Fruit of the Spirit: Joy | Stefan Potgieter

So we're in a series titled The Fruit of the Spirit, and Eric

kicked us off about two weeks ago and his message was titled

Walk in the Spirit. And then Hillary took us last

week through the Fruit of the Spirit.

That was love. So let me just remind us out of

Scripture what these fruits are. So in Galatians 522 to 25 it

says, but the fruit of the Spirit is Lovejoy, peace,

forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and

self-control. Against such things there is no

law. Those who belong to Christ Jesus

have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.

Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.

Let us not become conceited, provoking and envying each

other. So today we're going to be

focusing on one of those, namely joy.

And our main scripture, if you have your Bibles here, will be

out of Philippians. So Philippians 4 verse 4 to 7 is

Philippians 4:4–7

what we will be reading. Philippians 4 verse 47 says

rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again, rejoice.

Let your gentleness be evident to all.

The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about

anything, but in every situation, by prayer and

petition, with Thanksgiving, present your requests to God.

And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding,

will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Lord Jesus, thank you for your word.

Thank you that we can gather you this morning.

Thank you that we can come, expectant Lord, to to hear from

you. Lord, I thank you that you use

imperfect people. And I pray, Lord, that you would

use me this morning to preach your word faithfully.

I pray that through Holy Spirit, Lord, that our hearts would be

open, our ears would be open to hear.

Yeah, we Lord, we know that our flesh is against you.

So we pray, Lord, that that you would open our ears, you would

soften our hearts. And may we hear you this morning

in Jesus name, Amen. So maybe just a little bit of

context, Paul is writing to the church in Philippi and he is

imprisoned. So that's just a short, I think

relevant point. If you consider he's what he's

saying to these people, rejoice or other translations may say be

glad. And you might think like, well,

Paul is in prison and his message to these people is

rejoice, be glad. And I just think it, it shows

something of Paul's confidence. It shows something of Paul's

way. He actually puts his trust and

his faith that he can sit in prison and send a message out

and say be glad, rejoice. But what does it mean?

What does it mean when we say rejoice?

Or what does joy actually mean? Joy, as we may know, is not

something that I can put on a plate for you and something that

we can touch. It's not something tangible in

the physical sense. Joy is what we would refer to as

an emotional trait or emotional characteristic.

It's not something physical, for example.

Tried my best to come up with an example here, but a physical

trait might be breathing. It's something that I am

physically doing. When I'm breathing, you can see

that I'm breathing in and breathing out.

You can see my chest moving. If you're really close to me,

you can even feel me breathing, and you might even smell my

breath, and evidence of me breathing would be that I'm

still standing here and I'm alive.

But joy is not a physical thing like that, and it's not easy to

explain something like a emotional characteristic or

trait because none of us really know what the other person is

experiencing emotionally. We are all very good with

putting up appearances. We may physically portray a

positive appearance even though emotionally that's not how we

feel. You also may have heard that in

Christian circles people say that joy is not something that

the non believer can experience. Joy is only something that a

Christ follower can experience. People that don't know Jesus,

rather we say that they don't experience joy.

We say they experience happiness or pleasure.

And in one sense I agree that true, deep meaningful joy really

only comes with Christ. But in another sense, I do think

that there is a joy that is experienced by all people.

For example, I think that the believer and the non believer

alike experiences a sense of joy in their children, the birth of

their children, the dedication year, in the growing up of their

children. I think that people alike

experience joy in friendship and in relationships, in marriage

and in creation. And I do think that believers

mustn't think that we can't use the word happiness, that that's

like a dirty word for Christ. For no, we're too good for

happiness. We're too good for pleasure,

because the Bible speaks about happiness and the Bible speaks

about pleasures. So those are not inherently bad

things. For example, I might be happy

when my sports team wins. I might be be happy to to go for

a run. Well, I don't.

I'm not often happy when I go for a run, but some people may

be happy going for a run. My point is that sometimes we

make these emotions exclusive either way, and I just don't

think it's as simple as that. So what then is the difference

between joy that is experienced by anyone and joy that is a

fruit of the Spirit? Is there even a difference?

I would argue that there is a difference and that Christian

joy is very closely linked, if not inseparable from Christian

hope or the believers hope. Much of the below that I'm going

to go through now is informed by some of the writings of John

Piper. I say writings.

I think it was actually a sermon that I just read.

The message was titled the fruit of Hope Joy, and you can find

that if you would like to go and read it on the Desiring God

website. So let's start by saying what

joy is not Christian joy is not something that we can do.

And when I say that we can't do it is we can't will Christian

joy. It's not based on my willpower

or my decision. OK, now I'm going to experience

this joy and I'm going to decide to experience it now and then

I'm going to stop experiencing it.

Now remember I used the example of breathing, which may not be

the perfect example, but the point is if I choose to, at

least for a time. I can stop breathing and I can

decide to start breathing again. Yes, there may be a point where

I'm forced to start breathing, but I have a sense of control

over my breath. I cannot in the same way, decide

to start having this joy and then stop having this joy.

It is a spontaneous emotional reaction that comes from our

heart and many of us here may have experienced it.

I think for me, I've probably experienced it most singing a

song which I've sung 1000 times before and the words just seem

to have a new meaning one day and it just fills me with joy

seeing that truth which I've seen many times.

Secondly, and importantly, Christian joy is not based on

circumstances. Paul says to rejoice in the Lord

always. So before we go on, we know that

Paul says this while imprisoned, but he says rejoice in the Lord

always, which first tells us that the object of our joy is

not where we are or what we have.

The object of our joy is the Lord and always tells us that

there's no specific good or bad time to be rejoicing in the

Lord. This joy that Paul speaks of

transcends or goes beyond our circumstances.

This is where Christian joy differs from other joy.

The Bible teaches that that joy is present in spite of our

circumstances. In fact, in the worst of

circumstances the believer should rejoice.

Couple of scriptures that will not be on the screen, but this

just speak to this point. The first one is Romans 5.

Verse three to five says, not only that, but we rejoice in our

sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance and

endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and

hope does not put us to shame because God's love has been

poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been

given to us. James One.

Verse 2 to 4 says, Count it all Joy, my brothers, when you meet

trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your

faith produces steadfastness, and let steadfastness have its

full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in

nothing and one. Peter 4, verse 13 says, But

rejoice in so far as you share Christ's sufferings, that you

may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed.

Thirdly and finally, Christian joy is not natural, it is

spiritual. What makes something spiritual?

Spiritual it that is that it comes from the Spirit of God and

has the character of the Spirit of God.

So when we say that Christian joy is spiritual, not natural,

we mean that it is produced by the Spirit of God and it is the

kind of joy that God has and wants to see in US.

Romans 14 verse 17 says the Kingdom of God is righteousness

Romans 14:17

and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.

The Kingdom of God is righteousness and peace and joy

in the Holy Spirit. So the next natural question

that arises from this then is how can Paul and others in the

Bible then command us to rejoice?

How can they tell us, be joyful, be glad, rejoice, if it is not

based on my circumstances, it is not something that I necessarily

have control over, and it is not natural.

It is spiritual meaning from God.

How can he ask me then to rejoice?

The answer is hope. We can see from Paul's other

writings that his joy is firmly rooted in hope.

The joy that wells up in him comes from his hope.

So let's consider Romans 5, verse two to five.

It's Paul again. He says, therefore, since we

have been justified through faith, we have peace with God

through the Lord Jesus Christ. Through Him we have obtained

access to His grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in our

hope of sharing the glory of God.

More than that, we rejoice in suffering, knowing that

suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces

character, and character produces hope.

And hope does not disappoint us because God's love has been

poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit which has been

given to us. So the Scripture in Romans

really spells it out for us. It says to rejoice in hope

because of the grace in which we stand.

What grace and what hope the grace lost.

My spot here refers to what Jesus has done for us, and I

never want to take it for granted that we know what he has

done for us. So what did he do for us?

Jesus? And this actually comes in in

the the scriptures before Jesus was delivered over to death for

our sins. Jesus died for our sins.

We may have heard it many, many times, and maybe we've heard it

in a general term where it says Jesus died for everyone since

no, Jesus died for my sin and Jesus died for your sin.

But he was also raised to life. He was also raised to life for

our justification so that we can stand before God righteous.

We stand in this grace by having faith, believing that God did in

fact do what he said he was going to do and what the Bible

said that Jesus did and what he accomplished.

We believe that we have faith that Jesus did die for our sins.

We have faith that He was raised from the dead and we believe

that that did achieve what He said it would achieve, which is

forgiveness of sins and a reconciliation between US and

God. Before this we were far from

God. The Bible even says we were not

only far from him, we were enemies.

We are his enemies. But because of what Jesus has

done, we can now be called children of God, Enemies to

children. The hope.

The hope refers to the hope of sharing in the glory or in the

glory of God because we have put our faith in Him, the hope that

we have because of what He has achieved.

Our hope is in God that He would return as He said He would.

That we who put our faith in Him will spend eternity with Him

where there will be no more tears, no more pain, no more

suffering. Put put whatever you want in

there. No more corruption, no more

lies. This hope is not the same kind

of hope that you would have when you say sheesh I hope my team

wins this weekend. That I would word as wishful

thinking rather than hope. This hope is based on faith in

God, a confidence in God, a confidence in His Word, in His

promises that He will do what He said He is going to do, and He

has done what we see in the Bible he said he has done.

Hebrews 11 verse one says this faith is confidence in what we

hope for and assurance about what we do not see.

And this is what the ancients were commended for.

Now before Hebrews 11, there's a a whole list of if you want to

go and read it of examples that Paul gives of people that lived

with this hope and lived with this faith and maybe just a word

on suffering. I think Paul, we, we saw in the

Scriptures that Paul often speaks about all the the other

writers as well about rejoicing in suffering.

But it's interesting to read in Romans that when Paul says that

we must rejoice in suffering, at the end of the day, what it

produces According to him is still hope.

So actually he's saying to rejoice in hope.

Matthew Henry wrote a commentary on Romans 15, says the

following. The joy and the peace of

believers arise chiefly from their hopes.

What is laid out upon them is but little compared with what is

laid up for them. Therefore, the more hope they

have, the more joy and peace they have.

So Christians should desire and labor after abundance of hope.

So true spiritual joy comes from hope.

Hope comes from God. What God has done for us, what

God has promised to do for us, it comes from God's love.

The scripture above speaks about about that.

God gave us a spirit through his love, and this love comes from

the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit is a gift.

And that gift is given to people who put their faith in Jesus,

who put their faith and their trust in Jesus and what he has

done and what he has accomplished, and who put their

faith and their trust in Jesus for what he will store,

accomplish, and what he will still do.

So considering what Jesus has done for us is a gift that the

Holy Spirit is a gift that the love of God is a gift which

produces in US hope in which we can rejoice.

It is clear that joy is not something that we can

manufacture. It's not something that we can

will out of our own. It is a result of God's gift to

us and his promises to us. Hope should be one of the most

defining characteristics of a Christ follower.

Our hope rests on what Jesus has done for us.

And I think of Paul in Corinthians and I might just

read the last bit of this. It's 1 Corinthians 15, verse 12

1 Corinthians 15:12–19

to 19, but he's speaking about the resurrection and he's saying

that if there is no resurrection, then Christ is

also not raised from the dead. And then from verse 17 it says,

and if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile.

You are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen

asleep in Christ are lost. If only for this life we have

hope in Christ. We are of all people most to be

petite. So Paul saying like if, if, if

our hope in Jesus is only for this life.

Poor us, poor us. If, if our our hope in Jesus is

only for this life. Is there hope in Jesus for this

life? For sure, definitely there is.

But Paul saying, if it is only if, if Jesus has not been

raised, if there is no resurrection, then we are the

most to be pity. We believe Christ is raised from

the dead. So we have hope in Christ for

this life, but also for the next.

Our hope is in Christ and therefore we have reason to

rejoice. So how do we fight for joy?

If I can refer back to that quote from Matthew Henry, it

ended with this phrase that says Christian should desire and

labor. Labor meaning should work after

abundance of hope because he argues that the more hope we

have as Christ followers, the more peace and joy we will

experience. So we can fight for hope, which

essentially would be fighting for joy and fighting for peace.

So how do we do that? Number one, we must acknowledge

our very far shortcomings. We must acknowledge that we are

sinful people, and we will always be more inclined to

glorify ourselves than to glorify God.

But we come before God and we confess.

We confess our need, we confess our helplessness, we confess our

imperfection, and we confess our dependence on Him and on the

Holy Spirit. We pray that the Spirit of God

would pour His love into us, into our hearts so that out of

the love of God we may experience a abundance of joy

and peace. So we pray.

We pray for more of God, We pray for more of His Spirit.

We pray for more of God's love in our lives.

We set our eyes on the hope before us.

And if I had to say in my life and in many I believe believers

lives, this is probably the last thing on our minds.

What comes after eternity, Life with God?

Are we setting our minds on that?

Are we setting our minds on the things above?

Are we setting our minds on life with Jesus?

Eternity with Christ, where there's no need for a son

because he is the light of his people?

Is our minds and our hearts on eternity, Or like I often do,

we're just thinking about today. How can I get through this next

thing, this next deadline that I have to meet, this next thing

that I need to get? So let's set our eyes on the

hope before us. We get to look forward to

eternity with Christ. We get to look forward to

eternity without suffering, without pain, without tears,

without lies, without corruption.

Let's set our eyes on the hope before us, and let's familiarize

ourselves with the evidence in the Bible of God's love for us.

It's God's love that produces the joy in US.

It's what He has done for us. It's His promises is what He has

in store for us that produces the joy in US.

It's focusing on those things, it's meditating on those things,

it's reading those things, it's praying through those promises.

Never will I leave you, never will I forsake you.

And focusing on Christ's example, Hebrews 12 verse one to

three says, Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great

cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and

the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with

perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on

Jesus, the pioneer and perfector of our faith.

For the joy set before him, He endured the cross, scorning its

shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

Consider Him who endured such opposition from sinners so that

you will not grow weary and lose heart.

So, because of His great love for us, Jesus endured the cross.

Because of the joy set before him, Jesus endured the cross.

And what was that joy? That joy seems to be sitting at

the right hand of God. It seems to be that making a way

for us to be reconciled to God was His joy.

We too should rejoice in the hope that because of what Jesus

has done, we do not have to spend eternity apart from him.

So in conclusion, Christian joy rests on Christian hope.

And we say that Christian hope is not wishful thinking.

It's not holding thumbs hoping for the best.

It is faith. It's assurance of those things

that we do not see. And this all comes from God's

love, God's promises, and the completed work of Jesus.

Although we cannot manufacture this joy, we can prepare the

ground for this joy by humbling ourselves before God, praying

for more of His love and spirit in our lives, and keeping our

eyes fixed on Jesus, the author and perfector of our faith.

We can labor after this hope, as Matthew Henry put it.

So finally, I want us to read the scripture again, and I'm

just going to add in a couple things.

So if you can go back to Philippians 4 verse 47, it says

rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again, rejoice.

We are rejoicing in what He has done for us, in what He is doing

for us, and in what He will still do for us, the hope of

sharing in His glory and eternity.

And when we put our focus there, this allows us to let our

gentleness be evident to all. And we do that.

We are gentle to all. Because the Lord is near, His

coming is near, His presence is near.

And because the Lord is near, we do not need to be anxious about

anything. But in every situation, by

prayer and petition, with Thanksgiving, we should present

our request to God. And the peace of God, which

transcends all understanding, will guard our hearts and our

minds in Christ Jesus. So what I want you to do now is

I want you to pray. I know that while I'm standing

here, I have anxious heart, and I know that many people here

have anxious heart as well. I know that I want to take hold

of these scriptures to not worry and to not be anxious, but I

also know that it's a work of the Spirit.

All that I can do is come before God and ask him.

I always think of the the section where where Jesus asked

the man, do you believe? And he says, yes, I believe but

help my unbelief. So let's pray together.

Pray that God would fill us with His hope that would result in a

godly joy. Pray that God would take this

anxiety of us and replace it with this peace that he speaks

about. Yes, peace that that surpasses

all understanding. The Scripture says to bring our

request to God. It says be gentle to people and

bring your request to God. Let's do that now, you in your

own language. If you want to pray out loud, if

you want to pray quietly, let's do that now, together.

Lord Jesus, as we read and learn about joy, just pray, Lord, that

you would help us. We see that this joy is not

something that we can manufacture by our sure sheer

willpower. So we bring our request to you,

Lord. Lord, we we say that we want to

rejoice. We want to rejoice in what you

have done. We want to sing praises and

shouts of joy for what you have done for us, that you have died

for our sins, that you have taken my sin upon yourself, that

you have taken everyone here years sin upon yourself.

We want to rejoice, Lord, that you say that you will not leave

us nor forsake us, that you are walking here with us, that you

are near. Lord.

Lord, we want to rejoice in what you have in store for us, Lord,

that you will come back, that you will come and do what you

said you were going to do, that there will be a time where there

does not need to be suffering anymore or tears or hurt, all

lies and deception. We pray Lord that you would help

us, Lord, to keep our eyes fixed on you, to keep our eyes fixed

on what lay ahead. And we pray for more of your

peace. We pray this in Jesus name,

Amen.