APRIL 2010: OUR SUPREME DELIGHT

God has given us many things to enjoy upon the earth. Our lives are full of so many undeserved blessings: good food, a roof over our heads, clothes to keep us warm, running water, electricity, family, friends, a job, education, a ministry, etc. By the grace of God, it is human nature to enjoy the good things that life offers us. We were made that way. Happiness is found in the simple things; not in the spectacular. Ecclesiastes reminds us five times that, ‘there is nothing better for a man, than that he should eat, and drink, and that he should make his soul enjoy good in his labour’ (Ecclesiastes 2:24; see also 3:13; 5:18; 8:15 and 9:7). When a man or woman’s heart is at peace with God, there is joy in food, drink and work. What could be more down-to-earth than that?

But the supreme delight for all believers is something (or someone) more than ordinary. This person is called ‘God’. He is the delight of delights; the joy of joys; the pleasure of pleasures. It was Augustine who began his Confessions writing, ‘You have made us for yourself; and our souls are restless until they find their peace in You’. Unbelievers satiate their desires by fulfilling their lusts. But the desire (and indeed the absolute lust!) of the believer is Christ Himself (lust in the sense of the most burning desire that we have). We yearn for Him and His presence. Asaph ached for God. In Psalm 73 he penned these words, ‘You have destroyed all them that go a-whoring from You. But it is good for me to draw near to God’ (vv. 27-28). That word ‘good’ hides a world of meaning. It is pregnant with significance. It is the same word in Hebrew as when God ‘saw everything that He had made, and behold, it was very good’ (Genesis 1:31). Creation was bountiful, pleasing to God, a pleasure and a paradise. What creation was to God; He is for us. Jesus is our Paradise. He is our Garden of secret jewels and treasures.

Love is the strongest drawing force that this world has ever known; and a believer who sincerely draws near to God is overcome by love. Love cannot let God go! Love holds on when it seems impossible to do so. Love is passionate, zealous and altogether fire-like. It is stronger than the grave and deeper than the seas. God is love. And if you want to know God; then your love must be the Lord. No-one knows Him except those who love Him. And love makes the loved one seem so worthy of delight and pleasure. God is our delight, yea, our supreme delight. The children of darkness mock at such a thought; but you can’t get anywhere in your relationship with God without love. Love is jealous. Love demands your all. The Reformer Henry Bullinger wrote of prayer in this fashion, ‘Every prayer of the believer must be guided by faith and love’. The God-seeker Thomas à Kempis said, ‘All is vanity except to love God and serve Him’. The Puritan Stephen Charnock said, ‘When we delight in God, then our prayers will be answered’. King David promised, ‘Delight yourself in the Lord, and he shall give you the desires of your heart’ (Psalm 37:4).

When you delight yourself in God; your desire will be ‘God’. And when the desire of your heart is for God Himself; then how will God refuse your request? It is our Father’s delight to reveal Himself to His God-thirsty children. The greatest gift God can give us is Himself. And He has done so in the Person of His Son, that One we call ‘salvation’: Christ, our supreme delight.

So, do you earnestly delight in God? If you lost everything else in this world; could you proclaim with the patriarch Job: blessed be the name of the Lord? Delight yourself in Him; for He delights Himself in you. You are precious for Him; and He is more than precious for you. If you want to know more of God, the key to it all is to desire and to delight in Him.