The error in expecting God to make you happy …

We think of happiness as a great human “right,” after all, in the United States Declaration of Independence we find this great phrase: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

But whether or not we are actually happy has a lot to do with the expectations we hold, a reality that prompted writer Neale Donald Walsch to proffer, “Expectation is the greatest source of unhappiness.”

Could it be that we determine our happiness based on whether others meet the expectations we have for them? According to Daily Guideposts, such was the case for a certain Frenchman …

Louis XIV was one of France’s greatest kings. Known as the Sun King for the brilliance of his court, he saw his armies make France the most powerful country of its time. He was not without losses, however. When he received the news of his crushing defeat by the English at Blenheim, he purportedly proclaimed, “How could God do this to me? After all I have done for Him!”

Such a statement sounds overtly arrogant, to think a man would hold God to his own expectations! Why, you’ve never done such a thing, right?

Or have you?

Maybe you have, it just didn’t sound so arrogant when you were doing it. Nevertheless, you found yourself perturbed with God for not living up to your expectations of Him, kind of like how author Janet Malone found herself surprised by one of her favorite actors:

The first time I watched John Travolta in the movie, “Broken Arrow,” I had a difficult time following the plot because I was used to seeing him in comedies, like “Look Who’s Talking.” Then he pulled out a gun on his friend and forced him to eject from a jet plane over the desert. I finally came to the conclusion that he had to be a bad guy, something I was not expecting. This so took me by surprise that I had to rewind the movie and start over again to see the movie as it was, not as I expected it to be.

Malone concluded her observation with this:

Our preconceived notions [expectations] can prevent us from seeing what God is really up to. We can miss what is right “before our eyes” and find ourselves continually “dissatisfied, impatient, angry, dismayed or disgusted”(ibid). When this happens, what we need to do is rewind and start over again, viewing the church through the eyes of a faith that believes that God can cause all things, even the flaws of the church, to “work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them” (Romans 8:28).

Perhaps it’s because our thinking — especially our expectations — can be so warped, so irrational, that the Apostle Paul takes pains to help us understand that God has so greatly surpassed blessing us with our needs, that He has also lavished upon us His grace; He has gone far beyond anything we could ever hope — or expect — and we had nothing to do with it!

“God saved you by his grace when you believed. And you can’t take credit for this; it is a gift from God. Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so none of us can boast about it,” Ephesians 2:8-9.

If our happiness with God is dependent on our expectations of Him, we’ll often be unhappy, not because God never meets our expectations, but because He consistently operates far beyond them …

“Now all glory to God, who is able, through his mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think,” Ephesians 3:20.

“‘My thoughts are nothing like your thoughts,’ says the Lord. ‘And my ways are far beyond anything you could imagine,'” Isaiah 55:8.

We can expect God to do what He has says He will do, and we can be more than happy with that. Otherwise, maybe we should refrain from setting expectations for ways God can make us happy and just be happy with an infinite God; just be happy knowing that He loves us, has our best interests in mind, and will always do what is best for us:

“And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them,” Romans 8:28.

If you can’t be happy with that, you cannot rationally be satisfied!

Scotty