Every Christian should be glad in the Lord.  And sometimes that is so.  But more often than not we are down and sad and defeated.  Those who are looking at us as examples, or to us for encouragement, see little to help them.

    Why is it we seem so seldom glad?  Is it because we take our Christian faith so seriously that we feel we must be solemn?  Perhaps.  I know there are such folks, but I have rarely seen any of them.

    A much more likely reason for our lack of gladness might be that there is something blocking the pathway to fellowship with the Lord.  We may be unhappy with the circumstances God has sent or allowed in our lives.  We become critical of Him, although we never say we are.  And that critical spirit blocks the way.  Or God may be asking us to do something we don’t want to do.  Even though past experience has taught us that God always does things for our good and His glory, we find it hard to trust Him.  When we think what He is asking is unreasonable or distasteful or too hard, we often fight against Him.  And that rebellious spirit blocks the way.

    Maybe the key to understanding our lack of gladness can be found in the fact that our gladness is often rooted in ourselves, or others, or circumstances.  When that is true, we can be up one day and down another.  The Psalmist, on the other hand, said, “I will be glad in the Lord.”.  Since the Lord is always the same, if our gladness is rooted in Him, it will be unchanging also.

    But how can I be glad in the Lord?  Is there some secret?  There is no secret, but there is a way to get where we want to be.  It is spoken of  in the first part of the verse: “My meditation of Him  shall be sweet.”  That is the key.  Time spent meditating on Jesus.  That isn’t hard.  To meditate simply means to think about.  But we let whole days go by without thinking about Jesus at all, much less spending the time implied by meditating.

    Why don’t we meditate on (think about) Jesus more?  Perhaps it is because we are self-centered.  We don’t think about Him because we are so busy thinking about ourselves.  Or maybe it is because we spend too much time thinking about others, not with love and affection, but with envy and irritation.  To meditate on the Lord requires discipline.  We have to take the time, and focus our attention.  But when we do turn our thoughts to Him, and begin to count the perfections of Jesus, other things begin to fade away.  And we will discover the truth of the old hymn, which says: