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Are You Happy?
“Many people are not happy! They lead unfulfilled lives and wonder if happiness will ever come. Are you happy? If not, there is a solution you should try.
In every country, people experience varying degrees of happiness and unhappiness.
Only a third of Americans say they are very happy, according to a Harris Poll. And, according to a worldwide ranking, the U.S. is the 19th happiest country in the world. The World Happiness Report lists another 137 countries that are even less happy!
Declining happiness
And even in a comparatively happy country like the United States, different groups can face decreasing levels of happiness.
According to the World Happiness Report 2019, “Happiness and life satisfaction among United States adolescents, which increased between 1991 and 2011, suddenly declined after 2012. … Thus, by 2016-17, both adults and adolescents were reporting significantly less happiness than they had in the 2000s.”
We all want to achieve a level of well-being and satisfaction in our lives, but few of us have been taught or discovered the keys to happiness. Many of the popular ideas and self-help solutions turn out to be temporary or even counterproductive. The pursuit of happiness can seem like a fool’s game.
How to become happy
However, becoming happy is not as difficult as you might imagine. God gave us guidance on how to become happy in Proverbs 29:18: “Happy is he who keeps the law.”
Can becoming happy be that simple, and will it work? The answer is yes!
Unfortunately, many teach that the laws of God are no longer relevant in this “enlightened” society. Listings of the 10 Commandments have been removed from U.S. schools and from other public institutions. The mention of God or Jesus Christ in public forums is frowned upon.
Jesus explains what makes you happy
Notice how the Founder of Christianity summarizes God’s law-the way to true happiness.
Jesus Christ makes it very plain in Matthew 22:37-40: “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”
These two great commandments encompass all of God’s laws. God wants us to honor Him and not allow idolatry or anything else to come between us and our worship of Him. He doesn’t want us to take His name in vain, and He wants us to keep His Sabbath.
God also wants us to respect others by honoring our parents and rejecting murder, adultery, stealing, lying and coveting.
These are the 10 Commandments. They reflect God’s thinking and bring automatic benefits for us and for those around us. And God promises blessings and happiness to those who obey His laws!
Happiness is a world with God’s laws
Can you imagine a world where everyone tries to keep God’s laws? Can you just picture the peace there would be? Can you visualize how much happiness and joy everyone would have?
The Bible says this will become a reality after Jesus Christ returns to the earth and initiates a world of peace and happiness. Everyone will be taught to keep the laws of God.
Isaiah 2:3-4 says, “Many people shall come and say, ‘Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob.; He will teach us His ways, and we shall walk in His paths.’ For out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.”
And one of the results of that action will be that “nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore” (verse 4).
Happy day: no more war!
Think of that—no more war! Wars have claimed millions of lives over the centuries. The vast majority of wars are the result of lust (disobeying the 10th Commandment) and break the Sixth Commandment, “you shall not murder” (James 4:1-2; Exodus 20:13).
Even now, if everyone obeyed the Sixth Commandment, there would be no more war, plus no one would be murdered! We would never hear of tragic stories of school or workplace shootings. People would be freed from the fear of being shot, stabbed or poisoned.
Ultimately, when God writes His laws in our hearts and minds, there will be no more hatred—of anyone. Jesus equated unrighteous anger toward others with the sin of murder (Matthew 5:21-22). A world without hatred would no longer see bigotry, road rage, violent beatings or bullying.
Just keeping this one commandment would change the entire way people deal with others. Therefore, if you want to be happy now, don’t harbor the spirit of murder or hate others.
Happiness comes by obedience
Just think how happy everyone would be if they obeyed all the laws of God!
For instance, the Seventh Commandment demands that we not commit adultery. How many marriages would be saved if no one gave in to infidelity? How many people would be spared from contracting horrific sexually transmitted diseases if everyone obeyed this one law?
Just as Jesus emphasized the deeper meaning of the commandment against murder, so He expanded on the meaning of the command against adultery (Matthew 5:27-28). For a man to even look lustfully upon a woman who isn’t his wife is adulterous!
If this law were obeyed, the pornography industry would no longer exist, children would never be sexually exploited again, and rape would be a scourge of the past.
If you want to be happy, don’t commit adultery—period.
The same reasoning applies to all of God’s commandments. If you want to be happy—don’t lie, don’t cheat, don’t steal and, above all, honor God at all times and keep His Sabbath holy.
You want to be happy and God wants to help
Doing these things is not impossible—and God wants to help. The apostle John wrote the following definitive statement in 1 John 5:3: “For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not burdensome.”
And you will be happier! Though even those who obey God suffer in this current evil world, they are making the choices that will lead to satisfaction and joy now and for eternity (Psalms 34:19; 16:11).
As the apostle Paul wrote to Timothy, “For bodily exercise profits a little, but godliness [becoming like our loving God] is profitable for all things, having promise of the life that now is and of that which is to come” (1 Timothy 4:8).
So give it a try! According to Revelation 22:14, “Blessed are those who do His commandments, that they may have the right to the tree of life.” The sooner we begin to keep God’s laws, the happier and more blessed we will be.” From: https://lifehopeandtruth.com/bible/10-commandments/the-ten-commandments/are-you-happy/
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Don’t Think Christ Came to Destroy the Law
Matthew 5:17-19
“Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill. For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled. Whoever therefore breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches men so, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.”
“Some misunderstand Jesus Christ’s mission, feeling He did away with the teachings of the Old Testament and replaced them with new teachings. But Christ made clear that His teachings were a continuation of the teachings He inspired to be a part of the Holy Scriptures.
It was the One who became Jesus Christ who thundered the 10 Commandments from Mount Sinai and spoke to Moses (1 Corinthians 10:4; see “Jesus in the Old Testament?”).
What does it mean to “fulfill” the law? The Greek word translated “fulfill” is pleroo, which means “to make full, to fill to the full” (Vine’s Complete Expository Dictionary of Old and New Testament Words).
Jesus Christ continued in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5, 6 and 7) to expand the meaning of God’s law, to show its spiritual intent. By doing this, He gave fuller understanding and magnified and exalted the law (Isaiah 42:21). He in no way destroyed or annulled it.
In Matthew 5:19 Jesus clearly tells His followers to obey even what someone might consider “one of the least of these commandments.”
The essence of the New Covenant is not a change in the commandments, but the fact that they can be written on our hearts and minds by the Holy Spirit dwelling in Christians (Hebrews 10:16). This allows us to internalize and fully obey God in a way ancient Israel never could.” Listen to the "Verse by Verse" episode covering this scripture at: https://lifehopeandtruth.com/bible/blog/dont-think-christ-came-to-destroy-the-law/?
For more about God’s commandments, see “The 10 Commandments for Today” and download our free booklet God’s 10 Commandments: Still Relevant Today.
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Got Milk, Got Disease
The British Medical Journal reported in the news on October 29, 2014 on “Milk intake and risk of mortality and fractures in women and men: cohort studies.” This observational study found higher death rates for men and women who drank 3 or more glasses of milk daily, compared to less than a glass a day. There were also more fractures in general, and hip fractures, in the higher milk-consuming women. The researchers from Sweden focused on the milk sugar, D-galactose, as the trouble causer. They believe that oxidative stress and inflammation all over the body is caused by D-galactose.
An accompanying editorial in the British Medical Journal, as well as the worldwide lay press; have tried to put these findings in perspective for the consumer. In reality, this balanced reporting has kept the consumer from making sensible decisions that would undermine the dairy industry.
Cow’s milk is not only unnecessary for strong bones and healthy bodies, but this category of food is a more important cause of obesity and illness than is red meat. See my article: When Friends Ask: Where Do You Get Your Calcium?
May I remind you of some of the harmful qualities of this product?
1) The milk sugar, galactose, is toxic. As far back as 1981, cow’s milk was reported to cause cataracts of the eyes.
2) The fat you eat is the fat you wear. (Overweight and obesity.) Whole milk is 50% fat, milk advertised as 1% (low fat) is still 18% fat, and cheese is 70% fat.
3) Risk for heart attacks and stroke is most strongly tied to animal fats also called saturated fats. Dairy fat is 97% saturated fat. Dairy is loaded with cholesterol.
4) Milk is loaded with people poisoning chemicals. High levels of pesticides and herbicides are present in these foods. They cause cancer and brain damage.
5) Milk is filthy with microbes. Cow’s milk drinkers consume bovine leukemia viruses, bovine immunodeficiency viruses, listeria bacteria, mad cow prions, and much more.
6) Osteoporosis and kidney stones are from bone loss caused by eating animal proteins and dietary acids. Hard cheese is the greatest source of dietary acids.
7) Constipation is caused by lack of dietary fiber. Dairy products contain no dietary fiber. Plus cow’s milk protein causes allergic reactions, which paralyze the bowels making it almost impossible for children and adults to move their rock-hard stools.
8) Cow’s milk protein is the most common dietary cause of allergy and autoimmune diseases, including nephritis (kidney disease) and severe forms of arthritis.
9) Lactose, the basic milk sugar, causes the majority of people worldwide to become sick with diarrhea, stomach cramps, and gas (lactose intolerance).
10) The factory farming of dairy cows is considered to be animal abuse and production of dairy foods is a leading cause of environmental pollution and climate change.
Hopefully, today’s headlines will cause you to eliminate all cows’ milk products from your life.” From: https://www.drmcdougall.com/education/nutrition/got-milk-got-disease/
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