Happiness project lesson...The will of God is not our happiness but our faithfulness.

"I know that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to do good while they live. That each of them may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all their toil—this is the gift of God." (Ecclesiastes 3:12, 13 NIV)

Two things I have read this morning smacked me upside the head!

First of all, I am working on this "happiness project" because...I want to be happier, right? I want to enjoy the life and the blessings God has given me and lately I feel all I do is complain about what's wrong in my life. It's got to be better than this, right? Oh really?

Seth Godin is a best-selling author and a popular speaker in the business world, dealing with mostly with leadership. He writes a daily blog and I read it most days. Today's blog seemed to be written for me. He called it "Trading in Your Pain." Many of us think if we find a better situation, we will get rid of our pain. The pain of a bad work situation...the pain of an unhappy marriage...the pain of poor choices...the pain of bullying...We think if we change jobs, get divorced, go to a new school...we we change our situation the pain will go away. The funny thing is, when we do find ourselves in a new situation, we find we still have pain. It might be different pain, but it is pain all the same.

"The grass isn't always greener on the other side of the fence" is an old saying, but it is so true. I tend to do that...when things get hard, I start thinking and dreaming of the next best thing. THAT will make me happy won't it? Reality is...probably not.

Then I read that God is not as concerned with our happiness as he is with our faithfulness. I sometimes get the idea that God WANTS me to be happy...how could a loving, caring parent not want his child to be happy? But even the verse listed above doesn't promise happiness. Ecclesiastes 3:12-13 says it is better to be happy and do good. It says the gift of God is finding satisfaction in our toil. God wants us to be concerned with the good works he has for us to do than with finding happiness. Don't you think if we really grasped that idea, we would find ourselves happier more of the time?

I am glad I am working on this "happiness project" because I think I am realizing that true happiness is much different than I thought it was!