Today is a day wherein my prayer rests upon the desire for God’s children to know and to sense His delight in them. So much of religion presses us to do something. Do something delightful, good or worthy in order to gain acceptance from this incomprehensible God. Major world religions of various stripes place the constant onus on you to work up something to either remove the displeasure of God against you or to facilitate His favor on your behalf. This is work. This is toil. This can haunt a man in the night because he is never certain that he has done the right thing or enough of the right thing.
Yet the Scriptures teach that only one human has ever pleased the Father, and this was that man who was both human and divine. God’s acceptance of any one of us is found in the pleasure that the only begotten Son of God brought to His own Father. It is in Jesus that God is still well-pleased. Jesus is the beloved Son, and He lavishly poured out the basis of our acceptance with the Father when He spilled His own blood on Calvary. Now, mark my words: God the Father holds back no passion in communicating to you that you are His, and that He delights in you in ways that our hearts are reluctant to believe.
“For the Lord takes pleasure in His people; He adorns the humble with salvation.” – Psalm 149:4
“Let those who delight in My righteousness shout for joy and be glad and say evermore, Great is the Lord, who delights in the welfare of His servant!” – Psalm 35:27
These two missiles of truth land in our hearts to explode away our doubts and fears. God has accepted you, not because you were worthy then, or remain worthy at this very moment. He receives us because we are in His Son, Jesus. This is no forensic technicality, absent of emotion or delight. The basis of our acceptance may be judicial, but the vitality of our acceptance is animated in God’s immeasurable love for us. He loves you. He accepts you. He forgives you. He is pictured as dancing around you with joyful celebration (Zephaniah 3:17). He takes pleasure in you, and delights in the welfare of all His servants as we have read above. You are not tolerated by the Lord – you are cherished & welcomed by Him. It is His love for you, and goodness toward you, that must become your foundational rock of assurance.
Today let’s choose to dive into the deep end of God’s delight in us. Splash around some – it’s been a long time since some of us have done so. Some may have never risked it even once. Become soaked in the boundless sea of His acceptance. Swim as far as you will and there will be no rocky crags where the delight of Father comes to an end on your behalf. Oh that more of us would frolic in the acceptance of our Lord! We stand in a tub of lukewarm, ankle-deep water and call it salvation, when God has provided a crystal blue ocean for us with an open invitation to come, dive in and swim. Will you choose to believe that He is that good? Will you go past the theological nod of assent in acknowledging that He is good, and add to that theology the experience of His goodness on your behalf? Or will you, like many, choose for another day…another month…another year…to doubt His acceptance and love for you? Instead of swimming in the sea of His goodness, those who choose to doubt have sunk, never having left the shore.
Don’t let that be you. You were made to splash.
Father in my time of dispair you are always faithful,Thank You father for love ME.
Thank you Lord for all that you do for me and my family! I Praise you and give you all the Glory, in Jesus Christ Mighty and Holy Name I Pray. Amen
Praises to His name! I’m not “tolerated” by Him! So many times I feel that he is just tolerating me…I think to myself and even say to Him as if a reminder for Him to stay by me, with me, Lord I am Your child because of Your precious Son Jesus.
I want to remember this. That I am “cherished & welcomed by Him”! Wow, why is it hard to write that I am “cherished” by Him? I don’t feel worthy; but thankfully my feelings do not and will not change that fact! I will rejoice and be glad in it! Thank You Jesus! Thank You Father God! Thank You Holy Spirit! Amen!
Lord I’m amazed by YOU! How YOU LOVE ME!