God's Desire Is Yours to Keep

Delight yourself in the Lord,
And He will give you the desires of your heart

• Psalm 37:4

 

In past times, I have read this scripture numerous times and understood it to mean something, but today I read this scripture and it spoke something completely different to me. I read it this way, “if I delight myself in the Lord, I will get the desires of my heart from HIM.”

WOAH!!!!!!!

How often do we think God is supposed to give us what we want in our hearts because we know that is capable of doing so? Here is the problem with that concept….Our hearts can be deceitful (Jeremiah 17:9)

 

Our hearts don’t always lead us in the wrong direction, but they sometimes lead us in a direction that isn’t in perfect alignment with God’s will for our lives and how our lives contribute to His kingdom.

 

I did some research on the word delight…. I wanted to know what it means in different contexts and where it derives from to get a more clear understanding of how it applies in this verse IN CONTEXT. It is of Latin and French origin, and it means “to please greatly” or “take pleasure in”.

 

In the context of this verse, we can read it as such… “find great pleasure in the Lord, and He will give you the desire of your heart.” When we look to spend time with God, we experience real friendship, positive parenting, pure hearted provision, and so many things that are good and righteous. Spending time with God helps us to see Him for real and get to know Him on a deeper level. There are so many layers to who God is…. infinite layers. I believe we will never get to a place where know all there is to know about Him. As His words says, “His thoughts are not our thoughts nor His ways our ways.” He is just that great!

 

Therefore, when we take pleasure in God, we get to know Him more and we get to know our God-given identity more as well. God said He created us in His likeness. So, the more we know about Him, the more we know about who He created us to be. What He intended in our lives. What He wants for our lives and how we are to contribute to the body of Christ. Those things can be described as the desires of our hearts if we truly want God’s heart, which is ultimately, God’s will. How do we know God’s will?

 

Romans 12:1-2
I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. ² Do not be conformed to this world,^[c] but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

 

 

 

So, as we know Him better, He will share His heart with us and therefore we will grow to love what His heart wants, so much so that we want JUST THAT for our lives.
 
Our desires can be influenced by so many things…. We see an ad on FB, now we want that product. We see a review on Tiktok, now we gotta go order that. We see an article in a magazine and now that looks intriguing. Instagram has better lives to display so now I’m not content with my life. What if we saw what God is trying to do and we just wanted that and only that, in our lives?

 

The problem with the heart is that Jeremiah 17:9 says that the heart is deceitful above all things…. Meaning we cannot trust OUR hearts… But we can trust God’s. So lets delight in Him and let him GIVE US the desires of our hearts because if our desires come from Him.

 

1) we cannot go wrong
2) We have the promise that whatever that desire is, God will give it to us.
3) God keeps His promises, God gives the BEST we could ever have in this life. It doesn’t mean our lives will be perfect, but they will be in His perfect will for us.