Are you enjoying your relationship with the Lord every day!
Based on His word and my personal experience, I would venture to say that nothing gives Him greater pleasure than our enjoyment of Him, and He wants this to be our ongoing moment-by-moment, day-by-day experience. The instruction to “rejoice in the Lord always” (Philippians 4:4) is not just a directive for good Christian conduct or to have a positive attitude in difficulty. It is literally God’s desire for us. We read in Psalm 16:11, “You make known to me the path of life; You will fill me with joy in Your presence, with eternal pleasures at Your right hand.” And in Psalm 37:4, “Delight yourself in the Lord…”
The Lord never promised us that life will always be enjoyable or even pleasant. On the contrary, we are alerted that difficulties are unpredictable, inevitable and may even be excruciating. But the Lord wants to be our fountain of joy from which we can always drink.
How do we do this? The normal things we do to cultivate our relationship with the Lord are a part of the process, but they are not the most important ingredient. There is something that makes the doing of them a delight instead of a spiritual chore. And not surprisingly, that thing is faith. Not faith in a generic, vague sense, faith in Him! Faith in who He is. Someone once wisely said, the quality of all relationships comes down to our internal answers to four questions. What I think about you. What you think about me. What I think you are thinking about me. And what you think I am thinking about you. The Lord has given us an abundance of affirmation of His thoughts towards us, and He is always coaching us to think the right things about Him. That is our primary job. It is the key to the stability of our walk with Him, the deepening of our trust in Him, the growth of our fellowship with Him and the joy of our experience of Him.
“I have loved you with an everlasting love” (Jeremiah 31:3) is a good place to start. Talk it over with Him – I mean really – and let the joy of the Lord be your strength this holiday season.
(By the way, I will be unpacking this truth this Sunday. If this is relevant to your journey right now, feel free to join us at 11 a.m. Eastern time at Valleybrook.church. Just click on the streaming tab. Or tune in later in the week when it is posted for review under “Sermons.”)
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