Delight and Duty

Are you still watching?
by Ian Jannaway

Am I living out my life following Jesus, or am I just getting by?

What do you do that causes you to lose track of time? Listening to music. Watching sport, playing on your phone? How much time do you devote to the things of God? We may think that we know what God wants or who God is, but how can we if we don’t spend time with him?

The great Christian author C.S. Lewis said this- “MY idea of God is not God… I need my ideas smashed.” Perhaps we need our ideas smashed in order to get back to basics with God and start again. We need to submit our ideas to Jesus and the Holy Spirit to be shaped again.

After healing a blind man Jesus addresses this- John 10:10

10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.

The thief, satan, will steal our idea of who God is and pervert it, I, Jesus, I am the way, follow me. Full, in me only, is the fullness of all that which God has ordained for you-life, hope, the resurrection, joy, delight, peace.

Caleb gave us the idea of duty versus delight. Duty is a must, delight is a pleasure. It gives us the question of how do we approach God, as a duty or delight? How do we rediscover our delight in Jesus? John 10:10 points the way. Jesus would have shocked his listeners with his ‘I’ statement, he was basically saying that you need to follow me, not what you have been taught or think. ‘I’ am the way. it was what got him killed in the end, the Jewish leaders accused him of blasphemy for saying he was God.

Instead of finding delight in God, people today are trying to find joy in material and temporal things.   Jesus says come to me to have life, not the things of the world. Why would we not go to Jesus for delight? What were your first impressions of Jesus, when you first heard about him?

The reality is that our first impressions never give us the full picture, never complete.

The answer? One thing could be to read the gospels for yourself, develop the relationship with Jesus to find out what he is like.

Three things to do:

1/ Ask God to speak to you

2/ Sit in silence

3/ Write down your observations.

What do you need to stop doing so that you can start delighting? Remember that hurry is the death of delight.

Read psalm 119:9-16

How can a young person stay on the path of purity?
    By living according to your word.
10 I seek you with all my heart;
    do not let me stray from your commands.
11 I have hidden your word in my heart
    that I might not sin against you.
12 Praise be to you, Lord;
    teach me your decrees.
13 With my lips I recount
    all the laws that come from your mouth.
14 I rejoice in following your statutes
    as one rejoices in great riches.
15 I meditate on your precepts
    and consider your ways.
16 I delight in your decrees;