Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice. – Philippians 4:4
“Rejoice in the Lord always” is an imperative, something we are told to do. This means that rejoicing is a decision, not simply a reaction. And if it is a command, then it is something that God intends us to be able to do. What God commands he equips. The object of our rejoicing shows us how this works.
We rejoice “in the Lord,” which is why we can do it always. We have never lived a moment of our lives when the Lord has not given us reason to rejoice with his presence and goodness and power and work. Rejoicing in the Lord means that he is the object of our rejoicing, it is aimed at him. And it means that we are in the Lord while we are rejoicing–we draw on him for our reasons and ability to rejoice. So to rejoice in the Lord is to be facing the Lord with our praises and offering them to him even as we receive from the Lord all his goodness and strength to be able to rejoice.
I originally wrote this post for my church, Immanuel Nashville, in our Daily Pulse email. If you want encouragement from God’s word delivered Monday thru Friday to your inbox, I encourage you to subscribe.
