Happiness or Holiness?

“I know the Bible says this desire is wrong, but why do I have to give it up?  Doesn’t God want me to be happy?”  Yes. And no. Happy in God’s vocabulary isn’t the same as our 21st-century “it’s all about me” understanding. In the Bible, the word “happy” is interchangeable with the word “blessed.” Happiness is a blessing from God. It is not something you can attain from circumstances, pleasures, or emotions. And especially not from sin.

In the last half-century, the church has flung the doors wide open and said, “You don’t have to give up anything – just come sing a few songs and sip some coffee and God will make you happy.” That is nothing less than an outright lie. Before you throw your Bible at me – yes, God accepts us as we are, but His purpose in accepting us is to conform us into the image of His Son (Rom. 8:29).  One who has no love for sin. A more conservative answer is, “You don’t have to give up your sinful desire, just don’t act on it.” It is an attempt to live in the tension between the holiness of God and your flesh. Two things will happen:  you will withhold the most important part of yourself – your heart – from God, and you will eventually give up the pretense.

Here’s the deal, God isn’t after your cooperation, He’s after the desire of your heart.  I Chronicles 28:9 says, “The Lord searches every heart and understands every desire and every thought.”  He knows when your outward obedience masks a heart that still yearns for sin. Friend, the reason you and I fall back into sin over and over again is that we hold on to those fleshly, sinful, evil urges and don’t make Him the complete desire of our heart.  That’s what the Bible calls “cherishing sin (Psalm 66:18).  It’s also called a divided heart.  And you can’t survive with less than a whole heart – physically or spiritually. Believe me when I tell you God is stomping all over my toes right now.

Beloved, you may think the sin you desire so much will make you happy, but that’s a lie. When God is your heart’s greatest desire sin cannot compare. When your heart delights in Him He will bless you. That’s true happiness. 

With All Your Heart

Image may contain: 1 person, standing and outdoor

This is the story of the spiritual downfall of a king. It’s also the story of how any one of us can fall out of love with God. 2 Chronicles 25 is the account of Judah’s King Amaziah. Amaziah obeyed the Law of God in some circumstances – where it suited him, but not in others. That sounds familiar. When the king led his troops to war against the Edomites, it suited him to disobey God. “When Amaziah returned . . . he brought back the gods of the people of Seir.  He set them up as his own gods, bowed down to them, and burned sacrifices to them” (v. 14).  Because of his unfaithfulness, God brought the army of Israel to destroy the city’s protective wall, loot the temple and the palace, and take hostages back to Israel. This isn’t meant to be a political statement, but the king’s failure cost his nation greatly.

There is so much here that we can unpack and it all stems from verse 2, the defining statement of Amaziah’s life: “He did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, but not wholeheartedly.” Amaziah’s heart was divided, which meant that his devotion to God was divided and it showed. The lure of other “gods” pulled him away from the Lord God.

 A half-hearted devotion to God is a wholehearted rejection of God. Here’s the bottom line: you are either all in or you’re not in at all. Jesus said, “No one can serve two masters.  Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other” (Matt. 6: 24). His immediate context was about wealth, but the principle is the same. As the great missionary, Hudson Taylor said, “Christ is either Lord of all or He is not Lord at all.”

You and I cannot love God and the world.  We cannot love God and money. We cannot love God and status.  We cannot love God and lust.  We cannot love God and alcohol or drugs. We cannot love God and . . . any other thing. (Now, I am certainly not saying we cannot love our families or our church or people – we love them because God loves us.) If we’re wholeheartedly devoted to God, there’s just no room for other loves in our hearts; God takes up the whole thing.

Beloved, does God have your whole heart? Is it time to reevaluate your loves?