To Find Delight
We’ve spent the whole week considering how reaching for God’s Word benefits us in many ways. And one of the themes that we see very often in this Psalm is how it is God’s Word that brings the Psalmist a sense of delight!
Verse 47 says it: “I delight in your commands because I love them”. And we see it again and again – verse 77 “your law is my delight”; verse 92 “If your law had not been my delight, I would have perished in my affliction”; verse 97 “Oh, how I love your law! I meditate on it all day long”; verse 103 “How sweet are your words to my taste, sweeter than honey to my mouth!”; verse 111 “Your statutes are my heritage forever; they are the joy of my heart” and I could go on.
Finding Joy: Delighting in God's Word
Again I remind you that we don’t want to be bibliolaters – worshipping the Bible as if it is God. No, these verses are not about that – the Psalmist is saying that it is within the Bible that I find delight and joy and happiness because of how God is revealed in these pages.
Is the Bible delightful to you? Is it sweet tasting like honey to your soul? Does it bring joy to your heart? Many of us never think of the Bible in this way – we think of it more like a textbook. We think we probably should read it, because it is the story of God’s people, but perhaps we don’t see it as something delightful.
The Psalmist didn’t make that mistake! For him, opening the book and reading God’s Word was the most joyful and delightful thing he could do, because it was there that he encountered God!
In fact, have you ever considered that God commands us be delighted? Psalm 37:4 says “Delight yourself in the LORD, and he will give you the desires of your heart”. God wants us to find delight in Him, and one way to do this is to reach for Him in His Word, and delight in what we find within.
John Piper says it this way in his book Reading the Bible Supernaturally: “We read in order to see in order to savor. We seek insight in order to enjoy. We seek knowledge in order to love. We seek doctrine for the sake of delight.”
Daily Delight: Nourishing Your Soul with God's Word
I encourage you, friends, to open your Bible and reach for God for the delight of your soul! I encourage you to open this book with great excitement each day to find God and enjoy Him, love Him!
The truth is, all other delights tend to fade. But the Bible is this ever-fresh fountain of delightful water. Each day you can return to it and drink and be satisfied.
So join the Psalmist today, in declaring that you delight in God’s commands, and then gorge yourself on God’s Word day by day. Nothing else will satisfy quite like finding God in His Word each day.
