Pleasures

Psalms 16:11

“You will show me the path of life;

In Your presence is fullness of joy;

At Your right hand are pleasures forevermore.”

Recently, in one of our staff prayer meetings was a couple who had served as missionaries for years and are now semi-retired. She has been suffering debilitating pain for the past year that has made it difficult for her to do much. As we prayed around the room for missionaries and nations, I could see the pain in her face, but when it came to her turn, I was struck by these words in her prayer; “Lord, I so enjoy your presence.”

We are so often performance-oriented that we often fail to enjoy God’s presence. In fact, when we pray our minds can become so full of what we need to do that we really can’t enjoy the pleasure of His presence. Our heavenly Father, however, is more interested in spending time with us than our performance. We are His delight!

The Psalmist reminds us that the path to life is not in what we do, our accomplishments, or what we accumulate. The path to true abundant life is found in God’s presence; that true joy and perpetual, on-going, eternal pleasure is found in Him. What gives you pleasure today? Is it a temporal pleasure that can evaporate in changing circumstances? Jesus said in John 14:6, 9, "I am the way, the truth, and the life….I am the door.” Jesus says, “I am everything that you need. Our relationship is not based on your performance but upon my character.”

King David said in Psalms 27:4,

“One thing I have desired of the LORD, that will I seek:

That I may dwell in the house of the LORD

All the days of my life,

To behold the beauty of the LORD,

And to inquire in His temple.”

What is the one thing that you desire of the Lord? What causes you to get up in the morning? What is the driving passion of your life? When you face obstacles and challenges, what gives you the drive to overcome? Or, like the missionary lady, what gives you fulfillment and joy when all else is stripped away? God desires to become our life, our reson de etre (reason for being).

There is a song I learned in Kenya that I love to sing. In His presence, in His presence there is peace. In His presence, in His presence there is joy. I will linger, I will stay in His presence day by day, till His likeness shall be seen in me.

Spend time with Him and you will find that He is all you need.

Andy