Delight

'Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart.' Psalm 37:4

This verse reminds me of a kid let loose in a toy store with the instruction that anything you wish for you may have. But will that really bring that child happiness? Does getting what we really want bring us what we long for?

Many women long for a better figure, a better wardrobe, different hair, maybe even a different face or legs or something. We women are great at longing for something different instead of accepting ourselves for who we are. On the inside, deep down where no one sees, women long to be known and to be loved just for who they are, without the performance of wife, mother, employee, and friend. Other desires are noble and even biblical: that our children may know Him, or that our families would be bound into the love of Christ.

These are all great desires, but what if this verse is talking about something more? We all have experienced the feeling of delight. Think on the first time you held a newborn babe and brushed your lips across the sweet and downy forehead of new-life, life fresh from heaven. Or the first time chubby arms squeezed your neck and lisped the words, 'I love you'. That feeling of delight should fill our hearts and minds each time we think of the Lord. But how many of us, truly feel that way on a day to day, all day basis? Why are we so caught up in our lives that we forget the life-giver? Why do we forget that it is only by his grace that we live and breathe? Why do we think that this life must be conquered on our own?

To delight yourself in the Lord is to make His favor your delight. It is to seek after Him and His ways, day to day and moment by moment, breath by breath. Inhale. Exhale. He favors you. He delights over you. And if Someone can love us like that, shouldn't we then delight in His favor? In Him?