1. Vision
1.1. To help people be happy in the glory of God
1.2. what happy is not at its essence
1.2.1. fun
1.2.1.1. Writing in the mid-1950s, psychologist Martha Wolfenstein noted the emergence of what she called “fun morality,” an ethic that displaced the old-fashioned goodness morality
1.2.1.2. Writing in the mid-1950s, psychologist Martha Wolfenstein noted the emergence of what she called “fun morality,” an ethic that displaced the old-fashioned goodness morality “which stressed interference with impulses. Not having fun is an occasion for self-examination: ‘What is wrong with me?’ …Whereas gratification of forbidden impulses traditionally aroused guilt, failure to have fun now lowers one’s self-esteem.”
1.3. Benefit
1.3.1. satisified souls tend to look up and look out
1.4. process
1.4.1. Understand God's glory
1.4.1.1. A great part of God’s glory is his happiness. It was inconceivable to the apostle Paul that God could be denied infinite joy and still be all-glorious. To be infinitely glorious was to be infinitely happy. He used the phrase, “the glory of the happy God,” because it is a glorious thing for God to be as happy as he is. God’s glory consists much in the fact that he is happy beyond our wildest imagination.[ piper Alcorn, Randy. Happiness (p. 127). Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.. Kindle Edition.
1.4.1.2. Fred Sanders writes, “God in himself is perfect, and perfectly happy. Being perfect, he cannot essentially improve. . . . He can make happiness and blessedness available to [his] creatures because he always already has it.”[ Alcorn, Randy. Happiness (p. 127). Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.. Kindle Edition.
1.4.1.3. Thomas Aquinas stated, “Of God alone is it true that His Being is His Happiness,”[ Alcorn, Randy. Happiness (p. 148). Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.. Kindle Edition.
1.4.2. God is for the gloryifying of himself
1.4.3. This is good, becuase who God is (hi glory) is what we need
1.4.4. And when we see it, it s the ultimate place of happiness
1.4.4.1. CS Lewis - God made us: invented us as a man invents an engine. A car is made to run on petrol, and it would not run properly on anything else. Now God designed the human machine to run on Himself. He Himself is the fuel our spirits were designed to burn, or the food our spirits were designed to feed on. There is no other. That is why it is just no good asking God to make us happy in our own way without bothering about religion. God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing.[ Alcorn, Randy. Happiness (p. 91). Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.. Kindle Edition.
1.4.4.2. pslams
1.4.4.2.1. Psalm 2:2
1.4.4.2.2. Psalm 32:2
1.4.4.2.3. Psalml 33:12
1.4.4.2.4. Psalm 65:4
1.4.5. “Behold my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen, in whom my soul delights” (Isaiah 42: 1). Alcorn, Randy. Happiness (p. 134). Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.. Kindle Edition.
1.4.6. GOD is happy (page 112)
1.4.6.1. In Luke 15: 6, Jesus pictures God as a shepherd who “calls together his friends and his neighbors, saying to them, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.’” The Good News Translation renders this verse, “I am so happy I found my lost sheep. Let us celebrate!” In Christ’s parable of the lost son, who is it that runs to his son, embraces him, and forgives him? The father, who represents God. Who orders a feast and fills the home with music and dancing? God. Whose laughter is deepest and richest at the party? God’s. Alcorn, Randy. Happiness (p. 121). Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.. Kindle Edition.
1.4.7. Eerything else seems small
1.4.7.1. I’VE NEVER BEEN to Iguazu Falls, on the border of Brazil and Argentina. But I’ve watched astounding videos that offer a glimpse of its wonders. The falls are 1.7 miles across, with many small islands dividing the torrent of water into separate cataracts and waterfalls. Depending on the water level, there are between 150 and 300 of these falls, varying from about 200 to 270 feet high. I’ve witnessed the power of Niagara Falls firsthand, but the volume of the cascading waters of Iguazu Falls can be up to twenty times greater. (Upon visiting Iguazu Falls, Eleanor Roosevelt reportedly exclaimed, “Poor Niagara!”[ Alcorn, Randy. Happiness (p. 117). Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.. Kindle Edition.
1.5. We crave happiness
1.6. We find that in od
1.7. That is a good thing not a bad thing
1.8. God gives his because he himself is happy
1.8.1. Leigh wrote: God’s happiness is that Attribute whereby God hath all fullness of delight and contentment in himself, and needeth nothing out of himself to make him happy. . . . He is truly blessed which of himself and from his own nature is always free from all evils and abounds with all goods, perfectly knowing his own felicity [happiness] and desiring nothing out of himself, but being fully content with himself.[ Alcorn, Randy. Happiness (p. 150). Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.. Kindle Edition.
1.9. And salvation is an invitation into that
1.9.1. Jonathan Edwards, linking our happiness with God’s, wrote, “He has created man for this very end, to make him happy in the enjoyment of himself, the Almighty, who was happy from the days of eternity in himself.”[ Alcorn, Randy. Happiness (p. 151). Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.. Kindle Edition.
1.9.2. It’s hard to overstate the liberating, gladness-producing result when God’s people recognize his happiness. Knowing a God who is so happy that his delight spills out in the universe and in us changes everything — now and forever. Alcorn, Randy. Happiness (p. 154). Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.. Kindle Edition.
1.10. Value
1.10.1. We preach Christ as the source of joy
1.10.1.1. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Huck lives with Miss Watson, a Christian spinster. She takes a dim view of Huck’s fun-loving spirit and threatens Huck with the fires of Hell. She speaks of Heaven as a place everyone should want to go, but Huck sees it this way: She went on and told me all about the good place. She said all a body would have to do there was to go around all day long with a harp and sing, forever and ever. So I didn’t think much of it. . . . I asked her if she reckoned Tom Sawyer would go there, and she said not by a considerable sight. I was glad about that, because I wanted him and me to be together.[ Alcorn, Randy. Happiness (p. 147). Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.. Kindle Edition.
1.10.1.2. not about getting to heaven, but about Jesus