Psalm 37:4 is one of my favorite verses. It is only 16 small words but it says so much. Sunday morning the message was about why our prayers are not answered. My preacher mentioned this verse and he said we don't get our desires (or what we want) because we are not asking according to His will. I have tried a few times to study this verse out but I never searched hard enough until last night. I had my lovely Purple Bible that I normally use, and my Scofield Bible, a notebook and pen, and my IPad mini. My iPad has a strongs concordance Bible on it and I love it, I also have the dictionary on it. I got busy looking and God came and helped me :)
Here is what he showed me...
The bible tells us to 'delight thyself in the Lord' and 'he shall give thee the desires of thine heart.' That's pretty self explanatory but I had trouble figuring out how to delight in Him. Isaiah 58:13 tells us how.
There are a few different Hebrew words for delight but they come from the word anag (Is 58:14)which means: to be soft, or pliable, luxurious- delicate, have delight, sport self.
- that really didn't make sense to me but I kept on going.
***This is an If-Then statement*** therefore if one does verse13 then verse 14 will happen.
{Isaiah 58:13-14
Vs 13 If thou turn away thy foot from the sabbath,
from doing thy pleasure on my holy day;
and call the sabbath a delight,
the holy of the Lord, honourable;
and shalt honour him, not doing thine own ways,
nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words:
Vs14 Then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord;
and I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth,
and feed thee with the heritage of Jacob thy father:
for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it.}
If you want to delight yourself in The Lord you need to: STOP
1. Doing- your own ways
To get the desires of your heart you must first stop doing it your way. Many times I have that "my way or the highway" mentality. We want Gods blessings but we want it the way we think it should be. This word doing has many meanings. Here are a few: do or make. Bear, bestow, be busy. Commit, deal (with), follow, go about, govern, hinder, hold, journey, keep, sacrifice, serve, set, shew, sin, spend, surely, work, yield, use, observe. We try so hard to get our desires on our own. Yet we expect God to give us whatever we want and when he doesn't we get mad and do it in our own. When you "do" you are in control; when you stop "doing" then you allow God to "do" what he wants.
{Proverbs 3:6
In all thy ways acknowledge him,
and he shall direct thy paths.}
{Isaiah 55:8-9
For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are my ways higher than your ways,
and my thoughts than your thoughts.}
If you have never let go of your own dreams he wants you to. Go read my post on Plastic Pearls. His ways are soo much higher than ours. I can't comprehend what he has for me but I know it's much, much better than my way!
2. Finding- your own pleasure
Our pleasure (or desire) should be His hand on our life! We must look to him for our desires. It's funny how what we want can change so fast. One day I'm so sure I want this or that and a week later I've already changed my mind. The truth is we don't know what we want. We constantly change but He never does. Find his will for your life, and that will will never change. Don't find your pleasure in the world. You will miss out on his blessings if you search on your own. Be careful what you seek for because what you seek you will find.
Your desires...do you only want it so you can please yourself?
3. Speaking- your own words
I had a hard time with this one but I think he is saying be quiet. Stop running your mouth. Keep the sabbath. The sabbath symbolizes rest and worship. Worship him with your words and your silence. Be content with resting....or waiting. Sometimes God just wants us to stop and rest. When someone rests they are quiet and still. They are not afraid nor impatient. With my words I beg God to hurry up and give me the desire Of my heart...my Boaz. I want to meet him so bad! I want to get flowers for no reason, sweet texts in the mornings, laugh at his jokes (he better be funny!), not be single on valentines day anymore, be told 'I love you' and get a heart shaped engagement ring. I want to go wedding dress shopping. I want to have my small simple red, white, black and Tiffany blue wedding. I want to have my first kiss. I want to decorate our house for Christmas. I want to be a mom.
{Psalms 37:7
Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for him:
fret not thyself because of him who prospereth in his way...}
Sometimes what we want isn't necessarily bad but it's not the right time. So many times I think my life will be complete when I get my Boaz but I have to remind myself no one can complete me but Jesus. Other people down here can only complement a person. He won't give me what I want until I line up with what he wants. I must be "soft and pliable" in his hand. When He says "no" believe and know that he has a better "yes" for you down the road. He is the potter and I am just a little piece of clay. We think we can be, do, and say what we want because the world tells us we can. But get some perspective and realize you are nothing special, just a little piece of dirty clay. You will never be anything until God is your everything! Stop fighting, running and trying to do it on your own. You can't. But He can.
The last thing is to honor Him. We are not our own. We are bought with a price (a very high price).
{1 Corinthians 6:20
For ye are bought with a price:therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's.}
God made humans to use them to bring him honor and glory. Delighting in him is simply making him happy which in turn makes you happy. He really doesn't ask much of us. He wants us to read the Bible, talk to him, be faithful to church, and be a light to this dark world. Let Jesus make you happy. Stop and honor Christ. Like vs14 says He will lift you up and like ps37:4 says he'll give you the desires of your heart. Do your part,then he will do his.
"God doesn't exist for our pleasure and use. Just the opposite. We're made for God's pleasure, delight and use. He's the creator. We're the objects that were created...for his purposes."
