My 40-day blogging adventure continues today with help from my extremely intelligent and handsome husband Don. More from him later. Read on.

Today I’m going to try to stop. I’m going to stop chasing after something fleeting and start going after the eternal. Today I’m going to give up my pursuit of happiness….again.

Almost any American elementary child can tell you where the phrase “the pursuit of Happiness” was first introduced to us. It’s a phrase in the United States Declaration of Independence and is one of three examples of “unalienable rights” which the document says has been God-given to all humans, and which governments were created to protect.

Rabbit Trail Alert! Made me think a bit about what constitutes “happiness.” What makes me happy may not do a thing for you. And I know there are certain people out there who pursue their own brand of happiness in the form of physical and emotional abuse, and worse. Did God give us this right to pursue happiness? This blog could go on forever debating that question…so I’ll just let you ponder it on your own.

Back to stopping my own pursuit of happiness.

My happiness changes with the wind, or my mood, or my circumstances, or my financial situation, or my comfort level, or the weather, or my expectations. I’ve decided I spend way too much energy pursuing such a fleeting and capricious emotion. Happy is a catchy song (Thank you Pharrell Williams) but it isn’t so easy to catch in real life.

Here’s where my husband’s wisdom and insight come in. He writes a weekly Bible study and is currently working through the book of Hosea. Don prefaces the following remarks with an introduction to Hosea 9:1-9, saying the prophet Hosea, under the direction of the Holy Spirit provides a list of four things which the nation of Israel will lose because of their sin.

“The first thing lost due to their sinfulness was “joy.” Joy is more than emotion. Joy is the presence of God in our lives. Joy is something that comes from God, not from something external in our life. Joy and happiness are often mistaken for one another but it’s just not so. Joy is something deep down inside which is not controlled by circumstances as happiness is. I can be made happy by circumstances or by something someone else does. But Joy is something which transcends circumstances or the behavior of others.

God is more than our “source” of joy. God is our joy. As we walk with Him, no matter the circumstances we will have joy. The closer we get to Him, the more joy we will know.

Joy is something the world cannot give us nor can the world take it away.” Don McGarvey – Thursday Night Bible Study, study of Hosea. If this piques your interest, check out Don’s Bible Study on Facebook.

And how about pursuing the fruit of the Spirit which, in addition to joy, include love, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control?

Or how about just pursuing Jesus and everything else…everything of little to no importance falls away.

“It’s who you are and the way you live that count before God. Your worship must engage your spirit in the pursuit of truth. That’s the kind of people the Father is out looking for: those who are simply and honestly themselves before him in their worship. God is sheer being itself—Spirit. Those who worship him must do it out of their very being, their spirits, their true selves, in adoration.” (John 4:23-24 – MSG)

Jesus is really all I need to pursue. Because…and this is the cool part…He’s pursuing me!