Lasting happiness is not found by buying or selling… it’s found by giving.
In some circles, “happiness” gets a bad rap.
Not in this one… who isn’t happy about happiness?
Now that we know we’re OK with happiness… What’s the problem?
Mainly, it doesn’t last long enough. 🙁
You’re rocking along, all happy and fuzzy, and then, “BAM!” – something happens that knocks you off your little “happy train”. Once you clear your head and realize that you’re no longer happy, you wonder how it happened?
Maybe a better question is “Why did I let that happen?” – which is a good question and perhaps a topic for another day’s Tiny Words. Big Life. post.
But back to the vanishing happiness… It’s sorta the way it works. Most of what we experience and call happiness is really “superficial happiness”. It’s like it’s not designed to make you “permanently happy”. It’s just this thing that comes along and you ride it as long as you can – always looking for the proverbial “shoe to drop”.
To experience happiness differently, we have to seek happiness from a different source.
Today’s Tiny Words. Big Life. quote talks about “buying and selling” which implies that our “normal happiness” is often centered around “stuff”. It might be cars, TVs, boats, or just a good ‘ole Ribeye steak (now there’s something that’ll make you happy – with apologies and condolences to my Vegan friends).
The problem with “stuff” is that it’s always a temporary happiness. After all, “stuff” has a limited shelf-life – it doesn’t last forever.
So, what are we supposed to do to find lasting happiness?
The answer is easy to say but not so easy to accomplish. We have to first adjust our mindset about the things that make us happy. In our fallen world, we can’t do that alone. We have to seek God’s help, through prayer and His grace, so that we find less happiness in “stuff” and more happiness from God.
Once we do that, God will use our prayer in ways that we can’t fathom to accomplish His work in us.
In today’s Tiny Words. Big Life. Bible verses, the Apostle Matthew tells us that we should give to the needy without fanfare or any “public announcement”. In other words, we shouldn’t be looking for admiration from others when we give to the needy, or anyone for that matter. In turn, God will give us our “reward” because He sees what’s done in secret. On a side note, we know that Matthew was a tax collector – basically someone who was hated by most of the Jews for contracting with the Roman Empire to collect taxes and was most likely stealing from his own people. But God saw things differently. He took Matthew, someone who had already proven that his happiness was based on “stuff” and totally flipped that situation around.
The Tiny Words. Big Life. “AHA!” moment is this: You can’t buy or sell something to find lasting happiness. Neither “money” or “stuff” will do it. To get it, we have to “give it away” – and I’m not talking about that sweater in the back of my closet with a moth hole in the right arm… the one that I’ve also outgrown from getting “happy” with too many Ribeye steaks…
We have to give away things that matter – things we treasure.
Only “sacrificial giving” brings lasting happiness.
So, go ahead and test the theory. Give away something of value to someone who can use it and don’t let anyone know that you’re doing it.
And about that reward from God… Don’t be impatient and have faith. His reward will come in His time.
You’ll be happy you did.
Matthew 6:2-4
2 “So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. 3 But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, 4 so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.