“The Lord your God is with you, the Mighty Warrior who saves. He will take great delight in you; in his love he will no longer rebuke you, but will rejoice over you with singing.”
‭‭Zephaniah‬ ‭3:17‬

The dictionary defines ‘delight’ as a high degree of gratification. When we look back to the Greek roots of the Old Testament where the book of Zephaniah is found, ‘delight’ can be translated to ‘chara’- a Greek noun describing a feeling of inner gladness, delight or rejoicing; joy.

It’s crazy to think about the fact that God delights in you and I. It’s crazy to think about the fact that when God peers down at us from the high places of heaven, and He feels inner gladness and joy. It’s crazy to think about the fact that God literally rejoices in us.

In a world where we feel useless, God gives us purpose. In a world where we feel hopeless, God gives us hope. In a world where we feel uninvited, God gives us His family to belong to. In a world where we feel lonely, God walks with us. In a world where we feel unwanted, God welcomes and embraces us with open arms. In a world where we feel less than, the God of the universe says that we are enough. And in the same way, in a world where we often feel unloved, the God of the entire universe loves and delights in us. Just simply because the kind of love that God has for you is not the same kind of love anyone else in the world has for you- God’s love for you is a truly delighting love.

We think His delight in us is wrapped up in what we do for Him. We try to make ourselves more presentable. We show up to more church activities, we sign up to volunteer more, we clean up our acts before we dare whisper a prayer. But His delight in us is based on His character and not ours.

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God meets you where you are.

God is mighty to save.

God rejoices over you.

God quiets you with His love.

God sings over you loudly.

God delights in you.

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God sings a beautiful song of delight over you.

Just as a loving parent cradles a child and sings out of love, so God’s song over His people is born of His great love.

How lovely a truth to know that in the quiet moments of worship where you feel as if the world and all of its worries have melted away, where you feel your heart soaring and becoming closer to His, where you feel truly captivated by His love and in awe of His character, where your soul sings not in words but in the melodies of joy, that that is all reciprocated back to you, by the God of the Universe. Because that’s the God we praise. He is bigger than we could ever dare to believe but more invested in us than we could ever imagine.

Heavenly Father, I thank you so much for your overwhelming love for me and for the immense delight you take in me. It’s crazy to think that you rejoice in me, and I pray that that realization would change the way that I think and live. I pray that it would push me to see the vast, infinite, and priceless worth that I have in Your eyes. In your amazing name I pray, amen.