Dear Saints of Valley Church,
What comes to your mind when you think of the word “delight”? Do you delight in the smell of fresh-baked cookies, or the taste of your favorite dish, or a perfect cup of coffee? Do you delight in your child’s laughter, or a well-timed joke from your best friend, or the sound of your spouse’s voice? Do you delight in your team winning a game, finishing a great book, or when you hear your favorite song playing?
As we begin our summer in the Psalms with our study of Psalm 1, where on our lists would be the statement from Psalm 1:2 that the blessed one “delights in the law of the LORD”? If that didn’t make your list, that might be because, on the surface, the combination of “delight” and “law” seems like a strange combination. C.S. Lewis wrote that this phrase in Psalm 1:2 is “utterly bewildering and mysterious.” We would expect the Psalmist to say that we “delight in God’s mercies” or “delight in God’s love,” but we don’t often associate the word “delight” with the concept of “law.” We respect God’s law. We are glad that God’s law is good and righteous. We try to obey God’s law. But “delight” … is that the correct verb?
However, consider if someone says they love history, or chemistry, or poetry – what do they mean? It means they love to study and focus on those subjects, not as an end in themselves, but because of what is represented in those various disciplines. Lewis explains that, similarly, someone who delights in the law of God loves to focus on and study and think upon God’s law, not as an end in itself (since the Bible is not an end in itself), but because of what God’s law points to – God’s law is a revelation of God Himself! We delight in God’s Law because it is in his law that we see and behold the transcendent glory of God!
Do you want a window into your heart’s affections for God? Or a thermometer to indicate your heart’s desire to behold God’s glory? Ask yourself: How much delight do you have in studying the Bible? To delight in God is to delight in His revelation of Himself in His Law, in His Word, in His Scriptures. And the opposite also is true: To not delight in God’s revelation in His Scriptures would suggest that we may not be finding our delight in God.
This Sunday, Valley Church gathers to remind each other through our study of God’s Word, our singing (two of the songs we will be singing are Christ Be Magnified and Yet Not I But Through Christ in Me), and our fellowship with one another that there is no higher purpose, or joy, or blessedness, or delight than to behold the transcendent glory of the invisible God in Christ as revealed in the Scriptures.
By His strength and for His glory,
Craig Shigyo