Pure Satisfying Joy

This year, I'm sharing my "Treasures" of my study of my "Ponder the Morsels" book. I've picked 31 Psalms to study throughout 2013. Today I studied Psalm 43. Here is what I learned.

Then let me go to the altar of God, to God my highest joy, and I will give thanks to you on the lyre, O God, my God. Psalm 43:4 (GW)

Then I will go to the altar of God, to God who is my joy and happiness. I will praise you with a ·harp [lyre], God, my God. Psalm 43:4 (EXB)

He is not his joy alone, but his exceeding joy; not the fountain of joy, the giver of joy, or the maintainer of joy, but that joy itself. The margin hath it, "The gladness of my joy," i.e., the soul, the essence, the very bowels of my joy. To draw near to God, who is such a joy to us, may well be the object of our hungering and thirsting. The Treasury of David

"Exceeding joy." This can be said of no other joy. All other beauties have their boundaries, all other glories have their glooms. This is that illimitable sea, God. E. Paxton Hood

Since God is the joy itself, why do I search for joy in other things and in people? Joy obtained from things and people is short-term joy. It doesn’t last. Only the joy that is God and that God provides is satisfying and eternal. 

Ever find yourself getting excited to a special activity or day? Perhaps is a weekend outing, or attending a concert or spending time with friends. We drag ourselves through the day/week in great expectation of that event. But then the event is canceled or doesn’t live up the expectations, then we are disappointed. The joy we had hoped for, didn’t materialize. 

But God is accessible 24/7, the joy that is Him and He provides is also available 24/7. I don’t have to wait until a particular day or time to celebrate His joy. And God’s joy is perfect and complete. It always meets expectations.  No disappoints. No let-downs. Just pure satisfying joy.

To create a positive day, I need to look to God for pure satisfying joy, and stop trying to make it or find it in things or people around me.