Does God Delight in You?

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Scripture:

2Sam. 22:20     He brought me out into a broad place;
        he delivered me, because he delighted in me.

Observation:

This is a Psalm of David and you can find the corresponding Scripture in Psalm 18.  Here, however, it is found in the final chapters of David’s life and written as a personal song to the Lord.  It is in these words that we discover the very personal relationship between David and the LORD.  David spent much of his life as a warrior and he gave praise and glory to God for the victories,  God came and rescued him at the point of his need and brought him out of his difficult situation.

Where did God bring David?  To a broad place.  David had a scrappy band of warriors who knew how to use the terrain to their benefit, but so did his enemies.  To be in a broad place meant that there would be no place for his enemies to hide.  This was a safer place, out where he could see all that was happening around him and where there would be no ambush waiting to catch him.  God knew how and where to bring him for his long-term safety.

Finally we see in this deliverance that the Lord is delighted in David.  Why?  Because they were in a covenant relationship.  This was a deeply personal relationship where there was mutual love for one another.  The result was that God was simply delighted in David.

Application:

This little verse of Scripture provides us with a beautiful pattern for our personal covenant relationship with the Lord.  It is God who reaches out to humanity, who was willing to send his own son down to our level to save us.  We do not save ourselves and the idea that the God of all creation would reach down to pull us out is a beautiful picture of God’s grace.

At the same time we must realize that God wants to take us to that broad place.  David followed God to that place!  How many of us are still sitting in places of danger because we refuse to follow God out to the broad place.  Instead we continue to be surrounded by the enemy and temptations because we remain in the midst of danger.  God wants to remove us from that place and be our protector.  Our job is to respond to leading and go to that broad place.  It is in this place that we can grow and flourish as his beloved.

God delights in us!  That’s an amazing thought, that God could love us so much that he would actually be delighted in us.  When we respond to God and he is able to do good things for us, it delights him.  Just as a parent who loves to do good things for their own children and then watches them flourish in the midst of it all, so God delights in you and me.  This is the beauty of the deeply personal relationship which we can experience with him.  Just as David was the delight of God, so may we be also. 

Does God delight in you?  It all begins by responding to his gracious act of reaching out to us and offering to remove us from the place of danger.

Prayer:

Lord, thank you for the incredible truth we find in your word and the love that we experience from you.  Amen.




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