Psalm 149:4

“For the Lord takes pleasure in His people; He will beautify the humble with salvation.”

If we have believed in Jesus Christ and confessed His name, if we have been born again and filled with the Holy Spirit, we are His people! And He smiles over us, sings over us, rejoices over us and takes pleasure in us, even in our weakness. This is one of the most difficult truths to truly believe, but it’s one of the most liberating truths we can ever experience, when reality strikes the core of our hearts.

The truth is, that when we are sincere in our desire to love Jesus with all of our hearts, He is ravished even with a weak glance in His direction from us. He remembers that we are dust, and He is long suffering, and delights to give us mercy. In the Parable of the Father in Luke 15 it’s clear that before we are perfected, Jesus delights in us. Even in immaturity and failure, God still takes pleasure in us. Is He pleased with our sin or wrong actions? No. But does He see our desire to be with Him and follow Him? Absolutely, and He enjoys us in the whole process of us learning obedience. Here in psalm 149, it says that He will beautify the humble with salvation. The word humble means poor, needy, meek, weak and lowly. These are the people in desperate need of a doctor, the foolish things of the earth. They may have received an installment of beauty to a degree, but there is much more work to be done in the sanctification process of their lives, and God is enjoying them the whole time.

What scares a lot of people (including myself sometimes) is if we believe God to be too merciful, and too glad hearted, then everybody will just sin. The truth is, the more we believed in a God who delights in us as a good Father, even in weakness; The more we would run to Him and be empowered to overcome sin.

As I pondered the merciful and delighting God, I thought about a child trying to learn to ride a bike.  When the boy falls for the first time, a good father and leader doesn’t chastise His son and lead him to believe he can’t succeed by ridiculing his failure.  If a father did this, his son would be very reluctant to get back on the bike.  A good father would encourage his son with tenderness and instill confidence in him that he can do it.  This is what motivates the heart to overcome, get back up and keep going.

Next Monday I’m going to begin a journey through Luke 15, in discovering the Father’s heart.