I received some really tough news the other day. My first thought was dread and anxiety. I was thinking about all the ways I believed the situation would make my life much harder. I started to spiral. Then, almost audibly, God whispered, “What have I been teaching you this year about affliction?” I said to myself, “Right. Okay.” I paused my mounting anxiety, and began to remember the lessons on affliction that God has been giving me—which focus on the power of giving thanks. Then I made myself speak aloud, “Lord, this is an opportunity for Your glory, so help me to see it and face it—without fear and anxiety. Dissolve my unbelief in You. Help me to remember Your faithfulness to me this year.”
Then God gently reminded me to review the end of my prayer list which contains the list of every prayer He has answered in 2025.
This list is a vivid reminder of God’s PERSONAL faithfulness to me. It was also a reminder of a devotional last month about God’s glory being our greatest pleasure. You see, when we understand that the GREATEST pleasure we experience is when we glorify God, we learn to experience this pleasure irrespective of tough circumstances. In the timeless Spirit-inspired words of Paul the Apostle:
“And less I should be exalted above measure by the abundance of the revelations, a thorn in the flesh was given to me, a messenger of Satan to buffet me, less I be exalted above measure. Concerning this thing I pleaded with the Lord three times that it might depart from me. And He said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore I take PLEASURE in infirmities, in reproaches, in needs, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ’s sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong.” 2 Corinthians 12:7-10
Our physical pleasure is not the point of our existence. Through the gift of salvation, God has given humanity the opportunity to experience supernatural pleasure in a relationship with Him. There is no one you will ever know who is greater than God. No one satisfies like He does. No one protects like He does. No one loves like He does. No one comforts like He does. No one gives wisdom and strength like He does. No one gives peace like He does.
Ah, indeed, to glorify our amazing LORD brings us into the greatest experience of pleasure!
My friend, pain and tragedy are inevitable in this fallen world. Tough times will come. Be wise. Rather than make PHYSICAL pleasure your greatest goal and become crushed when tragedy steals it—make Jesus the LORD and center of your life. When Jesus is our greatest boast, greatest love, strongest strength, wisest counselor, and finest lover—no amount of pain, no circumstance, and no person—can steal our greatest pleasure. When God’s truth is our lens for viewing life, we learn to take our own comfort out of the equation and let His glory become our greatest pleasure.
Making Jesus the center of our greatest love is the great secret to a life of experiencing the greatest pleasure.
Lord, Who can separate us from Your love? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? In all these things we are more than conquerors through YOU, who loved us. Lord, we are persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord! Romans 8:35-39
