Video Notes: 

• The idea here is to have empathy towards everyone.
• What is the opposite of this? To be envious and sorrowful over other people’s joy and to be happy at someone’s sorrow.
  • Sometimes we react this way out of jealousy. “Why don’t I ever get good things?”
  • Sometimes we react this way out of a sense of righteous indignation. “Serves them right!”
• Love has empathy and desires the best for others.
• This post is titled, “Christians Aren’t Always Happy.” Sometimes people get this sense that Christians should always be happy.
  • James 1:2
  • 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18
  • or passages about how Christians go to be with the Lord when they die
• Passages like this can all lead us to believe that if we are ever unhappy, we aren’t truly faithful or we don’t really believe. That’s not the case.
  • First, there is a difference between the kind of joy the Bible speaks of and the emotional state of happiness. The joy of the Lord is knowing that God is with us, we are right with God, and all suffering is only temporary. We can experience that even when we suffer or mourn or experience unhappiness.
  • Second, passages like our passage today show us that we can weep. Jesus wept. 1 Corinthians says we can mourn, but our mourning is one with hope.
• Christians aren’t always happy and they shouldn’t be. There is plenty in this world and in our lives to be sad about. However, we are never without hope and we can always have a sense of joy even under the sorrow because we know God is with us, we are right with God in our salvation, and this suffering is temporary with God’s glory coming and remaining for all eternity.