My Delight

Praise God, the Soup Social is now history! We had a wonderful time and enjoyed amazing homemade soups and salads!

I thought I'd go ahead and share here what I shared there. I was so nervous! I am definitely a writer, not a speaker! Sorry about the length. I guess speeches are longer than what I traditionally write. Oh, well. Without further ado, here it is, in writing:

I am one of five daughters. Two sisters are a decade older than me and I am the middle daughter in the youngest grouping of three girls. We were known as "The Girls." Any of you from families with more than one female child can probably relate. We were most often seen as a single unit, "The Girls, " rather than individuals. That worked out pretty great most of the time.

We were able to share any punishments fairly evenly.

When we asked our parents to watch us, they could watch "The Girls" instead of having to watch three individual performances. Between the three of us, we could do a pretty passable rendition of the Wizard of Oz!

Sometimes "The Girls" scored a bigger present at Christmas than we would be able to coax out of my folks individually.

For example, one Christmas when we were all still elementary school-aged, we charged into the living room at the crack of dawn....OK, maybe it was still dark outside, but morning is anytime after midnight. At least, that's what we convinced our parents. We began the exciting task of discovering the treats in our Christmas stockings and opening the presents when one package - one really big package - caught our eye. It was leaning against the wall, sort of behind the tree and it had no tag; no name was attached to it. We stole glances at each other, communicating in a language only close siblings can understand. We were fairly confident it was a present for "The Girls." When I couldn't stand not knowing any longer (I may have lasted one full minute), I asked my parents who the present was for and, with a twinkle in his eye, my Dad confirmed our suspicions.

I could tell from his expression that this was something B.I.G. I knew immediately what it must be: A Barbie Townhouse! My mind snapped into warp speed, imagining my Sweet 16 Barbie riding up and down that super-cool elevator, making dinner, taking bubble baths and maybe even driving around her estate in her new convertible (my birthday is in March and I was planning ahead). After what seemed like an eternity, my dad finally picked up the box, laid it on the floor and had us sit around it. One...two...THREE!! We tore into that paper, desperate to be the first one to glimpse that townhouse. We squealed as the paper flew into the air! As the confetti settled to the ground we saw our prize:

A train set.

We tried to be happy. We really did! My dad seemed so excited. I exclaimed in my most fake/happy voice, "Oh...a train set!" Not an oscar-worthy performance, to be sure. We could tell my dad was bummed that we were disappointed, but he tried to laugh and make the best of it. Poor Dad.

Now, a model train set is a very special gift. He probably spent more on it than he would have spent for a Barbie Townhouse. So why would we be disappointed?

Because our focus was on what we wanted, not on what our father wanted for us.

Many of us struggle the same way in a spiritual sense with our Heavenly Father. Our prayers are often filled with our requests to Him.

"Help me pass that test."
"Let us be able to buy that house."
"Lord, I just want to lose these last 10 pounds!"

These are the desires of our hearts and it is certainly not wrong to want to have our desires fulfilled. Besides, who better to share our desires with than our Savior? The problem is that, just like my sisters and me, the focus is on our wants, not on what God wants for us.

As we mature in our faith, our desire often matures to become a bit more selfless, but often with conditions. As a child and into my teen years I regularly prayed, "Lord, I want to serve you, but please don't make me a missionary!" It wasn't that I didn't want to share Christ; I did. I just wasn't sure I could do it without access to running water, which, for some strange reason, was what I concluded all missionaries had to endure.

So, how do we find a way to serve God selflessly and still receive our heart's desire? The key lies in Psalm 37:4. This passage says, "Delight yourself in the Lord and He will give you the desire of your heart. That word "delight" means, "To be soft, delicate, be pampered, to make merry over." I think the term "tender-hearted" sums up that definition for me. So, how can we be tender-hearted to God? We can begin by making note of how tender-hearted God is toward us.

Deuteronomy 30:9 says, "Then the LORD your God will make you most prosperous in all the work of your hands and in the fruit of your womb, the young of your livestock and the crops of your land. The LORD will again delight in you and make you prosperous, just as he delighted in your fathers..." In this passage the Lord is completely focused on us, he is tender-hearted to us...even indulgent.

And here is a promise about how delighting in Him can bless us:

Isaiah 55:2, "Why spend money on what is not bread, and your labor on what does not satisfy? Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good, and your soul will delight in the richest of fare."

And we are even given directions for how to begin delighting in God in Job 22:21-26:

Submit to God and be at peace with him; in this way prosperity will come to you. Accept instruction from his mouth and lay up his words in your heart. If you return to the Almighty, you will be restored: If you remove wickedness far from your tent and assign your nuggets to the dust, your gold of Ophir to the rocks in the ravines, then the Almighty will be your gold, the choicest silver for you. Surely then you will find delight in the Almighty and will lift up your fact to God.

From this we learn that when we study the Bible, determine to stay close to the Lord, day and day out, pursuing a holy life; when we become more concerned with the richness God offers than the riches the world offers we surely find delight in Him!

I want to revisit the story of the train set. Fast forward 15-20 years. When my sisters and I ("The Girls") reached adulthood and had children of our own, my dad made a point to give one of us a small train-themed trinket each Christmas. We treasured these gifts and hoped we'd be the one he chose to bestow the train upon each year. When we were the recipient, we felt so special. What was different? We knew our dad so much better as adults and we loved having something special to share with him. Because we were tender-hearted to our dad, because we delighted ourselves in him, his gift became special to us. We wanted to receive it: We desired it!

When we steep ourselves in God's love for us, as it is described in Job, we begin to know our Savior better and we love to have something special to share with Him. We become tender-hearted to our Heavenly Father. We delight ourselves in Him! Then His gifts become special to us. We want to receive them: We desire them!

I pray Christ is our focus - our Delight - as we enter this Christmas season. He has a wonderful gift waiting for you to open. It will be something that blesses you and something that brings you joy. What that gift is, I don't know. It will be something unexpected - something you may not have even thought you wanted. But, if He is your delight, His gift will delight you!