Category: Uncategorized

Intro:
Hi, this is Dorette Schaal and I hope you enjoy my dailyeword. I started all the way back in 2002, before the word blog was invented, and how much of a joy and privilege it is on a regular basis to share from my heart some encouraging words with you. I love the illustration of silverware to help define how we can encourage others. We don’t want to be like a fork that pierces, or a knife that cuts, but we want to be like a spoon that lifts. I hope that your day is lifted and that you feel that God’s purpose and design for you can come to pass because not only do you have the best coach in the world behind you (God Himself), but I get to come along side and give you words of encouragement as well. This is our last week talking about joy filled living, and I hope you are overflowing with the joy of the Lord, spilling it over on everyone around you.

Many years ago when I first heard of the motivation (or foundational) gifts in Romans 12, I immediately pinpointed which gift was the one that most closely defined who I felt God created me to be. I noticed in some of the other gifts that were listed that there were points that applied, but when it came to encouragement, it fit me like a glove.
So for many years, I have been quietly encouraging people, trying not to let a day go by without using my words or voice to encourage someone. Then a couple of years ago, I heard a message on the ministry of encouragement, and the man who was ministering pointed me out at the end of the service and confirmed that encouragement is my ministry, and said that I needed to be more actively encouraging people with my words, through my writing, speaking, and singing. So that is what I have been doing for many years now. I’ve given personal poems to individuals, and groups, written kids books, and devotionals for may years now, all out of the abundance of my heart. I never have had anything published or copyrighted, so it has been a gift of love. I have been encouraged to get a book of poems and the children’s books I have written published and to syndicate my dailyeword encouragement. So I covet your prayers in this new endeavor. I could use your encouragement and your prayer! Thank you in advance

Discover Your Joy – Find it! Develop your joy – fulfill it! And Defend your joy – contend for it! To discover your joy, we must believe that God wants your joy to be full. Jesus is the joy of our salvation, and only in Him do we experience true, satisfying, complete joy. Once we are saved, we make a choice to think on the things listed in Phil 4:8. That means disciplining our mind to think on things that are true, noble, just, pure, lovely, of good report. If there be any virtue, if there be any praise, we are told to think on those things. To discover our joy, we have to choose to over ride past negative programming. Sometimes that means being introspective and finding out where the negativity came from and dealing with it so you can move on to living a joy filled life. Once we have found our joy, we must develop our joy – it is up to us to fulfill it! We choose to forgive ourself and others. We choose to act today how we want to feel. Because how we think is so important, and our emotional stability or instability reveal the quality of our thoughts! So think on the right thing! Lastly, let’s defend our joy, fight for it! Contend for JOY! We can’t allow others opinions to steal your joy. Authentic joy takes a leap of faith. We act joyfully before we see the evidence or manifestation of changed circumstances! That takes faith! And we actively seek good company and positive influences if we want to live a joy filled life, every day of the year.

Contentment is a word we don’t hear about much in our society. The Bible tells us to be content with what we have, but the world system tells us to want more! Just look at ads on TV or those you see on the internet or hear on the radio. All of them make it look like we can’t live without their product. Well, as believers, we can be satisfied and totally and thoroughly content. I wrote a song about that a few years back, and here are the words:
I’m satisfied with You alone,
In your presence, I find my home
My heart is yours
Forevermore
You’re all I want
\ I want you Lord

Content to follow where you lead
Your whispered Word is all I need
I’m fully yours
I want no more
You’re all I want
I want you Lord

Close to your heart, I want to stay
Your Word I promise to obey
content in you
I need no more
Satisfied
I want you Lord
Is there a more perfect place to be than satisfied in God? Truly we can say with the psalmist David, The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want!

It is interesting that fruit of joy just grows naturally when all the right elements are in place. When you plant a peach seed, you get years and years of fruit if you nurture the seed, coddle the seedling, prune the young tree, and provide water, good soil and sunshine. We should be fruitful not only through the years, but also day after day. To get a continual harvest, we have to be continually planting. We are farmers for LIFE! That means that our life is all about daily planting (through words, deeds, finances, etc.). What is so cool about daily planting is that you get to affect everyone who is around you. When the fruit of joy is growing, it naturally is shared with others. So your family gets to see your fruit at work. They get to see the most joy filled and best you, and hear your best words, and be recipients of your best behavior. Most the time we do it all backwards. We put our happy face on and give our best self away for strangers and let our family have our worst. Let’s be our best self always! Not because we’re trying to be joyful, but because we are letting the joy of the Lord flow through us. It is the goodness of God, not his harshness or anger that draws people to Christ. Our smile can be like that. A countenance of joy can make us magnets the lost! That is the best kind of fruit we could ever have!

Today is the day to sing for joy! Praise the completion of joy, and it also is a joy multiplier. When we chose to bring the sacrifice of praise to God, even when things in the natural realm are bleak, what happens on the inside is that the surge of joy brings hope back. It brings things back to our remembrance that we may have forgotten. When we look at Jesus, the things of earth grow dim. When we look at circumstances, the things of God grow dim. What we focus on becomes bigger. It works positively, and it works negatively. What praise does, is when we see big negative circumstances, it turns our focus away from the problem, and onto Jesus, and the big negative circumstances grow dimmer! Then praise becomes much less of a sacrifice and much more of an offering of thanks to God for being big enough to handle the issue that seemed so overwhelming. Another way praise multiplies is that just like laughter, it is contagious. We only have to see someone laughing and it makes us laugh. When we see others praising, it makes us want to join in with them. Like a crowd begetting a crowd, praise begets more praise. Let’s let those praises be released. Not only does it release more joy in us, God deserves it!

 

When our heart belongs exclusively to God, there will be a marked change in our countenance, and a true expression of joy from our lives. Joy will begin bubbling up from our core, in a multi dimensional way that is greater than just being happy or a feeling of pleasure. The Bible talks about it as joy unspeakable. It really is hard to define, but is unmistakable once you have experienced it. It is the joy of the Lord, resonating through you! Because His joy has an eternal source, it is not based upon circumstances whatsoever! When the spirit filled individual experiences negativity or adverse circumstances, or terribly difficult circumstances, our flow of joy does not have to be interrupted. The reason is because Jesus is our joy. Jesus not only brings joy, He is joy! When we hold on tight to Him, and never let Him go, His joy remains in us, and our joy is full. What an encouraging way to live. Intimately connected to the source of joy!

Intro:
This week we continue to talk about increasing our joy level. Hi, this is Dorette Schaal with your dailyeword. We are going to talk about some unexpected ways to get more joy this week, like getting out of a rut, and making necessary changes to live life more abundantly. Another way to get more joy is by praising. We can sing for joy, we can shout for joy, we can dance for joy. So if you need joy, start singing, start shouting, start dancing! Your life can be more joyfilled starting right now. Here is your daily eword.

Have you ever felt stuck and wonder how to get unstuck? One of my husband’s favorite things to do when he speaks on marriage is have each person look at their mate and say, I’m stuck! Then he says, that makes me happy! In the marriage covenant, being stuck is a good thing. We’ve made a covenant, said some sacred vows, and made a decision to be stuck! Being stuck in a rut is a whole different thing. You might have heard that a rut is just a grave with both end kicked out. We can get stuck doing or even believing the same thing, and it can feel like there is no way out of the situation we are in. In a situation like that, it is so good to remember that what we can’t do, God can do! We need to begin to meditate on God’s Word and remember with God all things are possible. Remind yourself of these truths:

I have power, love and a sound mind
I am a new creation in Christ
I am chosen for success
I am complete
I am secure
I am confident
I am free
I am capable
I am spiritually alive
I am God’s workmanship
I am welcome in God’s presence
I am protected by God.
I am who God says I am
I believe God’s truth about me
His truth has set me free!
I don’t have to stay stuck!
So instead of sinking into hopelessness, and negative thinking, and remaining stuck, believe that you are getting unstuck by the power of God that is at work within you. Your life can be joyfilled! Great days are ahead for you!

Most people try to find joy outside, instead of from within. God’s desire is that we live in joy, overflowing abundant and real. In I Thes 5:16-18, we see that it is God’s will that we be joyful always! The normal everyday average person walks through life and when difficulties come, they lose their joy. Their joy level is based on how their life is going at the moment. But joy is not dependent on having a perfect life. I love the definition of joy by Tommy Newberry. He says, “joy is the infectious and uncontainable fruit of divinely inspired growth. It is the deeply entrenched unshakable belief and result of sustained right thinking of dwelling on the nature of God. Joy is an outward sign of an inward faith in the promises of God. It is a way of acting and it is evidence of spiritual maturity. Joy is not a distant destination at which you arrive; it is a path you chose to travel each day. Joy is within us, but it must be released.” Isn’t that a powerful definition? It sounds so simple and really it is! Living in joy doesn’t have to be complicated. It can be as easy as changing how you think. Because of our human nature, we think we have to do something extreme or hard to have joy overflowing. The joy solution is really very simple. When we think about God and have our minds set on the things of God, we create an atmosphere for the kingdom of God to flourish in our life. The secret is out, and it is no secret! You can live a fully productive joy filled life, overflowing with the joy of the Lord, every single day!

One wonderful thing about kids is their ability to laugh. You could teach us adults how to live more joyfully, just by laughing more. Do you know the Bible talks about joy and gladness so many times, if I remember right it is over 800 times. Sometimes we think serving God is hard, and serious, but I like to think about God laughing! The Bible tells us that He does! He smiles on us, and even sings over us. It sounds like He is pretty joyful. In fact, I think of heaven as a place where joy abounds. To be able to live a life of joy, we have some choices to make. The best choice is to ask Jesus into your heart, and be saved. Immediately we have a well of joy to draw from. The next choice that is so important if we want to live a joy filled life is to choose what we will think on. Philippians 4:8 tells us to think on things that are true, noble, just, pure, lovely, of good report, if there be any virtue, if there be any praise, think on these things. It takes a choice to let go of bad thoughts, negative thoughts, or even foolish thoughts. Another choice that you get to make is to choose to act how you want to feel. Sometimes we just let ourselves get wrapped up in thoughts that make us discouraged or depressed, or even just sad and lonely. But we choose to act how we want to feel, that means we smile more, we laugh more, we choose joy and find good things to say and do. So when you chose Jesus, we chose to live a life of joy. Let’s live a joy filled life, 24/7/ 12 months of the year, for every year of your life!

Change. It is a big scary word for a lot of people. If you knew that the changes you would make would bring only blessing and benefits to your life, would it be hard to make a change? Probably not! So let me assure you, when you begin to change the way you think to think like Paul told us to think in Phil 4:8, blessing and benefits will result! When you make a choice to have a disciplined mind, and a focused and intentional thought life, you will be graciously surprised by how much better your world will become. The exciting aspect of changing how you think is that even if there are no immediate changes in your circumstances, you still can experience a joy filled life, because you are changing how you think about your circumstances. Paul was a pro at thinking above the world’s system. He knew he lived in a fallen world and on a cursed earth, but he realized that more than anything, his God centered thoughts could outweigh the burden of his current situation. Paul could have been the biggest whiner, complainer and belly acher. He chose instead to put his mind on things above, and deemphasize his current circumstances and accentuate the positives in his life. We can do that very same thing. I hope you choose to do that in your own life, today. That will begin a process of change that can alter your circumstances.