Being Happy In Your Life or With Your Life?

The Bible paints a couple different pictures of what it means to find happiness and contentment with our lives. In one sense, there’s an invitation to find a moment by moment sense of connection with God in our lives that brings a sense of goodness, well-being and joy. Listen to these words and hear the very immediate and tangible awareness of happiness in the author’s life:

Go, eat your bread with joy, and drink your wine with a merry heart; for God has already accepted your works. - Ecclesiastes 9:7

You will show me the path of life; in Your presence is fullness of joy; at Your right hand are pleasures forevermore. - Psalm 16:11 

And then there’s the bigger picture of being happy with our lives. Even in suffering, when we’re not experiencing the immediacy of goodness, we can still be aware of the overarching presence of God.

My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. - James 1:2-3

Both seem to be appropriate, although it seems pretty clear that either might exist without the other. Do you tend to be more aware of one more than the other? Do you tend to value one more than the other? Would you like to ask Jesus for help today with one or the other?