Ship of Fools: Happiness

Thread: Happiness Board: Oblivion / Ship of Fools.

To visit this thread, use this URL:
http://forum.ship-of-fools.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=70;t=026716

Posted by Anglican_Brat (# 12349) on :

"God wants you happy and fulfilled."

Is this true? I'm not exactly sure if this is necessarily correct.

Posted by Anglican_Brat (# 12349) on :

To add my opinion to start:

If we understand fulfillment in terms of aligning our will with the will of God for the increase of the Kingdom of God, I could see that. True happiness, AKA the Beatific Vision lies after death and/or the eschatological age when we behold God face to face and is lost in wonder, love and praise.

So yes, if happiness is defined to be the enjoyment of God forever in eternity, then we are made for this.

If however, we mean the momentary feelings of happiness on this earth, I'm not sure.

Posted by Lamb Chopped (# 5528) on :

Well, yes, it's true . . . but ask the questions "When?" and "Under what conditions?" and the whole thing starts to come unraveled. [Two face]

God wants you happy and fulfilled, yes; and in his view happiness means being what he created you to be, doing what he created you to do, in his love. The catch is, none of us are that yet. Certainly not in this earthly life with all of its flaws and failures and downright sin. And so the trek to being what he means us to be (and therefore being happy and fulfilled, yay) is necessarily going to be filled with a shedload of suffering and trouble. Bleah.

Posted by Lamb Chopped (# 5528) on :

In answer to your second--

Does my dentist want me to have painfree comfort? Certainly. But in his view the way to get there is (shudder) sometimes by drilling... My moment-to-moment comfort level may concern him a bit, but not so much that he's willing to let go of the ultimate objective. [Waterworks]

Posted by cosmic dance (# 14025) on :

Of course God does not want us to be 'happy' whatever that is. He wants us to be holy. Happiness may well come as a by-product of God's work in our lives, or as a result of serving others.

'Fulfilled' - tell that to the Christians who struggle to make a living in Africa or those who struggle to stay alive in conflicts or those who are living under repressive regimes, or those who have to take any job they can in order to support a family rather than the job of their dreams.

Happiness and fulfilment?? First world problems.

Posted by Eirenist (# 13343) on :

A woman wrote to C.S.Lewis: 'I have no fear of God, for I know he intends my good.' Lewis' response was, typically, 'Stupid woman! Hasn't she ever been to the dentist?'

Posted by Freddy (# 365) on :

I think that it is important to connect the terms "happiness" and "love."

God desires our eternal welfare because He loves us.

God is love and love has three attributes:

1. It seeks an object outside of itself to love.
2. It seeks to be freely joined with what it loves.
3. It seeks to make the one it loves happy.

God wants us to be happy because He is love itself and this is what love does.

Of course this means long-term, freely chosen happiness. As with the dentist this will often require short-term suffering.

So the purpose of creation is a heaven from the human race, where everyone is happy and joined with God of their own free will.

Posted by rolyn (# 16840) on :

I wonder if Lewis made that comment before or after he lost his new-love to cancer ?
Understandably he had a major problem with God's intentions re. his personal happiness for a long while after that.

(cross-posted with Freddy)

[ 26. January 2014, 11:58: Message edited by: rolyn ]

Posted by Raptor Eye (# 16649) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Anglican_Brat:

If however, we mean the momentary feelings of happiness on this earth, I'm not sure.

Yes, God wants us to be happy and fulfilled, but we often think this to mean individually rather than corporately, and it surely means both. As long as we continue to hurt each other, or fail to share with each other, we will receive only glimpses of the happiness and fulfilment that God offers.

Meanwhile, we may spend our lives pursuing them for ourselves as individuals, and miss out on the joy, peace, love and other gifts of the Holy Spirit that are received as we follow Christ.

UBB.classic^TM 6.5.0