10 Nehemiah said, “Go and enjoy choice food and sweet drinks, and send some to those who have nothing prepared. This day is sacred to our Lord. Do not grieve, for the joy of the LORD is your strength.”
43 And on that day they offered great sacrifices, rejoicing because God had given them great joy. The women and children also rejoiced. The sound of rejoicing in Jerusalem could be heard far away.
3 Send forth your light and your truth, let them guide me; let them bring me to your holy mountain, to the place where you dwell. 4 Then will I go to the altar of God, to God, my joy and my delight. I will praise you with the harp, O God, my God.
17 Though the fig tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, though there are no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls, 18 yet I will rejoice in the LORD, I will be joyful in God my Savior. 19 The Sovereign LORD is my strength; he makes my feet like the feet of a deer, he enables me to go on the heights. For the director of music. On my stringed instruments.
25 I know that my Redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand upon the earth. 26 And after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God; 27 I myself will see him with my own eyes--I, and not another. How my heart yearns within me!
22 The crowd joined in the attack against Paul and Silas, and the magistrates ordered them to be stripped and beaten. 23 After they had been severely flogged, they were thrown into prison, and the jailer was commanded to guard them carefully. 24 Upon receiving such orders, he put them in the inner cell and fastened their feet in the stocks. 25 About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the other prisoners were listening to them. 26 Suddenly there was such a violent earthquake that the foundations of the prison were shaken. At once all the prison doors flew open, and everybody's chains came loose. 27 The jailer woke up, and when he saw the prison doors open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself because he thought the prisoners had escaped. 28 But Paul shouted, “Don't harm yourself! We are all here!” 29 The jailer called for lights, rushed in and fell trembling before Paul and Silas. 30 He then brought them out and asked, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” 31 They replied, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved--you and your household.”
54 When they heard this, they were furious and gnashed their teeth at him. 55 But Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, looked up to heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. 56 “Look,” he said, “I see heaven open and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God.” 57 At this they covered their ears and, yelling at the top of their voices, they all rushed at him, 58 dragged him out of the city and began to stone him. Meanwhile, the witnesses laid their clothes at the feet of a young man named Saul. 59 While they were stoning him, Stephen prayed, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” 60 Then he fell on his knees and cried out, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.” When he had said this, he fell asleep.
1 Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. 2 Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. 3 Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.
22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.
“Do you want the gifts or the giver? Do you want deliverance from suffering and discomfort or do you want the Comforter Himself? We believe the lie that if you follow and obey God into discomfort and out of what is ‘safe’ then there will be blessings and reward for you and things will go well...but instead you’ve entered into discomfort and you’re finding it’s your new normal. How can suffering and joy coexist? In suffering, there is a death to life resurrection we get to witness, a picture of new life. In suffering, we anchor ourselves in the assurance of hope and joy in Jesus not in our circumstances. In American Christianity, we have bought into the lie that if it is good, then it cannot be hard. That goodness must exclude suffering. This is not true. In Jesus’ upside-down gospel good and hard totally coexist and weave together for our goodness and His glory.” Jay and Katherine Wolf
“Solid joys and lasting treasure none but Zion’s children know.” John Newton
“If there is joy in the world, surely the man of pure heart possesses it.” Thomas a Kempis
“Circumstances do not have the power to steal your joy. Joy is the by-product of experiencing God’s sovereign grace even in the midst of seemingly impossible circumstances.” Anonymous
“Joy is the most infallible sign of the presence of God.” Leon Bloy
“O love that wilt not let me go, I rest my weary soul in Thee. I give Thee back the life I owe, that in Thine ocean depths its flow, may richer fuller be. O light that followest all my way, I yield my flickering torch to Thee. My heart restores its borrowed ray, that in thy sunshine’s blaze its day, may brighter fairer be. O joy that seekest me through pain, I cannot close my heart to Thee. I trace the rainbow through the rain, and feel the promise is not vain, that morn shall tearless be. O cross that liftest up my head, I dare not ask to fly from Thee. I lay in dust life’s glory dead, and from the ground there blossoms red, life that shall endless be.” George Matheson
“I cannot understand Him, but I can trust Him. And so today, when everything physical and emotional in me is completely drained, and there is not a single note of praise in my heart, I choose to praise Him anyway. Not for what He does, but for Who He is. When I cannot praise Him out of joy, I will praise Him out of obedience. And I am learning that when I praise Him out of obedience from the depths of the pit, it is always more meaningful than when I praise Him out of an overflow of my heart from the heights of the mountain. And because I know His nature, and I know that even when I don’t feel it, He is still a kind, loving, good God, then I know that soon, He will fill my heart with joy once again. And the praise will flow easily from the depths of my heart.” Laura Black
“Ecstasy and delight are essential to the believer’s soul and they promote sanctification. We were not meant to live without spiritual exhilaration, and the Christian who goes for a long time without the experience of heart-warming will soon find himself tempted to have his emotions satisfied from earthly things and not, as he ought, from the Spirit of God. The soul is so constituted that it craves fulfillment from things outside itself and will embrace earthly joys for satisfaction when it cannot reach spiritual ones... The believer is in spiritual danger if he allows himself to go for any length of time without tasting the love of Christ and savoring the felt comforts of a Savior’s presence. When Christ ceases to fill the heart with satisfaction, our souls will go in silent search of other lovers... By the enjoyment of the love of Christ in the heart of a believer, we mean an experience of the “love of God shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given to us” (Rom. 5:5)... because the Lord has made himself accessible to us in the means of grace, it is our duty and privilege to seek this experience from Him in these means till we are made the joyful partakers of it.” John Flavel (1630-1691)
“The grace of God is love freely shown towards guilty sinners, contrary to their merit and indeed in defiance of their demerit. It is God showing goodness to persons who deserve only severity, and had no reason to expect anything but severity. We have seen why the thought of grace means so little to some church people—namely, because they do not share the beliefs about God and man which it presupposes. Now we have to ask: why should this thought mean so much to others? The answer is not far to seek; indeed, it is evident from what has already been said. It is surely clear that, once a man is convinced that his state and need are as described, the New Testament gospel of grace cannot but sweep him off his feet with wonder and joy. For it tells how our Judge has become our Saviour.” J.I. Packer
“Lord, with glowing heart I’d praise Thee, For the bliss Thy love bestows, For the pardoning grace that saves me, And the peace that from it flows; Help O God, my weak endeavor; this dull soul to rapture raise; Thou must light the flame, or never Can my love be warmed to praise.” Francis Scott Key
“We draw people to Christ not by loudly discrediting what they believe, by telling them how wrong they are and how right we are, but by showing them a light that is so lovely that they want with all their hearts to know the source of it.” Madeline L’Engle
“When faith has the upper hand in my heart I am satisfied with Christ and His promises. This is what Jesus meant when He said, ‘He who believed in Me shall never thirst’ (John 6:35). When my thirst for joy and meaning and passion are satisfied by the presence and promises of Christ, the power of sin is broken. We do not yield to the offer of sandwich meat when we can smell steak sizzling on the grill. The fight of faith against lust is the fight to stay satisfied with God.” John Piper
“Seeking with faith, hope, and love pleases our Lord; and finding Him pleases the soul, filling it full of joy.” Julian of Norwich
“Thou hast made us for Thyself, and the heart of man is restless until it finds its rest in Thee.” Augustine
“It is a bad world, Donatus, an incredibly bad world. But I have discovered in the midst of it a quiet and good people who have learned the great secret of life. They have found a joy and a wisdom which is a thousand times better than any of the pleasures 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, Donatus, are Christians...and I am one of them.” St. Cyprian, 200-258