It had been another rough night. Dad didn't come home for supper. Again. Clearly, the bar stool at Alex's Tap had much more appeal than sitting at the family table.

I was in my room feverishly working on my 7th-grade science project when I heard him come in the back door. Having developed keen hypervigilance at an early age I could determine my father's level of his intoxication simply by listening to him come into the house. When I heard his lunchbox scrape against the wall as he maneuvered the three-step landing leading to the kitchen I braced myself for a long night.

After eating his supper alone, all the while blaming my mother that his food was cold, he stumbled into the bedroom and shut the door. I prayed that this would be one of those nights when he slept until morning. I had to concentrate on my schoolwork. 

But as was often the case, my prayers, no matter how fervent, seemed to fall on deaf ears.

Dad got up every hour or so to drink more beer and to make sure my mom and I knew what worthless human beings we were. He would sit in the dark with his seemingly endless supply of of Stroh's and irately lecture us long into the night. Best I could tell, the reason he got drunk all the time was because my mom was a nag who didn't appreciate all he did for her and I was a lazy kid who would never amount to anything. It's funny how our brain tells us something is utter nonsense yet our heart believes it anyway. 

I put together my school project as best I could, all the while trying to ward off the unrelenting barrage of hurtful attacks and accusations coming from the kitchen. I really wanted to do well on this assignment. But the end result wasn't close to what I wanted it to be. It was a maddening metaphor of my life: not good enough no matter how hard I try. It wasn't fair.

I could feel the anger stirring in the pit of my stomach as I ate breakfast the next morning. Usually, that's where my anger remained. But on that particular morning, I let it out.

Without looking up from my bowl of cereal, I said to my mom who was tidying up the kitchen, "He can ruin his life if he wants to. But he's dragging you and me down with him. You need to get a divorce." 

Her response was immediate, as if she had rehearsed it a thousand times. Honestly, I was taken aback by the force of her words. Decades later I can still hear them in my mind, with the same intense inflection. With her hands on her hips she said emphatically, "I made a vow to him and to God and I'm not going to break it."

I had always viewed my mom as stubborn. And while that assessment was right on the money, these words weren't born out of hardheadedness. They emanated from a deep sense of conviction.

My mom was committed to husband. She made a promise to him in the presence of God that she would be his wife, for better or worse, till death did them part. Granted, she couldn't have known what worse was going to look like when she made that vow. But, to her, it didn't matter. A promise was a promise.

As a kid, I didn't appreciate her firmness. All I knew was I wasn't happy living with an alcoholic father and I was quite sure she wasn't too thrilled to have had an alcoholic husband.  But my mother's response made me realize something at age twelve that many adults still haven't figured out. God doesn't want us to be happy. God wants us to be holy. 

We live in an age in which personal preference often takes precedence over God's principles. Driven by our own desires, we are quick to disregard the will of God if we deem that it might make our lives unpleasant. The stark truth is, the Christian life is often unpleasant. Sometimes it's downright unfair. 
But we bring honor to God when we, through good times and bad, in sickness and in health, remain devoted to Him.

This is not to judge those who chosen divorce. I understand that all circumstances are different. But I also know that God is in the business of fixing broken things. He is truly able to do "immeasurably more than we could ask or imagine (Eph. 3:20)." And He most certainly came through for our family.

Some twelve years after my mom's declaration to me, God miraculously delivered my dad from his addiction. I was blessed beyond words to see my parents enjoy several years of life together, free from the effects of alcohol. I was able to reconcile with my dad and grow to love him for the gentle and kind man he really was. I came to understand that he was a good man who had a bad problem.

Before God took him home, I received Dad's permission to share our story with others who have experienced the horrors of alcoholism so that they, too, could discover hope and healing in the arms of a Heavenly Father who cares deeply for His kids. I have a sense that both of my fathers are proud.

I still find myself wondering, what if? What if my mom took the advice of her adolescent son? What if she decided to bail on her marriage? What if experiencing happiness in life was her primary motivator? And whenever my mind goes there I am overcome with gratitude for giving my mother the spiritual gift of stubbornness. Her uncompromising commitment to holiness has led to immeasurably more happiness than we could have asked or imagined.

It is said that six percent of the American population experience some form of tinnitus (ringing in the ears) at different stages of life. Many times it is simply a result of being subjected to loud noises and, after a period of time, it goes away. But over 12 million people have sought medical attention for tinnitus that doesn't go away. I am one of those people.

While there are some treatments that have helped make tinnitus more bearable, there is no known cure. The most common words of advice from even the very best ear, nose, and throat doctors: Learn to live with it. 

For me, most days the ringing is tolerable. Other days, for reasons I still haven't been able to figure out, it is quite pronounced. Today is one of those days.

I tend to like to be in control (those who have ever worked with me are saying, "Yeah, tell us something we don't know). But wanting to take charge of the situation has only proven to make it worse. The more I dwell on it, the more I try to fix it. The more I try to fix it, the more helpless I feel. The more helpless I feel, the more frustrated I get. The more frustrated I get, the more stress I experience. And stress is a known trigger for tinnitus sufferers. 

I am learning (I'm not there yet--but I'm learning​) to embrace my tinnitus as a means to experience at a deeper level God's wonderful gift of grace.

In the New Testament, the Apostle Paul acknowledged that there was a difficulty in his life which he referred to as a "thorn in the flesh." Biblical scholars have come up with a number of possibilities as to what Paul's thorn actually was. Some believe it was a physical disability, perhaps malaria, epilepsy, migraines, or an eye problem. Some are of the opinion that Paul's thorn was a temptation he was experiencing. Others contend it was a person who had gotten under Paul's skin.

No matter what it was specifically, there was something in Paul's life that clearly bothered him. And on multiple occasions he asked God to take it away. God's answer: “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” (2 Cor. 12:9)

What God said to Paul and what He is saying to all of us who struggle with adversity in our lives is this: Don't dwell on your problems. Dwell in my presence. My grace is all you need.

Every one of us has problems. Legitimate, difficult, sometimes painful problems. But while we can't choose which problems we'll have to deal with in our lives we do have a choice as to what we do with them.

Many of us, in the theater of our minds, choose to give our problems center stage. We choose to make them our primary focus. We choose to place our full attention on them. We choose to worry about them, we wonder about how to fix them, we ask why they are happening to us.

And left in the wake of our worry, wonder, and whys is any possibility of happiness, joy, and contentment.

If we have determined before we even get out of bed in the morning that it's going to be a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day, we may as well stay in bed. We'd actually be doing the rest of the world a favor. 

But, the truth is, we have a choice in the matter. Every day, at any given moment, we can choose to be happy simply by choosing what we want to think about. 

Groucho Marx once said, "Each morning when I open my eyes I say to myself: I, not events, have the power to make me happy or unhappy today. I can choose which it shall be."

So how might our lives be different if, rather than settling into our ringside seats every day to watch how our problems are going to play out, we chose to place God center stage? What if we chose to make make Him our primary focus? What if we chose to place our full attention on Him? What if we chose every day to watch God's love, mercy, and grace show?

I am in no way saying that we must simply think happy thoughts and ignore our problems. But there is a big difference between dealing with our problems and dwelling on our problems.

A person who chooses to dwell on their problems cannot be happy. But a person who chooses to dwell in God's presence cannot be unhappy.

Many people have justified their life choices by using the rationale, "God wants me to be happy." But does He?

In a word, yes. As long as our happiness is not a result of sinful behaviors that we know from His Word would not make Him happy. 

Contrary to the concept many have of God, He is not a dour, fun-deprived deity who is incapable of a good belly laugh. God created grins and giggles. He designed smiles and snickers--of both the chortle and the chocolate variety. 

A sense of humor is one of God's most glittering gifts. I'd love to give one to those who have clearly been deprived, but I've learned the hard way that if people aren't factory-equipped there is little I can do about it.

God is a Father who delights in His children. He enjoys seeing us smile. It warms His heart when His kids relish the life He's given us. 

It was King Solomon (and not the Byrds) who wrote,

       There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens:
              a time to be born and a time to die,
              a time to plant and a time to uproot, a time to kill and a time to heal,
              a time to tear down and a time to build,
              a time to weep and a time to laugh,
              a time to mourn and a time to dance,
              a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
              a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing (Ecclesiastes 3:1-5, NIV).

Solomon's little song was concluded with the words, there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to do good while they live (v. 12).

So, yes, God desires us to be happy. But it is even more meaningful to Him that we be joyful.

Happiness and joy are often used interchangeably. But there is a big difference. Joy--God's preferred emotion--goes much deeper.

• Happiness is a feeling. Joy is an attitude.

• Happiness leaves when adversity comes. Joy remains in good times and bad.

• Happiness is based on our circumstances. Joy is based on God's promises.

• Happiness is a result of things going right. Joy is a result of being right with God.

It is joy that keeps us cheerful in those trying times of uprooting and tearing down. It is joy that lifts our spirits when we find ourselves in those difficult times of weeping and mourning. It is joy that enables us to smile, even in times of death.  

Because God is very fond of us He wants us to be happy. Because He wants the very best for us He wants us to be joyful.