In Hebrews 11:6 it says that “without faith it is impossible to please God.” It’s interesting, I think, that for many Christians, they are satisfied with knowing God, or rather perhaps content with the idea that God knows them. But, it is really something more to not just be known by God but also to be pleasing to Him. When is the last time you thought about whether God is really pleased with you? By that, I’m not asking if you have considered whether God loves you and accepts you, because there should be no doubt that God loves and accepts all of His children; rather, I am asking whether you have thought about if God really takes pleasure in you? That is, do you wonder if God smiles when he thinks about you and if His heart swells up with joy when He watches you?
Eric Liddell, the Scottish runner, is famous for once saying “God made me fast. And when I run, I feel His pleasure.” Apparently, when Liddell competed, He could sense God’s happiness about what he was doing. And yet, the pleasure that he sensed was not so much in the fact that he was able to run fast but rather that he was fulfilling the purpose for which God had created him. In other words, the source of the pleasure for his Maker was in his child being the very man that God had intended him to be. Hence, the divine pleasure was not in watching his child perform but in seeing him fulfill his superintended calling.
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what it means to bring God pleasure. Because God is not like us, because His ways and thoughts are so much higher than ours, I’m not sure that God feels “pleasure” in the same way that we do. And, if He does, then I’m fairly sure that He feels it much more profoundly than we ever could. Though we feel pleasure perhaps when we see our children succeed, our sense of satisfaction is tainted by our own ambition and selfishness, whereas God’s pleasure as our Holy Father is probably entirely different. His pleasure is not marred or compromised by anything insincere or impure, so God’s sense of personal pleasure must be not only much deeper than ours but also much more intense. So, when God is pleased, I’m therefore not surprised that His children can not only sense it but also even feel it.
God’s pleasure undoubtedly sends supernatural shock waves through the universe that can be sensed by the spiritually sensitive human hearts of His children, and if they are looking and care to know, they may even feel it. At the same time, I wonder how many of God’s children go about their lives without ever stopping to look up at their Father’s face to see if perhaps He just might be smiling on them. What a sad story for God to be pleased in His child and for the child not to even notice.
Well, I think that I didn’t notice God’s smiles for many years in my life. Although God had probably at times smiled in my direction, I was too busy or too distracted to notice Him. Although I knew that God cared about me and loved me, I didn’t really think about whether He actually liked me. I wonder how many times God was saddened after He took pleasure in me and I failed to take note of it, and I have reflected on how my life might be different had I cared or noticed His joy all of these years. Perhaps you have wondered about these things too or maybe you are just now wondering for the first time.
It was only within the last couple of years that I have begun to look for God’s face to see if there might be a smile on it. And, what I found is that when I looked for signs of His pleasure in my life, I started to really notice that He smiled on me most often when I was engaged in one particular activity. For many years, I have preached God’s Word in various churches, with various groups, and in various places, but it wasn’t until I started preaching every week to the same group of people that I began to sense something that I hadn’t really noticed before.
What I sensed as I prepared and delivered God’s Word week in and week out was an ever increasing inward feeling of God’s satisfaction with me. Although the week to week teaching has sometimes felt tedious and even fruitless at times, I have realized more and more that it is anything but that. What I have been about doing in preaching is not giving talks or speeches to entertain and inspire people but rather living out the purpose for which God has created me. What I started to sense and have even begun to feel in my spirit when I preach is that God is happy when I am teaching. It’s not so much a sense that God is pleased when I teach well but rather than He is pleased that I am fulfilling the purpose for which He has created me. And, knowing that I’ve made God happy makes me happy.
Now, for several years, I didn’t actually apply myself to doing what God had in fact created me to do, and though there was enjoyment and reward in doing other tasks and pursuing other goals, I never felt God’s pleasure in doing those things as I do when I preach God’s Word. And, knowing that now, I would not have spent so much time doing anything other than that which brings my Father the most pleasure because there is no greater joy in this life than in feeling that you are doing the very thing that God put you on this earth to do.
So, what has God put you on this earth to do? It may not be preaching God’s Word but rather competing in sports, making music, creating art, selling insurance, designing buildings, or teaching kindergarten. It really doesn’t matter what it is so much as knowing that you are doing the very thing God has created you to do. The joy and the fulfillment is in sensing God’s pleasure when you are actually doing whatever it is that you do.
At the same time, if you cannot sense God’s pleasure in your heart when you go about your work, then perhaps you are not fulfilling the calling for which you were designed. Even if you enjoy it and are richly rewarded for your tasks, those successes are trivial and vain if they do not bring God’s pleasure and your awareness of it. Real fulfillment in this life is in doing the very thing that you know brings your God the most joy.
So, what is it that you do that you feel in your heart makes God smile? What is it that you do, and when you do it, you can feel God’s pleasure? If you can’t answer that question, then it means that either you are not doing what God created you to do or you haven’t taken the time to notice that you are.
So, how will you know if God is smiling on you? Quite simply, if God is not smiling on what you are doing, then you will likely feel an unsatisfied restlessness that compels you to always be wondering about what else you should be doing. And yet, if you have that feeling that you are settled in your calling and that this is the way you want to invest the rest of your life, then stop and look up at the Father’s face once in a while because He may just be smiling on you.
