The Genuine Happiness

There are three Biblical categories of happiness:

• Pseudo happiness
• Establishment happiness
• God's perfect happiness

Pseudo happiness is used by Satan to deceive the human race, establishment happiness is basically for unbelievers, and God's perfect happiness, hereafter noted as +H, is sharing the unchangeable happiness of God in all circumstances.

First let us note exactly what pseudo happiness is. Pseudo happiness is Satan's attempt to counterfeit the happiness, contentment and blessings which God has provided for every church age believer. Satan is the god of this world as documented in, 2Corinthians 4:4; Ephesians 2;2; John 12:31; Luke 4:5-7; John 14;30; John 16:11. And, it is Satan's goal to keep his citizens deceived by way of false happiness based on the "world's" temporal blessings. Satan keeps people deceived by providing stimulation, ambition, and self indulgence which will either counterfeit or cancel out the +H God provides. What Satan does is provides a system which gets people so wrapped up that they haven't time to learn what God's perfect happiness is all about. This is why we are commanded in 1John 2:15- 17 NOT to love the world (system), the world's lifestyle, the world's thinking, things of the world, etc. The cosmos diabolicus (devil's world) is filled with illusions, delusions, fallacies, and misconceptions about what happiness is. Satan's propaganda tells us happiness is based on money, or success, pleasure, social life, sexual life, public approbation, fame, material things, travel, health and pleasant circumstances and though these things can bring a measure of happiness it is not God's plan for us to depend on these things for happiness. True happiness comes through the inculcation of the word of God which strengthens the soul with divine viewpoint.

What God has provided for us in +H is a permanent factor and is a great problem solving device. Anything that is worthwhile is so in both adversity and prosperity. If you can pass through a tragedy and still remain calm, peaceful, and content you know you have the happiness of God. But, if you fall apart and lose your contentment and peace then you know your happiness was based on circumstances and that is pseudo happiness! If you are dependent on any person or set of circumstances for your happiness you are weak to the degree you are dependent.

The presence of arrogance in our soul is a guarantee of unhappiness perpetuated for the rest of your life. And, it is your arrogance which allows Satan to administer the pseudo happiness which only exists in one who decides to be involved in the cosmic system. The arrogant complex of sins is very deceptive because it deludes, distracts, and deceives man into false notions about what constitutes happiness. Pseudo happiness promises much but beyond that good moment in time arise many bad moments, in time routine and dull times. It is not "good times" which sustain us. Pseudo happiness is temporary while God's +H is present all the time! Freedom to indulge in all one desires is not that which secures happiness. Capacity for happiness must precede the experience or function of happiness and that capacity can only be developed through a consistent relationship with the word of God. Happiness or unhappiness depends on how we respond to any given situation, not the situation itself. Happiness is the harmony between one's thoughts and one's lifestyle.

An example of pseudo happiness is, when the pseudo happy single person is lonely and wishes to be married and the married person is miserable and wishes to be single. God's +H depends on what the believer thinks in his soul, it does not depend on any given divine institution, set of circumstances, nor one's environment! A happy marriage therefore, is two +H people who retain their +H in matrimony. One does not enter into matrimony to obtain +H!!! Marriage brings with it many distractions and so the believer must have soul stability based on a devoted relationship to God first. Pseudo happiness is based on illusions, an illusion being an erroneous concept of reality. If you harbor illusions when it comes to happiness you will end up with an empty, aimless, and meaningless life and it all starts with rejection of truth.

There are five basic illusions people hold to in reference to happiness:

1. Building happiness on the details of life such as money, success, pleasure, social life, friends, relatives, health, sex, or status symbols

• Building happiness on a pleasant environment.
•  Building happiness on people, romance, marriage, friendship, children, or social activity.
• Building happiness by way of changing the devil's world via reform crusades, social engineering, violence, civil disobedience, or revolution
• Building happiness on someone else's unhappiness, i.e., revenge. Pseudo happiness depends on involvement in the evil of the cosmic system of Satan and can only be related to momentary pleasure. And, anything you have in a moment which cannot be perpetuated is not related to +H but rather is related to emotion. Pseudo happiness is superficial, vain, subject to change, unstable, frustrating, and temporary and is therefore the source of self induced misery under the law of volitional responsibility.

Pseudo happiness is

• limited to this life, Psalms 17:14; Luke 16:2
• a short happiness, Job 20:5
•  uncertain, Luke 12:20
•  vain, Ecc 2:1; 7:6
• derived from wealth, Psalms 52:7
• derived from power, Psalms 37:35
• from worldly prosperity, Psalms 17:14
•  from gluttony, Isaiah 22:13
•  from drunkenness, Isaiah 56:12
• from vain pleasure, Isaiah 5;12
• from oppression of others, Hab 1:15

Unhappy people complain since their desires have not been met. Why? Because in pseudo happiness they have no capacity to appreciate what they have and they want more and more and so are implacable. In reality, if you want to experience happiness you need to have certain desires removed, not to have things added to your life. Your thinking is the problem. Unhappy thinking is arrogant thinking and is minus humility. Humility is the beginning of having God's +H and apart from humility there is only pseudo happiness. Only God's provisions can make you truly happy and that demands the function of reception, retention, and recall of Bible doctrine.

Look at Satan himself, he was the most beautiful, successful, attractive, genius creature to come from the hand of God! But he was miserable because he couldn't appreciate all that he had... instead he wanted more, Isaiah 14:12-14, he wanted to be like the Most High! And so he set about reeling in all that he wanted, hence, we have the angelic conflict!

True happiness realizes that if God does not open the doors, it's not a part of His plan for your life. God does not need to use the devil's method of promotion to advance His cause! All the believer needs to do is prepare himself and leave the rest to God. If God wants "it" to happen - then it will happen. But pseudo happiness becomes consumed in what it is lacking. Jer 25:10 informs us that once the word of God is rejected, happiness is taken from you and your lust pattern becomes saturated. Sure Satan has the ability to provide (pseudo) happiness, but... he does not have the ability to sustain or maintain his blessings and happiness.

People erroneously think that a life with no problems is what happiness is all about. In reality, problems are what offer us the opportunity to strengthen our faith and solidify our relationship with God. The unhappy person seeks to control his environment including the people therein either by use of guilt or self-pity. Self pity is the flattery that people who are failures crave so they can preserve their excuses to be losers and then develop a pseudo self-esteem. No matter what the unhappy person endeavors, nothing works for the believer apart from God's perfect plan and provisions, Solomon can second that fact.

What about the unbeliever? Well this is where Establishment happiness comes in. Establishment happiness comes from submitting to the laws of divine establishment which are designed to remove arrogance and fear from the life of the unbeliever and to replace it with genuine humility which results in a capacity for life. Note, this is not the case for the believer in Christ! To whom much is given much is required and once the individual is a believer, there is more to life than the keeping of establishment principles. The believer who honors divine establishment principles yet rejects the plan of God enters into arrogance and divine discipline. Establishment happiness is the temporal happiness of the unbeliever who lives by establishment principles. Under establishment happiness the unbeliever moves beyond morality to a place of limited virtue, becoming a person of honor. This type of person is very different from the unbeliever who is alone moral and quite self- righteous about his morality. Being faithful to the principles of establishment is not morality, though it includes it, it goes beyond morality for the unbeliever to genuine humility.

The unbeliever under establishment happiness and true humility can enjoy such God given temporal blessings as being married to the right one for one's life, and the blessing of occupation as noted in Ecc 9:9 cf Pro 18:22. This two-fold reward noted in Ecc 9:9 is not due to the unbeliever's morality but to his humility. But the tragedy here is that such blessings in the unbeliever's life come to a screeching halt at the grave. Establishment happiness is a restricted and temporal happiness tied into the laws of divine establishment and so these blessings are vulnerable to one's environment and circumstances.

Unlike God's +H, in establishment happiness there are adverse circumstances which are stronger than establishment happiness and can negate this happiness. There is nothing wrong with establishment happiness since it is designed by God, but it is temporal and lasts no further than the grave. Therefore the most important category of happiness is God's perfect happiness also known as divine happiness. There never was a time when God was unhappy. In such truth, there never was a time when God was unhappy with you! In His omniscience He knew all about all in eternity past and remained perfectly happy. Such +H is obtained on our part according to our intake and application of Bible doctrine. No person can take +H away since it comes from God and cannot be changed. Of course, relatively few believers possess God's +H, since it requires consistent perception, metabolization, and application of B.D., as well as the advance to spiritual adulthood, especially spiritual maturity.

God's +H is independent happiness and is the monopoly of the believer in spiritual adulthood. This +H is not found in the world, Mar 8:36. God's +H requires something no lazy minded person can do...concentrate. As John 8:31 notes, to abide in Christ denotes a direct dependence of the one under instruction upon one who is an authorized superior in spiritual knowledge. The word disciple also found in John 8:31 is a reference to the existence of a personal attachment which shapes the whole life of the one described or to be dedicated to something, here it points to a dedication to the word of God. The majority of believers cannot concentrate long enough on the word of God to come to know God's system, His plan, nor His mystery doctrine, therefore they become bored with God's plan and easily distracted. Such a believer will never know the +H of God.

Perfect happiness is divine happiness resident in the soul of the church age believer who utilizes his portfolio of invisible assets and divine power to attain spiritual maturity. God's happiness does not change with circumstances or with someone's mood. This does not mean you don't ever get emotional or that you will never have negative thoughts, but it does mean that you immediately rebound and rise above the circumstances. We never have a right to be unhappy or bitter with anyone due to the availability of problem solving device #7, impersonal love which is worth much more than money since is allows you to rise above letting people get to you.

The absence of problems is not +H, but peace and contentment no matter what you are faced with. Jesus Christ had this happiness throughout His whole incarnate life and even on the cross, Heb 12:2. Therefore, the opposition from Satan and the persecution from other believers in the cosmic system should only serve to intensify your +H! God will deal with those who are wrong, your job is to grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ and continue forward in God's plan. Problems are actually a vote of confidence from God in that He knows you can (if you choose to) handle them.

In fact, you will never know what type of happiness you have until you go through some bad experiences and tragedies. Again, happiness is not the absence of problems but the ability to deal with anything the devil's world can bring toward you, Phi 4:13. Once you have God's +H nothing that happens to you can change your peace and contentment. One of the powers the Lord Jesus Christ left for us through His teachings is... His perfect happiness, problem solving device #9! It's not enough to have a measure of God's +H, it must be brought to completion. And, if you know God as a rigid disciplinarian then you will never forge the way to His +H. God in His perfect justice and is waiting to be gracious to us, Isa 30:18. Knowing who God is and being devoted to His plan for your life is what offers the believer +H, only then can the temporal blessings of this world be appreciated for what they are and only then are we placed beyond being influenced by the problems and circumstances of the devil's world!

Since we are commanded to have the happiness of God (Philippians 4:4; 3:1), God must provide the ability for us to be so. If you are going to enjoy the perfect happiness (+H) of God you need to understand a certain attribute of God... His omniscience. God knew every sin, every form of evil, every cruel and vicious thing in all angelic and human history, hence, there is nothing that can surprise, upset, or make Him unhappy. We can never do anything to upset or sadden God! God has always known all thoughts, decisions, motives, and actions of each and every person in history. There is nothing we can do to destroy the +H of God. This happiness is immutable, therefore if you to claim you have God's +H and then wallow in fits of misery or flicker in moods of discontentment, you only lie to yourself about possessing the happiness of God. The +H of God is always content in whatever circumstance may prevail knowing that if God allowed the situation it is for your ultimate benefit.

The road to +H comes in finding the courage to go down into oneself and take responsibility for what is there and then apply divine solutions. To suffer in guilt and condemnation is to reject what the Lord Jesus Christ has done on our behalf at the cross. He was intimately acquainted with grief so that we need not be! Happiness is essentially a state of going in the proper direction with all your heart (system of thinking), with all your mind (decisions), with all your soul (all the 5 compartments), and with all your body (physical strength/effort) without regrets and without reservations. When one is dedicated to the execution of God's predestination or what we call the pre-designed plan of God (PPOG), it is impossible to be unhappy.

Unhappiness is not part of predestination! If you are unhappy it is because you are not executing God's plan for your life, but instead your own plan. God's +H is related to thought and our thoughts become a form of energy. In Philippians 4:6 Paul informs us that +H is an energy which is beyond human understanding and human imagination. Perfect happiness is only found in God's plan and the only way to share His thinking on the subject is through the word of God. Happiness and eternity do not begin at death, but they begin now with your decisions right here in time. Perfect happiness must be developed in this life through trusting in God which of course entails knowledge of Him.

The +H and dynamics of spiritual adulthood is the believer's strength. But you need also know, that to stick with the PPOG will bring about opposition in your life. It is vain to try and steer clear or erase from our lives all that opposes us and all that is uncomfortable since it is the discomfort in life which cultivates our strength in Christ and reliance on Him. It is, in fact, when things fall apart that your true happiness is made evident! To be truly happy takes facing and handling opposition in life, not trying to ignore or avoid it. And, the most exciting happiness is the happiness generated by forces beyond our control. You see, when something lies within our control and it turns out for the best we erroneously consider it earned, but those things which are beyond our control, the effects are also and we can claim no part in it. God is the One who makes the sovereign decision as to what He will allow us to go through and our +H in going through it is part of glorifying Him!

You will never glorify God unless you are perfectly happy in the situation you are in. This does not mean that you like it or enjoy what you are going through, but that you handle it without a long face and with an inner contentment which only comes in knowing God. Every time we voice our negative attitudes, it's an indictment against the sovereignty of God, and disobedience to God brings unhappiness in all situations. So, how do you know if you have developed God's +H in your life? First of all through the existing moment by moment attitude of thanksgiving in your soul. Perfect happiness also becomes part of your prayer life.

1Thesolonians 5:16 "Rejoice always..." means be happy always and since this a command, to be unhappy is sin. Whatever God allows you to go through you should accept with trust and courage and know that it is for your benefit! God's will for the believer in Christ Jesus is to give thanks for all situations... for everything, 1Thesonlonians 5:16-18! Until you can give thanks to God for everything in life, both prosperity and adversity you do not have the +H of God. When things are going right many people will say that they love their life. But do you love your life when things are not going right? If you do, you are on the road to the +H of God. The greatest experience of security in this life is to attain +H. In +H, when under pressure the believer thinks the right things, does the right things, and applies the right doctrines. And, of course this can only be done through repeated inculcation of Bible doctrine to the point where what flows from your soul is automatic.

 Repetition and inculcation create a thought pattern that is automatic, apart from emotionalism, Philippians 4:4. Note, +H is not something that you produce in yourself, it is something that is produced in you through your consistent positive decisions for the word of God. Greatness in any realm takes repetition and dedication and it's no different in the spiritual realm. Many people think that having all their desires met is +H. Well, you can never get enough of the things you don't need (which is most of what we want) since the things you don't need can never satisfy. In fact, to be without some things you want is an indispensable part of happiness since it cultivates contentment. Unhappiness is in not knowing what we want and then killing ourselves to get it.

Satan points to things we don't have and often do not even have the right to possess and says "THAT" would make you happy! He succeeded in such a plot with the woman in the Garden of Eden. Satan introduced the fact to the woman, that she was not happy because there was something in her life that she could not have. And the woman ate it up because she lacked capacity in her soul. We see this by her erroneous perception and supposed application of doctrine. She was not content with everything being perfect! The woman lacked something in her capacity to hear clearly and objectively what the divine prohibition involved and so fell into deception. She did not love the Lord with all her heart, mind, soul, and body.

Our relationships in life should not be based on who we are with each other but who we are with the Lord! It is doctrine in the soul which is what we are to trust in others. You can discover happiness not by fulfilling all your desires but rather by limiting you desires. Now, there are mechanics involved in the attainment of +H which guide us in the development of God's +H. It all starts with God the Holy Spirit who is the source of our sharing God's +H since He is the teacher of Bible doctrine, Romans 14:17. The +H God has for us is the result of the teaching ministry of God the H.S. Galatians 5:22 tells us that the fruit of the Spirit is arrived at through staying in fellowship with God which mandates the filling of the Spirit or rather God the H.S. being in control of our soul. Thus, 1Th 1:6 instructs us to be imitators of "us". Who is "us"? Us consists of two categories of people:

•  The only invisible hero of the great power experiment of the Hypostatic Union, The Lord Jesus Christ.
• The apostle Paul who as a sinner became an invisible hero and anyone of us who becomes an invisible hero. We are not to imitate their looks or personalities but their doctrine. Therefore, to complain about those you think are causing you unhappiness means NO HAPPINESS on your part. And, to be unhappy means that you are not appropriating the power available to you.
  

Following is a list of the three forms of power needed to attain +H:

• The Omnipotence of God the Father which is used to attain +H through perception of our portfolio of invisible assets and using those assets. Nothing is more important in the tactics of winning battles than to employ them. Remember, spiritual warfare!
• The Omnipotence of God the Son used by knowing He gives all believers a day at a time and is faithful in sustaining our life so we can attain +H.
• The Omnipotence of God the Holy Spirit used to attain +H in that God the H.S. is the teacher of B.D., John 14; 1Corinthians 2:9-16; 1John 2:24. If you want +H you can have it, but it requires daily decisions in order for your scale of values to be based on the word of God.

You must not only listen to the word and learn it but then apply it and advance in spiritual growth. The word of God is not given to meet your immediate needs nor to conform to your ideas. The word of God is given for your spiritual advance and attainment of +H and it is not for the weak-hearted, it takes dedication! God's +H does not belong to the natural man but to the new spiritual species in Christ. In such, the old things of 2Corinthians 5:17 which have lost their power are: genetics, environment, volitional handicaps, human dynamics, personality, talent and works, and flaws. The new things offered to the believer in Christ consist of: the portfolio of invisible assets, the 10 unique characteristics of the Church Age, the 10 Problem Solving Devices, all found in God's predestined plan for His children. In such there is equal privilege and equal opportunity and NO EXCUSES for not having the +H of God!

It is that which is written which gives us +H (i.e., the word of God), not that which we possess materially. Perfect happiness does not come from doing what you like to do, but from liking what you have to do! God's +H does not come from the things we possess nor pleasant circumstances but from the things we perceive. God's +H gives you answers to life which brings with it contentment. But, God must first share His thoughts with you before you can share His +H. And, doctrine in the soul is not enough for +H, it must be learned and used, that is how the believer advances spiritually. Each stage of spiritual adulthood increases the believers +H into a much stronger power and that is what glorifies God. The greater part of our happiness or misery depends upon our disposition and frame of mind, not our circumstances. Action is very important and though it may not always bring +H, there is no happiness apart from action. But, our actions must line up with what God thinks.

There is a certain progression of perfect happiness at each stage of spiritual adulthood, from being occupied with Christ in spiritual self esteem (SSE) to being confident in Christ in spiritual autonomy (SA) to the new complete and refreshing system of thinking found in spiritual maturity (SM). And though we all continue to have needs they become less and less important as we advance through the stages of spiritual adulthood. This is because we finally realize that God has known our needs all along. Once you reach spiritual adulthood, needs become inconsequential and you are no longer consumed with thinking about them. Of course, you still plan for your needs, which is part of an organized life but your needs aren't nearly as important as they once were.

This is also reflected in your prayer life which becomes greatly improved since you don't waste your time and God's times with a list of foolish needs. So, as long as your needs have number one priority in your life, it is impossible for you to reach spiritual adulthood, impossible for your to possess God's +H, and impossible for you to glorify God!

Happiness and love are meaningless as a state of happiness. We all say at certain times that we are happy or in love, but we are really talking about being in pleasant or enjoyable circumstances. But without perfect happiness, there is always the same problem: no matter what you have, you will want more! As long as there's something more that you must have, you aren't happy. You have to find happiness in yourself before you can find it with someone or something.

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