The Pursuit of Happiness

Today is my birthday. Wonderful people send cards and call to say, Happy Birthday. Then of course, we just had Christmas and Chanukkah so we are in the habit of sending cards around the globe to say, Happy Holidays. And next up, we have New Year’s Day so everyone you meet says, Happy New Year’s. Well, what does it take to be happy? Is this something we can conjure up at will or command for certain days of the year? Is happiness in our control at all, or is just something to be wished for and doled out for good measure to all our friends and loved ones? I think not.

I look around, either at the faces at the Salvation Army kitchen, or on the streets around me and realize how weak and hollow the words can sound. With all this happy talk I can’t help but think it’s not enough. We can’t drum it up no matter how hard we try. All our words fall far short of creating even an ounce of happiness. In fact, it’s a well known fact that there are more suicides at this festive time of year than at any other. So much for the convincing power of all this happy talk. It seems we only achieve a heightened awareness of how UNhappy we are!

Last night I went out to dinner and a movie with a dear friend. We saw the Pursuit of Happiness, a true story about homelessness and the family struggles that bring a young father and his son into the streets. Ha, it sounds depressing, but it was so well done and so captivating that in the end it was enheartening. Will Smith did a great job in this sensitive role. You could just feel this father’s frustrations and ache with his drive to succeed for his boy, who was admirably enacted by his real son. The story forces you to probe the meaning of happyness—purposely misspelled--as well as the subject of the worthy pursuits we choose for ourselves.

In a very temporal and immediate sense, I wondered why the Will Smith character chose such a difficult position when his very survival depended on getting an income. Why should a bright young man endure such hardship for a six month internship? He was so capable and driven and certainly could have fit into any industry or field. Aha, I thought, it’s the power of the dream. He had a vision of happiness on the street one day that set him on that chosen course.

That film certainly raised the bar of compassion for those who struggle in the pursuit, a commonality for all of humanity. It also led me to wonder about what it takes for me to be happy and challenged me to persevere for what I believe God wants me to do. This is a fitting time to ask the questions, what do I truly desire? What do I truly need to be happy and fulfilled?

This morning I read some astoundingly beautiful words by a great scholar. CS Lewis wrote, “There have been times when I think we do not desire heaven, but more often I find myself wondering whether, in our heart of hearts, we have ever desired anything else… when at last you meet another human being who has some inkling (but faint and uncertain even in the best) of that something which you were born desiring, and which, beneath the flux of other desires and in all the momentary silences between the louder passions, night and day, year by year, from childhood to old age, you are looking for, watching for, listening for? You have never had it. All the things…have been but hints of it—tantalizing glimpses… echoes that died away… But if it should really become manifest… you would say ‘Here at last is the thing I was made for.’ … It is the secret signature of each soul... which we will still desire on our deathbeds…”

And again he wrote, “The mould in which a key is made would be a strange thing if you had never seen a key: and the key itself a strange thing if you had never seen a lock. Your soul has a curious shape because it is a hollow made to fit a particular swelling in the infinite contours of the divine… All that you are, sins apart, is destined, if you will let God have His good way, to utter satisfaction…. God will look to every soul like its first love because He is its first love. Your place in heaven will seem to be made for you and you alone, because you were made for it—made for it stitch by stitch as a glove is made for a hand.” The Business of Heaven, p.318-319.

The happiness we pursue is a deep-seated contentment and satisfaction with life. I believe the real bedrock and foundation in our souls is a desire for purpose and a conviction of significance that makes us feel complete.

It is a connectedness and meaningfulness that assures us that our lives are not dripping out like a leaky faucet and going down the drain without accomplishing anything of lasting value.

I believe this true happiness comes from knowing the God who created us. He has the mould. He is the true smith of all that we are meant to be. When we link up with Him we find that which nothing else can give and no one can lightly bestow or wish upon us. We can have our deepest desires completely fulfilled in him. The thing that Lewis says we were born desiring, that secret signature of every soul, and that which we will still be yearning for when we take to our deathbeds--All is but a breath away in the one we call Jesus.

I pray you will find him this Christmas Season and I hope you will invite him to lead you into 2007. Then you will have a much better shot at a truly Happy New Year.


“…pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance and gentleness. Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called…” 1 Tim 6:11-12

"Whoever would love life and see good days must keep his tongue from evil and his lips from deceitful speech. He must turn from evil and do good; he must seek peace and pursue it. For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous and his ears are attentive to their prayer…” 1 Peter 3:10-12

“…if you seek the LORD your God, you will find him if you look for him with all your heart and with all your soul.” Deut 4:29

“The LORD looks down from heaven on the sons of men to see if there are any who understand, any who seek God.” Ps 14:2

“The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands. And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else. From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us.” Acts 17:24-27

“Seek the LORD while he may be found; call on him while he is near… turn to the LORD, and he will have mercy… and to our God, for he will freely pardon.” Isa 55:6-7

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