Desire to Please God

How do we delight in the Lord? – Part 1
by Kelly Dixon

When I first thought of how to start this devotional series on how to delight in the Lord, I had every intention of the first devotional being about developing an intimate personal relationship with the Lord. In the midst of writing the second paragraph, the Lord revealed to me that while developing an intimate personal relationship with Him is His great desire, it is not where this series should begin. After much prayer, thought and consideration, He showed me how we should set our goal on developing the desire to please Him by leading me to the Scripture 2 Corinthians 5:9.

"So we make it our goal to please Him, whether we are at home in the body or away from it."

I’ve always admired the Psalms. Mainly because I can relate to David and his struggles. At one point, he is praising the Lord for all the joys in his life and then, before you know it, he is begging for forgiveness for how he has failed the Lord. For many years I wondered why the Lord would call David a “man after His own heart.” As my Christian walk progressed, I realized that it was not David’s goodness in which God honored Him with this grand compliment, but instead it was his desire. As you study the Psalms and the Scriptural accounts of David's life (1 Samuel 16 - 2 Samuel), you will see that David had a great desire to please God. Even when he failed, he would come back to God for reconciliation because of this great desire.

As I thought about David and his desire to please God, the Lord led me to reviewing the infamous faith chapter - Hebrews 11. Hebrews 11:6 tells us, “And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to Him must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek Him.” The word faith, like the word love, is used so much in our world today that it is washed out and we don’t value the meaning to its fullest. Faith begins with the recognition that there is a God. Through salvation of Jesus Christ and our belief that God sent Him to die on the cross for our sins, we are saved and have been reconciled with God to live with Him eternally. But where does faith go from there? How is it played out in our every day walk with Christ? Hebrews 11:6 points us further down the faith route towards seeking God earnestly. After salvation, we should seek God earnestly by seeking to please Him.

Hebrews chapter 11 gives us examples of people with great faith. As we look over these examples, we see that their faith was counted unto them because of their great desire to please God. Do you have the same desire to please God as . . .

• Abel, who desired to please God by bringing Him the best offering with a pure heart and no ulterior motives.
• Enoch, who desired to please God so much that his testimony spoke for itself.
• Noah, who desired to please God even when all things on earth were pointing towards him “loosing his mind.”
• Abraham, who even though he didn’t know what was ahead, obeyed God regardless the cost because he desired to please Him.
• Rahab, who by helping the spies showed her great desire to please God even though she didn’t know much about Him.
• Joshua, who desired to please God so much that even though God’s chosen strategy of war seemed ridiculous to his human mind, He still led the Israeli people in the way God directed to overcome Jericho.

Developing the desire to please God begins with a choice. After you've made the choice to please God regardless what it takes, then God begins to develop the desire in your own heart. It is then that we begin the journey of delighting in the Lord. I always encourage each Christian to have a daily time alone with the Lord. A time when you and the Lord speak to each other. A time when you allow His Word to speak directly to your heart so you can learn more about what pleases Him. However, If you do this daily as an obligation and not as a desire to please God and to know Him better, then it will become a dry mundane habit that eventually you will not value. Setting aside time to speak to the Lord is a must in the Christian life. Doing so with the desire to please God and know Him better is when that habitual time becomes delight. For it is during these times that the Lord molds your heart's desires into being like His.

Prayer: Heavenly Father, I desire to please You. Show me how I am not doing so. Spark my heart with a fire that will burn with delight by my faith revealing my desire to please You. This I pray as Jesus would pray. Amen,

Deepening The Walk
Reflecting The Bible

Take a moment to read over Hebrews 11. Choose a few of the people listed with great faith and look up their stories in the Bible. Grab your journal and reflect upon the story and ask yourself these questions:

1. If God asked me to do the same thing as He asked them or if I was placed in the same situation as them, what hesitations do I hold in my heart from doing as they did?
2. How did they delight in the Lord?
3. What blessings did they receive from delighting in the Lord?
4. Is my desire to please God as great as their desire was to please God?
5. How is God tugging on my heart right now to mold me into having more of a desire to please Him?