Sometimes we have difficulty believing that God is really happy when we are happy. We somehow believe that God is only happy when we are undergoing some painful character building process in our lives, struggling to keep our faith above water, barely making it through the day. If we are honest with ourselves, we believe that His primary approach towards us is to make our lives difficult so that we will be forced to trust in Him. After all, it is for "our own good" isn't it. Talk of happiness, blessing and prosperity have become "bad words" in the Christian vocabulary. We believe only weak and immature Christians would seek after them. For the 'true' Christian, there is only the stoic, teeth-gritting peserverence through the 'expected' pain and injustice of life. That is what we have come to expect of life, and expect of God. That is so sad.
My little daughter is 3 months old now. Every morning when I wake, I go over to her room to check if she is awake. Having that cute little face coo and smile back at me is one of the most precious of life's moments. As her father, I love her to bits. Seeing her happy brings a kind of happiness little else can compare with. Seeing her smile warms my heart with joy. Then I think about God. If I who am human can take so much delight in the happiness of my daughter, have I somehow wronged God to believe that His love is so much less that He doesnt do the same. It soon began to dawn on me the realization that when we smile, God smiles too. He loves seeing us happy. That is His heart, the perfect Father heart of love. When we cry, He cries with us. He may discipline us for a moment, but because He loves us so much, it delights His heart to see us happy. What is your view of God today? When you close your eyes, do you see a vengeful, unreasonable God, or a God who is smiling at you? Maybe we need to rethink our view of God.