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In John 3, a man comes to Jesus looking for something more. He sensed in his spirit that Jesus might show him the way to something more. But Jesus' words confused him just a bit. Jesus said, if you want something more, "You must be born again." What in the world does that mean? It means that in Jesus, God offers us something more that's so radically different that it's like being born all over again; like starting over and being delivered into a whole new world, for a whole new life. It's not just more of the same old, same old. It's not just like before only better. It's not cosmetic or marginal; you are on your way to a breathtaking, supernatural, eternally new life.

Are you looking for something more?

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Here's a principle of joy on the Jesus-Way, it's so key. If we want joy, if we want to
live our one and only life overflowing with joy, don't miss this principle. It's found in the first of Jesus' miraculous signs; turning water into wine. Here's the principle. When the wine runs dry and you come to Jesus looking for joy, we can ask for anything as long as we are willing to surrender everything.

Mary told the servants, "Just do whatever he tells you to do." Are you willing to do whatever he asks? This is an issue of surrender. Am I willing to surrender control? When we ask for a miracle we honor God's hand by the size of our request, but we honor his heart by our willingness to do whatever he asks.

That's how we find joy on the Jesus-Way!

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Jon Ortberg writes, "God is the happiest being in the universe." God also knows sorrow, but the sorrow of God is a temporary response to a fallen world. The sorrow will be banished when the world is set right. Joy is God's basic character. Joy is God's eternal destiny. God is the happiest being in the universe." Perhaps few things are more essential for the life we long to live than the essential of joy. An unexplainable, uncontainable, contagious and outrageously overflowing joy that doesn't require a changing of my circumstances, or a looking away from pain. It's a joy that comes in spite of the hard.

So perhaps throughout this episode and after it, our simple prayer would be "God give me that joy, overflowing joy!"