“Joy is different from pleasure or amusement. Getting to joy often entails sustained effort. Joy is the evidence that our gifts have intersected with God’s design. We are doing the thing for which we were designed. God tells us to “fill the measure of our creation and have joy therein.” This is a key principle of life design.” (Meridian Magazine online, downloaded 7-5-2010, http://www.ldsmag.com/myth/090924marriageprint.html)
Joy is inextricably linked to godliness, and is the end result of a life lived in accordance with God's law. But why isn't it happiness or those other things that make life wonderful and satisfying? It's because mere satisfaction won't accomplish God's work.
When a young man or woman feels the first rush of love, the intensity of those feelings can be overwhelming. But it's based on hormones, a chemical reaction in the brain that helps men and women bond as a couple. It's basically selfish; “I want” this other person for myself. That isn't a bad thing at all, as the pair need to be focused on their feelings and needs at the beginning of the relationship, in order to have the bond necessary to make it through the stresses and problems that are inherent in a deeply committed relationship. But it isn't joy.
I think the family is one of the most important places to learn about joy. A person recently posted a question on a blog I frequent. The thread was talking about virtues and how important they are to a healthy society. Sacrifice was mentioned several times. He asked “What's so important about sacrifice?” I posted a reply that essentially said that being willing to sacrifice makes all the other virtues possible. Unless we are willing to put aside our wants for another's needs, the virtues of love, honesty, thrift and industry cannot survive. I pointed out that mothers are a wonderful example of sacrifice. Every single woman who has ever borne a child has made the ultimate sacrifice; she has literally walked through the valley of death in order to bring that child into the world. And the joy that comes of that sacrifice is very close to godliness. Her whole focus is on this new little life, caring for the fruit of her labors, bringing up the next generation. I don't believe that there can be joy without sacrifice. The ultimate sacrifice, of course, was Christ's, the great and atoning sacrifice that He made for all of us.
The various successes we attain in this life are another form of happiness—the elation at winning a coveted prize, the surprise at receiving an unexpected windfall, the feeling of accomplishment at completing a difficult task—these are all good feelings and worth experiencing. But they are also centered around “me”, I did this or that, I got something I didn't have before. They are not joy, nor do they lead to joy.
Joy is always “other” centered. It is never focused on self, on what the self can attain, but is all about those around us. Joy produces love of and desires for the joy of others. It entails sacrifice so that others will have what we have. Do a couple in love have the same feelings of commitment and love for other people? Does the winner of the race want the other contestants to be winners also? If you won the lottery, would you want everybody else to have won what you did?
The things that bring us pleasure in this world are of this world, and are gone when we leave it. We don't take lottery winnings with us when we die, nor do we get to keep the other “toys” we acquire during our sojourn here. We need joy because it is one of the few things we take with us into the next life, and the only thing that can bring us into the presence of Deity. The scriptures tell us that “Adam fell that man might be, and man is that he might have joy (2 Nephi 2:25).” We are not guaranteed joy, because we are always free to choose something else. If all we want is happiness, we can have that. But it will prove to be most unsatisfying in the end.
Goddard mentions “God's design”. In the Pearl of Great Price we read, “For this is my work and my glory, to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man (Moses 1:39).” He wants us to come back to Him, to live with Him eternally. Joy is what He feels; the joy of knowing that His children are becoming like Him, ready to receive everything He has. His whole purpose is focused on us. When our focus is on the salvation and eternal life of those around us, we are becoming like Him. When our focus broadens out to where it rests on the Savior, then we can speak of having a “fulness of joy. “...for in this world your joy is not full, but in me your joy is full (D&C 101:36).” Don't “be happy”, be joyful!
