Missed It By THAT Much

I love reading Chuck Colson's daily commentary on his Breakpoint web site. So many times he challenges me in just the right way. He is an amazing man whom God saved and that is readily apparent if you look at any of the millions of things he has done to advance God's kingdom here on earth. If you've never read any of his books or biography, I'd strongly advise it. The only place I'd part company with Chuch is on his overt ecumenism. But that's a drop in the sea compared to the rest of his life.

It was with great relish that I read his commentary today but as happens occasionally, I think he came up just a bit short of the goal line. Bummer when that happens! His commentary was about a NYT article talking about what maximizes happiness in our lives. And he was right that the author gave examples of things that make us happy but he never defines what happiness is. Perhaps that's because our nearly entire hedonistic society is built around maximizing "happiness" so that everyone knows that"happiness" is whatever makes you feel good (which ties in nicely with our postmodern cultural mentality).

Chuck went on to state that our founding fathers understood what happiness really is and that's why they wrote it into our Declaration of Independence. And while Chuck did a good job of explaining that happiness comes from living a "virtuous" life (and even mentioned the words "truth" and "righteousness"), I was sad that he never tied all of this up into God and His word.

We have scientific truth but that's not where we get happiness. Truth comes from the very Creator and He's given us that in His word, the Bible. That's where truth (with a capital "T") comes from. So we need to understand that the truth is that God created us to glorify Him. Anything short of that is a sell-out, a facsimile, an earthly pleasure which will have limited appeal. If you take God out of the equation you get the American society as a whole; life degenerates into a life wasted on the pursuit of self-pleasure.

To glorify Him means that you first have to be saved through repentance and faith in Jesus Christ's atoning death on the cross, His death, burial and resurrection. Once done we become an adopted child of God, we then use His word, His Spirit and the graces He has provided for us (Bible reading, prayer, worship, fellowship, etc.) to grow to be like Christ, to renew our minds and learn to love Him with all of our heart, soul, strength and mind.

As John Piper said, "He is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him." To be truly happy and want for nothing except Him (to be "content" as the Apostle Paul put it) is to live a life which is pleasing to Him and offer ourselves up as a daily sacrifice. That is happiness. That is a precursor to what believers will be doing for the rest of eternity.

Happiness and Virtue by Chuck Colson