I always find myself singing songs about joy and the unspeakable joy of Jesus. Up until last week, I really thought I got it. Logically, I knew that because I accepted Jesus I now have eternal life and the joy of my Savior. But really I was confusing joy with happiness (two completely different things, people)! So what is the difference? Well, happiness is defined by Webster’s dictionary as “A pleasurable or satisfying experience.” The key word in there is an experience. Happiness is not consistent. As humans, we have times of happiness, sadness, anger, and just emotions in general. So, what is joy and how is it any different?

My pastor defines joy as “The contentment that you have knowing God is in control. It is steady and unfleeting.” Joy is something that comes with Jesus. The love that Jesus has for us is something that produces a satisfying joy that cannot be found anywhere else. Something that really opened my eyes to the meaning of true joy was going to Haiti this past week. Walking past some of these blue tarp tents, I expected to go in and hear the owners begging for prayers that God would get them into a new house. Instead, when I walked into the shacks, tents, or cement buildings that these people lived in, I heard beautiful songs of praise to Jesus. I heard them asking me to pray that they would stay strong in their faith. And when some of these people insisted on praying for us, you could feel the Holy Spirit radiating from them and you could feel the joy that these people had, simply because they had Jesus. Their joy brought me to tears many times. They had nothing else, no clean water, some had no clothes, and some had not eaten for days. Yet, when I thought about it, they were better off than me. I can have everything in the world, but all I really need is the joy and the hope that comes from Jesus Christ because He is everything. Being around the Haitian people got me thinking, what do I do in hard circumstances? I realized that I complain to God, I ask Him to get me out of the hard times. In this realization, God showed me that the way I was doing it was wrong. He has the best plans for me, and sometimes I have to go through the rain simply because He wants me to appreciate the beauty of the rainbow. Throughout the trip, He was teaching me what I should do whether I am in the toughest situation of my life or having the time of my life: I should simply find joy in the Savior and Creator.

Now that I am back in the States, I have decided to choose joy every day. To wake up every morning and remember that no matter where the day finds me, I will be joyful simply because I have Jesus. I will consciously choose to remember that my God walks with me in the midst of pain and in the midst of excitement and happiness. I hope that I can shine the light of Jesus through the joy that I have as the Christian people in Haiti did. When I feel as though I have nothing, I will worship my God as if I have everything, because I do.