Inexpressible Joy

We’ve talked about irrepressible joy, joy, if you will, that you can’t shut up about. But the other side of that coin is, there is so much about the joy He gives that just doesn’t lend itself to being put into words. In the King James Version, it’s called “joy unspeakable and full of glory.” In other words, there is available to you today a joy that’s so deep and so durable that for all practical purposes, it is indescribable.

Peter says you have not seen him, but you love Him. Of course, it’s not necessary to see Him, because we know Him, and we know how His love was expressed on the cross… “But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8).

Peter had just got through talking about various trials and tests of faith that his readers would have to endure, and practically in the same breath he begins to talk about inexpressible joy. By now we know that joy doesn’t diminish in the face of trials or tests, but flourishes wherever Jesus is made Lord.

There’s a quote I love in A. W. Tozer’s The Pursuit of God (from a hymn by Frederick Faber):

Only to sit and think of God, Oh what a joy it is! To think the thought, to breathe the Name; Earth has no higher bliss.

It isn’t always necessary to talk. Just delight in the embrace of the God who loves you, and sit and think of who He is and let every breath exchange the cares of this world for the sweetness and the nearness of His presence. It is joy without equal, joy without limit, joy unspeakable.

Peter said this joy is not just unspeakable, it’s full of glory; it’s full of glory, because it’s full of Him—He is the joy! The moment you determine that His glory will be revealed in you because you’re going to cherish His presence and live out your life in service to Him, is also the moment when open access to your life is granted to the God for whom nothing is impossible, the moment when the God of miracles is welcomed into your circumstances—the moment God opens up a pipeline into your life for inexpressible, unspeakable joy.