Mormon Joy-What is it?

[_just me]

Zee, please continue! You are right on track with the OP.

I guess I never really thought about other Christians believing that they had a special joy that non-Christians don't have.

Maybe it is not that unusual of a belief after all.

[_moksha]

Trying to define happiness and joy as something more refined and exclusive to Mormons is like more of an exercise in group aggrandizement than anything real. As fellow children of the same God, such aggrandizements seem petty and ultimately galling to the listener.

[_Yoda]

I have always thought of joy as being synonymous with family. I doubt this perception would change for me whether I was in the Church or out.

[_Hades]

Mormon joy is like what happened to Tantalus. tantalize

To reach a fullness of Mormon joy you must be perfect, which is impossible. You are ever striving, yet never reaching.

[_huckelberry]

As best as I can consider it I find no real difference between Protestant assurance and Mormon testimony. Neither are joy to my understing.

I think of Christian joy as resulting from friendship, creating new friendship through helping others, love and creating with others. I do not think this joy is something different than the joy found by all kinds of people. We are after all all from the same God who brings rain and shine on all.

I do think that assurance can encourage people in the creation of joy. Christian faith, when it is not destroyed by Im better than you fights, encourages the creation of joy. I see no reason to think Mormon testamony would not encourage people to create joy. It does to my mind have the disadvantage of being weighted down with uncertainity however.

[_Hoops]

I am not a philosophy guy so I'm having a hard time with this topic. I humbly ask, how is "assurance" an emotion?

It isn't. So I have to disagree with the premise of the question.

Is not assurance nothing more than a condition that might provide someone joy?

That's a decent way to put it. I can live with that.

I'm curious about descriptions of the actual emotion itself.

We are admonished to distrust the resulting emotion.

Ignore me if you want. I don't really know what the hell I'm talking about.

No, I don't want to ignore you. Why would you say that? I'm trying to give you our persective the best way I know how.

[_Hoops]

As best as I can consider it I find no real difference between Protestant assurance and Mormon testimony. Neither are joy to my understing.

Probably the point of the op.

I think of Christian joy as resulting from friendship, creating new friendship through helping others, love and creating with others

.

You are certainly welcome to impress upon the word any meaning you wish. But that is not what it means to us.

I do not think this joy is something different than the joy found by all kinds of people

I think that is exactly the point. A Christian gets to experience "joy" that is wholely other than what you've described.

We are after all all from the same God who brings rain and shine on all.

Not sure what this has to do with anything.

I do think that assurance can encourage people in the creation of joy.

Well, good.

Christian faith, when it is not destroyed by I'm better than you fights,

I'm unfamiliar with these. Are they on Spike?

I see no reason to think Mormon testamony would not encourage people to create joy.

Interensting phrasing here. And telling.

It does to my mind have the disadvantage of being weighted down with uncertainity however.

Indeed. Not much of a joy then is it?" If it is joy at all.

[_huckelberry]

Hoops replied:"You are certainly welcome to impress upon the word any meaning you wish. But that is not what it means to us."

My return question,
Who is this us and why would you not include me? I am not Mormon, I am a Protestant. My comments about Christian joy I understand to be directly taught by Jesus and Paul. I really cannot imagine any other kind of Christianity.

[_Hoops]

Hoops replied:"You are certainly welcome to impress upon the word any meaning you wish. But that is not what it means to us."

My return question,
Who is this us and why would you not include me? I am not Mormon, I am a Protestant. My comments about Christian joy I understand to be directly taught by Jesus and Paul. I really cannot imagine any other kind of Christianity.

I've been through the entire theological gamut from RCC to low protestantism. I've heard many sermons on the subject of joy. I've never heard it described as you do. Perhaps I am wrong. But I can only give you what I have been taught, my impression of the teaching, and how it makes sense from a biblical perspective.

I don't think Jesus was ever asking us to conjure up an emotion as some kind affirmation of anything. Joy is opposite of that, though an emotion can and will coincide. But coincendental emotion is not the thing itself. That's His point.

[_why me]

Mormon joy: comes from the ability to live the word of god, ie, obey his commandments.

I think that that is it in a nutshell. And this definition of joy is no different than most prostestant sects or catholicism. Now in this world of debauchery, to be a christian is not easy. It is a constant swim upstream. And that can take aspects of joy away. But the definition still stands: to live the commandments. Such is Mormon joy.

And as christ said: These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full. This is my commandment, That ye love one another, as I have loved you. –Jesus Christ (John 15:11-12)

And cs lewis: When we are such as He can love without impediment, we shall in fact be happy. --C.S. Lewis