My Joy Is So Short-Lived — How Do I Make It Last?

00:00:04.000 | What an incredible weekend. Friday we celebrated the cross of Christ.

00:00:08.000 | Sunday we celebrated the resurrection of Christ. And now it's Easter evening when this episode officially launches online.

00:00:15.000 | And I love Easter more than any other date in the church calendar, even more than Christmas, to be honest.

00:00:21.000 | That move from the cross to the resurrection is just so stark, so stunning.

00:00:25.000 | And it leads to a question from a listener named Becca.

00:00:28.000 | Hi, Pastor John. I hope you and your family enjoyed the beauty of Christ this Easter season.

00:00:33.000 | I have benefited greatly from all your teachings and the wisdom at Desiring God.

00:00:37.000 | I'm a young believer devoted to following Christ daily for the last four years.

00:00:41.000 | For me, each Easter gets richer and richer as I have a more mature understanding and a deeper revelation of the power of the cross.

00:00:47.000 | But I'm also coming to the conclusion that, knowing the frailties of my own humanity,

00:00:52.000 | I cannot sustain the beauty and the works of the cross and the crucifixion I experienced in a weekend like this one on a daily basis.

00:00:59.000 | This frustrates me.

00:01:01.000 | Easter Monday, I'm left dry, feeling almost lifeless and numb to everything I just celebrated,

00:01:07.000 | lured back into my brainless media like social media and movies and TV, back to reality, I think to myself.

00:01:14.000 | Is this feeling normal?

00:01:17.000 | Or how does the cross and resurrection I celebrated this weekend change my life on Monday?

00:01:21.000 | What do I take from Easter Sunday into my Monday morning?

00:01:25.000 | Pastor John, what would you say to Becca?

00:01:27.000 | The first thing I want to say is that it is biblical and good to think of corporate worship on Sunday as a God-designed weekly high,

00:01:45.000 | high point in your spiritual life.

00:01:48.000 | It ought to be something that can't be replicated during the week.

00:01:53.000 | Can't be replicated by yourself, can't be replicated in a small group.

00:01:58.000 | Individual experiences of Christ and small group experiences of Christ are essential to our walk with God.

00:02:06.000 | But Sunday corporate worship under the preached word in the power of the Holy Spirit with Spirit-filled singing of God's people gathered

00:02:19.000 | is meant to be an extraordinary work of God in our lives.

00:02:25.000 | So the point of that is, for Becca, don't assume a decrease of that experience is a bad thing.

00:02:34.000 | I mean, he meant it to be special.

00:02:37.000 | He meant it to be unusually powerful, and that's good.

00:02:42.000 | So just be sure you're not setting up artificial expectations for Monday morning as though they should reproduce Sunday morning,

00:02:50.000 | because they shouldn't.

00:02:52.000 | Sunday morning is not Monday morning.

00:02:54.000 | It is the gathered people of God under the preached word in the Spirit singing, "Oh, my, it's glorious."

00:03:00.000 | The things that he's done for me over the years that aren't done any other way,

00:03:05.000 | and the way I meet God in those times meet him like no other time,

00:03:09.000 | even though I love my personal devotions and I love my small group.

00:03:14.000 | So Becca asked, you asked Becca, if the feeling is normal to be, quote, "left dry, lifeless, numb on Monday

00:03:25.000 | after experiencing the glories of the risen Christ on Sunday."

00:03:28.000 | Well, Jesus' answer to that question is, for a pretty large percentage of people, it is normal, but it ought not to be.

00:03:39.000 | And I'm basing that on the parable of the four soils.

00:03:44.000 | Remember that one?

00:03:45.000 | The devil comes, the word is delivered, and then the devil comes.

00:03:49.000 | Let's say he comes on Monday morning, maybe Sunday night.

00:03:53.000 | The devil comes and snatches away the word from the heart, and then there's this other soil where we hear the word of God with joy,

00:04:04.000 | and we have no root, and flourish for a little while, maybe till Wednesday, and bang, it's gone.

00:04:12.000 | The word is gone, choked out or burned up.

00:04:16.000 | And then the third soil is the cares and the riches and the pleasures of life choke out the word,

00:04:22.000 | and it doesn't bear any fruit.

00:04:23.000 | And then the fourth soil is like 25% of the hearers hear the word of God, hold it fast in an honest and good heart,

00:04:31.000 | and bear fruit with patience.

00:04:33.000 | So for three-fourths of the people in this parable--and I don't want to make any claim at all that that's typical of any given church on any Sunday morning,

00:04:44.000 | I'm just pointing out that normalcy isn't necessarily a good thing.

00:04:49.000 | So for three-fourths of the people in the parable, Sunday morning doesn't last beyond Monday or Tuesday or Wednesday.

00:04:57.000 | That makes it pretty normal and pretty scary.

00:05:01.000 | So here's what she's really asking.

00:05:03.000 | It doesn't have to be that way.

00:05:05.000 | So here's my main exhortation and then three minor exhortations.

00:05:11.000 | So the big main exhortation is this.

00:05:13.000 | Becca and all the rest of us who share her life, be sure that the spiritual high that you experience on Sunday is a truth high,

00:05:28.000 | not merely a music high or a friend high.

00:05:32.000 | Be sure it's a truth high.

00:05:34.000 | In other words, as you are singing, reading Scripture, listening to a sermon, make yourself focus on the truth that you are loving.

00:05:47.000 | What truths about God, what truths about Christ and his ways and his work, his promises, are especially stirring your heart with joy and trust and hope.

00:06:01.000 | And then later on Sunday afternoon, perhaps, write these truths down.

00:06:07.000 | Keep a notebook.

00:06:08.000 | Maybe you call it "My Truth High Notebook."

00:06:12.000 | One or two or three beautiful things about God, his ways, that was given you in the service on Sunday morning.

00:06:23.000 | And the reason this is so important is because if the emotional high, and believe me, I got no problem with emotional highs.

00:06:33.000 | I believe in emotional highs if they're truth highs.

00:06:38.000 | Got it?

00:06:39.000 | If the emotion is rooted in truth.

00:06:44.000 | So if they're not rooted in truth, they're going to be like these air plants that don't go anywhere.

00:06:52.000 | They just hang there.

00:06:54.000 | A normal plant that ought to have roots would just not survive in the air.

00:06:58.000 | So Monday morning, if you can't recite to yourself and preach to yourself in the power of the Spirit the truths from Sunday,

00:07:06.000 | it's no surprise that the effects of the truths won't be there either.

00:07:11.000 | So that's my main exhortation.

00:07:13.000 | Be sure that the Sunday morning high is a truth high.

00:07:17.000 | Write down those truths and you can rehearse them to yourself through the week.

00:07:22.000 | Now here are my three minor encouragements how to nurture the truth high for the sake of significant joy,

00:07:30.000 | if not the same Sunday morning joy, all through Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday.

00:07:37.000 | Number one, pray for your heart.

00:07:40.000 | Pray it.

00:07:41.000 | Pray for the inclination of your heart.

00:07:43.000 | Pray for the eyes of your heart.

00:07:45.000 | Pray for the taste of your heart.

00:07:47.000 | That's Psalm 119, verse 36, Ephesians 1, verse 17, 1 Peter 2, verses 2 and 3.

00:07:56.000 | The inclination, the eyes, and the taste of your heart.

00:08:00.000 | Many people are fatalistic about the state of their hearts, as if there's nothing that can be done about a numb heart.

00:08:10.000 | Like, "Oh, I got a numb heart.

00:08:11.000 | Que sera, sera.

00:08:12.000 | I'm cursed with a numb heart."

00:08:14.000 | No!

00:08:15.000 | The Bible presents a very different picture than being fatalistic.

00:08:20.000 | It presents an aggressive pursuit of God's help for the inclination of your heart,

00:08:29.000 | and for the seeing of your heart, and for the taste of your heart, seeing the heart.

00:08:37.000 | Don't settle for anything less than God's intervention to incline your heart, illumine your heart, sweeten your heart.

00:08:47.000 | That's God's work.

00:08:48.000 | He does it in answer to prayer.

00:08:50.000 | So that's my first subordinate exhortation.

00:08:54.000 | Pray for your heart.

00:08:55.000 | Number two, use Bible regimen, yes, and ransacking.

00:09:02.000 | Bible ransacking.

00:09:04.000 | Have a regimen of Bible reading every morning, but add to the regimen ransacking.

00:09:13.000 | Regimens are essential.

00:09:15.000 | I believe they're essential.

00:09:16.000 | But that's not the only way to handle the Bible.

00:09:20.000 | The Bible is a gold mine.

00:09:22.000 | It's a fountain of life.

00:09:23.000 | It's a sweet honey.

00:09:25.000 | It's a vine where you can pick grapes and satisfy your hunger and your thirst.

00:09:31.000 | It's just full of encouragement and steadfastness.

00:09:34.000 | But sometimes the regimen we have doesn't lead us to the places where that happens.

00:09:42.000 | So on those mornings, we need to add to regimen ransacking.

00:09:48.000 | In other words, flip through the Bible.

00:09:50.000 | Flip, flip, flip, flip, flip, flip.

00:09:52.000 | I've got to find a promise.

00:09:54.000 | And you look for something you've underlined in years gone by, or something that meant much yesterday,

00:09:59.000 | or you've got to ransack this book until you find something sweet and precious and valuable

00:10:06.000 | that you can roll around on the tongue of your soul all day long.

00:10:11.000 | So that's exhortation number two, add to regimen ransacking.

00:10:15.000 | And the last one is replace spiritual squelchers with spiritual sustainers.

00:10:24.000 | Becca, you referred to your own spiritual squelchers.

00:10:30.000 | You're not a dummy.

00:10:31.000 | You know what they are.

00:10:33.000 | You told me what they are.

00:10:34.000 | You said, "My brainless media, like social media and movies and TV."

00:10:41.000 | Those are your words, not mine.

00:10:43.000 | Well, well, well, well, if you know where the poison ivy is, don't walk through it.

00:10:50.000 | We're grownups.

00:10:52.000 | Replace poison ivy with flowers that smell good and grapevines that hang along the way with sweet grapes.

00:11:03.000 | I'll mention two squelch-avoiding sustainers.

00:11:09.000 | One, hanging out with godly people.

00:11:12.000 | Two, generously giving your time and effort to some worthy service.

00:11:17.000 | Because we all know that we tend to pick up the enthusiasms of others,

00:11:22.000 | and we all know that it's more blessed to give than to receive,

00:11:26.000 | and blessedness is what we are eager for.

00:11:30.000 | So here's my summary.

00:11:32.000 | One, rejoice that corporate worship is unique, special, glorious.

00:11:39.000 | Can't imitate it on Monday, even if Monday has its own way of being wonderful.

00:11:43.000 | Two, don't be among the three-fourths who let the word be burned up, choked out, snatched away.

00:11:52.000 | Three, be sure that the spiritual high Sunday morning is a truth high, not a music high or a social high.

00:12:00.000 | Four, then nurture the truth roots by earnestly praying for your heart's inclination,

00:12:11.000 | eyes, taste, and finally by adding Bible ransacking to Bible regimen and replacing squelchers with sustainers.

00:12:23.000 | Amen. Yeah, that's really good counsel for us moving from Easter Sunday back into our Monday routines.

00:12:28.000 | Really helpful counsel for every Monday morning, really. Thank you, Pastor John.

00:12:32.000 | And thank you for listening to this episode.

00:12:34.000 | Find our archives, read transcripts of episodes, or ask us a question of your own.

00:12:38.000 | Go to our online home at DesiringGod.org/AskPastorJohn.

00:12:43.000 | Well, I want Christ to be the treasure of my life.

00:12:46.000 | In fact, I often find the wanting of him to be my treasure a more common reality in my life

00:12:51.000 | than the actual act of treasuring and enjoying him as my treasure.

00:12:56.000 | Is that normative? It's a great question.

00:12:59.000 | It comes from you, comes frequently from you in the inbox.

00:13:02.000 | I'll ask it to Pastor John next time.

00:13:04.000 | I'm your host, Tony Reinke. We'll see you back here on Wednesday.

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