Joy Let Loose

January 20, 2019

Top 5 Scriptures to Turn My Attitude Around (#goals)

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Well, I let the cat out of the bag and told you my word for 2019 – Happy. 

Risky, I know.

Because what if I wake up on the wrong side of the bed? Or what if the dog chews up my shoes? Or what if I argue with my husband and I just want to be mad? Then you’ll know I’m breaking my New Year’s Resolution. Ugh.

Is it really like that? Can I just resolve to be happy? Well, in my last post I talked a little about the strategic element to pursuing happiness. And now I’m going to let you in a little on one actual day-to-day strategy.

What can you and I both do to help us to be happy?

If you want to be happy, set a goal that commands your thoughts, liberates your energy, and inspires your hopes.

Andrew Carnegie

Goal #1 to being happy: Fill Up with Good Things

If you’ve taken a turn around Joy Let Loose at all, you’ll know I love Jesus. If you aren’t sure whether you do, that’s ok. It’s still cool you’re here. But I need you to know that Jesus is always my filter. He’s always my lens. (P.S. If you haven’t read anything else on my site, hang out awhile. Check out previous posts in all my menus. You’ll find stuff about family, about trauma, about moving, jewelry, and even my choice to use essential oils. There’s a little bit of everything here, but I see it all through Jesus. And I’d love to sit and have coffee with you for a bit.)

So anyway, my very first goal – filling up with good things – has to do with Him. And specifically, the Bible. Because I have come to trust the Scriptures to turn my attitude around.

Confession time:

I’ve been in ministry for 20+ years – Churches, Bible Colleges, Discipleship Groups, Youth Groups…that’s a long time to be a spiritual leader. And most of that time, I’ve been a faithful student of the Bible. However, there are seasons where I have fallen off the wagon, so to speak. Where I allow my busy-ness or my tired-ness or my sad-ness or my confident-ness 🙂 to distract me from what I know deep down is an ultimate priority. Because I allow them to pull me away from spending time reading the Bible. So I can tell you from firsthand experience how much of a difference it makes in my level of happiness when I choose to fill up with good things – I need the Scriptures to turn my attitude around.

Renew Your Mind

Paul tells the Romans not to conform to the patterns of the world, but to be transformed by the renewing of their minds. (Romans 12:2) So how do we renew our minds? I believe one primary way to renew our minds so that we do not conform to the patterns of our world, and so that we are able to test and approve God’s perfect and pleasing will, is to read and meditate on scripture.

  • Scripture is a window into God’s heart. It is the primary way God chose to show us who He is. And it is abundant in the grace and love of our heavenly Father.
  • Scripture is a mirror. It reveals to us who we are. And also who God has created us to be. It is direct, vulnerable, kind, and transformative.
  • Scripture is living and active. It changes the way that we think and make our decisions.
  • Scripture is a perspective-changer. Like a brand-new lens, it helps us to see things with a Kingdom focus. It helps us to discover what God is doing through our circumstances, and not to focus on the circumstances alone.
  • Scripture sustains us. The Holy Spirit often uses it to remind us of truth in difficult moments. The more we are filled up with it, the more opportunity He has to fuel us with it in our day-to-day life.

Filling up with good things: the goal that commands my thoughts, liberates my energy, and inspires my hope.

With that in mind, then, who’s in? I’m choosing to depend on Scriptures to turn my attitude around. So do you want to join me to meditate on these 5 short passages over the next 15 days? I plan to focus on one Scripture for three days straight. I will read it, cross-reference it, write it out, memorize it, talk about it, and sit silently asking God to help me live into it. And I’m pretty confident this will help me on my journey as I choose #happy.

Join me!

So let me know by clicking here if you are joining me while I’m learning these 5 Scriptures to turn my attitude around. And if you do, I’ll send you a few encouragements along the way.

Fill Up With Good Things Download

What about you – what’s your word for 2019? Have you created a strategy to see it become a reality in your life? Tell us in the comments below!

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January 1, 2019

New Year’s Resolutions (and finding happiness)

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It’s time for those pesky New Year’s Resolutions again. As a blogger, I have the (un)fortunate opportunity to be reminded of previous New Year’s resolutions I’ve put out there in black and white for all to see. All it takes is a little scrolling for me to remember that I talked about enlarging our borders in 2018 and pursuing JOY in 2017. And I feel almost a little sorry for my then-self, who clearly had no idea about the dark corners and jagged cliffs those years would hold. Crisis and fear prowled around waiting to devour innocent resolve, and I had no clue what was coming. Did that make me naive, I wonder? Should I have not bothered?

My flesh a little bit says ‘yes’, but my spirit says, ‘NO!’ (Emphatically, in her biggest girl voice.)

Indeed, I still think it is important to make New Year’s Resolutions. Why bother? And what are mine for 2019? Thank you for asking. 🙂

Why Bother Making New Year’s Resolutions?

Well, I believe goal-setting helps us turn the page with purpose. New Year’s resolutions help us to be more strategic about how we face what is before us. A strategy, according to Merriam-Webster, “is a plan of action or policy designed to achieve a major or overall aim.” According to Forbes, it is “a framework for making decisions…” It helps us to consider the “why” of our lives as we enter the new year, so we can then chart the course of the “how.” Of course, we all know the challenge of remaining disciplined. But perhaps the gravity and importance of the resolution–its why–may help us. Anything worth becoming is worth working for.

Only those who attempt the absurd can achieve the impossible. (Albert Einstein)

Of course, reasonable resolutions may seem more possible than absurd ones. But the absurd are the places where imagination and creativity reside. Where passion and drive pulse.

Past Resolutions about JOY

Let me recount a little about my resolution to pursue JOY in 2017-18. What I thought I would find was more laughter, more light-heartedness, more jovial times. Instead, though, what I found was more steadfastness in pain, more patience in crisis, and a greater ability to remain constant in chaos. In fact, the jovial and light-hearted moments of this year were few and far between, and seemed almost to punctuate sadness. Was this the JOY I was looking for?

Well, no. And yes.

It wasn’t the JOY I was hoping for, but it was JOY that I found.

Paul reminds the Romans to “Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer.” (Romans 12:12). Interesting how closely he places joy and hope to affliction and prayer. Hmmmm. Almost as if that’s where joy tends to reside.

He had also pleaded with the Philippians: “Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: ‘Rejoice!’  Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near.  Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” (Phil. 4:4-7) Notable, again, how near joy sits to anxiousness and need. And that rejoicing is possible at all times.

So what about Happiness then?

Back in February of 2017 I wrote about the artificial division we Christians sometimes make between JOY and HAPPINESS. And I considered how God intended them to be intertwined, though they aren’t identical in nature. So now I sit and think about how fleeting moments of happiness have seemed this year, even though I have consistently been strengthened by the JOY of the Lord.

Was I perhaps more strategic in 2018 about pursuing JOY in my need than I was about pursuing HAPPINESS?

But may the righteous be glad and rejoice before God; may they be happy and joyful. (Psalm 68:3)


Choose JOY and Choose HAPPY

My Word for 2019 – HAPPY

In 2019 I am going to be more strategic to choose happy. I am going to look for happiness, document happiness, celebrate happiness, and promote happiness. Through my writing, my leading, my business building,  my whatever, I believe I can find the promised happiness of the Lord as I continue to choose joy.

How about you? Do you have a word for 2019? Share in the comments below how you resolve to pursue it in this coming year.

Elizabeth Joy

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