My wife has one of the most incredible laughs that I have ever encountered. At night time we sit down as a family to read, pray, and tell stories. She is a night person so her energy ramps up with the kids. They often stir up a joyful cackle session several times a week. Unfortunately I am not a night person and I’m shutting down at that time. When I shut down, emotions shut down, and communication goes radio silent. Zombie Hank rises every night about 8:30pm. Yep, 8:30 PM. I usually start my day at 5am, and my yawning commences at 8:00 PM.

Recently my six year old Ruby, after enjoying a good cackle session, observantly said, “Dad, you never laugh.” She giggled while saying it, but this one stung. I used to be the “fun” guy! From the mouth of babes, right? This little comment shook me. It was painful to think my sweet little girl knows me as someone who doesn’t laugh. She knows me as someone who does not know joy. I don’t want my kids to know me as a grouchy curmudgeon. This needs to change!

How does one find joy in their life? In my heart, my daughter's comment was a check engine light blinking with smoke coming out of the hood. How long have I been driving in the red? How long has my joy been missing? Where on the path of life roadtrip did I think it was okay to wad the directions to joy up and toss them out the window?

Where to start?

The word joy is referenced 242 times in the Bible, glad has 102 references, rejoice has 154. Grouch has absolutely zero references. Grumpy has zero references. I definitely couldn’t find sourpuss. Joy should be easy to find, right?

So I decided to thumb through some of the famous verses on joy. Maybe a good Bible scroll on my phone would help. Psalm 16:11 and Romans 14:17 really stuck out to me, and some questions surfaced to the top.

“You make known to me the path of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence, with eternal pleasures at your right hand.”

“For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit,” ‭‭

If the path of life is supposed to fill me with joy, where did I wander off to? I must have fallen into a briar patch along the way. And If God’s kingdom is ⅓ righteousness, ⅓ peace, and ⅓ joy in the Holy Spirit. When did I give a third of my kingdom of God peace-of-pie away?

I don’t necessarily feel like an Eyor or Oscar the Grouch per se. I just want to tap into the joy that God so willingly offers. God created joy to be easily accessed. Why does joy feel like chasing a cat that doesn’t want to hang out with you? Here kitty kitty…

Smile & Happy Thoughts Searching

It sort of feels like Billy Crystal in the movie City Slickers when his wife tells him to go find his smile right before he and his friend went on a cattle drive. He searched for it on the cattle drive but couldn’t find it. All he could do is crack jokes about how miserable he was. To hide his lack of joy he put on a veil of sarcasm. I can relate to that.

It also feels like Peter Pan (played by Robin Williams) in the movie Hook. He came to the real world, grew up, became a lawyer, and completely forgot who he was. When visiting home for Christmas, Wendy made a quiet comment that his life choices had turned him into a pirate. The most appalling thing she could think of. Captain Hook would sneak over to the real world and kidnap Peter’s kids. Peter would return to Neverland, attempt to rescue them, but couldn’t fly, fight, or crow. He did not know how to access his happy thoughts. They were the key to unlocking his heart and rescuing his kids. He just couldn’t remember how.

Without knowing, Ruby’s comment launched me on a journey. It is a journey to wiggle my way free of the briar patch. A journey to stick my fork in a piece of the joy pie or a cattle drive to find my smile. I want to rescue my kids from a dad whose heart has turned into a pirate.

CLEAR!!! (Defibrillator Sound)

How does one find joy? Is there some kind of joy defibrillator? Flipping through videos of America's Funniest Home Videos isn’t seeming to do the trick.

I told several people about my daughter Ruby’s comment to me, and each time they referenced the famous scripture Nehemiah 8:10, “The joy of the Lord is your strength.” When this was quoted to me it felt like I was getting a cliché greeting card from a slightly senile relative.

For some reason, in a weak moment, I gave ole Nehemiah some curiosity and began to dissect what he said. The joy of the Lord is my strength. HIS JOY, is MY strength. How does God’s joy or happiness make me stronger? If God’s happiness is connected to my well being, I need to find out what makes God happy. So, what makes God happy? I felt a little faith in that question. ”What makes God happy?” I repeated. I’m a little curious now. Maybe I should ask Him.

GOD…WHAT MAKES YOU HAPPY?

After I asked Him, I had to fight off all the religious verbiage that I have learned over the years. I didn’t want it to feel like it was coming from some corduroy elbow patched jacket wearing theology professor. I want the answer to my question to be as if God and I were sitting on rocking chairs on a mountain cabin patio drinking Arnold Palmers, or Sun Joys for the non-golf enthusiasts. I imagine God the father sitting on his rocking chair in overalls and a white beard giving love filled wisdom that I carry the rest of my life. I long for an answer that comes from someone who loves me, knows me, and wants to impart long lasting joy into me. I need something that would reverberate in my soul. The kind of wisdom people write books about and tell their children.

So I asked Him, “God, if your joy and happiness is what makes me stronger and whole. What makes you happy?”

I spent the rest of the day trying to fight my own thoughts and religious answers. My thoughts seemed to win that day and wouldn’t let me quiet down enough. The next morning with my cup of Joe, I opened up to my next reading in my Read the Bible in a Year checklist. Leviticus….. Great, I’m sure I can find joy in this one (dripping with my City Slicker sarcasm)

Joy in Leviticus?

The word Leviticus when broken down, actually means “manual for Levites.” So after reading the incredible stories of Genesis and Exodus you get slammed with reading a manual…Fun…. Not a manual for putting together a lego set or IKEA bookshelf, but the ‘How-To’ of the sacrificial system of the Israelites. The sacrifice of cows, bulls, lambs, birds at the temple. Everything including animals and grains got set on fire. And if you flippantly follow this manual in the wrong manner the consequences could be deadly. But since Jesus’s sacrifice was once and for all (Hebrews 10:1-18), reading Leviticus is hard to read and is well, outdated. Or maybe I should say out-convenant-ed. (Cheesy dad joke/theology rant over)

During the first few chapters, the phrase, “an aroma pleasing to the Lord” kept popping up. The aroma was in reference to the sacrifices being burnt by the Levites at the Temple. It repeatedly jumped out at me. I then asked myself the question, why did it smell so good? What made the aroma so pleasing to God? What kind of smells does God like?

With the amount of sacrifices required for EVERY Israelite in “The Manual”, the streets must have been filled with animals about to be sacrificed. I imagine it looking like some kind of livestock stockyard. Millions of people were required by God to follow levitical law of sacrificing barn animals. That sounds very busy, messy, noisy, and chaotic. But it was “an aroma pleasing to the Lord.” It made God happy.

God Love Barbecue

I looked at the margin of my bible, and I wrote a note that I must have written years ago. It says, “God loves BBQ.” I sat on that for a minute and It made sense. The smells that came from the temple must have smelled like a Texas barbecue, aside from the pork. They were constantly cooking cows, bulls, sheep, and goats. The picture of the temple changed for me. I imagine the Levites looked more like a butcher/pit master named Cookie, rather than an Aaron. This made me smile. I love catching a whiff of good ole Texas BBQ. It is unmistakable. Does God really love barbecue?

I then laughed because I remembered I had just asked God the question, “What makes you happy?” This warmed my heart immensely. There was something really deep and holy that God was sharing with me. Apparently the love of smells brings a smile to my face too..

My Super Sniffer

I’m so glad I have a good sense of smell. Getting older has been an interesting journey. Lately I have had to hold my phone further away to read it. I’m wearing reading glasses even though I have contacts in. Not being able to hear the person I’m talking to in noisy restaurants is quite frustrating. There is more grunting when getting out of bed or a car. I’ve also had to embrace subtitles on tv shows. Why do they have to talk so quietly?

Though my seeing and hearing are struggling, my ability to smell things has not faded. I often feel like a bloodhound that can catch a whiff of some kind of varmint that I’m down wind of. I love how smells trigger memories. Recently I had childhood memories flood in because of the smell of the salt air as we approached the ocean. Just smelling the ocean soothes my soul on a level that the stir of the suburbs can not penetrate.

The other day our home received a gully washer from a mid July rainstorm. The smell of hot concrete being cooled by the deluge of rain water triggers the refreshing of God to my heart. I’m sure you can smell it now. It triggers memories of days with no school, swimming pool, fireworks, and vacation. My little kids and I got to share the refreshing smell of summer together as we sat on lawn chairs with the garage doors open. The moment triggered conversations about the goodness of God. A sweet moment with my kids.

In Leviticus, I’m sure what was a pleasing aroma to the Lord was the sacrifice that His people were making to Him, but for the moment God was relating to me in the depths of my soul. The smell of barbecue was beyond correct theology, beyond an exegesis of biblical script, beyond the manual of the levitical system. It was me imagining myself back on that porch with God taking in the smell smelling of a 16 pound brisket being sliced up for lunch. The same way my kids and I enjoyed the rain together, I was finding joy with God. It was a moment a father loves to share with his kids.

I had such a grin on my face. I realized God was answering my question in a small but holy moment. What makes you happy, God? His joy of barbecue became OUR joy of barbecue. The moment shifted my heart closer to joy. Joy comes with sharing moments of life and love with those who see your value.

For instance, I found joy the other day when my son and I shared a meal at Whataburger. I laughed out loud when my 10 year old groaned with delight as his burger hit his taste buds. It was his first real Whataburger outing, and it won’t be our last.

Just scraping the top

I have not received my laugh back the way that my wife does at night time with our kids, but there is a new door open in my heart to the growth of joy. It holds something deep that I have not even begun to scrape the top of. My heart is changing though. I look for ways to find the things that are a “pleasing aroma to the Lord”. The things that make his heart glad, will make my heart glad. Slowly I’m becoming less of a pirate like Wendy called Peter.

If you keep watching the movie Hook, Peter Pan gets his identity, flight, and fight back by remembering what his happy thoughts were. They were his children. As he remembered he noticed he could fly again. His joy did not resurrect the old Peter Pan that never wanted to grow up, but His joy in his children made him the person he was meant to be…a dad. He became a better Peter Pan by embracing who he is, along with who he once was.

At the end of City Slickers, Larry had just completed an adventurous cattle drive with his buddies. He did things that he never thought he could with people that saw his value. He even brought home a calf as a souvenir. He said to his wife at the airport, “I found it.” She was perplexed at what he found, but then he pointed to his smile.

I pray the joy in God’s heart will become yours. I pray those happy thoughts would transform you into who you were meant to be. I pray that you would embrace how much God values you, and get around more people who value you.

To add to God’s love of barbecue, my family received two FREE meals of barbecue the same week I read Leviticus. Yes, TWO, and for my WHOLE family! And it smelled fantastic! Thank you, Lord, for good barbecue.

I also started to dance with little Ruby before dinner. Our little jam and dance sessions have become a pleasing aroma to the Lord.

-Hank Lee

Firelife Church Transformation Center Pastor