The quest for happiness

Study passage: Matthew 5:1-11

The queue for the bus was held up as a young woman struggled with buggy, toddler and bags of shopping. I reached forward for her shopping and held the toddler’s hand as mum manoeuvred the buggy and baby on to the bus. The baby slept peacefully and, once on, the mother gathered up her toddler, sinking gratefully into the seat reserved for them. She smiled up at me and said: “Bless you.” For her, it was a simple expression of thanks. For me it was imbued with biblical meaning. Jesus talks about people who are ‘blessed’ in his Sermon on the Mount, and this word is often translated as ‘happy’. So, probably without realising it, this mother was wishing happiness upon me; that I might enjoy the abundance that comes from God. I was glad to receive it. 

Most of us share a human craving for happiness. It’s as old as history and seems to run through every culture. In times of poverty and hunger that longing can become acute, as every day presents a test of survival. Happiness can feel utterly absent in the destructions of war, where bombings and death plunge whole populations into loss and despair. I shudder to think of the long-term impact of the carnage and devastation suffered by people in Ukraine and the Middle East over the last few years. Future happiness is hard to imagine, when your home and loved ones have been wiped out and trauma is deeply etched into your memory. 

Even in societies that don’t suffer hunger, or war, happiness can be elusive. Overhearing a conversation on a train between three women, it became evident that none of them was very happy. Despite enjoying a measure of affluence and having time for leisure, it wasn’t long before their stories began to exude an air of dissatisfaction. Disappointments, poor relationships, worry over children and failed ambitions soon surfaced. “I shouldn’t complain,” acknowledged one woman as they stood to leave, “some people have it a lot worse.” Yet, clearly, her life was not as happy as she’d hoped it would be. 

Jesus’ teaching on happiness

The New Testament seems to understand the human need for happiness. The Gospels show how Jesus immediately recognised when it was missing in people’s lives. He understood the unhappiness of people cut off from others through disability or stigma. He recognised its absence in those who feel rejected by families or friends. He noticed when weary folk struggled with pain and defeat. And Jesus’ response was to minister to them, ‘blessing’ ones who were sick, lonely, unhappy and without hope. In so many gentle ways, Jesus’ compassion brought happiness to people who’d been written off by everyone else. 

Yet Jesus also challenges our ideas of what makes us happy. When he spoke to the crowds on the hillside (Matthew 5:1-11) he addressed a question people have been asking throughout history: “How can I be happy?” He provided short snapshots of what constitutes happiness and blessing in people’s lives, but, in doing so, turned our cultural ideas upside down. Not only did Jesus undermine most of our normal concepts of happiness, he also replaced them with what seems to be the opposite.  

Jesus’ ‘Beatitudes’ teach us that we’re not made happy by avoiding pain or grief, and happiness isn’t dependent on how we feel. We don’t become blessed through success or status, or by gaining power and controlling other people. Nor are wealth and riches the route to a happy life. And if we’re bent on paying back those who have wronged us, that will never usher in the happiness we long for. By contrast, all these things can become forms of bondage. Status can cut us off from others and foster self-delusion. Wanting to get our own back can take away our peace, and lead to bitterness and distorted motives. And thirst for riches can leave us insatiable, never satisfied. I found it revealing to read what one of the world’s wealthiest billionaires said when asked how much wealth he needed to be really happy. His answer? “Just a little bit more.” 

Reflecting Jesus’ values

At a meeting of aid organisation leaders at a London dinner I once attended, Archbishop Desmond Tutu spoke about poverty in Africa alongside the wealth of the affluent North. While thanking us for our concern and generosity in alleviating hardship, he made one courageous plea: that we do not also export our materialism and “emptiness of soul” into the African continent. He urged us to understand what happiness really is before we try to send it round the world. 

Tutu was appealing to the values and characteristics that Jesus outlines in the Beatitudes. What makes these fundamentally different from normal concepts of happiness is that they belong to the kingdom of God and tap into the meaning of our human lives before him. In the short phrases he spoke, Jesus reversed the perceptions and the standards of the world. It’s the ‘meek’ who will inherit the earth (v5), not those with ruthless ambition, the driven or the self-seeking. It’s those who “hunger and thirst for righteousness” who receive fullness (v6) not those with lavish expense accounts and a full wine cellar. It’s the “poor in spirit” (v3) who experience the joy of the kingdom, for they can see through the superficiality and glibness of this world and happily embrace what others might see as poverty.  

Through his teaching, Jesus broke every expectation of what it means to be truly happy or enjoy abundant life. Those who are happy trust God despite deprivation or hardship. When he used the phrases: “Blessed are the merciful for they will be shown mercy” (v7); “Blessed are the pure in heart for they will see God” (v8); “Blessed are the peacemakers for they will be called children of God” (v9) he was identifying these people as already living with the values of God’s kingdom. The bi-product of doing so is happiness. Even those who are suffering experience happiness, whether they’re mourning loss (v4) or undergoing persecution and injustice (v10), because, in spite of the cost, they are standing firm for God in a broken world. So they receive the blessings that come from serving in God’s kingdom and combatting evil. What these people all have in common is that the Holy Spirit has taken them beyond the superficiality of our world and shown them what it means to be citizens of the kingdom of God. 

How do we apply the Beatitudes today?

Being blessed – happy – is as important for us today as it was for Jesus’ hearers on the hillside. Jesus endorsed those things which help us to flourish in our normal, everyday lives. Good health, good work, good food, good relationships all help to build us up and make life pleasant. But in the Beatitudes he also taught us not to set our hearts on these things or put our trust in them, but to go deeper to find true happiness. Being blessed is about living in a state of grace where we choose to serve others in love, through our relationship with God and our citizenship in God’s kingdom. 

These Beatitudes apply to us personally and the Holy Spirit can help us to let them shape our identity as ambassadors for Jesus in our time and culture. But they are also world-changing structural principles that challenge the ways nations themselves should operate. The poor in spirit are those world leaders who do not want to conquer and dominate, but choose peace and good governance rather than war. The meek are those who are not caught up in announcing their own greatness but in seeking just leadership. Similarly, the merciful are those who don’t want to annihilate opponents or dissidents, but are ready to listen and find ways of reconciliation. When countries across our world start to hunger and thirst for righteousness, the hungry are fed, the poor are educated and the vulnerable find new strength. In contrast to the tyrants of his age and all ages, Jesus links happiness with the parameters of God’s gentle, life-giving world government. 

The search for happiness is also a costly calling. Jesus’ view of happiness is not triumphalistic, but hard work. The Beatitudes don’t offer us trouble-free lives. Being blessed children of God does not inoculate us against those who would hurt us, or cause harm to those we love. It rather gives us the strength to resist evil and pray for God’s word to break through. Women who work alongside the broken and needy understand this really well. They reject the kind of Christianity that suggests Christians should never suffer or be sick or despondent. Instead, in their work for others, they demonstrate the reality of God’s kingdom on earth, and know the deep blessings that come from this.