We are told to live each day to the Lord.

Psalms 5:11  But let all who take refuge in you be glad; let them ever sing for joy. Spread your protection over them, that those who love your name may rejoice in you.

Christians

As a man living around 300 A.D. was anticipating death, he wrote these last words to a friend: "It's a bad world, an incredibly bad world. But I have discovered in the midst of it a quiet and holy people who have learned a great secret. They have found a joy which is a thousand times better than any pleasure of our sinful life. They are despised and persecuted, but they care not. They are masters of their souls. They have overcome the world. These people are the Christians--and I am one of them." (Moody Bible Institute's, Today In The Word, June, 1988, p. 18)

Christians are the only people who truly have joy and peace.  They understand that this world is simply a short space in eternity.  They are content to suffer and even die for the cause of Christ because they know that they are laying up treasures in heaven.  Today we live in an uncertain world.  There is little space for joy.  But as Christians, though we mourn with those who mourn and suffer trials and persecution, we have a deep inner joy that gives us strength to carry on.  And often when we give a little joy, we get a little also.

$50.

A young pastor who had little money was given $50. By a churchgoer after church as people were filing pst to shake his hand at the door.  The churchgoer told the pastor he should use it to take his wife out to a nice restaurant.  As he was thinking about the nice time they would have the next person in line came to shake his hand.  The pastor knew this person was in great financial need.  The Lord prompted him to give that $50. In turn to the needy person, the next person in line.  During that week the Lord continued to burden people to give the pastors gifts of money, and each time the Lord also led the pastor to give that money away again.  This happened seven times.  On the eighth time the Lord let the pastor keep the $50. He was given and take his wife out for a nice dinner.

We can share the joy that the Lord gives us if we in turn give it away.  We have to remember that we have the joy of knowing that someday there will be peace when we are with the Lord, an eternity of peace and joy.  That is our ultimate place of joy and we want as many as possible to share that joy with us.

Jesus, Man of Joy

While Jesus was a "Man of Sorrows," Luke also paints a scene where Jesus "rejoiced very greatly in the Spirit" (Luke 10:21) - which implies more than just smiling.  The occasion for this joyful outburst was the return of the 70 from their successful mission.  They had been given spiritual authority over all the powers of the enemy and had liberated many from the hold of the enemy.  There was good reason to celebrate.

But Jesus cautions them, "Do not rejoice at this, that the spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven" (10:20).  No matter how much power they exercised in their ministry, the ultimate source of their joy was to be rooted in the fact that their names were written in heaven.  Ministry is temporary.  Life in heaven it permanent. Then Jesus joyfully thanked the Father for opening the hearts of the disciples to see this and to enter into the fellowship of the Father and the Son (10:21-24).  ...

On the eve of his execution, Jesus told his disciples that all he had revealed to them was so that "my joy may be in you and that your joy may be full"