Fighting for Joy - Louie Giglio

[Applause] and today we're talking about joy thanks to jared butler and the baylor university men's basketball team we're in this series in this journey of talks uh called joy uh in the final four if you missed the setup a few weeks ago as baylor is progressing to the championship game ultimately winning the championship game every interview they're talking about how all year long we've just played with a culture of joy and i'm like this is a team that had a three-week covid knockout this is a team that's been through incredible challenges this is a season that barely happened but yet somehow they made it all the way through because they were playing with a culture of joy i'd never heard that phrase before something blew up inside my heart and i was like i want to be a part of a culture of joy i want to join up for whatever a culture of joy looks like and so we made the pivot started on this journey and i'm telling you it's doing something really good i don't know about you but this journey is doing something really good on the inside of me and today we're talking about fighting for joy we defined joy like this a little bit different than happiness happiness is an emotion that is based on circumstances and outcomes and happiness isn't bad by the way but happiness you can be at the pinnacle at 2 15 in the afternoon and then you can be in the pit of sadness by 2 30. because happiness is based on circumstances and outcomes but we've been looking at this word for joy in the greek and what it's taught us is it's an awareness of god's grace in our lives and so we're defining joy as gratitude that is rooted in grace no matter the circumstances in other words joy supersedes circumstances and when you have it it's permanent and permeating in your life because it overrides whatever is happening around you we're going to end this talk today with some practical takeaways as as to how you can fight for joy in your life and we're going to get them all out of the book of philippians from our brother the apostle paul and philippians is called the book of joy and so i was in the jesus bible this week digging around in philippians for a little bit and the title page of every book in the jesus bible connects that book to the person of christ and the title page four philippians says jesus our joy in suffering so we have a whole letter written to this church it's all about joy rejoice in the lord always and again i say rejoice these are the kinds of things paul is writing while he's in prison for his faith in christ so in a circumstance that says no joy he says oh no i've got joy because my joy is gratitude rooted in immovable circumstances namely the grace of god at the cross and the future grace i have that i am now and will forevermore be seated with christ at the right hand of god i am alive and saved and i'm seated with christ those two things cannot be affected by any situation or circumstance therefore i can always have joy in any situation but you have to fight for joy and we're going to talk about why that is but the reality is that kind of permeating joy the joy that rises above and trumps all circumstances doesn't come naturally to a human being it has to be produced by the work of the spirit and you've got to fight for it and if you don't have it today it's because it's been stolen from you see we live in a battle not in a bubble we were with some people the last few days and they're coming out of 2020 talking about their bubble group that they were with all during the year maybe you had a bubble group and they would only eat at their bubble groups houses and they could only uh travel around with their bubble group their bubble group had just gone on a trip together and it somehow that allowed them to sort of survive within the situation that was going on around them but in in faith we don't have a bubble group that can protect us from the elements of the spiritual battle that we live in and living in this spiritual battle there is an enemy for you and i to face a specific enemy that's trying to steal your joy we see this in galatians chapter 5 and coming down to the end paul sets it up this way in verse 16. he says so i say live by the spirit and you will not gratify the desires of the sinful nature for the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the spirit and the spirit what is contrary to the sinful nature they are and say it with me conflict with each other so the spirit of god the holy spirit and our sinful nature the sinful nature of humanity are in conflict one with the other and one of them is going to win out and you're going to be able to see very obviously in in through our lives which one has the upper hand they're in conflict with each other so that you do not do what you want but if you are led by the spirit you are not under law and then he describes the two differences the acts of the sinful nature are obvious and he lists them all but i want you to notice in the middle here jealousy fits of rage and selfish ambition now some of the other you know regular characters are mentioned as well the ones you would expect when the sinful desires of the sinful flesh are in control but the ones that kind of sneak in are jealousy and selfish ambition these are in conflict with the holy spirit and he comes down in verse 22 and shows us obviously what's going on when the spirit is in control but the fruit of the spirit is love joy there's our word kara peace patience kindness goodness faithfulness gentleness and self-control against such things there is no law now i want you just to put a little mark by verse 24 because you're going to have to come back to this and i'm going to have to come back to this verse as we fight for joy though those who belong to christ jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires in other words the the way we translate that into like real language for us in this moment is if joy is going to live in your life something is going to have to die in your life if there if you are going to be a living fountain of this gratitude expressed in joy then something has to die and the something that has to die is the sinful nature something that has to die is the flesh the the me that i want the i i decide part has to go away and then in verse 25 since we live by the spirit let us keep in step with the spirit let us not become conceited man he these words seem like they pack so much more meaning right now let us not become conceited provoking and envying each other so at the end of the day we have to fight for joy it's like in france this month the spring has been brutally cold and so the wine makers there have been fighting for their grapes i don't know if you've seen it in the news or not but on any given night it looks like this in france and because of the cold temperatures and ice actually forming on the little sprigs of the vine the wine makers have had to light these pots all through the vineyards and for miles and miles and miles you see the fires are burning because they're fighting for the fruit they're fighting for the crop that they want and they know they can't just sit back and do nothing or they'll lose that battle so they're in the middle of it fighting it stoking the fires if you will for the fruit and in the very same way that's what god is inviting us to do today he's saying i want to invite you to stoke the fires of joy and you can step into that process today we talked about how the key to the fruit of the spirit this love and joy and peace this this outcome that we want is all connected to the root in other words we we get the fruit from the root and the root is jesus and so we focus on jesus we talked about that early in the message journey so that we can get the fruit that is produced from that root but in the very same way if you're losing this conflict the root in your life isn't jesus the root is self and as the root jesus is moving through the vine we're in the middle we're the middle man in here the vine and as jesus by the holy spirit is moving through the vine the fruit is produced in the same way if self is the root it's also moving through the vine we obviously being the middle person and the self also produces fruit and the main fruit it produces related to joy is the fruit of an ungrateful spirit you've seen it everywhere comparison is the thief of joy super famous quote and it's almost a hundred percent it's almost there you'll see how it's almost there in just a moment the real bullseye enemy of joy is an ungrateful spirit rooted in self the enemy of joy is an ungrateful spirit rooted in self if joy is gratitude rooted in grace then the enemy of joy is an ungrateful spirit that's rooted in self and that ungrateful spirit rooted itself expresses itself in two major ways a lot of different ways but two major ways that god wants us to look at today and those two ways trap us in a cycle of ungrateful hearts and the first one of those is this i want us to look at this thing called the circle of self this is when self is the root the first way that we see that it expresses itself is an entitlement an entitlement with a simple definition is simply this i deserve it and when your attitude is i deserve it you are fostering an ungrateful spirit in your life because everything that comes along your way you're just like i deserve it and if you didn't get what you wanted to get then you're going to envy and compare and complain until you do get what you think you deserve and that spirit snuffs out gratitude and ultimately steals away your joy so when it said comparison is a thief of joy that's true but the reason why we compare is because we feel like we're entitled to more therefore we're always evaluating how many chips everybody else has in their stack and figuring out how to get more than what someone else has an entitled person is a person who may have tasted of the fruit of joy at some point but it's spoiled in their heart spoiled is a good word it's spoiled and they're spoiled because they think they deserve everything they've got and for all of us sitting in this building today who have so much in our lives i'm telling you it is a big big deal i i a good example of this i'm going to use someone else and not myself even though i could make many examples of my own but i do that often enough here so i'll use some other person as an example of being entitled um we were at the kennedy space center all week with astronaut shane kimbrough who is on the international space station thank you lord going up on the falcon 9 rocket taking the dragon capsule docked to the international space station him uh commanding this launch and this capsule to the space station and shane is actually going to see this gathering at some point so be good if we just said we're proud of you as passion city church and we are with you and praying for you on your journey and through the week we were able to do some amazing things and one of the days we were in a situation i can't really get into with a handful of people doing something that is very very very very special to do and at the end of the time we had to wait a little bit longer for some things to happen and people were starting to grumble a little bit because we were having to wait after we were doing this thing that no one gets to do now we're having to wait for an hour and um before we could leave isn't that horrible to be made to wait like that and then finally we went down in this building that's not even open to the public to this lobby to get on the bus and there's a little store in the lobby for the employees that work there a lot of employees work in this place and there's a little store there where you can buy all kinds of different stuff but in the store they had some specific um souvenir apparel items to this launch and we were like hey do we have time to run in there and like get one of those and they're like sure and so our little group of less than 20 people kind of flooded into this little store which was smaller than a third of this uh area that i'm standing on and um as people started going in the the shop manager behind the plexiglas where the cash register was said whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa only eight people in the store at a time and so i um i was not in yet so i'm in the wait list wait line now and uh one guy was in but the guy kept telling him you have to get out you have to get out you have to go back out like from there to there and um so the guy's like well what uh whatever and he counts again the guy does counts to people he says no there's seven seven people i'm eight and the guy says no only eight people in the store and so our our host says to the guy please wait outside so now it's me and him i'm telling this story about him because it would surely i would have never done anything like this and um he says he yells back in because he's not going to have it i mean because he and i are going to have to wait i don't know maybe five minutes for someone to come out and um he yells back in the sign and there's a little sign stuck on the plexiglas the sign says eight customers you ever been there eight customers just on the sign eight customers you said eight people is it eight people or eight customers i'm telling you we are the best sign readers in the world you and me are we not oh no no no no no no no no the sign says you need me to come in and turn the sign around for you so you can read it while we're in a building no one gets to go in and just did something no one gets to do and now i have to wait five minutes to go into the little store that we didn't even know there was a store so that we can get something that people can't even get and i'm gonna have to wait out here because you said eight people but the sign says eight customers want any joy going on right there because all the goodness that we had just experienced was stolen by the spirit of an ungrateful heart entitlement robs joy and our world is filled with it there were ten lepers who begged jesus for healing and he said go show yourself to the priest and as they went luke tells us they were healed so we're talking about a guy who had lost the end of three fingers now has whole fingers again a guy whose nose had come off now has a nose a guy who had lost a third of his ear and all of this ear now he has two ears a person whose toes were gone now they're back and as they're going they're freaking out realizing this is crazy but one of them says wait a minute that guy named jesus he's responsible for all this i'm going back turns around goes to jesus falls at his feet worships him and thanks him and jesus says whoa time out weren't there 10 of you and didn't everyone get healed and the guy says yeah everybody got healed you wouldn't believe it people were high-fiving for the first time in a long time it was really exceptional joy and he said well where are the other nine are you telling me that only one person and you being a samaritan thought to come back and be grateful somehow entitlement can get you so fast that you can go from begging for mercy in one breath to shouting over healing in the next breath and forget about the gratitude that you need to express in the next breath and already have joy stolen from you entitlement says i deserve it and there are a lot of people who have not used those words in church but they just somehow deep down figure that god was going to help them anyway you know why because he probably just was can give me a little nudge give me a little help give me you know a little pat on the back give me a little patch to put on my sleeve of course he was because look everything i've done in life's kind of worked out like that so surely god was going to help me but the other way this works out is kind of a little bit tricky too and that is self works itself out in shame and shame is an adversary to joy because shame you would think well shame is going to say i don't deserve it but we really don't deserve it so that's true what shame is going to say is that when i hear about the grace of god i'm going to say i could never receive it in other words based on what i've done or what has been done to me that may work for everybody else but i'm not going to be able to receive that goodness and forgiveness and that holiness and righteousness in christ that brand new life that brand new identity that seat at the table that sonship that daughtership that place with god that future grace with him i'm not going to be able to fully receive that and when we do that what we're saying in effect is the same as entitlement we're saying my opinion about what i should get trumps god's opinion about what he wants to give to me shameful people think it's humility working itself out when the root of it itself and the root of self is pride and people who are entitled and people who are living in shame both have the same remedy you would think there'd be one remedy for the entitled person in a different remedy for the shameful person but they really have the same remedy and the remedy for both of them is a revelation of grace and glory eyes open to see the gap between where they are and where god is because both of them the entitled person is ungrateful because they think they deserve it and the shameful person is ungrateful because they've never received it and how can you be grateful for something that you haven't received so both of them are ungrateful and the answer for both of them is a revelation of grace and glory to see the gap and then to understand this please catch this to understand this that i don't deserve anything but death so if you want to be a sign reader read that sign the wages of sin is death it says it right on the sign and i know i have sinned therefore i deserve death so when i say i'm entitled i am entitled and you know what i'm entitled to i am entitled to death and i want it i saw the sign right there see nobody is reading that sign but that's the entitled sign i am deserving but i'm deserving of the wages of my sin which is death and when i see the gap and i know i don't deserve anything but death but here's the ticket but because of grace i have life in christ jesus when i see that that is the result of a revelation of grace and glory i don't deserve anything but death but by grace i get new life in christ in other words the ultimate fruit was the fruit that came let me scoot a little further down is the grace that came the life that came when jesus came because jesus is the root but at some point the root became a human being he became flesh and dwelt among us and even as isaiah had prophesied he was going to be like a tender shoot and at some point he was going to be cut off he was going to be offered for you so that the entitled person could see the gap and go whoa the one who paul said has the title above every title gave himself for me and the shameful person who says i could never receive it says the one who has the title above every title gave himself for me and he was crushed for me we don't have a crushing mechanism and this probably won't even work but i'll just try when people realize there's something called new wine entitlement goes out the window and people who've lived under shame all their lives realize what's in the cup was what's made them feel ashamed so many people have heard the victory story but they've never come to lift the cup for themselves and so still no joy when i was coming up as a young speaker i would say yes to anything i got invited to a lock-in yes that sounds amazing the kids are gonna stay up all night and i'm gonna speak at 2 a.m and at 6 00 a.m to wrap it up absolutely i'm in oh you can pay me 25 incredible and 30 cents a mile to drive there i sign me up one time i went to a youth uh event in this little town in west texas and it was big time because when i got there there were no hotels in this town it was that small and but the guy said hey no worries um my office has a little efficiency apartment in it and so we we drove out to his office it was just about sundown really cool office way out on the edge of town by itself and uh but really nice and nicely remodeled and i'm like why does your office have an efficiency apartment in it what do you do and he goes well i'm an accountant blah blah blah blah but we bought this property from the funeral home that went out of business and they had a little apartment in the back where the undertakers would stay during the night hey we'll we'll pick you up at 8 30 for church in the morning sun went down he went no sleeping that night no one time i went to this town in oklahoma and the guy uh meets me and he says you're gonna stay at my house and that's always was a toss up back in the day and so i thought okay great so we pull up his driveway in the house is like these big gates in this entrance and we'd pull up into his house and i'm like oh my goodness though all right this is going to work this is a hotel and um i wanted to ask him what he did but you know it's kind of like awkward like oh big house bro what do you do and uh so a little bit later i found out he was the bail bondsman in town so apparently that's good business oh andy owned the pawn shop and he said i'm glad you're here um we are our softball team is playing in the state men's softball championship this weekend and we have a game tonight friday so we're going to have you have to cut the message short because we got a game tonight uh tomorrow we got two games during the day if we keep winning i don't know how it's going to work out for tomorrow night's session at the youth revival because we got a game tomorrow night and uh sunday will be fine though because it's over saturday night and i was like that's great go do your thing go plato's no i want you to come along come with me in fact why don't you come play with us do you play softball i said well currently i was actually on a softball team and i said yes sure i do and he said well come play with us he was just that kind of guy like the more the merrier let's go i have an extra jersey uh and do you have any sweatpants or anything i was like yeah i got some some sweats and so off we go friday night to the to the tournament and um he loans me a glove and i'm out there warming up with the team and sitting on the bench and introducing myself to people hi i'm louie good to see you just came in town for the youth event yep awesome great great to meet you and you and you and you and you and you and all of y'all and yeah i know he just insisted that i come and be on the team so friday night we won which was awesome um i didn't get to play friday night but we won uh came back saturday batting practice warmed up the whole thing great people are like oh great the louis guy's back that's awesome and uh we had a game before lunch and a game after lunch won both games so now we're 3-0 and playing in the final game saturday night so i haven't played yet in the saturday games but we go to the final game and in the final game it goes literally to the last inning walk-off double scores two runs we win the oklahoma men's softball championship there is a rush of the field everybody is jumping on top of each other a big scrum on home plate they give the trophy out this big giant trophy and everybody's holding the trophy up and i'm just kind of standing over by the dugout like awesome i got nothing in this so i'm happy for all of y'all and i can officially say you're looking right now at the oklahoma state men's softball champion i mean right here but i never rushed out there to hold the trophy up zero desire to go and hold that thing over my head because i i didn't have anything in it and we've come into these places so often and we've sung the song of victory but for a lot of you you still don't know that it wasn't necessarily that you played in the game but but all of your shame is definitely in the game and when christ took the cup in the garden it was your cup and when he said your will not mine it was your sin and when he hung on that cross it was your shame and when he said it's finished it really was finished so that you could maybe for the first time in your life come and take the cup and hold it up over your head and say this is my cup this is my cup that's my cup that's my forgiveness that's my grace that's my kindness that's my love that's my forgiveness that's my brand new life that's a brand new me i'm lifting up the cup of the new wine of the grace of god and shame is done [Applause] either way whether you're entitled and you lift the cup or ashamed when you lift the cup that revelation of grace and glory it does the same thing in every person [Music] it produces grateful people so instead of self in the center now this revelation of grace and glory is in the center and now going in every direction are grateful people and grateful people have joy but you got to fight and you got to stoke the fires of gratitude how do you do it i'll give you a few walkouts they all come from the book of philippians number one identify the things you're grateful for and give thanks [Music] this letter that paul wrote from prison he opened it by saying in chapter 1 this is verse 3 i thank my god every time i remember you i'm in prison but i'm thanking god every time i think about you in all my prayers for all of you i always pray with joy so there's a connection between gratitude and joy so for some of you the the takeaway is maybe going to be a little gratitude journal or start a note on your phone and before you read the first email about what's going wrong at work or you see the first headline about what's going wrong in the world or you get the first text about what did or didn't happen in the circumstance and the outcome open up your little note and just before the day even begins write two or three things that you're thankful for and grateful for today and give god thanks i've been searching happiness and worry and joy and so i guess all the powers that be know what to put in my news feed so on friday i got in my news feed from that reputable news source the huffington post a headline and it said you want to you want to see click bait five things you should do first thing in the morning to be happier all day oh people are clicking on that and so i clicked because i just wanted to see five things i'm gonna give it a go number one something like exercise number two eat better number three put your phone in the other room number four don't remember number four number five incorporate gratitude and it wasn't just huffington post there were lots of links to some amazing studies and i've read some from the university of pennsylvania from harvard from doctors psychologists in all parts of the world and they all say that gratitude produces happiness that's their language just affirming god's law of the spiritual universe that gratitude produces joy for some of you don't start the day with what's wrong what's got to get fixed what you don't like doesn't mean you're ignoring the world around you but start the day with something or someone that you're grateful for and after 30 days of starting your day with gratitude every one of these scientific articles i have read says you have we will see a noticeable improvement in your state of they'll call it happiness i'll say joy number two also coming from paul don't over ask of people and things in other words enjoy the blessing but don't put the root of your joy in the blessing [Music] and i'm talking about your family members your husband your job your stuff the experience all that's great god is not wanting you to be unhappy but as you're enjoying what god has blessed you with make sure you're enjoying it and not putting the root of your joy in it paul said it this way in philippians 4 verse 10 including one of the most powerful passages that we've all memorized probably somewhere back in life he says i rejoice greatly in the lord that at last you have renewed your concern for me indeed you have been concerned but you had no opportunity to show it now i'm not saying this because i am in need listen to this for i have learned it to be content whatever the circumstances how do you define that joy i know what it is to be in need and i know what it is to have plenty i've learned the secret of being content in any and every situation whether well-fed or hungry whether living in plenty or in want i can do everything through him who gives me strength [Music] in other words i'm not over asking of you to be my source of joy i have a root his name is jesus and the root of jesus produces the fruit of joy in my life so i'm going to enjoy you because you are a gift in my life but i'm not going to put my root of joy in you and i'm not going to ask you to do what only christ can do because i can do all things through christ who gives me strength and there's no one else on planet earth and nothing else on planet earth i can say that about number three these are super simple balance and for some of you this is going to be the key joyless people with joyful people paul says in philippians 2 in verse 2. he's talking about the kind of people we ought to be the family we ought to be then make my joy complete by being like-minded having the same mind being one in spirit and purpose do nothing out of selfish ambition remember the fruit of the sinful nature do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit remember the inter-galatians they're conceited provoking each other and envying but in humility consider others better than yourself and then down in verse 14 do everything without complaining or arguing so that you may become blameless and pure children of god without fault in a crooked and depraved generation in which you shine like stars in the universe what is he saying he's saying you've got to live out in the world you got to be in every sphere i want you to be light in the darkness i want you to be in the streets i want you to be a voice for the oppressed i want you to live out in the world and there's a lot of a vacuum of joy out there but you're going to be joyful out there but when you come back to your crew to your inner circle to the people that you run with and hang with if if the people you run and hang with are joyless people they're going to steal your joy if your crew is full of complainers at the end of the day you're going to notice your joy quotient going down so you're going to have to replace some of the people or balance some of the people you got i got some joy killers in my group right now i need to add some joy bringers to my group right now i got some firefighters of the wrong kind they're in here putting all the pots out between my vines and here i'm coming back trying to stoke the fires of joy and every time they show up they're just drowning out all the fires of my joy and that's not to say that one of us is better than the other it's just to say that some of you got three giant complainers in your inner circle and you're wondering why you don't have joy and so you're going to need to balance you need to do a little shuffling around of the crew and get some joy carriers in the mix and be a joy carrier in the mix and if you are a joy carrier in the mix and you got people who are always pushing back on your joy you're gonna need to cause them to take a step or two to the side because joy is a gift but it's a gift you've got to fight for in your life and then the last thing it's obvious and we started with this at the beginning of this journey of messages but keep seeking jesus you have to make the root the priority you cannot keep wishing for the fruit you have to prioritize your relationship with the root so you can't just say i wish i had more fruit i wish i had more joy i want to try to fight for joy well fighting for joy means abiding in the root and this is what paul made clear paul had every reason to be entitled but once he met jesus all that went by the wayside and he had described all of his past his upbringing his family all of his accomplishments and his position but then in verse seven he says of chapter three but ever but whatever was to my prophet i now consider loss for the sake of christ what is more i consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing christ jesus my lord for whose sake i have lost all things i consider them rubbish that i may gain christ so the way that we stoke the fires of gratitude the main way we stoke the fires of gratitude is we embrace and stay connected to the author of grace [Music] because there is definitely a connection between generosity and gratitude it is the generosity of a king who would be crushed for the entitled and ashamed so that we would be brought from death to life and invited into a relationship with the alpha and the omega the one who himself is the beginning and the end and he says you can come to me joy is not out there joy is in christ joy is not a character trait that we're going to try to work on joy is a person named jesus and the more you keep your eyes and your heart on him the more time you spend with him the more time you are in this word learning about him and feeding on him and hanging with him and walking with him and talking with him and doing life with him the more jesus the more joy because joy is spelled jesus others and you and i know that's counter to the world because the world is not going to be silent and it is going to tell you every second of every day it all starts with you and if there's space for somebody else bring them along and if you got extra time maybe drop into the house of worship on a sunday but we live in an upside down kingdom with a king who gave it all and he says if you put me first trust me you're not going to come in last [Music] if you put me at the center you are going to be filled with [Music] joy you

Channel: Passion City Church

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Keywords: joy, jesus christ, louie giglio, passion city church worship, louie giglio sermons, passion city, giglio louie, city church, passion, giglio, passion city church sermons, Atlanta, passion church, louis giglio, cumberland, temptations, live church, live worship, live worship songs, live worship music, live worship songs 2020, passion city online sunday gathering, fighting for joy, fighting, wanting joy, happiness, Worship Matters, W2O2R2S2H2I2P

Id: 3tvMtnPPnfc

Length: 47min 16sec (2836 seconds)

Published: Mon Apr 26 2021