| The Happiest Place in the World |
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The Happiest Place in the World Psalm 16:11 Introduction Last year a professor from England performed a study on world happiness, trying to identify the happiest and unhappiest places in the world, and trying to identify the factors that contribute to happiness and unhappiness. He created what he calls the world's first "map of happiness." He concluded that Denmark is the happiest place on earth. The United States did not even break the top 20. The study compiled data from 70,000 people in 178 countries and found that countries with good access to health care and education were happiest. Of course Disney World also claims to be "the happiest place on earth" and they don't offer much in the way of health care or education. Benjamin Holst, a Danish journalist, said that Denmark's high suicide rate - the second worst in Europe - should make people question just how happy Danes were. "I'm not sure about these studies and I really wonder about the suicide rates in Denmark," he said. "I mean is it that we're so happy we kill ourselves? I really wonder about that." Yeah, makes me wonder too. The question of what makes people happy is no idle question. You could make the case that every action of every person is driven by the desire for happiness. 17th century philosopher Blaise Pascal observed this: "All men seek happiness. This is without exception. The cause of some going to war, and of others avoiding it, is the same desire in both. This is the motive of every action of every man, even of those who hang themselves." In other words, even those who kill themselves do it because they believe they will be happier dead than alive. If I am honest, I must admit that my life is driven by this same desire – I want happiness, and I have looked a lot of different places to find it. What is your "happiest place on earth"? What makes you most happy? The flip side is, what makes you most unhappy. These are really two sides of the same coin. The things that make us most happy are also the things that make us most unhappy in their absence. Happy Places In reality, the factors that cause happiness, or unhappiness in their absence, are not very difficult to figure out. My own experience, which I think you will find is very similar to yours, reveals that four factors contribute to the happiest or unhappiest moments in life: 1. Love 2. Beauty 3. Accomplishment 4. Pleasure Love Let's start with the most obvious. The happiest moments of my life have been those moments when I have felt the most love for another person, and the unhappiest moments of my life have been those moments when I felt most rejected by another person. This experience goes back to my earliest days as a kid. I was not raised in a very stable home. My parents were divorced when I two years old. My mom remarried shortly after the divorce, and I lived with my mom and step-dad. He was an abusive man who used to hit my mom on a regular basis, and eventually started getting into fist fights with my brother. Needless to say, it was not a very loving environment. In those days, the happiest place in the world for me was at my Grandma Babe's. At Grandma Babe's, there was no fighting, and there was an unlimited supply of hugs, candy, and pop. I absolutely adored Grandma Babe, and would have spent every night at her house if I could. I'm not sure it is possible to love someone more than I loved Grandma Babe, and I was convinced that no one could ever love me more than she did. That was, until one summer afternoon that I still remember as one of the worst moments of my life. I had stayed with Grandma Babe for almost a week straight when I overheard her talking to my Aunt Betty in the kitchen saying: "I'm so sick of that kid; I think it's time for him to go home." It was like someone stabbed me in the heart. Now that I am grown up and have a child of my own, I can understand how she felt, but as a little kid I could not understand. All I could think was that the person I loved most in the whole world didn't feel the same way about me. The happiest place in the world, on that day, became the unhappiest place in the world. This story has replayed itself in different settings many times in my life, most notably when I found out that the woman I had been married to for eleven years had been having an affair for four years. Yes, this is the power of love -- the power to bring intense happiness, and intense pain. As Erwin McManus writes in his book Soul Cravings: "How is it that the same thing that can make your life a rhapsody can also leave you gutted, like a dead fish wrapped in day-old newspaper….After all, the only people who can hurt you deeply are the ones you allow to get deep inside your soul." Or as Depeche Mode sings in "The Meaning of Love": "From the notes that I've made so far, Love seems something like wanting a scar." In spite of this, there is no happier moment than a moment in love. It's as if we were made for love. The craving for love is universal. Beauty Second only to love in my life is the experience of being in the presence of something beautiful. Think of those moments in your life when you were in the presence of something (or someone) uncommonly beautiful or majestic. There is a happiness that is unexplainable when you are in the presence of something like this. You could stay in such places all day and do nothing but stare and never grow tired of it. Two weeks ago I took my daughter on a cruise to the Bahamas. It is not surprising to me that the Bahamas ranked #5 on the "World Map of Happiness." The sun shines every day, the temperature never dips below 70 degrees, the beaches are filled with white sand, and the ocean is the most crystal-clear aqua-blue you've ever seen. It is truly a beautiful place. I think my favorite place in the world, however, is Yosemite National Park in the Sierra Nevada Mountains of California. It's hard to imagine anything more glorious than the sun shining on Yosemite Falls as the water drops 2,425 feet, or the shadows falling on the Mariposa Grove of Giant Sequoia Trees, 300 feet tall and 40 feet in diameter. It is a breathtaking sight. I have been there three times, and will go back as many times as life allows. However, it doesn't take anything as majestic as Yosemite or pristine as the Bahamas to create this happy sense of wonder and amazement. Sometimes all it takes is the beautiful woman who fills my prescriptions at the pharmacy. Just seeing her smile at me makes my day. On the flip side, there is the pollution and smell I encountered on the south side of Detroit as I drove here on I-75. It is the absolute absence of beauty and diminishes the happiness of thousands of drivers every day. Once eyes have seen the beauty of the Bahamas, they should not have to come home and look upon such blight. A more serious reaction to the absence of beauty is a condition known as "Seasonal Affective Disorder," which is a clinical diagnosis that the absence of sunlight in the winter actually makes some people hopelessly depressed. It should be clear that a beautiful place is a happy place. It's as if we were made for beauty. It's universal. Perhaps this is why I am not a big fan of mirrors. Accomplishment If the happiest moments of my life have been moments of love and moments in the presence of beauty, following closely behind are moments of accomplishment. Pitching a one-hitter in the championship game when I was thirteen, making the basketball team at East Coast Bible College my freshman year, graduating from college and seminary. These events were the culmination of hard work and determination, and the sense of accomplishment was sweet indeed. These were days when a smile never left my face. There continue to be simpler, more routine accomplishments as well. Learning how to cook, and actually having my daughter enjoy eating what I cook. Solving my clients' complicated tax problems at work. Even finishing the laundry and cleaning the house can be pretty satisfying. Of course, for every accomplishment it seems like there are twice as many failures. The first soft-ball team I coached lost every game. I was cut from the basketball team three times in junior high and high school. I have been passed over two years in a row for a promotion at work. We all have a longing to accomplish and achieve. It's as if we were made for this also. It too is universal. Pleasure I put pleasure last on the list of happy places because it is the most fleeting of the four. The moments themselves can be some of the most intense, but they never last very long. The happiness of sex, food, drink, music, dancing and other thrills last only as long the pleasure itself. But who can deny that Andiamo's Italian Bistro is a blissful place when filet mignon with zip sauce is on your plate? And who can deny that "Top Thrill Dragster" at Cedar Point is 17 seconds of pure joy while falling 400 feet at 120 miles per hour? And who can deny that the dance floor of a friend's wedding after a couple of drinks is one of the happiest places in the world? The happiness of pleasure is not only fleeting, however. It can also be dangerous and bring painful consequences. Sexually transmitted diseases, unwanted pregnancies, obesity, alcoholism, and drunk driving to name a few. Pleasure in excess rarely comes without a hangover effect. Pleasures only seem to contribute to long-term happiness if they serve to intensify our experience of love, beauty and accomplishment. Good food, good music, and physical touch can intensify almost any moment of love. The ocean coast of Pleasure Island in the Bahamas seems more beautiful from a jet-ski riding the waves at 40 miles per hour. A hearty graduation party can definitely make a graduate feel more accomplished. Even though it seems we were made for pleasures, it also seems that pleasures were never meant to be an end in themselves. They seem to be pointing us beyond themselves to something else. The Happiest Place in the World In fact, the insatiable craving in our souls for love, beauty, accomplishment and pleasure all seem to be pointing us beyond themselves to something more. Friends, family, romance, sex, wealth, possessions, drugs, alcohol, food, sports, work, school, music, religion -- if we are honest, we will admit that they are all ultimately disappointing. If we look for happiness in friends and family, we get wonderful glimpses of it, but ultimately find the schedule is overbooked, the phone is busy, the address has changed, or the casket is full. If we look for happiness in romance or sex, we find the romance fades and the pleasure is fleeting. If we look for happiness in wealth and possessions, we find there is never enough money and the possessions get old. We don't even need to talk about drugs, alcohol and food – we all know where those lead. And religion certainly hasn't proven itself to be the answer – if by religion you mean keeping certain commandments and performing certain good deeds. So where can we look to satisfy this insatiable desire. Perhaps the answer is more obvious than we think. Could it be that God created us with this desire, and deliberately created us in a way that nothing can satisfy us but Him? Could it be that all the happiness of this world is simply a shadow intended to point us beyond itself to its maker? Could it be that all the love, beauty, accomplishment and pleasure of this world is pointing us to God? This is God's word to us: "You make known to me the path of life; in your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore." (Psalm 16:11). Jonathan Edwards described it like this: The enjoyment of God is the only happiness with which our souls can be satisfied…Fathers and mothers, husbands, wives, or children, or the company of earthly friends, are but shadows; but God is the substance. These are but scattered beams, but God is the sun. These are but streams. But God is the ocean. (Jonathan Edwards, Works, II, 244) Every enjoyment we experience in this life is the shadow of God. The purpose of shadows is to point us beyond themselves to their substance. The love, beauty, accomplishments and pleasures of this world are meant to point us to the love of God, the beauty of God, the calling of God, and the pleasures of God. His love is incomparable! His beauty is unmatched! His calling is highest! His pleasures are unparalleled! The Kingdom of God The Bible has a name for this place. It is called the Kingdom of God, and we are invited to live in it 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. It is the happiest place in the world. It exists everywhere you happen to be at any moment of your life. It exists in this room right now. It waits for you to enter. God Himself waits for you to enter. John Bright wrote, “To grasp what is meant by the Kingdom of God is to come very close to the heart of the Bible’s gospel of salvation.” It cannot be denied that “the burden of Jesus’ preaching was to announce the Kingdom of God.” Jesus came to proclaim the Gospel of the Kingdom: Matthew 4:17 "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." Matthew 4:23 "He went throughout all Galilee…proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom." Matthew 12:28 "The kingdom of God has come upon you." Luke 4:43 "I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns as well; for I was sent for this purpose." Luke 9:2 "He sent them out to proclaim the kingdom of God." Luke 10:9 "The kingdom of God has come near to you." Luke 16:16 "The Law and the Prophets were until John; since then the good news of the kingdom of God is preached." Isn't it interesting that Jesus defined his message in terms of "The Kingdom of God" and yet you seldom hear it referred to in these terms today. I would bet that 9 out of 10 Christians could not give you a good definition of the "Kingdom of God," and yet Jesus says it is His Gospel. How can we preach the Gospel of Jesus, the Gospel of the Kingdom of God, if we don't even know what it means? A study of the original languages and a survey of the Bible's teaching on the subject reveal that the definition is not a very complicated one. The Kingdom of God is the realm of God's dynamic presence where His will is done in you and through you. Therefore, the Gospel of Jesus, the Gospel of the Kingdom of God, is an invitation to enter into God's dynamic presence where His will can be done in you and through you. It is an invitation to live with God every moment of your life. God wants to be with you right now, right here, at this moment. Are you in the Kingdom of God here and now? Are you living in God's dynamic presence? This is why Jesus died, so you could enter the Kingdom of God and live with Him. "He died for us so that…we may live together with him." (1 Th. 5:10) Romans 14:17 is the closest the Bible comes to a concise definition: "The kingdom of God is…righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit." Why is the Kingdom of God the Happiest Place in the World? The Kingdom of God is the happiest place in the world because His love is incomparable, His beauty is unmatched, His calling is highest, and His pleasures are unparalleled. The Incomparable Love of God God loves us with an eternal, infinite, free, unchangeable love. His love will never end. There is nothing we can do to increase or reduce it; it is infinite. He has freely chosen to love us for eternity, and nothing can ever change his mind. His love is perfect, unbounded, unfading, and ever-increasing! "Take in the extravagant dimensions of Christ's love. Reach out and experience the breadth! Test its length! Plumb the depths! Rise to the heights! Live full lives, full in the fullness of God." (Eph. 3:16-19, The Message) I'll never forget the time I first heard the Gospel. It was at a concert being performed by a Christian band from my school called "Watchman." They were a Christian heavy metal band, which was my music of choice in those days. At the end of the concert, the lead singer talked about how God created me special and wanted to live with me forever. That he didn't care what I had done wrong, how tall I was, or how smart I was - that He would completely forgive me and accept me just the way I am - that He had an incredible plan for my life and was waiting for me to come to Him and find out what it was. It was the most amazing thing I had ever heard. I embraced the love of Jesus that day, and He has never stopped embracing me since. In my lowest moments of life, His love is unchanging. When others reject me, Jesus embraces me. When I commit my worst sins, He shows me His greatest mercy. When I fail at something, He shows me He has better plans for me. There is no other love like this! It is my strength, my refuge, my rock. Even more amazing is that this love, this incredible love, is not just FOR us in the Kingdom of God – it is IN us! We will be able to love Jesus and others with the very love of God! Jesus prayed for this; it will come to pass! "Father, I desire…that the love with which you have loved me may be in them…" (John 17) Have you been harboring anger and bitterness toward someone? Come into the Kingdom of God and find power to forgive others as He has forgiven you. Come into God's dynamic presence and let His will be done in you and through you. The Unmatched Beauty of God One of the first things I noticed after becoming a Christian was that the world actually looked different than it did before. It might sound weird, but the grass looked greener, the sun seemed brighter, the sky looked bluer, the breeze seemed cooler, the trees seemed more majestic. I noticed flowers and birds I never noticed before. It was more dramatic than the day I first got contact lenses. - you know, the day you could actually see the leaves on the trees. It's as if God gave me new eyes to see His fingerprints and reflection all around me. I think this is what Jesus meant when He said to His disciples: "Blessed are your eyes, for they see…" (Mt. 13:16). God actually enables us to SEE His presence in the world - to SEE the Kingdom of God! The glimpses we get of God's beauty in this world will explode into fullness in the age to come! Words fail when Biblical writers try to speak of God’s beauty. The brilliance, the radiance, the splendor, and the majesty of God cause even the angels to hide their faces because they can not contain such beauty with their eyes. And yet – we will behold Him! …with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord… (2 Cor. 3:18) …perfect in beauty, God shines forth. (Ps. 50:2) …the holy city…coming down out of heaven from God, having the glory of God, its radiance like a most rare jewel…The wall was built of jasper, while the city was pure gold, clear as glass. The foundations of the wall of the city were adorned with every kind of jewel… And the twelve gates were twelve pearls, each of the gates made of a single pearl, and the street of the city was pure gold, transparent as glass. And I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb. And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and its lamp is the Lamb. By its light will the nations walk, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it, and its gates will never be shut by day- and there will be no night there. (Rev. 21) Oh! The beauty upon which we will feast our eyes one day in heaven! Oh! The glory of God that will light that place and splash upon its jewels with such brilliance! This beauty will fill our hearts with joy unspeakable! What a place it will be! The High Calling of God "All of us long to become something more than we are. We are driven to achieve, moved to accomplish, fueled by ambition. It burns hotter in some than in others, but it is within all of us. We're all searching for our unique purpose, our divine destiny, or simply a sense of significance or some measure of success. … If there were no God, it would be inane for us to search for significance or to be ambitious for success….This thing that haunts you, that never seems satisfied, the cravings in your soul that you are unable to satiate through all the success that the world can bring - this is your soul screaming for God" (Erwin McManus). God created you for a purpose - for a high calling. He has a plan for your life. It is a plan of adventure, danger, achievement, and significance. There is no more exciting, adventurous place in the world than joining God in His mission for the world. Walter Brueggeman describes the God of the Bible as "wild, dangerous, unfettered and free." If you are looking for a safe, ordinary, mundane life - don't look for it in the Kingdom of God. The Christian life, in the words of Steven Curtis Chapman, is "The Great Adventure." It is a quest to spread a Kingdom of righteousness, peace and joy around the world. It often requires you to leave the people and things of this world behind as you journey with the King Himself. "Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or wife or brothers or parents or children, for the sake of the kingdom of God, who will not receive many times more in this time, and in the age to come eternal life." (Luke 18:29-30) Life in the Kingdom of God is joining a rescue mission that will take you to places you never dreamed you would go. In the Kingdom, God will do things through you that you never dreamed you could do. Ten years ago my mom was a lonely, depressed, sick woman. The doctors were running tests on her trying to figure out why there were days her muscles were so weak she couldn't get out of bed. It was during this time that I finally convinced her to go to church with me. She had tears running down her face during the sermon, and after the service I prayed with her to receive Jesus in the living room of my grandparent's house. For the past five years, she has spent the last two weeks of April ministering to children in the orphanages of Nicaragua. This is what God does with those who enter His Kingdom. He takes lonely, depressed, sick people and turns them into world ambassadors for the Gospel. He will take you, in whatever condition you are in, and do the same for you. The only requirement is that you enter into His Kingdom, and it is not for the faint of heart. It is only for those who are convinced that it is the happiest place in the world. Matthew 13:44-46 "The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found…Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field. Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls, who, on finding one pearl of great value, went and sold all that he had and bought it." The Unparalleled Pleasures of God Much like the way the Kingdom affects how we experience beauty, it also affects the way we experience pleasure. In the Kingdom of God, the pleasures of this world become occasions for worship. "Hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment" (1 Tim. 6:17). "For everything God created is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, because it is consecrated by the word of God and prayer." (1 Tim. 4:4-5) "So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God." (1 Cor. 10:31) The implications of this are staggering. Sex, food, drink, music, dancing -- they all become sacred instruments of worship in the Kingdom of God, when enjoyed according to the will of the King. All of this is a foretaste of heaven, when our souls will feed upon God’s glory, drink from His delights, be touched by His tender hand, and experience infinite pleasures in relationship with Him. How precious is your steadfast love, O God! The children of mankind take refuge in the shadow of your wings. They feast on the abundance of your house, and you give them drink from the river of your delights. (Psalm 36:8) …as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so shall your God rejoice over you. …he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing. (Is. 62:5, Zeph. 3:17) Oh what rapturous pleasures await us in the arms of our beloved God and savior Jesus Christ! All eternity will be a feast and honeymoon! Let us rejoice and exult and give him the glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and his Bride has made herself ready… “Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb." (Rev. 19:7,9) How to live in the Kingdom of God We've talked about the Kingdom of God and explained why it is the happiest place in the world - the place of highest love, beauty, accomplishment, and pleasure. But we have not yet talked about how to live in it. And we don't have time this morning to talk about it in much detail. But let me say this: most of the Bible is simply an explanation of how to live in the happiest place in the world. Look at how people in the Bible related to God, how they lived with Him. What you will find are some time-tested, God-honored practices of how to live in His presence. Look especially at the life of Jesus - He is the supreme example of how to live in the Kingdom of God. What you will find is that God promises an open door to His Kingdom through practices like prayer, Bible-reading, meditation, fasting, solitude, silence, service, confession, and Godly friendships. Make these practices a regular part of your life, and you will find God waiting for you there - with His love, beauty, calling, and pleasures in hand. If you are interested in the names of some good books on the subject, see me after the service. One of the greatest frustrations of my life is that I know that living in the Kingdom of God is the happiest place in the world - and yet I find myself living outside of it far too often. It is possible to have been a Christian for many years, and still live most of your life outside of the dynamic presence of God where His will is done in you and through you - outside of the Kingdom of God. If you have never given your life to Jesus before, or if you have been a Christian for many years, won't you join me this morning in committing or recommitting your life to this treasure hidden in the field, to this pearl of great price, to living in the presence of God where there is incomparable love, unmatched beauty, the highest calling, and unparalleled pleasures. The Kingdom of God is the happiest place in the world. "You make known to me the path of life; in your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore." (Psalm 16:11) |
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