"The Pursuit of Happiness"

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“Work hard, Party harder”, “King of good times”, “Let the good times roll” extremely known phrases aren’t they! The media keeps throwing at us these happy faces, faces with a can of beer in hand, or with the latest funky gadget in hand, or with sum new fashion line on, or simply with a new toothpaste in hand. Come to think of it, when the advertisers bring these ads out they are desperately trying to tell us that our pursuit of happiness will end with their product but it never does.

Being 23 years old in 2011, and working in the corporate, comes with its set of challenges. From my interactions with my ‘generation mates’ over the past year, I have found, that for my generation life is all about the ‘I’ and the ‘me’. And just like the media portrays, my friends have come to believe that, happiness is in the ‘fashion’, it is in the ‘drink’ and it is in the ‘flings’. It is in everything that can be bought. More bluntly put all of we have been made to believe in the fact that happiness can be bought!

I can take this post further and talk about clichéd facts like, how happiness cannot be bought or how happiness is found in the laugh of a baby or how happiness is in just watching the sun go down at a quiet beach. But then we know all about this, don’t we? And for those of us who have experienced these moments, we’ll know that even these moments are temporary. Now don’t think that I killed all the sources of happiness in your life, I am not done yet, there is something permanent!

There was this one day when our life started, there was this moment, when we were just one cell old and there was a person who loved us since then. He saw us grow from, one cell, to a whole baby, He saw us take our first steps, and heard our first words. Yes! He was there all the while. He waited for us to realize that our strength is in Him, our peace is in Him and our happiness is in Him. But we didn’t, we didn’t because we were too busy discovering the world around us, we didn’t because we were too busy eating from the so called ‘tree of life’, we didn’t because we were too busy trying to find love, peace and happiness. Our search for temporary love, peace and happiness not only blinded us from His everlasting love, peace and happiness but also has made us slaves, slaves to passing pleasures.

Still God waits. “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.”(1 John 1:9 |Bible) He waits to give us the ‘peace that passes all understanding’, He waits to ‘make us a new creation’, He waits on us to ‘taste and see’ that He is good. God waits!

And when we run back to His arms, like the Psalmist we will proclaim “One day spent in Your house, this beautiful place of worship, beats thousands spent on Greek island beaches.” (Psalm 84:10|Bible|The Message translation)


Everlasting happiness can be found in the everlasting God