Episode 84: When We Experience God’s Delight

Jacob Paul: Welcome to the Truth in Love podcast with your hosts Kimberly Faith and John Mack. The Truth in Love podcast seeks to present God’s timeless truth through the lens of his remarkable love.

Kimberly Faith: That I’m I’m pretty excited about this topic. And I know I say that every time, but I was going

John McLarty: to say, Kim, has there been a podcast we’ve done that you’re not excited about? I And that’s a good thing.

Kimberly Faith: God’s word is exciting.

John McLarty: That’s it right there.

Kimberly Faith: And you know, when basically free falling in our relationship with Him, we heard a little sermonette this morning that was so good. And we’ll probably do a podcast on it, because I kind of wanna explore it. Doctor. Pat Briney said something. He said, Either you are trusting 100% in God or you’re not.

Right. He said, Because if there’s anything, any area of your life that you’re not trusting God, then that means you’re still in control.

John McLarty: You’re not completely trusting God.

Kimberly Faith: That’s right. Then he You’re holding back something. He used a really good example of somebody who says they trust a bench, they sit on the bench, but the whole time they’re sitting on the bench, they look worried and concerned that the bench might break. And they’re kinda Yeah. Look like they might Yeah, jump

John McLarty: they might, they’ll race to jump up.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah, and I think that’s a really good way of, if you’re a born again believer, and we’ve all been there, you and I’ve been there, we might be there tomorrow, and you have a lack of really peace and joy, then there’s not a 100% trust in God. And that was very challenging sermon to me. That has really not a lot to do with this podcast, but it’s just worth mentioning because the title of this podcast is When Does God Delight in Us and Why Does That Matter? We’re gonna cover both those issues.

John McLarty: And that’s so interesting because so many podcasts and messages are about what kind of attitude behavior, attitudes towards God, behaviors as a Christian we should have, and this switches it.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah, that’s a good And

John McLarty: it’s talking about God delights in us. Very intriguing idea, So I’m excited

Kimberly Faith: too. Yeah. Well, it kind of was precipitated out of Psalms 18 verses 17 through 19. And you wanna read those verses?

John McLarty: Yeah. This is great, great stuff. He delivered me from my strong enemy, from those who hated me, for they were too strong for me. They confronted me in the day of my calamity, but the Lord was my support. He also brought me out into a broad place.

He delivered me because He delighted in me.

Kimberly Faith: This is just a staggering thought that God has given His children the opportunity to capture his delight. I mean, think about it. We both have children. Of course, I’m your child.

John McLarty: And you’re a delightful child.

Kimberly Faith: Well, I wasn’t looking for the compliment. But when we find delight in our children.

John McLarty: And that’s something we can all relate to.

Kimberly Faith: That’s right. That’s right. Very relatable. And here we have the Almighty God, God of the maker of heaven, earth, the planets, the stars, to the minuscule molecules that we aren’t even able to understand and the complexity of. Right?

And to think that He would ever be delighted or captivated by our life is just unbelievable.

John McLarty: It’s so human to think of God delighting in us. I mean, we all think about a little two year old spinning around or just learning to talk, or the first time maybe a small, like one of our children or grandchildren expresses thanks or appreciation. It’s just so delightful.

Kimberly Faith: Right. I mean, we just celebrated mom’s birthday and you could just tell that she was delighted in having her children and grandchildren her. It gave her great joy.

John McLarty: But to thank God’s like that.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. It’s just little

John McLarty: So we think of him as this, know, a mystery, on the throne, very almost stoic, just kinda dealing with the affairs of mankind. Exactly.

Kimberly Faith: You know

John McLarty: what a mess we

Kimberly Faith: are. Running the universe.

John McLarty: A little bit busy.

Kimberly Faith: A little bit, right. Well, it just never registered on the radar of my little puny human brain that God would actually consider delighting in me until I read this verse. For those who are listening to us and have read my story on the internet or heard your story and mom’s story on the first podcast that we did, there’s always been periods of time, for me anyway, as a born again believer, where I was pretty suspicious of God. And I doubtful of his motives for my life. And that’s because I created my own false image of who God is based on my experience with flawed humans.

Right? Right. But then there’s this psalm.

John McLarty: The stoic, ready to punish God.

Kimberly Faith: Right. The judgment

John McLarty: Ready to chase him. Yes.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. And and then there’s this psalm that just in the you know, completely upends my thinking about God. And and but they but you know what? The Lord does. There’s a lot of verses that talk about, you know, describing God’s tenderness towards his children.

I think one of the things I think about is is when Jesus when Jesus was talking about taking the mantle or the lampstand from Israel and giving it to the church, and He He said, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how I-

John McLarty: Oh, I would’ve gathered-

Kimberly Faith: Yeah, I would’ve like gathered you a hen gathers her chicks.

John McLarty: There’s just so Very tender.

Kimberly Faith: Yes, so many examples of God’s tender mercies. But you know, just like you said, making it relatable. If you’re listening to this and you have children, you know you like to delight in your children. And so it would make sense that God would then delight in us to even a greater extent, because God is the author of all delight.

John McLarty: Right. We’re made in His image.

Kimberly Faith: Right. So just to kind of illustrate that, let’s look at a couple of these Psalms. You because you see, God’s word, it doesn’t hide the ball from us about how God delights in His people. Do you wanna read?

John McLarty: Yeah, and this is really great because this isn’t an idea we’re just plucking out of context. Right. You read the Psalms, and there’s a lot of these. But here’s Psalm 140 nine:four, For the Lord takes pleasure in His people. He will beautify the humble with salvation.

And then Psalm 1forty seven eleven, The Lord takes pleasure in those that fear Him, in those who hope in His mercy. Yeah, So He takes pleasure.

Kimberly Faith: He does. He has this affectionate posture towards those who walk before Him in humility and trust. And to our earlier point, the illustration from the sermon about trust, I like to call it free falling in God’s will, where I’m not hanging on to any ropes. One of the early podcasts, talked about bungee jumping. I still had that rope.

I didn’t go off platform over the ravine without the bungee.

John McLarty: Right.

Kimberly Faith: Right? But when we trust God, I mean, why would I trust those people I don’t know attaching that bungee rope to my hips and not trust God who Yep. Made the

John McLarty: But that’s a double exercise of trust.

Kimberly Faith: Yes. Yes. But God’s pleasure, the thing that we have to get away from is that God’s pleasure isn’t earned by our rigid performance, our works that are done out of obligation. God loves the humility, the posture of humility, the fact that we want to serve Him because we love Him. And humility, we’re not talking about humility being, you’re a doormat.

God doesn’t wanna make us doormats. No, He wants to use our posture of submission to Him completely to show us how favored we are.

John McLarty: Yeah, and I think a humble person is thankful, a person that appreciates, that’s a humility.

Kimberly Faith: Yes. And we’re gonna talk about that too, because thankfulness, you’ve said this in an earlier podcast, and it was so kind of riveting for me just how important thankfulness is. But we need to when we understand God more and more for who He says He is as opposed to who we have made Him, we are put in a posture of humility and thankfulness so that we are then able to become part of His delight.

John McLarty: And the more we know about God, the more we have to be thankful for.

Kimberly Faith: That’s right. I think about that verse in Zephaniah, one of my favorite verses in Zephaniah three seventeen, the Bible says, The Lord your God in your midst, the mighty one will save. He will rejoice over you with gladness. He will quiet you with his love. He will rejoice over you with singing.

And that is just so beautiful.

John McLarty: That is amazing. He will rejoice over you with singing. We typically think of us singing worship with the Lord, and here he will rejoice over you with singing.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah, and with gladness. And I love the observation you made at the very beginning of this podcast about how a lot of our podcasts are about things that we do. But this is really talking about how we respond to God and how it brings Him to light. So what is it about us that really invites such delight from God?

John McLarty: I think one thing just relating to just humans feeling appreciated, and somebody being thankful. So you do something for somebody, and if they just don’t even acknowledge it, you know, that’s okay. You didn’t do it to get that. But if you do something, you know, bring somebody some bread or give them some honey, and they’re just like very thankful, that really triggers that back. It’s that feeling of being appreciated.

So I’m kind of applying that to God. I think God likes us to be thankful. And I don’t think it’s like he’s selfish. Right. Like he has you know, he demands it of us, but I think that that delights us.

We’re in Yes, his

Kimberly Faith: right. We’re creating his image. I think about you and mom are really good at this. Anytime one of us kids has done something for you, you don’t just say thanks once. A lot of times you’re kind of go on and on and on about it.

And we may not say it all the time, but that really is encouraging. It’s an encouraging thing to know that somebody is grateful. And again, God is the eternal self existing one. He doesn’t need us. But I think it’s not that God needs us to be thankful.

I think it’s we need to be thankful in order to be humble and thus be drawing close to God rather than living in the pride of our own self sufficiency. Well,

John McLarty: I’ll give a real life example. We have a young man in our church. He just got called to the ministry, Paul Harden. But over the last six months, he’s bringing these series of devotions. He’s in the military, and he’s just been applying the Christian life to the military and the armor of God.

And just great PowerPoints

Kimberly Faith: and well

John McLarty: scripted messages. Well, the first time he did that, I just rushed over to him. I said, Paul, that was incredible. And he didn’t do it for this reason, but he just beamed.

Kimberly Faith: It felt good to be appreciated. Yes,

John McLarty: I appreciate. So I expressed that to him, and then he felt that. And I think God likes to be appreciated because he loves us. And there’s kind of this mutual It’s a relationship. Relationships are two way things.

Kimberly Faith: Well, but I think even equally or more important than that, our thankfulness is not as much for God’s benefit as it is for our benefit. Because we cannot be thankful and be proud.

John McLarty: Yeah, I was trying to go on with that. That’s where that leads to. It’s not a selfish thing that God needs this, but then because He loves us so much. He knows that that helps us.

Kimberly Faith: Yes, yes.

John McLarty: Can- Like be in tune to Him. And then that leads us to a more productive life.

Kimberly Faith: Well, we know that pride puts us at an enmity with God. So humility is what draws us close to God by definition. But I think about Psalm 3seven 23 that says that the steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord and he delights in his way. You know, we’re talking about walking in God’s will. Again, this little sermonette that Pat Riney gave this morning, he pointed out two things.

He said, the middle letter in the word sin is I. The middle word or letter in the word pride is I. What do we substitute I for? God. And that’s how we keep from walking in the path of destruction.

And I think when we talk about the steps of a good man being ordered by the Lord, that means we’re giving him the complete control. Right.

John McLarty: And you know, this may not exactly apply here, but I thought about that I before and kind of the influences in our life. You’ve got God’s influence, which wants the best for us because he loves us.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: And then as we walk in his ways, he delights in it. But again, not because he’s selfish, because he knows that’s better for us.

Kimberly Faith: Not for his own benefit.

John McLarty: Right, not

Kimberly Faith: for his own for our benefit. It’s like when our children, if one of my children, I have three brilliant children, I think they’re brilliant. If one of

John McLarty: them- And I agree.

Kimberly Faith: But if one of them had decided to waste their talent, they decided instead of following the way that I had for them, my limited ability as a parent to guide them, as opposed to God’s unlimited ability, His omniscience, right? It would

John McLarty: have been heartbreaking. Heartbreaking. Yeah, it’s not like

Kimberly Faith: you’re angry. Not because of my pride, because I want what’s best for them because I love them.

John McLarty: You see what they’re missing,

Kimberly Faith: the abundant life. Yeah. And so, to this first point, what we’re looking for is this intimacy with God. And that intimacy is what brings us into a place where God is delighting us. I think about our relationship.

I remember my rebellious teenage years. I didn’t do. Didn’t have the kind of intimacy we have today where we can almost read each other’s minds about- We

John McLarty: had some good talks though out in the car,

Kimberly Faith: wasn’t We did. I loved your lectures, but I needed them. But it’s a different dynamic today because all the time and effort and love that you and mom poured into me as a teenager and as a girl, it wasn’t wasted. And now you’re seeing through just even this podcast, you’re seeing it come back. And now it’s a different dynamic.

It’s a more loving dynamic,

John McLarty: if that

Kimberly Faith: makes sense.

John McLarty: Yeah. And again, I can relate to that. And it’s not that we’re like, Oh, that makes us feel like we did such good jobs as parents.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: And it’s like all about us and pride again. But it’s just seeing your life blessed. And so that blesses us to see your life. You’re happy, you’re productive, you have the abundant life. Right.

And so, God’s that way. Yeah, that’s a good relatable God’s that way towards us.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. And if you think about So we’re kind of covering this point about, what is it? When does God delight in us? Well, then it’s worthwhile to look at the opposite trajectory. And then the not so subtle fracture that distances us from God’s presence is unthankfulness.

And why don’t you read Romans one twenty one?

John McLarty: Yeah, That’s like a famous verse on this subject. Romans one twenty one, because although they knew God, this kind of talks about the downward spiral of humans. Right. Because although the new God, they did not glorify him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts and their foolish hearts were darkened.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. That is so powerful because really the descent into misery and foolish darkness begins with something so deceptively small, and that is ingratitude. Unthankfulness isn’t a mood. It’s a posture of independence that leads us to destruction. And I like to think of it as the first biopsy that reveals the cancer of unthankfulness and dark foolishness, really, within us.

And any time we are crediting ourselves with anything in our life rather than God, we’re rejecting reality.

John McLarty: Yeah. And I love that. The middle of pride is I. The middle of sin is I. And that’s what unthankfulness and lack of appreciation is, because we’re putting the I concept back Yeah.

Into our

Kimberly Faith: And then, you know, you think about it, James-

John McLarty: And turning away from God.

Kimberly Faith: That’s right. And then we’re putting ourselves in a position to be resisting God. You know, James four:six says, God resists the proud. Can you imagine? I mean, I can’t even visualize I know I’ve been in this position, but to visualize myself opposing God, that’s just so dumb.

That’s so foolish. That’s so futile. What a horrible way to live.

John McLarty: And I have to add a little theology in here, but just, I have to think of some of the famous verses in the Old Testament. Satan, Lucifer, was the head of the angels.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: And just to paraphrase, his rebellion was I will.

Kimberly Faith: I will.

John McLarty: I will. Yeah. I think there was five I wills. I will be. A sin above the most high.

So Satan’s sin was I. Right. And that was pride.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. And then Eve’s sin was, I can live without God. Right. I want the apple or whatever fruit it was. We don’t know what fruit it was.

Because Satan has told me I can be like God.

John McLarty: And it goes back to that example of not trusting God completely because we’re trusting in us.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah, yeah, exactly. The very first thought we started this podcast with, it’s pride and thankfulness cannot coexist.

John McLarty: And

Kimberly Faith: if we are intentionally thankful and we live our lives intentionally with gratitude, which just requires discipline on some level, then that will displace, that has to displace any kind of self sufficiency or self exaltation. I love Psalms one hundred:four. It says, Enter into his gates with thanksgiving, into his courts with praise. Be thankful to him and bless his name. Thankfulness isn’t just a prayer.

Man, it’s a relational realignment. If I come to your house and I’m thankful, I’m not gonna just throw my clothes on the floor. I’m not gonna just come and dirty all the dishes. I’m gonna come and figure out a way to serve you because I’m thankful.

John McLarty: Yeah. It’s an attitude that also translates into behaviors. That’s a perfect example. If you come and you’re thankful, then yeah, you’re not just gonna leave the place trashed out and you’re gonna express thankfulness and then you’re going to show it. So that’s really enter into His gates with thanksgiving and into His courts with praise.

Kimberly Faith: Well, I think thankfulness is really, it’s ultimately a response to love. Jesus died for us when we were His enemies. Romans five:eight says, God demonstrated His love toward us, that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. When I think about the horrors of hell that, in the last podcast, I think it was the last one we talked about how life on this earth the only hell we’ll ever experience. All the trials and tribulations we go through.

But people who are not saved, their hell And is gonna be this earth is the only heaven they’re going to experience. When I think about That’s a sleepless profound thought. When I think about sleepless nights, when I think about being hungry, being thirsty, being worried, having anxiety over maybe a problem I can’t solve, being rejected, whatever, trial, death, health issues, those things are just a preview of hell, and from which we have been rescued. We have been rescued from that eternity.

John McLarty: So just that’s a perspective. That’s right. And that can turn around a time of trouble-

Kimberly Faith: That’s right.

John McLarty: That perspective. That gives us thankfulness. And thankfulness leads to appreciation. Yeah, yeah. I’ll just get a little real here last night.

You made a pie for your mom’s birthday party last And what if we just did kind of like, that was nice, Kim. Yeah. And it was worthy of raving over, but we raved over that pie and you felt I very

Kimberly Faith: did. Felt very appreciated.

John McLarty: That’s because we didn’t sell thanks, Kim. That was good.

Kimberly Faith: It was nice.

John McLarty: We wanna watch the show.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah.

John McLarty: But that’s the way to show appreciation to God. And then I really think just as the human side, he appreciates that.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. And just to be clear, thankfulness is not some strategy to manipulate God. It’s a recognition of the reality of who He is as

John McLarty: You can’t make it up.

Kimberly Faith: That’s right. As He says who He is in His word, we know that every good thing comes back to Him. The Bible tells us that. Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above. That’s in, I think, James.

Reading that Psalms, again, the one we started with, God delights to bring us into his goodness.

John McLarty: Amen.

Kimberly Faith: And so thankfulness is this key to experience just how much God delights in us. If you wanna experience the delight of God, then just start counting your blessings. Start understanding the magnitude of what God has done for us. And it’s Look, I’m not sitting here saying, I’ve arrived on that, because I have to renew this every day. I have to recalibrate my brain to be thankful, because as soon as God answers one prayer, I’m looking for the next one.

I’m not giving thanks for the wreck that I averted in the left lane of the interstate over and over and over again like I should be. I’m not saying, again, you said it perfectly. It’s only God needs us or demands us from us.

John McLarty: Benefits us.

Kimberly Faith: It is. And so the second question in this podcast is, why does this matter? Why does having God delight in us, why does that matter to us?

John McLarty: I think because it’s self fulfilling. To Yeah. Feel the love of God in our life is so fulfilling. Yeah. And I like what you said, you know, no one’s arrived, but we have I don’t know if we I could in heaven, you know, who knows?

Heaven’s really going to be great. Right. But in this life, we get glimpses of this. And it’s fulfilling to feel that God’s delight in

Kimberly Faith: us. Right.

John McLarty: Well, think And I don’t mean this in a bad way, but it’s kinda like God’s Like, if you did something and your parents expressed you were proud of you, Kim, you did this and we’re proud of you. Yeah. I’m not using pride in a negative way. It’s a blessing. We’re happy for you.

You’ve blessed us.

Kimberly Faith: Right.

John McLarty: And I think to feel that from God is self fulfilling. Why does it matter? Right. It fills our life.

Kimberly Faith: Well, even you think about when Jesus was baptized and when, on the Mount Of Transfiguration

John McLarty: Very good.

Kimberly Faith: When God said, this is my beloved son in whom I’m well pleased.

John McLarty: Yes.

Kimberly Faith: Know, I mean, what an immense just example to us. You know, this wasn’t him bragging on Jesus so Jesus would be prideful. This was just him making a statement. This is my beloved son. I want the Lord to say that, Well done.

Well done, Kim. And not just when I stand before his throne and the judgment of Christ. Not just then, I want him to say it now. I want him to feel that intimacy, that powerful intimacy. In my mind, that’s why it matters that God delights in us.

Because when He delights in us, we are drawn into a powerful intimacy. And I mentioned every good gift and every perfect gift is being from above and comes down from the Father of lights, in whom there’s no variation or shadow of turning, James one seventeen, a minute ago. You think about We talked about heaven last podcast, I think. But you think about every good thing that you enjoy, whether that’s a good night’s rest, whether that’s a great meal, whether that’s just fellowship with your family. I mean, we had a wild time in the park with all the boys and the grandsons, and they’re all catching crawdads in the creek.

John McLarty: They were delighting in the creek and we were delighting in the fact they were delighted.

Kimberly Faith: We were especially delighted in the fact that

John McLarty: God- And I think God was happy about the whole thing too.

Kimberly Faith: I think so. And those experiences are all good experiences. When we come to a place where we’re thankful, so thankful that God delights in us, we gain a powerful intimacy that so It’s a game changer. It’s the best experience we ever experience on this earth. You know,

John McLarty: and I have to add this, Kim. I was just thinking about yesterday. So we had a birthday party It’s for Lynn, my wife, Lynn’s mom. Kim’s mom. Put Kim’s But together, I mean, we put effort.

Right. We created an event and got some snacks and brought some kids. And so, you know, just kind of the message is, why does this matter? It matters putting effort into God’s work because we this feedback.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah, for sure.

John McLarty: From God. From God. And others.

Kimberly Faith: That’s right. And you know, it was funny you’re saying this because I appreciate you saying that. Because when I was in church this morning, a lady came up to me and we were talking about a mutual acquaintance of ours. And she was telling me this because I’ve doing some I have some communication with her. But anyway, she said, This lady told me that she’s been reading God’s word and all these things, but God’s not talking back to her.

And I immediately thought about this podcast because God’s presence is not governed by our perception. That is so critical for us to understand. His presence is not governed by our perception. He’s always here.

John McLarty: He’s always here.

Kimberly Faith: But in our emotions and circumstances are the most shifting part of us. I mean, they’re like clouds across the sky. But the problem isn’t God’s presence. The problem is us.

John McLarty: Us being open to it.

Kimberly Faith: Us being When we become unthankful, then what does it say? Our foolish heart is darkened.

John McLarty: Darkened, right.

Kimberly Faith: So when we cannot sense God’s presence, God hasn’t gone anywhere. He’s like the sun. He constantly shines, right? It’s because we’ve let the clouds obscure his view. And unthankfulness does that.

And intimacy, intimacy is like radar piercing the clouds. We don’t And I kind of love that visual because when you think about it, if we have God’s radar and we have His perspective, then we always see Him. The clouds don’t matter.

John McLarty: God’s always ready to delight in us and right. Show that to us. It’s our behavior that prevents this. So I’ve gotta tell a funny story. So my mom is 96 and turning 97.

And I had a phone call with her the other day, and it went back to something I did, just an event I was involved in back when I was 17 years old. And she told me she was proud of me. That here I am, I’m almost 75. And my mother telling me that just made me glow. Aw.

I thought, Lynn, my mom just said she’s proud of me. I mean, she says it often, but just for her to say that-

Kimberly Faith: Yeah, the feeling-

John McLarty: It’s just, yeah. A blessing to me.

Kimberly Faith: And that’s a really good example because we-

John McLarty: It never grows old.

Kimberly Faith: It never grows old. And the thing is that feeling that we get from a parent affirming us like that is something we can have all the time with God.

John McLarty: With God, yes. Because He’s always there,

Kimberly Faith: wanting That’s to right. He wants to affirm His presence in our life and keep the radar strong between us. Because then it’s what guides us through the storms. It’s what guides us through the emotions. It’s what guides us through the deaths, the disease, the loss of job, the financial collapse, all those things.

And so the great gift of God delighting in us is this gift of intimacy. That’s why it matters. This is kind of a bit of a side note, but I think that in order to desire God and to be thankful, we have to know Him for who He says He is.

John McLarty: Absolutely.

Kimberly Faith: And you teach the Bible concepts and the law of sin and death, which is caused, really, this law of sin and death exists because of who God is. And in a nutshell, just explain who God is, what His nature is according to His word.

John McLarty: Well, His nature is He’s righteous.

Kimberly Faith: And

John McLarty: that means He’s always right. And fortunately for us, his righteousness matches up with common sense.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah, for sure.

John McLarty: He’s not right in a way like some evil dictator thought that he was right, that he’s actually evil. God is righteous. He’s also just, maintains the justice in the universe. But fortunately, in addition to that, He’s loving. So God is righteous, just, and loving.

Kimberly Faith: If you think about the perfection of that nature, He cannot act outside of that nature. Then, his character or his attributes are They’re dependable. Think about it if you had an omniscient friend or an omnipotent friend

John McLarty: or

Kimberly Faith: an omnipresent friend.

John McLarty: He’s all knowing, all powerful, and everywhere present.

Kimberly Faith: That’s right. And you think about that, you know,

John McLarty: let’s- Wouldn’t we all want a friend like that?

Kimberly Faith: Yes. Here’s the creator of

John McLarty: All the friend that we have in Jesus. The

Kimberly Faith: creator of the universe saying, A, I wanna be your friend. Matter of fact, wanna be more than your friend. I wanna be the kind of friend that will never leave you or forsake you, that will give you the wisdom that confounds the mighty, right? And I just think that we have such a great opportunity if we will seek to have God delight in us through being thankful. It’s real simple.

Be thankful, right? Because what thankfulness does for us is it shifts us into God’s perspective. And when we start seeing things from God’s perspective, we want more of God’s perspective. Because it’s like light shining through the darkness. We start to see everything starts to make sense.

The worldview starts to make sense. Oh, yeah. You know what? God didn’t create evil. God allowed us to have free will and we created evil because we had free will.

And gosh, God’s so powerful, evil doesn’t have to control us. Evil can be worked against itself because God’s that big. We use it for good. And I think about some of the verses in the Bible. I just wanna read a couple of these verses from Jeremiah, because Jeremiah is one of my favorite It’s becoming one of my favorite books in the Bible.

I never would’ve thought that it would be that until I started studying it about three months ago. But Jeremiah 30 two:seven says, Oh Lord God, behold, you have made the heavens and the earth by your great power and outstretched arm. There is nothing too hard for you. And he says, I’ll be intimate with you. And Jeremiah 23 says, I a God near at hand, says the Lord, and not a God afar off?

Can anyone hide himself in secret places so I will not see him? Do I not feel heaven and earth? And then we go ahead and read Jeremiah 30 one:three.

John McLarty: Yeah, this is part of his omnipresent and all knowing, but his loving, loving kindness. The Lord, this is Jeremiah 30 one:three, The Lord has appeared of old to me saying, ‘Yes, I have loved you with an everlasting love. Therefore, with loving kindness I have drawn you.

Kimberly Faith: I love that because there’s such a wrong image of God that somehow the only way people get saved is by, you know, at gunpoint. No. There’s a fear of hell, sure. But it’s the goodness of God that draws us to repentance.

John McLarty: I’ve gotta throw in a little bit of my testimony here, because when I got saved, I was under Holy Spirit conviction. I knew I was a sinner. I had been fighting that idea. But my moment of salvation was not under the sense of, for some people it is. It’s like the wrath of heaven and hell.

And that can be That can be effective. That can be effective. My concept at the time was almost, it wasn’t this vision, vision, like some mysterious vision, but this image in my head of Jesus reaching out to me, almost like Peter sinking in the water. Right. It was Jesus’ outstretched hands.

And it was like, John, you’ve sinned against me. You have ignored me all your life. But that’s okay. We can be friends.

Kimberly Faith: Wow.

John McLarty: Because I went to the cross. That was very much my sin and the penalty of sin, separation from God. That anxiety was there. That I was separated from God. Right.

But Jesus was like, We can be friends.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. That’s amazing. What a what a way to draw you out of spiritual anxiety,

John McLarty: you

Kimberly Faith: know, into something you’ve looked for your whole life.

John McLarty: And I was like, we can be friends? And I’ve basically kind of ignored you all my life.

Kimberly Faith: Right. No human friends were

John McLarty: offered I that want to be your friend. Yeah. And that’s this, you had this, you know, this our image of God. Right. And that’s Jesus wants to be our God wants to be our friend.

That’s amazing. He delights in us.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. That’s amazing. And you know, then one, I mean, my experience with intimacy with God, because it’s a waxing and waning thing, because I’m just so Romans chapter seven, you know? When I would do good, evil is present with me, right? But I want it to be stronger and stronger and less breakable and less And you start thinking about the verse that says, God is light and in Him is no darkness at all, one John one:five.

God is never in the dark. And He is the unquenchable source of light. And the believer’s perception of God can never be altered by circumstances. It’s only altered by the degree of darkness we allow to influence our heart and mind.

John McLarty: No, because God, one John one:five, God is light and in him is no darkness

Kimberly Faith: Right, at right. We’ve used the relatable example of a child living in a home and the parent provides everything good, shelter, guidance, affection, protection, yet the child chooses to sneak around, disobey the rules, and live in opposition. And the child starts forming these distorted opinions about God because they’re stirring up these And then they complain, the parent seems distant and uncaring, when the parent’s been there still offering the best. This illustration is used for your own salvation, which is such a great example. Because the child’s rebellion doesn’t change the parent’s presence or love.

It only blinds the child to the benefits already available and wastes the riches of that nearness. That’s

John McLarty: so true.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah. And so when we choose to walk in pride and unthankfulness, we create our own storms and then we wrongfully conclude that God is far away. And that’s just such a blinded perspective.

John McLarty: And it’s so relevant to why does this matter is because we can change that.

Kimberly Faith: That’s right.

John McLarty: We can change that perspective.

Kimberly Faith: That’s right.

John McLarty: As a born again Christian, if we’ve wandered away and we’re that child of God that’s wandered away, not feeling the love anymore, we can change that.

Kimberly Faith: That’s right. Yeah. And Psalms one hundred:four says, Enter into his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise. Give thanks to him and bless his name. Amen.

The gates represent the outer entrance to God’s dwelling and the courts represent going deeper into his presence. Thanksgiving is presented here the pathway key to approaching God, start worshiping Him with gratitude, which invites us into communion rather than coming in with our demands and complaints and, you know- Perfect day

John McLarty: to God.

Kimberly Faith: Yeah, we acknowledge His Lordship and goodness first, and then that positions our heart to experience intimacy. And of course, Thanksgiving doesn’t happen in a vacuum, right? We’ve got to do some things to discipline ourselves and build a different way. We have to train our brain, right? Our brain is not trained naturally in the things of God, especially not being thankful.

And so we’ve talked about a lot of things that we have to do to cultivate these attitudes of Christ, the mind of Christ.

John McLarty: Yeah, we can use the word, we don’t wanna overuse it, but it’s intentional. Yes. It’s an intentional- Intentional. Process.

Kimberly Faith: Intentionally praying. Bible study.

John McLarty: Fellowshipping with other believers.

Kimberly Faith: Right. Commitment to a local church. Right. Teaching. We were listening to a sermon this morning and Brother Michael Lee, who’s been a missionary to Ecuador, and they’re getting ready to have a church started down there.

He was talking about how within a couple weeks of him being saved, he was trying to teach what he was learning to somebody else.

John McLarty: Yes, that that was remarkable.

Kimberly Faith: It’s so remarkable, but that’s-

John McLarty: But that’s the way it should be.

Kimberly Faith: That’s the way it should be, right? And people are so afraid that they aren’t ready to teach when can teach If you’re learning, you can teach what you’ve learned. That’s just an old age principle. Old age, age old. I’m getting

John McLarty: That’ll work.

Kimberly Faith: So these disciplines, though, teach us that, going back to the Bible says, Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. If you want God, like you said, He’s waiting to be your friend.

John McLarty: And He wants to show us that He’s delighted in our life. Yeah. He’s Yeah, a loving God.

Kimberly Faith: And what a great privilege for us to know that we can have this intimacy with God and just experience His delight. There’s really no experience of delight like when God delights in you. And again, I’m not sitting here saying that I experience this all the time. I have experienced it, but I wanna experience it more.

John McLarty: Yeah, this is so good because there’s this common perception that salvation is merely we’ve been saved from hell. Right. And now heaven’s our destination. But God delights in us. He wants to show that just like a parent.

We go back to this. Like a parent wants to let a child know this is delightful. Right. Really triggered, especially, how to trigger that, the thankfulness and the appreciation. Doesn’t want- And

Kimberly Faith: we have

John McLarty: a lot to be thankful for.

Kimberly Faith: That’s right. And He doesn’t want us to be focused on the buy and buy, so to speak. We can have joy now. We can have peace now. We can have love now.

We can experience the fruit of God’s spirit flowing through us now. Sure, it’s imperfect. Sure, it’s broken. But it’s so incredible. That might even make it more incredible, really, because we get to see the contrast.

Right. But God delight, He will delight

John McLarty: in Yeah, it was there all the time. It’s gonna be amazing. Heaven’s gonna be amazing because it will be there all the time. But in this life with the body and the flesh, there’s the contrast that gives us really that extra appreciation. You’ve When the valleys make the hills look better.

When you’ve been thirsty for

Kimberly Faith: a long time, that first drink of water is so good. And when you’ve been tired, that pillow feels so good. And I think that we, as children of God If you’re listening to this and you’re a born again believer and you haven’t experienced what it is to be delightful and delighted by or to have God delight in you. I can’t stumbling here. Then start being thankful.

Start doing the basic things that we’ve just gone over. Reading your God’s Word, studying God’s Word, commit to a local church, serve.

John McLarty: Count your blessings.

Kimberly Faith: Count your blessings. Yeah, overall. And do all that, through everything that you do, count your blessings. When I sit down and read my Bible sometimes, in the morning, especially, have on my prayer list, the people that I know live in countries that have to be underground as Christians. North We Korea,

John McLarty: can name

Kimberly Faith: a of countries. And we can name a lot of countries. Then it makes me thankful that I can sit there in my living room with my Bible, because I know there are people who can’t.

John McLarty: And those perspectives can change our whole

Kimberly Faith: way of thinking. Absolutely. I just think it’s so miraculous that the Bible promises us, if we draw near to God, he will draw near to us. I think, man, it’s such a blessing. And if you’re not born again, that’s where it starts.

You must receive Jesus Christ as your Lord and savior. Then he will make your soul and spirit alive. And guess what? Then you can draw near to him.

John McLarty: And he delights in his children.

Kimberly Faith: That’s right. Well, dad, thank you so much for This has exciting. This has been exciting, and it is. Hey, friend. If this podcast lifted your heart or challenged your faith, imagine what God can do when you dive even deeper.

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