The Pharisees of Jesus’ day were judged as being pious because of their somber dispositions. Some of the Puritans encouraged frowning as an expression of religious seriousness. The truth is that we don’t need encouragement to frown or be unhappy. Life will give us plenty of reasons for that.
In his Confessions, Augustine asked, “Is not a happy life the thing that all desire, and is there anyone who altogether desires it not?” He went on to add, “But where did they acquire the knowledge of it, that they so desire it? Where have they seen it, that they so love it?” Augustine’s point was that a desire for happiness is etched into our psyche. We long for it, but we often find ourselves seeking it in the wrong places. Even when we find joy in earthly delights, we discover that they don’t last.
When I think of happiness from a biblical viewpoint, I’m often drawn to Jeremiah. “For my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can hold no water” (Jeremiah 2:13, ESV). There is a sadness in God’s rebuke related to the deceptiveness and destructive nature of sin; it promises what it can’t deliver.
The people of Judah rejected God and chose their own path. Jeremiah equates this to rejecting living, moving water for the stale water of a cistern, and a broken one at that. Sin promises happiness but only delivers hurt. Perhaps you have family or friends who are on this road to disillusionment and dissatisfaction. What do we do? We speak truth when the opportunity is there, but for those closest to us, we need to ask ourselves, “Do I live an attractive life? Do I live a life of rest? Do I seek hope in the living waters of Jesus? Or do I seek hope in that which will always disappoint?”
“As for you also, because of the blood of my covenant with you, I will set your prisoners free from the waterless pit. Return to your stronghold, O prisoners of hope; today I declare that I will restore to you double” (Zechariah 9:11-12). We are ‘prisoners’ of hope, so are we hoping in the right things? What are you seeking hope in that will never deliver? What cisterns have you built?
May we all return to drink deeply of the living waters of Jesus.