God Desires People to be Filled with Delight

No one enjoys life without delight and happiness. The good news is that the God who loves us desires to fill our hearts and lives with delight and happiness. The utmost ultimate delight and happiness is found in our triune God. The delightful things in this world--love, marriage, family, friendships, fellowship, feasts--only points to the ultimate Delight.

"Take delight in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart" (Ps 37:4). "You make known to me  the path of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence, with eternal pleasures at your right hand" (Ps 16:11). "They feast on the abundance of your house; you give them drink from your river of delights" (Ps 36:8). "Rejoice always" (1 Th 5:16). "The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace..." (Gal 5:22). " I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete" (Jn 15:11).

A Pseudo-Community Avoids Messes

This excellent excerpt is from Community and Growth by Jean Vanier:

Scott Peck talks of pseudo-communities. These are where people pretend to live in community. Everybody is polite and obeys the rules and regulations. They speak in platitudes and generalities. But underlying it all is an immense fear of conflict, a fear of letting out the monsters.

If people start to truly listen to each other and to get involved, speaking from their guts, their anger and fears may rise up and they might start hitting each other over the head with frying pans. There are so many pent-up emotions contained in their hearts that if these were to start surfacing, God knows what might happen! It would be chaos.

But from that chaos, healing could come.

Wish Dream

In Life Together, Dietrich Bonhoeffer explains why a "wish dream" hinders (destroys) Christian community:

"Every human wish dream that is injected into the Christian community is a hindrance to genuine community and must be banished if genuine community is to survive. He who loves his dream of a community more than the Christian community itself becomes a destroyer of the latter, even though his personal intentions may be ever so honest and earnest and sacrificial."

"B" is for Beauty

Psalm 27:4 (Gen 27:27-28; 29:17-20)

"One thing I ask from the Lord, this only do I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze on the beauty of the Lord and to seek him in his temple." (Ps 90:17 says, "And let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us..." [KJV])

(Last week's theme was "A" is for Accountability. The questions were, "Do you have a Nathan? Are you a Nathan? Would having a Nathan and being a Nathan burden or enrich your life? Why?")

Theme/thesis: Human beings inextricably link together love, beauty and happiness. Thus, we can never resist desiring and loving what we find most beautiful.

Key Questions: What is most beautiful to you? Are you attracted to "the beauty of the Lord"?

ACCOUNTABILITY [The "A" of Practical Christian Living]

"Brothers and sisters, if someone is caught in a sin, you who live by the Spirit should restore that person gently. But watch yourselves, or you also may be tempted" (Gal 6:1).

Christianity is ultimately not basic instructions for life but a loving relationship with a Person. There are no basic standard formulas for a healthy, productive and fulfilling life. There are no 7 steps to a happy Christian life that works for everyone. Yet some principles may be helpful, not as a rule or code, but as a guide for practical consideration.

Here are proposed ABCs that may help Christ followers in our journey of faith (please freely think of other words):