Can you explain Psalm 37:4 to me? “Delight yourself also in the LORD, And He shall give you the desires of your heart.” Does this mean be obedient to God just to get what I want like marriage, money to provide for a family one day, etc? I am trying to reconcile this and make sense of not reducing God to a series of transactions but also trying to figure out what the verse means.
God is not transactional fundamentally because if He were, we'd only deserve death and hell. Yet in His mercy He offers forgiveness, and in His grace, reconciliation as a gift (Rom 6:23). So when we don't receive what we truly deserve, that is God's grace. Here, delighting yourself in the LORD means not just aligning your values with God and consciously adoring God for His magnificence and loving-kindness, but also submitting your will as a proper response to the former. If we obey God from the heart, which requires regeneration and faith that comes from God only, instead of seeking ulterior gain, God's will is accomplished, so our hearts desire is to do what glorifies God. God always accomplishes His purposes for His glory, and we will rejoice in that if we truly love Him. In another sense, we as humans have a God-shaped hole in our heart (Ecc 3:11). When we meet God, we can open or close our heart to Him. If we open our heart to Him, then He can enter and do His work, namely giving Himself to us. Notice that we first delight, then in the second part God is the one who acts by giving, not us. To properly understand what the desires of your heart is, you'd have to realize that your own thoughts and conscious experience are not completely aligned with what is best for you, but in fact, contrary (Jer 17:9). So God has to change you fundamentally, or cause you to be born again, in order for that desire that is Christ, embedded in the definition of being human, to be given to you. Now this doesn't preclude earthly blessings as God will dispense those at the right time by His grace. We call this providence. Providence helps us walk with Him and gives otther basis that we can praise God for in addition to the ultimate basis of Him offering His Son as propitiation for our sins. A very similar idea is repeated in Prov 3:5-6 by Solomon, where we trust in God and lean not on our own understanding, then He makes our paths straight. Jesus's words in Matt 6:33 tells us to seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these will be granted to you as well. Even if you don't receive earthly, temporal blessings, God is sure to give you far better in heaven according to His promises to wipe away every tear and give you a body that does not know sickness or death (Rev 21:4). Hopefully this helps!
Dr John Piper, can we revisit your assertion that life and freedom aren’t as important as being against the man God used to save millions of babies? Sun Tzu said that a wicked ruler will see his nation burned to the ground to rule over the ashes. Sun Tzu must have seen the dystopian future that is being ushered in by the Democrats, at the behest of pastors like yourself.
@@HearGodsWord Why do you want to know? See, I’ve had people who I’ve told and then they go off and tell on me! Can you believe it? Like I’m doing something wrong just trying to get Piper to clarify his divisive statements! (All Piper would have to do is to simply acknowledge me and my concerns. Isn’t it odd that he won’t do that? I mean, is that a modest request or what? (Hint: he lives in Minnesota!!!!)
@user-xq2bm3nq8y no surprise you were too scared to answer. Perhaps it's because you don't have one. Your comments have never shown any hint of actually being a follower of Christ, but that's because you follow Donald instead.
