Does God want us to be happy? What does the Bible say about happiness?

“Happiness” may seem like a passing thing, and hardly the ultimate goal in most belief systems. In fact, though, it is the Lord’s greatest goal for us: He wants us to be happy. If we allow it, He will lead and guide us to be as happy as we are able to be.

The whole reason the Lord created us was so that he could love us, and what else but happiness do you wish for someone you love? But the happiness the Lord wants for us is not the passing joy of satisfying our bodily desires but the exquisite eternal joy of conjunction with the Lord and true love of the neighbor, things that are harder to see and harder to attain but ultimately far more delightful.

Swedenborg distinguishes heaven’s happiness from worldly happiness of satisfying our bodily desires. In heaven, all happiness is felt from loving the Lord and being of use, living for the sake of others. Everything the Lord does is part of his attempt to lead us to that state, and in everything that happens to us - even the things that are the most tragic on the natural level - he provides opportunities for us to move toward that state.

In Arcana Coelestia 6392, there's this: "...performing good deeds without thought of recompense is that in which heavenly happiness consists." A couple of sentences later, there's another key statement -- i.e. that this real love of the neighbor has to be rooted in a "new will" in us, a will that can only be implanted by the Lord when we make room for it, and seek it.

In the American Declaration of Independence, the "pursuit of happiness" is one of the 3 enumerated inalienable rights that our Creator endows us with. Certainly, the Lord wants our happiness, and wants us to pursue it. In a way, though, if we pursue it directly, externally, we will probably not get it. If we pursue happiness for others, we will be making our minds open and ready for that new will. (See Arcana Coelestia 454 for more about this.)

The Lord also leaves us in freedom. We can reject his efforts and turn away if we choose to, and while that choice may seem to us to lead toward happiness, it's a passing, low-level happiness that is ultimately only a shadow of the joy he desires for us. However, people in hell are "happy" being there - at least as happy as they CAN be - because the life there matches the self-centered love they cultivated while on earth. If people in hell could be lifted up to heaven, they would feel tormented.

From Psalm 65:9-13:

Thou visitest the earth, and blessest it; thou makest it very plenteous.

The river of God is full of water: thou preparest their corn, for so thou providest for the earth.

Thou waterest her furrows; thou sendest rain into the little valleys thereof; thou makest it soft with the drops of rain, and blessest the increase of it.

Thou crownest the year with thy goodness; and thy clouds drop fatness.

They shall drop upon the dwellings of the wilderness; and the little hills shall rejoice on every side.

The folds shall be full of sheep; the valleys also shall stand so thick with corn, that they shall laugh and sing.

From John 15:11:

I have told you these things so that My joy may be in you and your joy may be complete.

(References: Arcana Coelestia 1153 [2]; Divine Providence 37)

1153. That 'the sons of Gomer' also means those who possessed external worship, but an external worship derived from that which existed with the nation Gomer, follows from what has been stated and shown several times already about the meaning of 'sons', as well as from the fact that Gomer is one of those nations which possessed external worship corresponding to internal. Seven nations which possessed such worship are mentioned by name in the previous verse, and seven again, called 'the sons of Gomer and of Javan', in this. The specific differences however between one nation and another cannot be stated, as only their names are given here. In the Prophets however when the subject is specifically this or that type of Church-worship the differences can be established. In general all variations of external worship, as also of internal, arise according to the adoration of the Lord in the worship, and the adoration is according to the love to the Lord and love towards the neighbour that exist there. For it is within love that the Lord is present, and thus within worship. The differences of worship therefore existing among the nations mentioned here depend on the nature of His presence within.

[2] To make it easier to talk about how types of worship differ and how they did so in the Ancient Church among various nations, let it be realized that all true worship consists in adoration of the Lord. Adoration of the Lord consists in being humble; and being humble consists in the self-acknowledgement that with oneself there is nothing living and nothing good, but that with oneself everything is dead, indeed corpse-like. Being humble also consists in the acknowledgement that everything living and everything good come from the Lord. The more a person acknowledges these things not just with the lips but in his heart, the more humility he has; and consequently the more adoration - which is true worship - and the more love and charity, and the more happiness. The first contains the second, and they are so linked together as to be inseparable. This shows what these differences of worship are and the nature of them.

[3] Those who are mentioned here and are called 'the sons of Gomer and of Javan' are people who likewise possessed external worship corresponding to internal, but it was somewhat more remote than that of the people mentioned in the previous verse. This also is why they are called 'sons'. Generations descending one after another, or derivatives, here progress from what is interior towards things that are exterior. The more someone relies on the senses, the more exterior he becomes, and consequently becomes further removed from true worship of the Lord. For when it is more concerned with the world, the body, and the earth, and less with the spirit, it consequently becomes more remote. Because these people called the sons of Gomer and of Javan relied more on the senses, they focused worship even more on external things than those referred to as their parents and cousins had done. Consequently they form a second group here.

3490. Genesis 27

1. And so it was, that Isaac was old and his eyes were becoming dark so that he could not see; and he called Esau his elder son and said to him, My son; and he said to him, Here I am.

2. And he said, Behold now, I am old; I do not know the day of my death.

3. And now take, I beg you, your weapons, your quiver and your bow, and go out to the field and hunt venison for me.

4. And make me savoury food such as I love, and bring it to me, and I will eat, so that my soul may bless you before I die.

5. And Rebekah was listening to Isaac while he spoke to Esau his son. And Esau went to the field to hunt for venison, to bring it [home].

6. And Rebekah said to Jacob her son - she said - Behold, I listened to your father speaking to Esau your brother, saying,

7. Bring me venison, and make me savoury food, and I will eat, and I will bless you before Jehovah, before my death.

8. And now, my son, hearken to my voice, to what I command you.

9. Go now to the flock, and take for me from there two good kids of the she-goats, and I will make them into savoury food for your father, such as he loves.

10. And bring it to your father, and let him eat, so that he may bless you before his death.

11. And Jacob said to Rebekah his mother, Behold, Esau my brother is a hairy man, and I am a smooth man.

12. Perhaps my father will feel me, and I shall be in his eyes as one who misleads, and I shall bring upon myself a curse and not a blessing.

13. And his mother said to him, Upon me be your curse, my son; only hearken to my voice, and go, take them for me.

14. And he went and took them, and brought them to his mother; and his mother made savoury food such as his father loved.

15. And Rebekah took the best clothes ¹ of Esau her elder son, which were with her in the house, and put them on Jacob her younger son.

16. And she put the skins of the kids of the she-goats on his hands and on the smooth of his neck.

17. And she gave the savoury food and the bread which she had made into the hand of Jacob her son.

18. And he went to his father, and said, My father. And he said, Behold, here I am; who are you, my son?

19. And Jacob said to his father, I am Esau your firstborn; I have done what you told me. Rise up now; sit, and eat from my venison, so that your soul may bless me.

20. And Isaac said to his son, Why have you found it so quickly, my son? And he said, Because Jehovah your God caused it to come before my face.

21. And Isaac said to Jacob, Come near now, and I will feel you, my son, whether you are my son Esau, or not.

22. And Jacob came near to Isaac his father; and he felt him, and said, The voice is Jacob's voice, and the hands Esau's hands.

23. And he did not recognize him because his hands were hairy like the hands of Esau his brother; and he blessed him.

24. And he said, Are you my very son Esau? And he said, I am.

25. And he said, Bring it to me, and I will eat from my son's venison, so that my soul may bless you. And he brought it to him, and he ate; and he brought him wine, and he drank.

26. And Isaac his father said to him, Come near now, and kiss me, my son.

27. And he came near and kissed him. And he smelled the odour of his clothes, and he blessed him, and he said, See, the odour of my son, like the odour of the field that Jehovah has blessed.

28. And God will give to you of the dew of heaven, and of the fatness of the land, and abundance of grain and of new wine.

29. Peoples will serve you, and peoples will bow down to you. Be lord over your brothers, and your mother's sons will bow down to you. Cursed are those cursing you, and blessed those blessing you.

30. And so it was, as soon as Isaac had finished blessing Jacob, and Jacob had only just gone out from the presence of Isaac his father, that Esau his brother came in from his hunting.

31. And he too made savoury food, and brought it to his father; and he said to his father, Let my father arise, and eat from his son's venison, so that your soul may bless me.

32. And Isaac his father said to him, Who are you? And he said, I am your son, your firstborn, Esau.

33. And Isaac trembled very greatly, and he said, Who then is he who has hunted venison and brought it to me, and I have eaten from all of it before you came in, and have blessed him? Indeed, he will be blessed!

34. Even as Esau heard his father's words, he cried out with a great and exceedingly bitter cry, and said to his father, Bless me, me also, my father.

35. And he said, Your brother came in deceitfully, and has taken away your blessing.

36. And he said, Does he not call his name Jacob? And he has supplanted me these two times. He took away my birthright, and behold, now he has taken away my blessing. And he said, Have you not reserved a blessing for me?

37. And Isaac answered, and said to Esau, Behold, I have made him lord over you, and have given all his brothers to him as servants, and I have sustained him with grain and new wine. And for you therefore, what shall I do, my son?

38. And Esau said to his father, Have you but one blessing, my father? Bless me, me also, my father. And Esau raised his voice, and wept.

39. And Isaac his father answered, and said to him, Behold, of the fatness of the land will be your dwelling, and of the dew of heaven from above.

40. And by your sword you will live, and you will serve your brother; and it will be when you have dominion over him, that you will break his yoke from above your neck.

41. And Esau hated Jacob because of the blessing with which his father had blessed him; and Esau said in his heart, The days of mourning for my father are approaching, and I will kill Jacob my brother.

42. And the words of Esau her elder son were pointed out to Rebekah, and she sent and summoned Jacob her younger son, and said to him, Behold, Esau your brother is consoling himself concerning you [by planning] to kill you.

43. And now, my son, hearken to my voice, and arise, flee to Laban my brother, to Haran.

44. And stay with him for a few days, until your brother's wrath turns back,

45. Until your brother's anger turns back from you, and he forgets what you have done to him, and I send and fetch you from there. Why should I be bereft of you both in one day?

46. And Rebekah said to Isaac, I loathe my life on account of the daughters of Heth. If Jacob takes a wife from the daughters of Heth, like these of the daughters of the land, what would life hold for me?

CONTENTS

Previously, where Isaac and Rebekah were the subject, the internal sense dealt with the Rational and how the Lord had made it Divine within Himself. The internal sense now deals with the Natural and how the Lord made that Divine within Himself. Esau is the good, Jacob the truth, of the Natural, for while He was in the world the Lord did indeed make Divine within Himself His entire Human, both that which is interior, namely the Rational, and that which is exterior, namely the Natural, and the Bodily as well. He did so according to Divine order. According to the same order also the Lord renews or regenerates man, and this is why the representative sense here deals with a person's regeneration as regards his natural. In that sense also Esau is the good of the natural, and Jacob its truth. Nevertheless both are Divine because all good and truth that a regenerate person has come from the Lord.

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