Oh! One hour with God infinitely exceeds all the pleasures and delights of this lower world.
– David Brainerd –
Joy & Happiness
Alone with the Living God – Keith Green
When the meeting is over and there is no one there to listen except the only One who matters, do you still have the same passionate joy in your spirit, just to be alone with the Living God?
– Keith Green –
The pleasures of religion – Matthew Henry
The pleasures of religion will abide; they wither not in winter, nor tarnish with time, nor doth age wrinkle their beauty; frosts nip them not, nor do storms blast them; they continue through the greatest opposition of events, and despise that time and change, which happens to all things under the sun’ (Ecl 9:1). Believers, when they are sorrowful, they are but as sorrowful, for they are “always rejoicing” (2 Cor 6:10) and “Thanks be to God who always causes us to triumph” (2 Cor 2:14).
– Matthew Henry –
from The Pleasantness of a Religious Life, 1714
Where your treasure is – Augustine
Where your pleasure is, there is your treasure. Where your treasure is, there is your heart. Where your heart is, there is your happiness.
– Augustine –
354-430 AD
Find Contentment – Jeremiah Burroughs
A man whose bones are filled with marrow, and his veins with good blood does not complain of the cold as others do. So a gracious heart, having the Spirit of God within him, and his heart filled with grace has that within him that makes him find contentment.
– Jeremiah Burroughs –
from The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment, 1648
Focus on God’s smile – Catherine Booth
Never mind man’s frown if God smiles.
– Catherine Booth –
Spirit-filled souls ablaze for God – Samuel Chadwick
Spirit-filled souls are ablaze for God. They love with a love that glows. They serve with a faith that kindles. They serve with a devotion that consumes. They hate sin with fierceness that burns. They rejoice with a joy that radiates. Love is perfected in the fire of God.
– Samuel Chadwick –
Rules for Self Discovery – AW Tozer
Rules for Self Discovery:
1. What we want most
2. What we think about most
3. How we use our money
4. What we do with our leisure time
5. The company we enjoy
6. Who and what we admire
7. What we laugh at
– AW Tozer –
Joy is the Beauty of Christians – Thomas Brooks
A beautiful face is at all time pleasing to the eye, but then especially when there is joy manifested in the countenance. Joy in the face puts a new beauty, and makes that which before was beautiful to be exceeding beautiful. It puts a lustre and glory upon beauty; so does joy in the face, heart, and life of a Christian, cast a general splendor and glory upon him, and the ways of God wherein he walks. The joy of the Lord is not only the strength, but also the beauty and glory of Christians. (see Nehemiah 8:10)
– Thomas Brooks –
from Heaven on Earth: A Treatise on Christian Assurance, 1654