God’s Delight

“For the Lord taketh pleasure in His people...” – Psalm 149:4a

Again, God cares for your soul, Do you care for the souls of others? Do you care for your own soul?? Sometimes the way we treat our physical, emotional, and spiritual health is an affront to God. The soul is the totality of a person and God takes pleasure in all that you are. For you to decide that some aspect of your life is not worthy of being nurtured is not an act of sacrificial worship but of negligence.

We have seen that God cares for our souls and that we must exercise care as well – for our own lives and for the lives of others. Now we see the reason: God takes great delight in His people. He receives pleasure from His relationship with His children. It is had to fathom, but it is true.

Have you ever given someone you love a precious gift, something that you have received from another generation and a passing on through that person to subsequent generations? That gift is not really the possession of the person holding it as much as it is the heritage of the family line. You expect the recipient to care for it, protect it, and pass it on with care. You delight in seeing it displayed and honored. You are offended when it is treated with careless disregard for its significance and handled with common contempt.

It is a very imperfect example, but it points to some truth. We are not our own, the scripture sys, but bought with a price. We belong to God and have been made trustees of our lives in time and space. God’s purpose is to enjoy us and have a love relationship with us. He expects us to care for our own lives and nurture our souls with His Word, with fellowship, with healthy food and habits, and with life affirming relationships.

It grieves the heart of God when we do not take care of ourselves.

It also grieves the heart of God when we do not nurture and take delight in His other children. He expects us to see the loveliness of other people. When we find that difficult, He promises to help us and to love them through us.

Let us worship God by taking pleasure in Him, in our own lives as consecrated to Him, and in His children.

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Readings

ZEPH. 3:14-20

Sing aloud, O daughter Zion; shout, O Israel! Rejoice and exult with all your heart, O daughter Jerusalem! The Lord has taken away the judgments against you, he has turned away your enemies. The king of Israel, the Lord, is in your midst; you shall fear disaster no more. On that day it shall be said to Jerusalem: Do not fear, O Zion; do not let your hands grow weak. The Lord, your God, is in your midst, a warrior who gives victory; he will rejoice over you with gladness, he will renew you in his love; he will exult over you with loud singing as on a day of festival. I will remove disaster from you, so that you will not bear reproach for it. I will deal with all your oppressors at that time. And I will save the lame and gather the outcast, and I will change their shame into praise and renown in all the earth. At that time I will bring you home, at the time when I gather you; for I will make you renowned and praised among all the peoples of the earth, when I restore your fortunes before your eyes, says the Lord.

MARK 15:47-16:7

Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joses saw where the body was laid. When the sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, so that they might go and anoint him. And very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they went to the tomb. They had been saying to one another, "Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance to the tomb?" When they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had already been rolled back. As they entered the tomb, they saw a young man, dressed in a white robe, sitting on the right side; and they were alarmed. But he said to them, "Do not be alarmed; you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been raised; he is not here. Look, there is the place they laid him. But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him, just as he told you."

EXODUS 15:19-21

When the horses of Pharaoh with his chariots and his chariot drivers went into the sea, the Lord brought back the waters of the sea upon them; but the Israelites walked through the sea on dry ground. Then the prophet Miriam, Aaron's sister, took a tambourine in her hand; and all the women went out after her with tambourines and with dancing. And Miriam sang to them: "Sing to the Lord, for he has triumphed gloriously; horse and rider he has thrown into the sea."

Sing to the Lord

“Then sang Moses and the children of Israel this song unto the LORD, and spake, saying, I will sing unto the LORD, for he hath triumphed gloriously: the horse and his rider hath he thrown into the sea.” – Exodus 15:1

When we worship, we most often sing. It is an intrinsic response to the glory of God. Are these but songs or do they call us to a deeper reality of God and His purposes?

God does not leave us with an empty mandate to sing His praise, but a reason for singing. He acts in our history in a way that is so dramatic and redemptive that a song forms within us before the invitation to release it is given. We become the tablet upon which a composition of joy is written and we cannot help but shout His glories.

The song of Moses was at once, one of gratitude, adoration, and celebration. It was a hymn of joy and exuberant exaltation. It was performed with gusto and full engagement.

Some of the singing that takes place in churches is pitiful – not because it is not professional. God doesn’t require professionalism – except from professionals. It is not pitiful because it lacks full instrumentation or vocal training, nor because it is not pleasing to the ears or two contemporary or too old or too fast or slow. We are too shy or too boastful; - singing to ourselves or others, but not unto the Lord.

What is pitiful about much of today’s singing is that it lacks full engagement of body, soul, and spirit in exultant praise to God. That is what God desires – for us to be fully present in the singing of His praise – as was Moses in the desert. Sing unto the Lord.