Just Dance
I have spoken of these matters in figures of speech, but soon I will stop speaking figuratively and will tell you plainly all about the Father. Then you will ask in my name. I’m not saying I will ask the Father on your behalf, for the Father himself loves you dearly because you love me and believe that I came from God. John 16:25-27
I am starting on a 90-day prayer schedule offered by my church. It asks me to focus on a prayer for my wife and to change it up each week. This is the first week of it, and it immediately struck a chord with me. It asks me to pray on how God dances over her and is delighted to spend time with her. Now that might seem a bit extreme at first, but then, I thought to myself. Is it really too far of a stretch that our Heavenly Father would be so delighted in our having a relationship with Him that it excites Him? Speaking about the day of redemption, Zephaniah 3:17 says:
For the Lord your God is living among you.
He is a mighty savior.
He will take delight in you with gladness.
With his love, he will calm all your fears.
He will rejoice over you with joyful songs.”
So yes, God does rejoice over us. I say this thinking about how many of the messages about God talk about His wrath over our sinful nature. My thoughts are not that God does not ask us to repent of our sins or He is only about smiles and happy things. That would be entirely naïve. However, the people who focus on the love of God have a great point. We too often see and speak about how God wants us to repent and not enough about how God rejoices over the relationship we have with Him.
God is joyful that we are His children. We often look at our relationship with God with a degree of disappointment. We will have a negative self-talk within ourselves saying things like, “I failed to live up to His expectations.” It might also sound something like, “God, I know I am a sinner, and I have done wrong.” There is nothing wrong with acknowledging the reality of our failures or falling short of God’s Glory. However, we too often fail to see ourselves as God sees us through Christ and instead focus on how much of a failure we have been. He has this forgiving undying love for us. He acknowledges our failures, but He also sees us as a work in progress toward the beautiful person we will become. Living in Detroit, you understand the concept of the assembly line and how each part of a car is assembled from its bare structure to its finished product. In our journeys of faith, the vision of ourselves is limited to the part of the assembly line that we are on. God has already seen the blueprint of the finished product and knows exactly where we are on the assembly line. He celebrates as each aspect of our spiritual growth occurs and gains a level of great satisfaction as we continue to move toward His vision for us. Thus, our successes and yes, even our failures are all part of God’s plan, and we are being made to become an amazing child whom He both delights in and loves oh so dearly.
God is genuinely excited to have us. If we know this about Him, how excited would we be? We often complain about who falls short of God’s glory or how someone needs God. What we should say is how He loves us despite our flaws and failures, and we need His love as much as those around us. Let us be encouraged by how He feels about both who we are today and who we will become in His name. Are you excited about you as God is? How different is your testimony sharing knowing how God delights in you? My prayer is that we open our eyes to see not only how God sees us but also why the mere thought of you would make Him dance. Amen.