Self, Happiness and Holiness

This morning there is a thought rolling around in my newly retired mind ~ what is happiness?

With more time on my hands these days, more 'mundane' daily activities with less stress (cooking, garden harvesting, dishes, cleaning, laundry) I am caught thinking about what to do with my day ... what would 'make me happy'?

Reading in Sacred Marriage Devotional by Gary Thomas he argues 

"What if God designed marriage to make us holy more than to make us happy?"

With that in mind, I guess I've set aside the  idea of what makes me happy for some time now and I am keenly aware of resentment approaching my state of mind.  Once the realness of retirement sets in, your friends return to work, the personal contacts and conversations change.  I'm just being real.  No judgement, there's just not the same daily interaction and 'work material' for conversation and it can be a bit awkward, and distant.

So what to do with this?

"Biblical happiness is the offspring of holiness, giving holiness the pride of place as the parent." Dr. Thomas continues.  He says that

"many marriages break down in a context of resentment and a feeling that we're not getting what we need or want".   

But looked at in the light of love, this enemy loses all its power and place:  "The most obvious lesson in Christ's teaching, " Drummonds writes,

"is that there is no happiness in having and getting anything but only in giving."  

We think that happiness is all about having and getting, but in our design God only gives true happiness as an outcropping of giving.

From Morning/Evening Daily Readings by C.H. Spurgeon (August 22)

"The nearer to Him, the nearer to the perfect calm of heaven; the nearer to Him, the fuller the heart is, not only of peace, but of life, and vigor, and joy, for these all depend on being in constant relationship with Jesus."

As we grow, we leave our old self.  Some of the 'leaving' involved a change of the timing of your day, and I have found it to both be a struggle and a gift to not be managed by the clock.  On the other hand, it forced me to do things in a specific way at a specific time when I was working and now; I have to develop a discipline that is more self imposed then before.  I am forced to be more thoughtful to my husband with my time and what I do because I do not have anything else 'to do' that's is 'important'.

I can also see why people do not retire, how they avoid this part of life by staying on a forced schedule.

From Jennifer Rothschild blog today "When I am most self aware, I am most miserable".  

Hmmm

Go figure. 

Want the 'remedy'?  I know I do.

From Albert Schweitzer "The only ones among you who will be really happy are those who have sought and found how to serve."
From Jennifer Rothschild "focus on someone else's needs, grant someone else the attention you desire and ask the question Jesus how might I serve you today?"

See how this works?  Take ME out of my day and rest in the design of our creator.

I'm not saying this is easy to do, to tame your thoughts and flesh because those have been so ingrained in us; and I am certainly a 'no one' in the huge process God has created ~ if I can do a small thing for Him today what a privilege. 

Blessings.