JOY: The Renewal Frequency

Joy can disappear even when life looks “fine” on the outside and it can show up when everything is falling apart. That tension is exactly why I call joy the renewal frequency: it is not the reward you get after you arrive, it is the fuel that gets you there.

I walk through Nehemiah 8:10, “the joy of the Lord is your strength,” and get painfully practical about joy vs happiness. Happiness rises and falls with circumstances, but Christian joy is an internal condition rooted in our relationship with Jesus. That difference changes how we lead, how we build businesses, how we handle conflict at home, and how we move through seasons that feel like war.

We also look at Scripture that refuses to separate joy from suffering: Jesus enduring the cross for the joy set before him, and Paul and Silas singing hymns in prison at midnight. Then I share one of the hardest stories of my life, losing our twin sons late in pregnancy, and how God met us with strength and presence in the middle of grief.

If you feel easily triggered, exhausted, or like your peace depends on things going your way, press play and pray with me for renewed joy. Subscribe to Proximity, share this with someone who needs strength today, and leave a review with the one line that stood out to you most.

Transcript

Welcome And Series Setup

SPEAKER_00 0:35

Hey guys, welcome to another episode of Proximity. I am your host, Ken Joclin. Super excited as we continue the series that we started out of my upcoming book, 14 Frequencies of Proximity. So, this is your first week. Today we're in week number five or frequency number five, which is joy. And joy we call in my upcoming book the renewal frequency. Joy really is the thing that we need. It's the thing every single day that renews us, it's the thing that gives us strength. Joy is not what you get when you finally arrive. Joy is the fuel that helps us get there. So let me say that again. Joy is not the thing that you and I get when we finally arrive. Joy needs to be the fuel that gets us to

Joy As Daily Renewal Fuel

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our destination. And I love Nehemiah 8.10. And I'm going to read Nehemiah 8.10 right here out of my Bible. And this is the joy of the Lord is your strength. The joy of the Lord is your strength. And I want to talk tonight a little bit the difference between joy and happiness. Because again, happiness and joy are two totally separate things. Joy isn't what we get at the destination when we're finished. Joy literally is the fuel that God gives us, it's the renewal frequency. That's why every single day you can rise up and start all over again. Every morning, every time something bad or negative happens, which guys, listen, we live in a world at war. The fall of Adam put forth this world that we live in. And if you

Joy Versus Happiness Explained

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are a faith-based entrepreneur, if you're a faith-based individual and you're listening to this podcast, you understand exactly what scripture says. Jesus said, listen, you're going to be offended. You're going to be persecuted. Like these things are going to happen to you. I understand a lot in the Western church and the Western culture, we do. It's health, wealth, prosperity, all of those things. Do I think God wants us healthy? Yes. Do I believe the covenant that God gives us wants us healthy? Yes. Does he want us wealthy or does he want us to be good stewards? I think if we're good stewards, we will have everything that God desires for us to have. So let's get back in today. Frequency number five, joy, which is the renewal frequency. Again, joy isn't what we get when we finally arrive, it's the fuel that gets us there. If we lose or when we lose joy, we lose the engine. That is the thing that propels us into what God has for us. So, guys, we can't pour out of an empty tank. Joy is what replenishes, joy is what refuels us every single day. So, Nehemiah 10, the joy of the Lord is our strength, is what Nehemiah wrote. So, out of Nehemiah 10, I want to talk about the difference between joy and happiness, because a lot of people, we don't really understand the difference. And I'm going to explain how happiness is an external thing when joy for the Christ follower is the internal thing. Two totally different things. Happiness and joy are not the same thing. And if you hear the world talk, the world's like, I just want to be happy. Well, let me break that down for you. Happiness or the word happy comes from the word happiness, which comes from the word circumstances. It's so if, or actually, it's happy goes into happenstance, which comes from circumstance. So if the circumstances in my life are going really, really well and things are happening well on the outside, externally, my job, my marriage, my kids, on the inside, I'm happy. Joy, on the other hand, is a completely different thing. Literally, everything around you can be falling apart. Even the scripture, it says, for the joy set before him, Jesus endured the cross. The most humiliating, painful, agonizing, torturous way that you could take the life of another human being. And scripture says, for the joy that was set before him, he endured the cross. And what that tells me, and what that tells you, and the encouragement that he gives us today as you listen to this podcast is this that if I lean into and really and really seek joy and not happiness, then what I've done is I literally have trusted God for my surroundings, my environment, my presence. I've trusted him versus trusting the circumstances that are going on in my life. And guys, joy, again, is an internal thing. Let's talk about some of the things that joy is and some of the things that joy is not. Joy is an internal condition of your heart. The deeper and the more intimate we get to be able to connect with Christ, joy will be the fuel. Joy will be the thing that strengthens us to take the journey. When you look in Acts chapter, I believe it's Acts chapter 16, when they they put them in prison and at midnight they were singing hymns. Now they've been beaten, they're in prison. Like, why are you singing hymns? Because they had joy. Because

Joy Under Pressure In Scripture

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the way they acted and lived their life wasn't based on circumstances that happened to them externally. Otherwise, they would have been in the prison at midnight complaining to God about what was going on in their life. But Paul didn't do that. They sang hymns at midnight, earthquake happened, chains fall off, prison doors are open. And the jailer goes, Well, how come you haven't left? And the jailer's literally about to take his own life. And said, Paul said, No, don't do that. And he could see the joy on their lives. I've asked this question a ton of places in a ton of rooms to thousands and thousands of people. When you walk into a room, do people gravitate towards you or away from you? Do you know who the people, the type of person that people keep gravitating towards? It's the person who lives their life with joy. And you want to talk about a witness, you want to talk about an example for the world that does not know Jesus, is when a Christ follower can live a life in such a way that the world looks on the outside and goes, oh my gosh, you've got all these things happening to you, but yet there's something different about you. You're not downcast. Your countenance isn't like you're you actually have joy in the midst of things that are going on around you that causes the world to be confused, guys. And listen, entrepreneurship, hard, marriage, hard, raising kids, hard. Like some of these things, they're difficult things, guys. And when we even even when we look at those things through the lens of seasons and we look at those things as listen, there's going to be a moment that I'm in this and it's going to be difficult. But life is hard in general. But God's saying, Nehemiah 8:10, the joy of the Lord is your strength. Jesus, this it said about Jesus for the joy that was set before him, he endured the cross. Skill can say, so what is joy? Joy is an internal condition that comes from, it is an immediate, intimate result from my relationship with Jesus. Man, when I sit here and I can get in God's word, and I can literally just get in God's word and say, God, speak to me today. Even sometimes, guys, God can give you a word of rebuke. He can pinpoint something in your heart, an area in your heart, something that you said, something, there's a motivation in your heart that you may not even realize is there. He can pinpoint that motivation and it's still not hurt. It still can be joyous. God, thank you for revealing that to me. God help me work through this.

Repentance That Restores Joy

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God, that area of my heart, guys, do you want to know what brings joy? When God reveals something in your heart, this is my book, my in two books. I'm writing a book right now called Course Correct: The Power of Self-Awareness and Repentance. What does that look like for us to be self-aware? But, guys, when we're self-aware and we want God to speak to us, what happens, the result of that is God can rebuke us. He can show us something in our life that we may need to repent over. Father, anywhere in my heart or anywhere in this action or my motives, God, that I would hurt your heart or sin against you, I bring that area of my heart to death through the cross of Christ. And God, I just pray through the power of the gospel of Jesus, God, when we bring flesh to the cross, it dies. And when it dies, it produces what? Spirit. God, I just pray anywhere in my heart or in that area that God gives you, that he reveals to you. God, in that area, anywhere where I've sinned against you, Father, I just repent number one. And God, I bring that heart, that area of my heart, that motivation, that behavior, that trauma, whatever it is, I bring that to death through the cross of Christ. And I pray, God, just the power of the gospel would change my heart. The more we do that, guys, the more God will fill you with joy. One of the most difficult days in my entire life. I am in the middle of pastoring and building one of the largest youth ministries in the country. This is in the late 1990s. My daughter Holly, who is now 30, was about one and a half. And I'll never forget the first week of April. I believe it was in 1998, first week of April 1998. So Holly would have been two. She would have been two years old. First week of April 1998, we're pregnant. And we're pregnant with, which we really didn't, we didn't know this until the end. And Christy was about

Losing Twins And Choosing Worship

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six months pregnant, and we were pregnant with twin sons. And so we're going into now we had we had with with this pregnancy a year and a half, two hours, two years after the first pregnancy, and and and the girl's mom worked at labor and delivery. So we were there a lot. So they're always doing ultrasounds and doing the stuff. And so obviously we found out they were twins a little earlier. And so we're just a normal checkup day, a little bit over six months into the pregnancy. And it was a Thursday, Thursday morning. And I'll never forget it. I we had a staff meeting on Thursday morning. I was a youth pastor, and we had a staff meeting, and I said, hey, I said, I'm gonna go with Christy to the doctor's office today. We didn't think anything was wrong. It's just a normal visit. And I'll never forget, we get in the car, we get there, and we're doing the ultrasound. And again, Christy worked in labor and delivery, so she knew a lot of what was going on. And Regina, who was doing, who was a dear friend of ours who worked very close with Christy. We're at the OB doctors, one of the people, Dr. Cox and Dr. Little, are two of the people who delivered all of our babies, all of our girls. And we're doing the ultrasound, and I'll never forget the look on Regina's face. And she goes, guys, I need to go get Dr. Cox. And I remember looking at Christy and she, I saw it in her. And I'm like, oh my gosh, God, okay, what's going on? And so Dr. Cox comes in, does the ultrasound. Again, we're six, six and a half months, it's pregnant with the twenty with the boys. And for those of you guys don't know, I have four daughters 30, 27, 23, and 17. And Dr. Cox comes in, he he's on the ultrasound, he's looking, he's looking, he goes, guys, I'm so sorry, but I don't have a heartbeat on either one of the boys. And it's the most difficult moment of my entire life. I've never had anything happen. And I've had some some hard things happen, but nothing like that in my entire life. And so I'll never forget we're there on a Thursday, and they said, Hey, listen, come back in tomorrow. Let's check again. And so we go home that night, that that day on Thursday. Obviously, the church is praying for us. Friday, we we get together with some of my leaders in my youth ministry Friday night to have dinner. And that's when uh we hadn't gone back to the to the to Dr. Cox and Dr. Little's office on Friday. And again, no heartbeat, no anything. And I'm like, I just want community. Like I want to be around my leaders. And so we had about some eight or nine couples, and we all went to dinner that night. Never forget it. We go to dinner, and in the middle of dinner, Christy started the all the labor and everything started to kick in. And we already had an appointment to come in Monday morning. And so Monday morning, we we make it into the to the hospital for her to have the two boys. And, you know, all of her nurses that worked in labor and delivery with her, Dr. Cox, Dr. Little, like both doctors are there. Just a lot of people there to support us. And we're walking through this. It's the hardest weekend in my life because I'm praying and believing, God, to touch and heal my boys. God, if you don't, God, I want to handle what for whatever reason this is going on in my life. I want to be able to handle this the right way. And so I never forget we get in the hospital early that morning, like 5:30 a.m., and they they do all the IVs and everything to start, to start the labor and the delivery process. And just a few hours later, she, Joshua and Caleb were born. One was a good bit larger than the other. The issue was a thing they call twin-to-twin transfusion, uh, where one of the umbilical cords pulls away from the placenta. One gets more nutrition, the other gets none, eventually takes the smaller one's life, and that life, loss of life, eventually takes the life of the other. And so we're in the hospital and we've got friends and her her nurse friends that were there in labor delivery. And I'll never forget we got done, and Dr. Cox wrapped Joshua and Caleb up in a blanket, just like they did for all four of my daughters. And I'll never forget they handed Joshua and Caleb to me and to Christy, and we're sitting there and we're looking at them, and God said, I want you to worship me. I want you to honor me. And I wrote about this in my book because it's uh it's one of the moments in my life that was is probably still the most difficult. And I'm standing there and I've got my two sons in my hand. They're wrapped up in a little blanket, and they're just tiny. You know, they're six months, and so they're just they're little. You can see their fingers and their toes and their and their little eyes, and you can see all this stuff. And so I've got my boys, and I said, God, I said, I just want to honor you and worship you. And Father, I thank you that your word says in John 10, 10, that the enemy comes to steal, kill, and destroy. But you have come, Jesus, to give us life and give us more, give it to us more abundantly. And God, never let anyone say that the enemy or God needed another angel in heaven because God doesn't operate that way. God says, Jesus says in John 10, 10, I've come to give you life and give it to you more abundantly. He's not the author of the author of death, he's not the author of confusion or any of those things. I said, never let anyone say God had anything to do with this, because this is, this was 100% an attack of the enemy. And I'll never forget, man, I got through and I prayed and I had lifted the boys up and we prayed, and everybody in the rooms gathered hands and we got done. And it was amazing the joy that God gave me through that process to the point. A few months later, getting ready for Create, which was my national youth leadership conference. Uh, the last one we did in 2000, September 2000, we had about 400 people there from youth pastors, senior pastors from about 18 different states and praying for create. And I'm getting ready for my national youth leadership conference and praying for this. And it's I had a vision. It's the only vision I've ever had. I've never had another vision ever. And I had a vision and I saw the boys. I saw Joshua and Caleb. They were about five or six years old, dark haired, dark brown eyes, like mine when I was young. And I saw Jesus sitting on the throne, and he had one of my boys on each, on each leg. And it was, he didn't say anything. I didn't hear anything. It was just I saw this vision of them, and it was like the Holy Spirit just said, Ken, you're going to get to see them again. I have them, and they're just fine. And you want to talk about joy?

A Vision That Brought Peace

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Guys, you want to talk about the renewal frequency that renewed me. And guys, if you're listening to this podcast today, I want to encourage you. I don't know what you're going through. It could be difficult. Life could be amazing right now, but you still don't have joy. If things happened, it it you can get triggered really, really quick. And if you're, if you can tend to get triggered or you can tend to get frustrated or lose your temper, guys, that's not joy. That's someone who leans in and seeks happiness. And I want to encourage you to just pray a prayer. As a matter of fact, I'm going to pray one with you right now. I want to pray this with you right now. And I want to encourage you to lean into your relationship with Christ and just ask, God, I need you to give me joy. God, all of the other things, the circumstances, the material possessions, all of the things, those things are great, guys, and they're amazing. And they can, they can, man, it can be a fun life when you have those things. But the reality of it is, if you don't have joy, it can be difficult. I would love to lead you in a prayer right now. If you're listening to this, you're driving down the road, please don't stop. Please don't shut your eyes. Just pray it with your eyes open. But Jesus, I thank you for the sacrifice that you made for me. And Jesus, I just pray through your Holy Spirit, you help me understand the scripture that for the joy set before you, Jesus, you endured the cross. And God helped me understand that I am that joy. That as your son or your daughter, I am the joy that you saw,

A Guided Prayer For Joy

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that you knew was coming down the road. So you endured the cross. The humiliation, the pain, the disgrace of all of that. You endured that because I am your and I was your joy. God help me with that. And Holy Spirit, help me to understand and be content in my relationship with you, to steward what you've given me well, understanding that you will give me more to steward. But God help me walk in peace and walk in joy. In Jesus' name. Well, guys, thank you so much for joining us for another episode of Proximity with Ken Johnson. Frequency number five, guys, joy, the renewal frequency. Guys, if you want something that will wake you up every single day, it's cultivating your relationship with Christ to such a way, to such a degree that all the outside chaos and all the outside noise doesn't really matter. But God, I just desire your presence. And when you do, you will have joy. What did Moses pray when they were getting set free from Egypt? He said, God, if you don't go with us, I don't want to go. I'll stay right here with

Final Encouragement And Next Steps

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your presence, then leave captivity without it. Guys, joy is the renewal frequency, and it can be yours. Pray, ask God for it, and just dive into his word and go, God, give me a greater joy, passion for you, for your word. And I promise you guys, they'll do something special. I'll see you next week on the next episode of Proximity with Ken Jocelyn.