Day 49
Enjoying God
Read your Bible: Psalm 34:1–10
Spotlight Verse:
Taste and see that the Lord is good.
Oh, the joys of those who trust in Him!Psalm 34:8 NLT
Blaise Pascal was one of the greatest geniuses in human history.
At 12, he was working out geometry problems that had never been solved.
In his mid-20s he invented a mechanical calculator.
He did ground-breaking research on atmospheric pressure and vacuums.
He also did the foundational work on theories of probability.
And did I mention he lived in the 1600s? And he did all this before his death at age 39? He must have seemed like a man from the future.
Like many people he slowly found himself falling away from his childhood Christianity. Then he found his interest in that faith slowly rekindled. He decided to pick up the Gospels and read them again.
And on the evening of November 23, 1654, he had what he called a “definite conversion.” It was a sudden, unexpected, overwhelming experience of the majesty of God.
I love how poetically he describes this mysterious, ecstatic experience in his journal from that night:
From about half past ten at night until about half past midnight,
FIRE.
GOD of Abraham, GOD of Isaac, GOD of Jacob
not of the philosophers and of the learned.
Certitude. Certitude. Feeling. Joy. Peace.
GOD of Jesus Christ
My God and your God
Your GOD will be my God
Forgetfulness of the world and of everything, except GOD.
He is only found by the ways taught in the Gospel…
Joy, joy, joy, tears of joy…
This is eternal life, that they know you, the one true God,
and the one that you sent, Jesus Christ.
Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ.
I left Him; I fled Him, renounced, crucified.
Let me never be separated from Him…
Renunciation, total and sweet.
Complete submission to Jesus Christ…65
This intellectual genius met God. Or as he wrote, GOD.
And when you meet GOD, not some godlet you fashion, there is a point when His love and His majesty
ignites you
and zooms you
right past the atmosphere of the self
and into the infinite cosmos of pure worship.
Joy, joy, joy, tears of joy…
Brushes with God
When I read Pascal’s description of his conversion I’m moved to tears. Because it helps me remember. My soul too has brushed up against GOD in unexpected moments.
I’ve had to pull over my car, so saturated with a sense of GOD I could no longer drive. I’ve casually glanced out my window at the neighborhood when suddenly an awareness of divine love for what I was seeing seemed to cascade through me — like I was caught beneath a waterfall of God’s wonderful passion. More frequently I’ve found myself deeply moved during congregational worship, giving myself to God again with tears of joy and awe.
Certitude. Certitude. Feeling. Joy. Peace.
Why I’m Here
A heart filled with joy and love is one of the effects of trust in God:
For we know how dearly God loves us, because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love. Romans 5:5b (NLT)
Those who look to Him for help will be radiant with joy… Psalm 34:5 (NLT)
I will be filled with joy because of you; I will sing praises to your name, O Most High. Psalm 9:2 (NLT)
Of course emotions can become idols, too, and I should never serve God just because I get emotions out of the deal. But…
But enjoying God is what I am made for.
As the Westminster Catechism affirms, “the chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.”
I remember when I first read that as a kid I thought someone was playing a joke on me. Enjoy God? It seemed almost irreverent. No, I thought: My job is to work hard for God. Not to enjoy Him!
Wrong.
The chief end of man really is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.
So how do you glorify a Being that already has all glory?
It’s what we’ve been doing in this study. You notice His glories. You thank Him for His glories. And you share with others the glories of God you’ve been discovering.
As you glorify God, you grow to enjoy God, to lose yourself in His majesty and grace.
“In commanding us to glorify Him, God is inviting us to enjoy Him.” — C.S. Lewis66
I hope you’ve found that your enjoyment of God has been growing. It’s a foretaste of heaven, because there you will be in bliss, enjoying God forever.
As the ancient church leader St. Augustine wrote in his
Confessions:
Great are you, O Lord, and exceedingly worthy of praise; your power is immense, and your wisdom beyond reckoning. And so we creatures, who are a part of your creation, long to praise you …because you have made us and drawn us to yourself, and our heart is restless until it rests in you.67
How does that move you?
God is… the One I was made to enjoy forever.
Questions For Reflection
Can you relate to Blaise Pascal’s experience? How so?
How has your enjoyment of God grown through this study?
