Wishing all our dear readers a Joyful Christmas! A life of joy and gladness is born. 

Luke 2:10-11 – “Don’t be afraid,” he said. “I bring you good news that will bring great JOY to all people. The Saviour – yes, the Messiah, the Lord – has been born today in Bethlehem, the city of David!

In this beautiful Christmas season, I feel it is important to dwell deeply and meditate on the source of this great joy that was promised to all people. 

In the first part, we started exploring the first source of true joy and gladness – Joy and gladness come from knowing God’s presence. In this second and final part, we will explore the next two sources – (2) from being conformed to God’s holiness; and, (3) from the hope of God’s raising our bodies so that we can eternally dwell with Him.

2. Joy and gladness come from being conformed to God’s holiness

Jesus is here called God’s “Holy One.” He was without sin, as even His enemies had to admit (John 8:46). Hebrews 1:9 says of Jesus, “You have loved righteousness and hated lawlessness; therefore God, Your God, has anointed You with the oil of gladness above Your companions.” Note how righteousness and gladness go together.

Again, Satan perpetrates a great lie. He makes us think that real happiness is found in sin, whereas holiness is a dull, wearisome matter. But God’s Word teaches that holiness and happiness are inextricably bound together. Sin may give momentary pleasures, but it always wreaks destruction and death.

Clearly, a person living in sin could not be happy in God’s holy presence. Men love darkness and want to hide from the God who is light, because their deeds are evil (John 3:19-21). When Jonah disobeyed God, he tried to run from God’s presence (Jonah 1:3, 10). So the only way to know the joy and gladness that come from God’s presence is to know that your sins are forgiven through faith in Jesus Christ and to be walking in obedience to Him, beginning on the thought level.

In our text, the Lord Jesus prays, “You have made known to me the ways of life” (Acts 2:28). This refers to God’s paths of righteousness that lead to true life—eternal life—that begins now. The one who lives for sinful desires is on the way that leads to destruction and death. The one who puts to death the sinful deeds of the flesh knows God’s ways of life (Rom. 8:13).

To be sure there is real self-denial and real discipline and gouging out of the eye and cutting off of the hand—a spiritual severity of warfare that many have not attained. But it must be said—and let the apostle say it with all authority—that the secret beneath this severe discipline, the secret to severing all else as rubbish, is to savour Christ as gain (Philippians 3:8).

The battle for holiness is a battle to be fought mainly by fuelling the fires of our passion for Christ. Sanctification is the triumph of “sovereign joy.”

When David sinned with Bathsheba, he was miserable until he confessed his sins and prayed, “Restore to me the joy of Your salvation” (Ps. 51:12). If you lack God’s joy, examine your heart and make sure that you are not entertaining any known sin. Confess and forsake it and with David entreat God to restore to you the joy of His salvation. True joy and gladness come only as we continually know God’s presence and walk in His paths of holiness.

3. Joy and gladness come from the certain hope of God’s raising our bodies so that we can eternally dwell with Him

The joy of Jesus in this psalm is the joy of knowing that God would raise Him from the dead before His body would undergo decay. We can rejoice because we have the certain hope that because Jesus was raised, even so we will be raised when He returns (1 Cor. 15). The instant we die, our soul goes to be with Jesus in heaven (2 Cor. 5:8). But our bodies await that great moment when “the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trumpet of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and thus we shall always be with the Lord” (1 Thess. 4:16-17).

All of the blessings that God gives us in this life are just samples to whet our appetites for the eternal blessings that we will enjoy in His presence in heaven. Do you like to eat? Heaven is pictured as a great banquet. Do you like to rest from hard work? Heaven, as Richard Baxter put it, is the place of “the saints’ everlasting rest.” 

Jesus says that His flesh will abide in hope (Acts 2:26). The literal meaning of “abide” is “to put down a tent.” The idea is that as long as we’re in this body, we will hope in God and the promise of the resurrection. But like a tent, our hope is temporary, until the resurrection, when we no longer need to hope because the promise is realized (Rom. 8:24-25).

Don’t miss the application: As the Lord’s people, we should be filled with the certain hope of His coming and the resurrection of our bodies, when we shall dwell with Him eternally. Such hope will fill us with joy and gladness. Only when you’re ready to die are you ready to live. You can have true joy in this life only when you know that you will have eternal joy in the next life, after death.

And the psalmist isn’t just talking about a trickle of joy and gladness in this life. He says, “You will make me full of gladness in Your presence” (Acts 2:28). Don’t rest until the Lord fills you with His joy and gladness. Of course, we won’t be totally full of His joy until we’re with Him in heaven. But we should seek Him continually, not settling for a trickle of joy, but asking Him for the fulness of His joy that comes with our salvation.

God is the highest good of the reasonable creature, and the enjoyment of Him is the only happiness with which our souls can be satisfied. To go to heaven, fully to enjoy God, is infinitely better than the most pleasant accommodations here. Fathers and mothers, husbands, wives, or children, or the company of earthly friends, are but shadows; but the enjoyment of God is the substance. These are but scattered beams, but God is the sun. These are but streams, but God is the fountain. These are but drops, but God is the ocean. Therefore it becomes us to spend this life only as a journey towards heaven, as it becomes us to make the seeking of our highest end and proper good, the whole work of our lives; to which we should subordinate all other concerns of life. Why should we labour for, or set our hearts on, anything else, but that which is our proper end, and true happiness?

God desires that you be full of joy and gladness. You will find it only in Him. Aim for it, seek after it, and don’t rest until you enjoy a good measure of it! As you grow in God’s joy and gladness, He will be glorified through your life. As John Piper puts it, “God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him.”

Are you still afraid and worried, cheer up, “Don’t be afraid”, for you know the source of the greatest joy that was given to all humanity. The Saviour – yes, the Messiah, the Lord – has been born today in Bethlehem, the city of David!

Show the joy of Christ to the world! God Bless!