GOD IS SINGING AS HE THINKS OF YOU!

¹⁴ Sing aloud, O daughter of Zion;
shout, O Israel! Rejoice and exult with all your heart,
O daughter of Jerusalem!
¹⁵ The Lord has taken away the judgments against you;
he has cleared away your enemies.
The King of Israel, the Lord, is in your midst;
you shall never again fear evil.
¹⁶ On that day it shall be said to Jerusalem:
“Fear not, O Zion; let not your hands grow weak.
 ¹⁷ The Lord your God is in your midst,
a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing."

Zephaniah 3:14-17

 

What does God think about when He thinks about you?  When God meditates on you in His heart, what does He feel?  When God focuses His eyes on your soul, what does He see?  When God opens His mouth to speak of you, what does He say?

I have to confess that too often I have projected on God what I think He feels about me. Perhaps many of you would answer those questions like this: "He thinks badly of me; He feels repelled by me.  He does not like me. He is disappointed with me. He is fed up with me." The fact is, nothing could be farther from the truth! 

Notwithstanding what you have been told in the past, or what you may feel in the present, when God thinks about you, feels for you, and sees you, He opens His mouth and sings with inexpressible joy!

God's love for you is so infinitely intense that He quite literally sings for joy.  The depth of His affection is such that mere words prove paltry and inadequate.  So profoundly intimate is God's devotion to you that He bursts forth in sacred song. I'm talking about you dear reader.  That's right, you, not just all the other people reading this blog.  I'm talking about each and every one of you who is convinced that no matter how many times I tell you that God loves you, still you imagine that God surely has someone else in mind.  No, He has you in mind.

If ever there were a scripture verse worth committing to memory, Zephaniah 3:14-17 is it.  It has rightly been called "the John 3:16 of the Old Testament."

First, the prophet says in verse 17 that He is "in your midst," He is "always with you." Just think of it; He is right there where you are, no matter where that may be.  That may not get everyone excited, but it sure turned on Zephaniah! His response to God's abiding presence is recorded in verses 14-15,

¹⁴ Sing aloud, O daughter of Zion;shout, O Israel! Rejoice and exult with all your heart, O daughter of Jerusalem!
 The Lord has taken away the judgments against you;
he has cleared away your enemies.The King of Israel, the Lord, is in your midst; you shall never again fear evil.
There is no way you can tone down this language.  You can't escape the uninhibited exuberance contained in these words.  Shout for joy!  Shout loudly in triumphant exultation!  Rejoice and be glad, and celebrate with all your might!  God is with us, so let's party! Cast aside all reserve.  Forget about what others might think or say.  Think about God's presence, His abiding fellowship, and CUT LOOSE!

When Zephaniah chose the word sing aloud or shout in verse 14 he intended to make a point.  This word carries the force of a ringing cry that calls for the onslaught of battle.  Observe how it is used elsewhere:
"When you go into battle in your own land against an enemy who is oppressing you, sound a blast on the trumpets.  Then you will be remembered by the LORD your God and rescued from your enemies." Numbers 10:9
"But Joshua had commanded the people, "Do not give a war cry, do not raise your voices, do not say a word until the day I tell you to shout.  Then shout!" -Joshua 6:10.
"God is with us; he is our leader.  His priests with their trumpets will sound the battle cry against you.  Men of Israel, do not fight against the LORD, the God of your fathers, for you will not succeed ... and the men of Judah raised the battle cry."
2 Chronicles13:12,15

In other words, it's okay to get excited about the presence of God.  Fill the air with the piercing cry of exultation.  Shout for joy!  God is with you.

But what if this God can't do anything about my problems?  What good is His presence if He isn't strong enough to help me face my struggles? That's a valid question.  Here's the answer: The God who is present with you is also a God of unlimited power.  He is a mighty warrior, a strong and victorious hero who fights on your behalf I know it sounds strange, but think about it anyway.  God is a soldier!  He's dressed for battle, armed, and ready.  He is your champion, your defender. Isaiah exhorts God's people to sing songs of joyful praise, because "the LORD will march out like a mighty man, like a warrior he will stir up his zeal; with a shout he will raise the battle cry and will triumph over his enemies" (Isaiah 42:13).

God’s presence comforts me.  His power reassures me.  But his, passion overwhelms me.  God is so full of passion that He exults, delights, rejoices, and sings as expressions of His love.

Listen to some of the expressions of His passion in scripture:
"Is not Ephraim my dear son, the child in whom I delight?  Though I often speak against him, I still remember him.  Therefore my heart yearns for him; I have great compassion for him," declares the LORD."
Jeremiah 31:20
"How can I give you up, Ephraim?  How can I hand you over, Israel? ... My heart is changed within me; all my compassion is aroused.  I will not carry out my fierce anger, nor will I turn and devastate Ephraim."
Hosea 11:8-9

No one fully understands the nature of God's nature.  In one sense, the emotional categories of God are hard to understand, but I believe the scripture clearly teaches us that God feels.  It proclaims that God has emotions, passions, and affections.  In particular, He experiences delight and pleasure, dare I say ecstasy, over you and me!

Consider what Jesus said in the parable of the talents: "Come and share your master's [God's] happiness" (Matt. 25:21, 23).  God is an extremely happy God.' The glory of heaven is wrapped up in our participation in the very joy that floods the heart of the Father.  Isn't this why Jesus came?  His desire is for the joy of His own life to become the joy of ours. (John 15:11, "These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full.).

One can only wonder at the depths of divine delight in the soul of the Son of God.  Jesus intends for this very joy to fill up and overflow the hearts of His people (John 17:13,  "But now I come to You, and these things I speak in the world, that they may have My joy fulfilled in themselves.).  We are to experience not simply joy in God or even the joy that God gives but better still the very joy that God Himself enjoys.  All that i can say in response is WOW!!!God's joy becomes our joy and in that God takes joy. To put it another way, God is happy when we are happy with His happiness.

All this is just another way of saying that God is ecstatically happy in His love for His little ones.   Let's go back to Zephaniah 3:17 and look closely at the three statements in the latter half of the verse.

First of all, God "exults over you in pleasure and with great delight." What makes this remarkable is that the same language used in verse 14 to describe our rejoicing over God is here used to portray God's rejoicing over us. We are exhorted to sing.  God too rejoices with singing!  We are to experience joy.  God too delights over us with joy.  Back and forth, as it were, God and His people take turns enjoying one another!

All of us know what it's like to get excited about God.  We read in Isaiah 61:10, "I delight greatly in the LORD; my soul rejoices in my God".  But God gets just as excited over you, for He Himself says, "I will rejoice over Jerusalem and take delight in my people" (Isa. 65:19). Better still, God exults over you with great delight. How else can I say it?  When God thinks about you, His child, His heart explodes in glad celebration.  There is divine glee and jubilation beyond words when the almighty God ponders His own. If you think I'm just making this up, look at how the terms in Zephaniah 3:17 are used elsewhere; ask yourself if "glad celebration" and "glee" and "'jubilation' are too strong.
"When the men were returning home after David had killed the Philistine, the women came out from all the towns of Israel to meet King Saul with singing and dancing, with joyful songs and with tambourines and lutes."
1 Samuel 18:6
"And all the people went up after him, playing flutes and rejoicing greatly, so that the ground shook with the sound."
1 Kings 1:40
Merriment, elation, hoopla, unbridled glee, raucous mirth.  That's how we feel about the grace of God and the God of grace.  But that's also how He feels about us.

If this gets you excited, look closely at what comes next in the text.  "He becomes quiet as He reflects on His deep affection for you."

   Here we see a love that is so deeply felt, so profound, so perfect, that words are inadequate, indeed, unnecessary.  To put it bluntly, God is speechless!  The all-wise God, the "never-at-a loss-for-words-God," the God with perfect insight into every situation, the God who always speaks correctly and with divine precision, is here moved to utter silence!  Such is the impact of His love for you.  Happiness can express itself not only in loud merriment but also in peaceful calm.  God is so entirely absorbed in you that He feels no need to say anything! After the clamorous, yet spiritual, celebration, it is as if God "I love you so much that I can’t find words to express it. 

What imagery!  What beauty!  How profound! What wonder does this evoke in us!
 

There is a final thing we need to see, God sings over you! He breaks the silence with song. That’s right, God begins to sing over you. What does He sing? He sings of His love for you. Why? Because He loves you! That is how passionate He is in expressing that love. What can stir the mighty God of heaven and earth to sing? YOU! You stir His heart! You make Him glad. You His child, are the apple of His eye.

Do you believe this? Every moment of our day we are confronted with the ugliness of our souls, our tendency to wander from God, our calloused preoccupations with our selves, and it sickens us. What must God think? Well, please read Psalm 103: 8-14,

"The LORD is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in mercy. He will not always strive with us, nor will He keep His anger forever. He has not dealt with us according to our sins, nor punished us according to our iniquities. For as the heavens are high above the earth, so great is His mercy toward those who fear Him; As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us. As a father pities his children, so the LORD pities those who fear Him. For He knows our frame; he remembers that we are dust."

It would seem that all knowledge of me would end all love and intimacy towards me. Isn’t this exactly why we often times run from rather than running to God? Yet look what the Psalmest says:

It is because God does know you that He loves, forgives,and shows compassion!

Don’t miss that little word “for”. It is a stunning word that will turn your entire grasp upon God and who He is upside down. God knows it all and shows us love and sings, is quiet, and parties over us! All we can do is say “wow”. May that knowledge of Him and His compassion move us to to a fresh commitment.

Oh what a happy God we have! Listen to these words:

 Isaiah 62:5, “as a bridegroom rejoices over his bride, so will your God rejoice over you.”

Psalm 35:27, "The LORD be exalted, who delights in the well-being of his servant."

Psalm. 149:4, "For the LORD takes delight in his people; he crowns the humble with salvation. ” 

Psalm147: 10-11, His pleasure is not in the strength of the horse, nor his delight in the legs of a man; the LORD delights in those who fear him, who put their hope in his unfailing love.

 “The Lord will God’s exuberance to do us good is one of the most freeing discoveries we can make. This is the vision we need...

God is singing over you this moment! Can you hear Him? Do you love hearing this sweet sound? Oh that we might believe it and savor it and bring it to our minds again and again until it is our very nature to feel its truth and thus do what the prophet Zephaniah encourages us to do in verse 14, Sing, O Daughter of Zion; shout aloud, O Israel! Be glad and rejoice with all your heart, O Daughter of Jerusalem!

Pastor Bill

Thoughts on Turning 60 and the Rest of My Life

This is my first post from my new home in Maui. Today was a kind of milestone for me. I have outlived my heroes Spurgeon, Edwards, and Calvin. I am humbled and grateful. As John Piper writes, "all we ever receive is mercy."

I met the Lord in December of 1974 and two months later He called me to the ministry while I was all alone on an isolated point in Mexico called El Farro at Punta Mita. I have watched Him work out this supernatural event in my life for over 38 years.

As I look ahead to the rest  of my life here is my prayer:

Heavenly Father, I humbly ask,

That you help me to see and savor Your Son, Jesus, more.

That I would find You, in all Your triune glory, to be my greatest treasure and the source of my greatest pleasure. and loved people.
That the legacy of my life would be that I loved God

That I would never stop proclaiming Your supremacy in all things in a man-centered world
That I would not waste my life.
That I earnestly till the day that I die engage in a passionate pursuit of  You
That my life would uphold and to submit to Your Word.
That I would love Your Word
That I would stand passionately for Your truth, even when it isn't popular.
That I would always maintain a spirit of humility before You and man,  always willing to admit my own shortcomings and always asking for prayer and encouragement as I seek Your help 
That I would always love and seek the fellowship of the body of Christ.
That I would always and earnestly be devoted to prayer
That I would become very generous as You have been so to me.
That I would stay true to the faith.
That I would always teach and show what mercy means.
That I would be a gospel-centered (not works-centered) and grace centered man.
That I would continue to persevere through the times when they were tough and remained committed to calling.
That I would never forget my own sinfulness, and always preach to myself that my only hope is in Christ from beginning to end.
That I would never lose my hunger for more of You and Your Word.
That I would never feel that have it all figured out and that I will be always growing and learning.
That I will always be the same person behind the pulpit that I am in everyday life.
That I will have a greater burden for the cause of global mission
That I would not let all the bitter hardships of life discourage me from pressing on toward You or calling others do the same.
That I would be diligent and faithful in whatever I set out to do.
That I would always rest my confidence in the Lord and His word.
That I would do everything I do as unto the Lord and not unto man and always for His glory.
That I would grow more and more as a quiet, reflective, and contemplative man, listening more and talking less, and never afraid of silence.
That I would trust in Your sovereign goodness in everything—in time of blessing and in the face of tragedy.
That I would shrink back from pointing others to deep theology in their time of need.
That I would flee to the gospel when faced with the double-edged sword of the fear of man and the love of the praise of man. That I would anchor myself in the Father's love and acceptance us in the Beloved
That I would truly love all men and that my life will be a life of love.
That I would finish well.
That people will be built up and deified in being around me.
That I would become a wiser man as the years go by.
That my life would be characterized by mercy, grace, compassion, forgiveness, and kindness.
That I would always worship in spirit and truth.
That I would always keep my life more free from the love of money.

That my best and most fruitful days be ahead of me.

That  God would cause me to see more glorious kingdom victories! 
That I would never stop fighting the fight of faith, running the race, and keeping the faith,
That I would magnify Him in my body in life and death.
That someday I will hear You say to me, "Well done, my good and faithful servant, enter into the joy of the Lord."

Looking ahead to a future of glory and usefulness,
Pastor Bill