Increasing Your Joy in Serving God
1 Joy is a fruit of God’s holy spirit—therefore, something that we need to have. Jesus, full of God’s spirit, was a man of joy, even though he was “a man meant for pains and for having acquaintance with sickness.” (Isa. 53:3) Nevertheless, “for the joy that was set before him he endured a torture stake, despising shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.”—Heb. 12:2.
2 Jesus looked forward to the service God had reserved for him as King and High Priest. He experienced great joy in teaching and training others who would share with him in that Kingdom. Also he found supreme joy in upholding his Father’s name and in strengthening his disciples to partake of that joy. These joys caused all rebuffs and indignities to pale into insignificance. Imitating Jesus, we will be able to face difficult situations, as well as enjoy the favorable ones, in preaching the good news. Always sustaining us is the joy of anticipating the new system of things and what Jehovah has in store for us, as we appreciate presently having a measure of health and strength that we can use in his service.
JOYS THAT WE CAN NOW HAVE
3 One of the outstanding joys we can now have is to help our brothers, as in times of sickness, need, distress, bereavement or loneliness. (Gal. 6:10; Jas. 1:27) And, what can replace the joy we have in sharing the good news with others, especially when we can study the Bible with them? Nothing encourages us more than to see them grasp the truth and begin to change their lives in harmony with the requirements of true worship. We have to experience this joy really to appreciate it.
4 When witnessing we know that we are sharing the best of good news. Why, then, do we sometimes tend to lose our joy? It is because we tend to forget why we are proclaiming the good news. When we meet with unpleasant looks or apathy, we need to remind ourselves that none of our work is in vain in connection with the Lord —that Jehovah will cause it to work out to his vindication and glory. (1 Cor. 15:58) Since he has given us the good news and the commission to proclaim it, we can be sure that our speaking God’s Word of truth will never fail to give glory to him. Many are the experiences of persons who turned down the truth many times but found that they could not forget what they had heard. Eventually they just had to take it seriously, and it brought real joy and meaning to their lives.
5 We can have great joy if we do what God sets before us to do. We will be happy if we do what we can according to our ability. While we can work to improve our God-given abilities and opportunities, we destroy our joy if we worry about our weaknesses and inadequacies. We need to keep constantly in mind that it is not by might and power, nor by the wisdom of man that God gets his work done, but by his spirit. We can receive that spirit, along with the necessary wisdom to cope with our problems, by asking for it in faith.—Luke 11:13; Jas. 1:5.