Delight thyself in the LORD

Psalms 37:4-5
Delight thyself also in the LORD; and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart. Commit thy way unto the LORD; trust also in him; and he shall bring it to pass.

Surprisingly, as I just realised, today's devotional from Spurgeon's Morning and Evening was Psalms 37:4 and the verse-a-day appearing on the home page of my pocket PC was Psalms 37:5! And I didnt realise it until now! " Delight thyself in the LORD and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart. " What a promise, not everyone understands to claim upon. It seems, so, easy. Well, it is easy. But to those who are hoping that this is a genie bottle which gives you whatever you want or desire, I guess you havent comprehended the verse. Delight thyself in the LORD. The first thing to do is to delight ourselves in God.

What does it mean to delight ourselves in the LORD?

Some verses to consider:

• Ps 43:4 Then will I go unto the altar of God, unto God my exceeding joy: yea, upon the harp will I praise thee, O God my God.
• Ps 104:34 My meditation of him shall be sweet: I will be glad in the LORD.
• 1 Peter 1:8 Whom having not seen, ye love; in whom, though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory:

Such should be our delight in our God. Even as rejoicing with joy unspeakable and full of glory as the day we shall see Him! When we learn to love God so much, when we desire so much just to please Him that means we can claim upon the promise following after. "he shall give thee the desires of thine heart." I believe when we have delighted ourselves in the Lord, our desires may be aligned and shaped according to His will.

God gave these promises boldly unto us, and He was sure that if the requirement was fulfilled, whatever we ask would definitely be given unto us. Such are the promises He has freely given unto us:

• John 15:7 If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you.
• 1 John 3:22 And whatsoever we ask, we receive of him, because we keep his commandments, and do those things that are pleasing in his sight.
• 1 John 5:14-15 And this is the confidence that we have in him, that, if we ask any thing according to his will, he heareth us: And if we know that he hear us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we desired of him.

The next verse gives another promise, a double promise. Ha. "Commit thy way unto the LORD; trust also in him; and he shall bring it to pass." When we have delighted ourselves in God, He promise to give the desires of our heart. And it goes on by saying, to commit your ways to God (in prayer) and trust, important to trust, and God will bring it to pass.

When I look at this verse, I didnt think of what I could get out of these promises for my selfish desires. As spurgeon repeatedly reminded me in his devotional, that the ultimate desire of a christian is holiness and godliness. "The happiest state of a Christian is the holiest state. As there is the most heat nearest to the sun, so there is the most happiness nearest to Christ." Naturally, a Christian praying in the Spirit of the Lord will be asking only one thing, to be "More like the Son of God". Such is, I feel, my desire for this week, for the days to come.

Interesting that the night before I was praying and pleading for God to comfort me, and of course pray for my dear friends over at Port Dickson and also my pals stuck here in Singapore with me, and I thank God for today's two verses which are very beautiful to me. You may ask, after one day, how am I doing? Well, to be honest, there are times when I would be thinking of what people are doing over in Port Dickson and feel very, "sian". Not only the fellowship, but also the time of resting and being restored in God. When I heard how people said the message on sunday was powerful, how I wished I had not missed it. But God gave me Jim Berg's "Getting Grace From God" to satisfy my need for His truth. But still, how I hoped to be challenged on that sunday. After thinking and contemplating on my situation, I realise that the difference between those at Port Dickson and in Singapore is, over there God's Word is literally fed to those who come seeking, here in Singapore, one has to be digging and seeking as he goes along. One thing I know, if God puts me here, if God puts us guys in Singapore, what He has for us to learn here is definitely going to be more precious than if we were to be there. Truly, I've been blessed on the first day be C.H. Spurgeon's "Fear Not" sermon. I'd like to share a little about it later. I started studying and reading the book of 1 Samuel. I begun to highlight verses that are nice and beautiful. I realise there are so so much resources all around us, around me, that we can never complain that we are unable to seek after God. Sermonaudio, Biblegateway, Online devotionals, books, PRAYER (so available to us always). Something I've learnt before, and came back to my memory while I was praying yesterday night. What God has taken away, very much more He will give back and bless. Remember: No Good Thing Would He Withhold from US!

Isaiah 55:8-9 For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.

I guess its true. We can never get the full picture and understand what God is doing and why are these circumstances falling on us. But we always can trust in what God says, "For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the LORD, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end."(Jer29:11) and "And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose" (Romans 8:28) Such are the abundance of promises from God, yet so seldom claimed by His children and fully trusting in them.

There is this devotional I really want to share. It was on Morning and Evenings June 11.

"We love Him because He first loved us." --1 John 4:19

There is no light in the planet but that which proceedeth from the sun; and there is no true love to Jesus in the heart but that which cometh from the Lord Jesus himself. From this overflowing fountain of the infinite love of God, all our love to God must spring. This must ever be a great and certain truth, that we love Him for no other reason than because He first loved us. Our love to Him is the fair offspring of His love to us. Cold admiration, when studying the works of God, anyone may have, but the warmth of love can only be kindled in the heart by God's Spirit. How great the wonder that such as we should ever have been brought to love Jesus at all! How marvellous that when we had rebelled against Him, He should, by a display of such amazing love, seek to draw us back. No! never should we have had a grain of love towards God unless it had been sown in us by the sweet seed of His love to us. Love, then, has for its parent the love of God shed abroad in the heart: but after it is thus divinely born, it must be divinely nourished. Love is an exotic; it is not a plant which will flourish naturally in human soil, it must be watered from above. Love to Jesus is a flower of a delicate nature, and if it received no nourishment but that which could be drawn from the rock of our hearts it would soon wither. As love comes from heaven, so it must feed on heavenly bread. It cannot exist in the wilderness unless it be fed by manna from on high. Love must feed on love. The very soul and life of our love to God is His love to us.

"I love thee, Lord,
but with no love of mine,
For I have none to give;
I love thee, Lord;
but all the love is thine,
For by thy love I live.
I am as nothing,
and rejoice to be
Emptied, and lost,
and swallowed up in thee."

I think it is very true. We love God for no other reason than because He first loved us and gave Himself for us. Just as I always thought we shouldnt recieve salvation just because we do not wish to go to hell. Well, there is nothing wrong in trusting God because we believe He is the only WAY to heaven. But as we go along in our christian life, we realise that the only reason we should believe in Jesus as our Savior was because of His love shown to us on the cross. The only reason we devote and consecrate ourselves to Christ is because God, Creator of all loves us and died for our sins. Before God loved me, before He loved man, men knew nothing about love. We cannot claim to love God because in fact, we know no love except the love of God. As the short excerpt read, "I love Thee Lord, but with no love of mine, For I have none to give. I love Thee Lord; but all the love is Thine. "

I watched 20/20 last night on CNA about the ressurection of Christ. This documentary was quite nice in fact. They went back to the place they thought was the burial and the place Jesus was crucified and they inquired about whether Jesus was really resurrected. And I think something that I found most assuring was what one of those theologians said. Many at that time claims to be the messiah of the Jews and what the Romans did was to crucified them and after their death, they ceased to become remembered and everything they taught or said, went away with them. Such was they thought that if Jesus was crucified, all that He taught would become nothing. But lo, they didnt think that He would be raised and that His legacy and teachings not only did not die out, but lived on for thousands of years, spread all over the world. Such is the greatness of our faith. As Paul said, if there was no ressurection, our preaching is in vain and so is our faith void. At any point of history, if Jesus Christ's remain's were to be found anywhere Christianity would instantly die out. But surprising that is that none claim to have the body of Jesus Christ. Almost everyone living at that time acknowledge the fact the body was gone but the only matter was where it went. I guess the greatest evidence and encouragement assurance to us christians supporting the fact that Jesus was raised and dwell another 40 days longer was the fact that the scattered, frightened, terrified, and definitely depressed disciples came out of their hiding place and preach Jesus publically even at the place where Christ was publically crucified. Even James, Jesus' brother who was skeptical about what Christ preached when He was alived, joined in. The fact we know that all of Christ's disciples who were so timid and faithless gave their lives for God's Kingdom and for their faith. What cause such instant change in the lives of these men? What was that supernatural power they possess to preach with power? What has brought Christianity through persecution, trials, divisions into what we know as our faith today? I guess the only sensible answer is that our faith is real and true, and Jesus whom we trust in was raised by God for His redemption on the cross.