God's Promise of Happiness

God's Promise of Happiness
Author: Randy Alcorn
Publisher: NavPress
Total Pages: 65
Release: 2015-10-01
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 149641151X

Think God doesn’t want you to be happy? Think again. We know that we will experience unimaginable joy and happiness in Heaven, but that doesn’t mean we can’t also experience joy and happiness here on earth. In God’s Promise of Happiness, bestselling author and noted theologian Randy Alcorn shares select passages and scripture from his latest hardcover release, Happiness, that provide insight, wisdom, and proof positive that God not only wants us to be happy, he commands it!

Does God Want Us to Be Happy?

Does God Want Us to Be Happy?
Author: Randy Alcorn
Publisher: NavPress
Total Pages: 192
Release: 2019-08-06
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1496432592

What if we were wired for happiness? If you were to ask a room full of people about how God wants us to live, you’d likely get a wide range of answers. Some people would say he wants us to be holy. Others might claim he wants us to love people and stand up for peace and justice. But chances are, you wouldn’t hear anyone say, “God wants us to be happy.” We all want to be happy, but we may feel guilty for this longing. Isn’t it selfish to pursue happiness? Isn’t it more spiritual to frown than to smile? In a world full of brokenness, is happiness a worthy pursuit? For those seeking to follow Jesus, should this quest be written off as superficial and unspiritual? In Does God Want Us to Be Happy?, New York Times bestselling author Randy Alcorn offers a collection of short, easy readings on one of life’s biggest questions. As he explores what happiness is and how we attain it, Alcorn provides wisdom, insight, and scriptural proof that God not only wants us to be happy—he commands it! (Adapted from the trade book Happiness.)

Happiness

Happiness
Author: Randy Alcorn
Publisher: NavPress
Total Pages: 575
Release: 2015-09-17
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1496403851

Do you ever wonder whether God even cares if we’re happy? This world can be so hard, and we aren’t promised an easy road. But that’s not the whole story. The Bible is filled with verses that prove that ours is a God who not only loves celebrations but also desperately wants his children to experience happiness. Why else would he go to the lengths he did to ensure our eternal happiness in his presence? We know that we will experience unimaginable joy and happiness in heaven, but that doesn’t mean we can’t also experience joy and happiness here on earth. In Happiness, noted theologian Randy Alcorn (bestselling author of Heaven) dispels centuries of misconceptions about happiness, including downright harmful ideas like the prosperity gospel, and provides indisputable proof that God not only wants us to be happy, he commands it. Randy covers questions like: How can I cultivate happiness in my life? What’s the difference between joy and happiness? Can good things become idols that steal our happiness? Is seeking happiness selfish? How can I achieve happiness through gratitude? What does it look like to receive God’s grace? The most definitive study on the subject of happiness to date, this book is a paradigm-shifting wake-up call for the church and Christians everywhere.

60 Days of Happiness

60 Days of Happiness
Author: Randy Alcorn
Publisher: NavPress
Total Pages: 305
Release: 2017-01-04
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1496420039

Would you like to experience true happiness? When it comes to happiness, most of us have the same questions. Why can’t I be consistently happy? Is it wrong to be happy when there’s so much pain and suffering in the world? And perhaps the biggest one: How can I be happier? Some Christians make an artificial contrast between joy and happiness, while others claim God wants us to be holy, but not happy. In fact, he wants us to be both, and the two go hand in hand! In 60 Days of Happiness, noted theologian and New York Times bestselling author Randy Alcorn shares sixty timeless devotions demonstrating that God not only wants us to be happy in him and enjoy his gifts, he commands and empowers us to do so.

Hoping for Happiness

Hoping for Happiness
Author: Barnabas Piper
Publisher: The Good Book Company
Total Pages: 135
Release: 2020-10-01
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1784985465

Everyone wants to be happy, and we all pursue happiness in different ways. Some people are thrill-seekers; others are homebodies. Some people are loners; others love big families or communities. Some people express things creatively; others consume what is created. Some sing; others listen to music. Whatever we find happiness in, we are united by our desire for work that matters and relationships that fulfil. As Christians, we often fall into the trap of basing our hopes on earthly things, even when we know they only make us happy for a short time. But how are we to experience happiness in this life? How do we avoid expecting too much of earthly things and being disappointed, or expecting too little and becoming cynics? In this book, recovering cynic Barnabas Piper helps us to throw off both the unrealistic expectations that end in disappointment and the guilty sense that Christians are not meant to have fun. He shows how having a clear view of the reality of the fall and the promise of redemption frees us to live a life that's grounded, hopeful and genuinely happy.

The Promise of Happiness

The Promise of Happiness
Author: Sara Ahmed
Publisher: Duke University Press
Total Pages: 328
Release: 2010-04-06
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 082239278X

The Promise of Happiness is a provocative cultural critique of the imperative to be happy. It asks what follows when we make our desires and even our own happiness conditional on the happiness of others: “I just want you to be happy”; “I’m happy if you’re happy.” Combining philosophy and feminist cultural studies, Sara Ahmed reveals the affective and moral work performed by the “happiness duty,” the expectation that we will be made happy by taking part in that which is deemed good, and that by being happy ourselves, we will make others happy. Ahmed maintains that happiness is a promise that directs us toward certain life choices and away from others. Happiness is promised to those willing to live their lives in the right way. Ahmed draws on the intellectual history of happiness, from classical accounts of ethics as the good life, through seventeenth-century writings on affect and the passions, eighteenth-century debates on virtue and education, and nineteenth-century utilitarianism. She engages with feminist, antiracist, and queer critics who have shown how happiness is used to justify social oppression, and how challenging oppression causes unhappiness. Reading novels and films including Mrs. Dalloway, The Well of Loneliness, Bend It Like Beckham, and Children of Men, Ahmed considers the plight of the figures who challenge and are challenged by the attribution of happiness to particular objects or social ideals: the feminist killjoy, the unhappy queer, the angry black woman, and the melancholic migrant. Through her readings she raises critical questions about the moral order imposed by the injunction to be happy.

The Year of Living Happy

The Year of Living Happy
Author: Alli Worthington
Publisher: Zondervan
Total Pages: 240
Release: 2018-10-02
Genre: Self-Help
ISBN: 0310094909

Take a daily step toward joy and contentment and ditch stress, overwhelming thoughts, and boredom with encouraging and biblical messages from Alli Worthington. You do your best to live life well—you work hard to be present in the moment, take care of the people in your life, knock it out of the park at work and home. And yet, somehow, you still have days (perhaps more than you'd like to admit) where you're simultaneously stressed and bored, and you wonder if you even know how to be happy. Is happiness a worthy goal? Does happiness matter to God, or does He only care about holier things? Alli Worthington gets it. As a wife, mother of five boys, author, speaker, and entrepreneur, she knows a thing or two about being busy, stressed, and happy in the midst of a crazy world! Over the years, she's seen how happiness gets a bad rap in Christian circles, and now she is standing up to shout the good news from the roof (or the internet, as the case may be): You are allowed to be happy! Yes, you! You can be happy right now! Join Alli for The Year of Living Happy: Finding Contentment and Connection in a Crazy World, and find the roots of your happiest life yet. Each of the 100 short and inspirational entries includes a thoughtful message from Alli, based on God’s Word practical ways to make your life happier day by day a journaling section This gorgeous book is an empowering gift for yourself or any woman you love. It can be used as a daily devotional or as a guided journal. Be part of this exciting message: Happiness and holiness can coexist for a beautiful life. Don’t miss the great big adventure God has for you. Let this be The Year of Living Happy!

God Wants You Happy

God Wants You Happy
Author: Jonathan Morris
Publisher: Harper Collins
Total Pages: 242
Release: 2011-04-19
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0062000209

"Inviting, accessible and personal. . . . A reminder of an overlooked truth: faith leads to joy." —James Martin, SJ, author of The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything Fox News analyst Father Jonathan Morris challenges the wisdom espoused by New Age self-help experts with the time-tested counsel found in the Bible. Readers who may have sought solace in popular self-help books like Eckart Tolle’s A New Earth, Rhonda Byrne’s The Secret, or Deepak Chopra’s The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success will be enthralled by Morris’s moving argument about the enduring spiritual succor awaiting in Scripture.

Health, Wealth, and Happiness

Health, Wealth, and Happiness
Author: David W. Jones
Publisher: Kregel Publications
Total Pages: 152
Release: 2017-07-25
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0825445078

Be faithful in your giving and God will reward you financially. It's not always stated that blatantly but the promises of the Prosperity Gospel--or the name-it-and-claim-it gospel, the health-and-wealth gospel, the word of faith movement, or positive confession theology--are false. Yet its message permeates the preaching of well-known Christian leaders: Joyce Meyer, T. D. Jakes, Joel Osteen, Creflo Dollar, Kenneth and Gloria Copeland, and many more. The appeal of this teaching crosses racial, gender, denominational, and international boundaries. Why are otherwise faithful Christians so easily led astray? Because the Prosperity Gospel contains a grain of biblical truth, greatly distorted. For anyone who knows that Prosperity Gospel theology is wrong but has trouble articulating and refuting the finer points, this concise edition contains all the robust arguments of the hard-hitting original edition in a shorter, more accessible form.

The Only Way To Happiness

The Only Way To Happiness
Author: John MacArthur
Publisher: Moody Publishers
Total Pages: 246
Release: 1998-04-01
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1575675951

Jesus' first recorded sermon in the Bible is a blueprint for being happy here on earth. And though His definition contains no prescriptions for acquiring cars, homes, or savings, it does require transformation and obedience. MacArthur examines Jesus' timeless definition of happiness, and explains that our reward for following Jesus' plan is citizenship in the kingdom of God- and an abiding joy that can never be taken away. Study guide and review included for individual or group study.