Sorrow Sucks

This is a series of devotions and meditations on scripture that reject fear and champion faith. The people of Jerusalem wept when they heard the words of the law because they realized they were not following it correctly. Sorrow can be managed and can lead to growth, but sorrow that is not healed will destroy your life. We combat worldly sorrow with joy and focus on the unseen things of God. We access what God has given us through faith and the Word. Joy brings strength and overpowers external sorrow. The strength of the Lord is joy, and it washes away sorrow. Welcome to Fear No Fear. Grace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. May the Holy Spirit embrace you today. This is a series of devotions and meditations on scripture. We reject fear in any and all forms. Fear is a spiritual force, the currency of darkness and ignorance. It's what we inherited when Adam gave up his faith and Satan uses it to keep people down. His only weapon is words. If he can get you believing or looking at words of fear, he's got you. Instead, we champion faith as an allegiance to God, as a belief and trust and loyalty to the Lord God Almighty. We accept the evidence of His word as unvarnished truth, as is, just as it's written. We get close to His perfect love through the word, and perfect love casts out fear. 1 John 4.18 All scripture is taken from the World English Bible, which is in the public domain. Visit eBible.org Nehemiah 8.10 Then he said to them, Go your way, eat the fat, drink the sweet, and send portions to him for whom nothing is prepared. For today is holy to our Lord. Don't be grieved, for the joy of the Lord is your strength. The Levites who taught the people, Nehemiah who was governor of the people, and Ezra the prophet, yeah, that Ezra, had called all the people in Jerusalem together. The wall they had been working on was done. The process of rebuilding the city was visibly moving forward. So they got together, and then Ezra read to them the book of the law. All the people wept when they heard the words of the law. Verse 9 These were not tears of joy. When the Israelites were first released to return to Jerusalem, to the promised land, the first thing they did was build the temple. There were issues, but it got done. Next, Ezra led a group home to Jerusalem, and found the people there had not followed the Lord's commands. He led them in a revival to honest and true worship of the Lord, but they still weren't doing everything they were supposed to. Next, Nehemiah came and led the project to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem, and they did. Finally, with the work done, they came into the temple to worship the Lord, and Ezra read them the law. The law that they were not following the way that they should. They had gotten rid of some major habits and sins, but they weren't full-faced on the Lord. And they were realizing it, and they wept. Weeping is a flowing of tears. This isn't a good cry. This is body-shaking, soul-emptying emotion. Ezra read the law, and in verses 7 and 8, also, And the Levites caused the people to understand the law, and the people stayed in their place. They read in the book, in the law of God, distinctly, and they gave the sense, so that they understood the reading. They understood what was being said, where they had stepped wrong, and they saw all of what they were not doing. They were getting a glimpse of the all that they had missed out on. They saw it was their actions that had gotten them carted off in exile. They saw that they were not fixing or changing that behavior, now that they had returned. Weeping is often accompanied by sadness or deep grief. Sadness is an emotion. It's a thing of the soul. It is a guidepost. It is a wrong-way sign, a flag that we are stepping off the path, and we need to do something to get back. Sometimes it means consciously choosing not to be sad by embracing happy things. Sometimes it means working through things, grieving it out. Sometimes it means altering our actions, which are leading to the circumstances that are causing our sad. Sometimes it is watching our words and reprogramming our atmosphere. Sadness or grief can also be godly. It can be that remorseful feeling of knowing you are not enough, but He is. But sorrow, true fleshly or worldly sorrow, is a different thing. Shadow and darkness are the absence of light. Cold is the absence of heat. Sorrow is the absence of joy. It is not productive. It is a feeling, not an emotion. It is of the flesh, not of the spirit or the soul. It is not grief. It is despair. It is a singular focus on that which brings no good. Sadness can work through things, reason, function, and also foster growth and change. Sadness can be a positive if it is managed properly. But sorrow cannot. Sorrow stops the show. Sorrow blinds us. Sorrow binds us. Sorrow prevents growth. Sorrow is a negative. Sorrow cannot be managed. It is a tsunami that wipes our mental landscape out. If you are sorrowful, you need saving. The Lord is near to those who have a broken heart and saves those who have a crushed spirit. Psalm 34 18 For godly sorrow produces repentance leading to salvation, which brings no regret. But the sorrow of the world produces death. 2 Corinthians 7 10 We need saving from sorrow or it will cause us death. Why is godly sorrow okay? It is because it is about hope. It is realizing you are heading into death and separation from God, but that He has a way for you to choose to step off that ride. Sorrowful sorrow just wallows until life stops. I have experienced it. It stopped everything. It blinded me to everything. It derailed my life, my career, and my family. It took years to recover to the point of functionality because I was stuck in it. I had no hope. I was not turning to the author of hope. When I did, it was gone overnight. Overnight. For His anger is but for a moment. His favor is for a lifetime. Weeping may stay for the night, but joy comes in the morning. Psalm 30 verse 5 Godly sorrow is gone in a short time. Worldly sorrow has no timetable. Sorrow dealt with by the Lord is gone quickly because it is dealt with. It is over. It is finished. It is done. Sorrow unhealed will destroy your life. The question becomes, how to avoid the trap of sorrow? How to not embrace worldly sorrow? How to avoid a feeling-based, flesh-fueled, sorrowful attitude? And the answer is in today's verse, the joy of the Lord is your strength. How about that? Joy. We combat worldly sorrow with joy. We keep from the trap of the flesh by a thing of the Spirit. We avoid the world by embracing the Lord. Go figure, huh? 2 Corinthians 4.17 For our light affliction, which is for the moment, works for us more and more exceedingly an eternal weight of glory. It's just for a moment, overnight, brief, and in the scope of things, light. It's not heavy. It doesn't have to weigh us down. We can put it aside and then walk on. But how? Sorrow is so real, so here, so now. Well, verse 18 of 2 Corinthians 4 tells us how. While we don't look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal. Focus on the unseen, the godly. God, period. Focus on Him and the things of the earth pass away. Matthew 24.35 We get there by faith. Faith is the heir of the kingdom. Faith is the bridge between the seen and the unseen. Faith is how we get things of heaven into our lives and our world. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, even as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and without defect before Him in love, having predestined us for adoption as children through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His desire, to the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He freely gave us favor in the Beloved. Ephesians 1.3-6 The Father already gave us everything we need to get through our grief and our sadness. He also gave us everything we need to defeat and wipe away our sorrow. We access what He has given our spirit with faith, pulling it from the spirit to the soul, and then from the soul and mind to our flesh, where our feelings bow to emotions led by the Spirit in our spirit. What strengthens faith? The Word. Romans 10.17 The Israelites heard the Word and wept because they saw by faith where they were missing it. They wanted to embrace it, but the tears were preventing them. Nehemiah and the others told them the path to follow, joy. Why joy? Because they are spiritual blessings. They aren't natural blessings. They aren't flesh blessings. They aren't mental blessings. They are spiritual blessings. They are in and of the Father. We get them through Jesus. Now, Jesus' Spirit indwells us. He is with us, telling us what we are, what we can have, and who we will be. He is yesterday, today, and forever. Hebrews 13.8 We need to go to the Father to requisition those blessings into our lives. He said we can have them. Seek me and you get all this. Matthew 6.33 Spirit first, then soul, heart, mind, and then body. I've got it. Come and get it. We do that with joy because it is by joy we enter the Lord's presence. For God's kingdom is not eating and drinking, but righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit. Romans 14.17 Enter into his gates with thanksgiving and into his courts with praise. Give thanks to him and bless his name. Psalm 104 Many sorrows come to the wicked, but loving kindness shall surround him who trusts in the Lord. Be glad in the Lord and rejoice, you righteous. Shout for joy, all you who are upright in heart. Psalm 32.10-11 You want to get into the presence of the Lord? Be joyful. Choose praise. Eat the fat, drink the sweet, and send portions to him for whom nothing is prepared. For today is holy to our Lord. Inner spiritual happiness overpowers external sorrow because joy brings strength. Not our strength, but his strength. The Lord is my strength and song. He has become my salvation. This is my God, and I will praise him. My Father's God, and I will exalt him. Exodus 15.2 But may the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after you have suffered a little while, perfect, establish, strengthen, and settle you. 1 Peter 5.10 We avoid sorrow of the flesh with the strength of the Lord. The strength of the Lord is joy, and inner joy washes away an external sorrow. Sadness is a process we go through guided by the Holy Spirit. Grief is a process we go through guided by the Holy Spirit. They are but for a moment. They are a light affliction. The Spirit leading us through these human emotions so they don't overcome us and we can process our experiences. Godly sorrow is the place of brokenness where we acknowledge the supremacy of God and his will, worshiping him, bowing down, acknowledging his majesty and grace. But sorrow, worldly sorrow, fleshly sorrow, it is a swamp of despair where we get sucked down, immobilized, stopped, and fester until we die. It is a terrible, horrible, satanic place. It is not of the kingdom, not of the Lord, not of the body of Christ, not for the believer, and not for you. The Spirit stays with you always, but you were not meant to be there. Joy your way out. Sing a song of praise. Can't sing? Yell real loud. God doesn't call us to sing well just to make a noise. Joyfully. Joy makes all the difference. Like love, joy is a choice, a conscious decision to enact this emotion toward the Lord God Almighty. Before you're done, you'll have it welling up inside you. John 4, 13-14 Joy will empower your worship, reinforce your word, improve your meditation on the Scriptures, and unlock your potential to have boldness approaching the throne. Hebrews 4, 16 Take joy and use it. Wield it. Embrace it. Feast on the Lord. Drink the living water and eat the living bread. Trample sorrow under your feet. Be bold. Be thankful. Be joy. Our daily affirmation of God's love is Romans 15, 9-13. Hope. We make movies focused on it. Claim it as a virtue to be valued. Descend to the depths of despair when we don't have it and give up. Everything weighs more without it. Everything seems brighter when we think we have some. It only takes a little for us to do the wildest things. The most dangerous and desperate actions. The craziest and foolish gambles. The most idiotic schemes. It is part of the human psyche. And I have to wonder, did Adam and Eve even have it before they fell? Was there any need of it? I don't think so. Because as soon as they fell, there was a need for hope. And the Lord provided it. At that moment, the human psyche was wired for it. We look for it in every situation. We value things by whether or not hope is involved. It is in half of our sayings. It is part of our culture. Every culture. There is a need within humanity to embrace hope. Not as a concept, although we do that by default. But as a physical thing. A thing that we need to know we have to maintain an even keel. The hope of glory. The chance for restoration. The God hole. It's there in all of us. The empty spot, unable to be filled by anything else. Without His actions, without His love, there is no hope to ever fill it. We have to hope for it. Look for it. Seek it. We try and fill it with so many things, but ultimately they are unsatisfactory. In the end, only God will do. Because He is the source of our hope. The only chance we have to avoid total despair. He loved us too much to leave us lost. He programmed us with hope so that we would look to His salvation. He is the God of hope. We are the children of hope. How are your hope levels? Low? Fill up in, at, and with the Holy Spirit. With hope, your whole life looks better. With God's hope, it looks best. Because His hope isn't just a longing, or expectation, or anticipation. It is a promise. And none of His promises fail. Joshua 21, 45 As we close, remember that you have worth. You are precious and valuable. Declare this. Today, God loves that I, now you, fill in the blank. Was it a meal you made? A smile you gave? Did you get out of bed? Read? Put on socks? There's no wrong answers here. There is no end to God's love. And no end to the things about you that He loves each and every day. Pick one. And remember, the Lord loves you, just because you're you. 1 John 4, 9-10 By this, God's love was revealed in us. That God has sent His only born Son into the world. That we might live through Him. And this is love. Not that we loved God, but that He loved us. And sent His Son as the atoning sacrifice for our sins. His perfect love turned away God's wrath because of sin. And it casts out our fear too. See verses 18 and 19. We love because He first loved us. He just loves us. Can't get enough of us. And that is wonderful. See you next time.