn maze so Granny, SweetTate, and I went along. We had a great time getting completely lost in the maze! Seriously, we were so lost the lady running it was watching out for us on the tower. She tried to give us directions, but eventually came to our rescue and led us out herself! I'm sure there is a devotional in that, but we'll go there another day.

For birthday supper SweetDoll wanted chicken nugget kabobs. (Dad was at a ballgame.)

Our present to SweetDoll was going horseback riding. SweetDoll got new cowgirl boots for her birthday. I dug mine out of the closet too. Haven't worn them in years! But there is just something about putting on a pair of boots! We are ready!

Miniature horses greeted us at the ranch. SweetDoll loved it!

We found a great place to take a picture. Here is my 6 year old!

SweetBoy was so excited that he got to ride alone. He rode Lightnin'.

SweetDoll rode with Daddy on Star. SweetTate and I got Slim. (Infront of SweetBoy is Toby, the huge Belgian Mule who wanted to have his picture taken too!)
The kids' favorite part was when we would go down and up the creek bed ravine, the horses would trot. And every time they did, the kids would just giggle! Which was our favorite part! Priceless. We had a glorious ride through some beautiful country! The pictures don't do it justice. (Your next photography challenge...get a good picture on horseback with a three year old in front of you!)



I hate to end this on a sad note, but it has been part of our week too. Our dog, Daisy, had been really good about staying close to the house, but this week she ran off a couple of times. Friday she ran off and the big kids chased after her. They saw that she got to the highway and turned back and came home. Thankfully they didn't see what happened for many reasons mostly their safety. But Daisy was hit by a car and she died. It has not been nearly as hard to deal with as loosing Sadie last October, but it is still sad. SweetTate got his B'noculars out to look for her today.



On a happier animal note...(aren't you glad!) SweetBoy is getting a show lamb this week, so I'm sure we will have new animal adventures to talk about!