Emotional Commandments
Serve the Lord with gladness; come before Him with joyful singing. Psalm 100:2 NASB
Gladness – Is David making a suggestion or issuing a royal decree? The verb is an imperative, so we may assume that David expects his subjects (and all his readers?) to comply. But how? How is it possible to command a feeling? That’s what David is doing. “Serve” is the imperative ibdu, from the verb ‘abad. To work, to serve, to accomplish, to do. This is not a hopeful hint at religious psychological experience. This is an expectation of action. “Do this! Serve YHVH with simha.”
“The root ś-m-ḥ denotes being glad or joyful with the whole disposition as indicated by its association with the heart (cf. Ex 4:14; Ps 19:8 [H 9]; 104:15; 105:3), the soul (Ps 86:4); and with the lighting up of the eyes (Prov 15:30).”[1]
According to King David, we are to do whatever it is that YHVH calls us to do with a whole disposition of joy. We are to act with wholehearted abandon in ways that would typically be exhibited at weddings, festivals and holy days. There is to be no holding back, no reticence, no disengagement. Whatever we do, it is to be done with overwhelming joy!
The problem, of course, is that I don’t feel like it. Certainly there are times when I feel joyful, but not because I command myself to feel that way. Joy comes over me (that’s what it means to experience an emotion) because of other circumstances. In other words, I can’t simply tell myself to be joyful. Instead, I discover I am experiencing joy because of something else that I am doing or something else that is happening. I might go to a wedding feeling discouraged, angry, disappointed, but because of the celebration of the event, I find that I am joyful, at least for the newly married couple. I didn’t go telling myself to stop feeling discouraged. I went discouraged, but being there changed how I felt. If we apply this typical process to David’s command, perhaps we discover that David isn’t really telling us to pull ourselves up by our bootstraps and somehow force joy into our lives. Perhaps he is saying, “Consider who God is and how much He has loved you. Recognize the blessing to be experienced in fulfilling His purposes. Then sing about it. Make some noise. Concentrate on the goodness you know. And notice what happens.”
Just suppose that I do something like this. Suppose that I say to myself, “Wow! Look at all the divine engineering that went into getting me to the place I am today. I could never have imagined how to do that. God must be watching over me. And look at how carefully He manages things around me. Why, I could have had such terrible things happen to me, and yet they didn’t. How lucky I am to have even known Him! Would it hurt me to say that out loud? No, it wouldn’t. And it’s true too. I am happy to see that He really does care. I think I’ll just sing a few lines from one of those hymns I used to know.” And what do you know? Just like being at a wedding, my perspective begins to change. I might even dance.
Topical Index: joy, simha, emotions, Psalm 100:2
[1] Waltke, B. K. (1999). 2268 שָׂמַח. In R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer, Jr. & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament (R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer, Jr. & B. K. Waltke, Ed.) (electronic ed.) (879). Chicago: Moody Press.
TRAVEL NOTE: I am on my way to Israel today to meet the group for the tour. I will have limited internet until August 22. But we will have a really great time without it!
Bon voyage, Skip and all!
I am commanded to not lean upon my own understanding – a command which could also include not to hinge my day on how I am already feeling (unless it is gladness, of course). If I wake up in a panic (which used to be my typical ‘understanding’), that command would mean that I must not go forward even as much as one step in that panic. I am also commanded not to travel in my own strength. This has been really catching me up short for the last few years, as my past is a testimony to how far one can go in their own strength – a mixture of fear, arrogance and more fear (did I say fear (adrenaline)? Pride and fear are not strengths, however, I have learned to my sorrow. They are expensive realities. They ended up costing me more than they ever gave me, and always left me totally exhausted and unsatisfied.
To take these commands seriously (which I feel I have had to do in order to save my life) has also meant that I have had to include the understanding that I must not move except in the strength of the Lord. What strength is that? Joy, of course. (Um, that would be gladness, too.) This has been like learning Chinese for me! What is this joy-and-gladness stuff? How do I get it?
Here we are back at gratitude. If I cannot find or remember how to be grateful for exactly what is in front of my face, I am in wrong relationship with my present moment. The sin of ingratitude encompasses an entire range of rebelliousness and self pity. The moments I am believing that I am ‘in control’ or that I am being persecuted, even, are the moments I am not acknowledging the lordship or care of YHVH. True joy is to be found only when I am walking in the freedom of obedience to His rule and acceptance of His leading. If I do not feel like jumping up and down, or at least resting my heart in that blessed assurance, I am learning that I have to stop like Balaam’s donkey and refuse to move until I have gotten to the joy place again. All the other places are where I am still in rebellion and stuck in sin. These are not exactly places where I am free to move. If I am not moving in freedom (which will ALWAYS be experienced as that joy(!)) I am better off canceling all my appointments and heading straight for the Great Physician’s office, for I have a broken heart in that place that needs some repair. Joy and gladness, I am finding to my shock, are the spiritual ATP I was created to run on. Who knew?
ahh…as ATP is the energy currency for the body…joy and gladness are the spiritual currency for the mind. I like that analogy Laurita.
I think it depends on how we best sublimate (‘suppress’) conflicting modes of experience, some might orientate better at a stage or situation by way of emotional focus, whereas others, including myself, tend to suppress feelings in focus on God’s will being good, even as one might not feel good and indeed feel quite terrible
I’m not saying this is an absolute classification but would find trying to emotionally motivate myself very difficult outside of the disposition that already feels in a certain way, and have since learned to live not by feeling or by trying to always fell good instead of rather placing God’s good will above one’s personal circumstances and difficulties (and of course each individual mode of experience will be configured in other ways to best approach this type of resolution between the self and reality and determining the will for God foremost)
Excellent. Thank you.
Well, perhaps maybe little children know. We are commanded by Yeshua to get back to that place, after all. Little children melt in a puddle if they find they cannot move forward in joy, and adults find themselves spending enormous amounts of energy restoring them back to that joy, before the child can function again. At least until we can teach them the wickedness of functioning otherwise. These are the cursed stumbling blocks we put in their way. (I better get off my stump when it comes to the little children!)
Maybe Yeshua uses “little” children because they are less likely to be inhibited in their expression on feelings
Hallelu YaH! Yes! Let’s dance!
Oh, how I needed this encouragement today! Todah rabah! And ENJOY Israel!!
So did Yeshua comment that the kingdom belongs to those likened unto a child. Nicely explained Skip and Laurita.
Paul phrased this reminder slightly different when he commented that we must be careful not to fall behind because of a root of bitterness.
How be it when we choose to be joyful, we are often caught in the struggle to create the momentum that joy creates, as adults those false evidence appearing real with a pinch of pride is all nick needs to steal our joy in the moment.
I believe it is for this reason that we must command our joy so that our fear doesn’t make us loose the opportunity to serve God.
We can gather to worship Him with any emotional feeling but to serve him with uprightness we need to have joy in our hearts not knowledge, wisdom etc as with joy we love the moment… this may be why assemblies in His name all seem to be linked with a communal feast…
Got that right, Seeker! If the gathering is not slap full of joy uncontained and unashamed, I wonder if He is not ashamed of us? The devil cannot stand to be mocked; he appears to take himself seriously, but, is this our example? NO! Yeshua, for the JOY set before him, showed us the way to endure all shame and reproach. How often do we not praise our King because of the fear of those two things – in our assemblies, no less? Then who are we serving (following the example of)? We should be going down the street hollering “Halleluah!” and doing a jig like the saved people we are supposed to be.
AMEN SISTER PREACH IT!!!!!
To be with and around folks who are happy, joyful, and cheerful, we can never be unhappy. Joy is contagious!
I enjoy good old-fashioned witty comedies that can bring forth a good hearty laugh from me that even the neighbours can hear!
On weekends in Tel Aviv’s long stretch of beaches, you can’t miss the joyful Jewish music and songs being blasted from microphones onto the crowds of folks, young and old alike, gathered there for dancing! You cannot, no way can you remain downcast nor miserable.
But, of course true joy overflows from thankfulness. That in whatever situation. or circumstances we may be in, there are for a divine purpose/ reason, remembering ABBA will always see us through in His own amazing ways!