In 1991, when Rolling Stone interviewed Bob Dylan on the occasion of his 50th birthday, he gave a curious response when the interviewer asked him if he was happy. He fell silent for a few moments and stared at his hands. ‘You know,’ he said, ‘these are yuppie words, happiness and unhappiness. It’s not happiness or unhappiness, it’s either blessed or unblessed.’
What wisdom there is in these words, “Happy is a yuppie word.” But what does this really mean? Does it mean that our society has gotten confused as to what the main purpose of life is all about? Well, that is an easy yes. But what about us? When some one asks me, “What do you want most for your children?” The response that immediately comes to my mind is, “Well, I want them to be happy?”
C. S. Lewis shared great insight in his book ‘Mere Christianity’ when he was talking comfort, a word that could be used interchangeably with happiness in the modern mind. Lewis wrote, “If you look for truth, you may find comfort in the end; if you look for comfort you will not get either comfort or truth, only soft soap and wishful thinking to begin, and in the end, despair.” These words echo clearly the words of our Lord Jesus when he said,
“And he said to all, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it. For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses or forfeits himself?” Luke 9:23-25
Christians receive comfort, joy and lasting happiness, not from the security or approval that this world can offer, but from the TRUTH! The fact that Jesus loves us and took on our sin and suffered under its full weight, so that we can have LIFE. So, with Dylan, let us look at our lives not in terms of happy or unhappy, comfortable or uncomfortable, but in terms of blessed or unblessed. When we consider the gift that God has given us we can truly stand on solid ground an say that we are BLESSED!