"I could sing unending songs of how you've saved my soul."

Before I get to my point, I need to set this up.

9 times out of 10 (or some other approximate ratio because I don't really know the true statistics, but it just happens a lot and that phrase has become a conventional way to say "a lot") I'm inspired to blog when I have interacted with people, whether it be in person, or online, on the phone, etc. My friend Kaitlyn gets credit for inspiring this blog. We just talked for three hours, and there was something I said to her that I thought would be appropriate to share here. Seeing that Kaitlyn is one of my only consistent readers (I think she reads most of what I write?), I'm risking being redundant. But so be it.

As you may have gathered if you've been reading my posts over the last several months, or if you pay any attention to my updates on various social networking sites, my life for the past five months has been a dream. I have been so happy, and I feel a peace and contentment that hasn't often been present before. Every time I try to describe it, even to myself just so I can better understand it, I can't find the right words.

Like with most things, though, there's another side to all of this. As much as I appreciate this joy that I have been living in, and as much as I hate to say this, I'm skeptical. The world that you and I have been living in our whole lives has conditioned me. It's been my experience that as soon as one challenging, discouraging, disheartening thing ends, another one begins. And that's if you're lucky enough to not have a myriad of challening, discouraging, disheartening things occurring simultaneously. And sure, God is there and will bring you through, but it's going to be a hard fight and constant weariness is an inevitability.

So as soon as my face starts to hurt from smiling, a small voice so very quietly, yet so very clearly, says, "Okay, something's gotta give. At any moment now. Don't get used to this, because something is surely going to come out of nowhere and this short reign of delight is going to end. Brace yourself."

I don't think I'm alone in this. I know I'm not alone in this. Nobody, anywhere, has a completely carefree life. But I think Christians, a group which includes me, might often be especially prone to this because we have Scripture proclaiming our doom. There's a well-known sentence in John 16:33 that says, "In this world you will have trouble." There's no ambiguity in that statement. It's clear what's coming, and the fact it is coming is just as clear.

And I think we get hung up on that. Firstly, because it's guaranteed. Secondly, because we seem to have developed an idea that we're supposed to take all the junk of the world and deal with it. I think the intentions behind that are, or can be, sincerely motivated, because we're followers of Christ, who can have and has had anything thrown at him is not shaken by it. But we have somehow translated that into meaning that we are supposed to take the nightmares of the world and content ourselves to "rejoice that [we] participate in the sufferings of Christ" (1 Peter 4:13). (<----Sorry, I just realized that I unconsciously formatted that in MLA.......continuing on.) As if being in trouble for the sake of trouble makes us holy. Therefore, if we're not happy and we're heaped in problems, we must be doing something right. But that's overlooking the rest of John 16:33. The preceding sentence is, "I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace." Then after the assertion of "trouble," Jesus says, "But take heart! I have overcome the world." And in that passage from 1 Peter, it's important to note that it's "the sufferings of Christ." Not just suffering for the sake of suffering, but because you choose to associate yourself with him. It's like being friends with a person that many others detest, and choosing to stick with them and endure any kind of ill treatment you may receive as a result.

But like Jesus said, he overcame everything. So it's okay to be happy, I tell myself just as fervently as I will tell anyone else. When blessings and joy abound, cherish them. Enjoy them fully as long as they are present. There is a time for this, just as there is a time for everything else under heaven.

Let's not be a perpetually depressed people. We're supposed to be Christ to others, and I don't think there are many out there who are drawn to depression.