“Yes, joyful are those who live like this! Joyful indeed are those whose God is the Lord!”  – Psalm 144:15

Yes, joyful are those who live like this… who live like what? Joyful are those who live as children of God! We have access to grace and lavish favor from the One who made the heavens and the earth. As followers of Jesus Christ we are forgiven, highly favored, healed, fruitful, successful, prosperous, blessed, chosen, loved, and in relationship with the King of Kings!

As we begin a new series today about JOY, my heart is filled with this thought—while we were still sinners, far from God—He sent His son Jesus to be born as a baby so that He would later die on the cross for our sins. Wow… God is so good! What joy it brings to my heart that God was good to us, when we were not even good! He didn’t wait for us to get better before He would be good to us!

Yet there are many followers of Christ who somehow believe that God requires us to be good in order for Him to be good to us. I’ve got news for you, my friend… God’s goodness is not based on your goodness. He is good all of the time – even when you are not. We don’t start out with grace and then graduate to something better.

We continue to rely on God’s grace, on how good He is, not how good we are! Does that mean we don’t have to be good or obey the Lord? No, obedience still matters to God. It’s out of His goodness that God has given us a new heart, a heart to know Him, a heart to obey, and a heart with both the right desires and power to back up those desires! He doesn’t just tell us to obey… He gives us the heart to walk in obedience. God wants you blessed so much that He gave you the ability to obey!

I pray today that as you walk in obedience and rely on His grace, His goodness would cause your heart to overflow with JOY!