We go through seasons of struggle and these seasons can be any length of time – a day, a week, a month, sometimes years.  A common phrase we hear and sometimes say ourselves is, “it just seems to be one thing after another.” I pay close attention if I find myself saying or thinking this.

If I have reached the point of thinking that it’s one thing after another, I have usually lost my joy in the situation. I don’t know of a single scripture that tells believers they should be sad and in doubt over anything. I can name lots of scriptures that tell us to count it all joy and rejoice, praise and worship regardless of what the situation is.

Pffffft.

Do you know how hard it is to have joy when everything is going wrong? I’ll be honest, when I’m having a rough go of things and someone says to me, “you should be rejoicing”, I want to karate chop them in the throat just enough to stun them and see how they go about rejoicing over it. Don’t do this, it’s not nice.

The truth is, they are right. The Word is right. The Word is Truth. No matter what our situation is, we always have reason to rejoice. We may not be able to find happiness in the situation causing us stress but we can find joy, peace and happiness in Jesus. This is where we must work on adjusting our thinking.

If someone tells me to “count it all joy” it’s because they have listened to me complain about something. If I’m complaining about something, where is my focus? It’s on the problem. Where does my focus need to be? On Jesus. Duh.

They are helping me redirect my focus back to Him when they say count it all joy. If we focus on the Word and the promises of God, how can we not have joy? His promises are Yes and Amen! His promises are to bring me to an expected end, not my destruction! He wants to prosper me, not destroy me! I hear people say all the time, “If it be God’s will.” READ YOUR BIBLE, YOU’LL FIND OUT WHAT HIS WILL IS. It’s for you to be healed and whole, it’s for you to have peace, joy, happiness. It’s for you to prosper. You can’t find a scripture that says “God wants you miserable and sick.”

Sometimes to get to our victory, we have to clean out the junk. Cleaning out the junk isn’t always fun but if we focus on what is waiting for us, we will find joy in cleaning out the junk. Cleaning out the junk means finding our joy.

How do we focus and get our joy back? We speak of it. Stop talking about the problem and talk about the outcome instead – God’s got this! The best is yet to come! I see a turnaround coming! I have the victory! Jesus is Lord! The devil is a liar! All things are being worked out for good!

Karate chop the devil in the throat, not the person who is sowing Word into your life.

Get happy! Find your joy! Speak it out! Seriously, stop with the fear and doubt, that doesn’t come from God. My husband and I have been working on this in regards to a situation that has been ongoing for a few months. We struggled to find joy in the situation until this past weekend. Our conversations about it would start out saying things like “everything is going to be fine” and then it would turn into “what-if’s” and by the end of it, we were both in doubt and stressed out.

This weekend was different. There was excitement about the dreams God has given us. There was hope. There was joy! Our conversations didn’t focus on what was happening right now, our conversations focused on what was to come. We had to redirect our focus to find our joy. There was a different atmosphere in our house and things started “clicking”. Count it ALL joy. We are going through a transition right now that is leading us into the dreams that God gave us. Why shouldn’t we have joy about that?

Where do you need to redirect your focus? Where do you need to find joy? Get in the Word and study the scriptures that back up your dreams. Take your joy back! Throat punch the devil!

John 16:33 (KJV)

These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.