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The Desires of Your Heartby Elizabeth A. Nixon, Esq.
Study includes:
A. Prophetic EncouragementNO MORE DELAY! It’s January, the New Year, 2011! Resolutions have been made by many and avoided by others – perhaps consciously, perhaps not. Whether we are outspoken about what we want from the New Year or not, most likely we all want to see our dreams come true. And, while holding our breath, we wonder if this is the year! If you’re like me, you’ve received a prophetic word, it was very encouraging at the time and it probably hit the very core of your personal dreams and desires for life. For me, it made a way to focus in prayer. But the years have dragged by with no sign of the word coming to pass. In fact, you can look around and say that this is true for a lot of people you know. So you wonder, were the words true? We are not the first ones to encounter the sovereign timing and seeming delays of prophetic words coming to pass. In the days of the Israelites, apparently it was so common to them that they had developed a proverb about it, but focusing on the disappointment of delay created rebellion and bitterness in their hearts. This should be a warning for us. My encouragement for you is to believe with the same zeal, anticipation and hope that you had the very first moment the word breathed life into your spirit. For I tell you today, NO MORE DELAYS! Ezekiel gave this same word of hope to the Israelites when he gave them this message from the Lord in Ezekiel 12:21-23: Son of man, you’ve heard that proverb they quote in Israel: “Time passes, and prophecies come to nothing.” Tell the people, “This is what the Sovereign Lord says: I will put an end to this proverb, and you will soon stop quoting it.” Now give them this new proverb to replace the old one: “The time has come for every prophecy to be fulfilled!” (New Living Translation) B. Devotional TeachingTHE DESIRES OF YOUR HEART As we walk into this New Year and lay our dreams and desires before the Lord, let us remember what He has already told us in Psalms 37:4: “Delight yourself in the Lord and According to this verse, giving us the desires of our heart is exactly what God wishes to do for us. Stop and focus on this truth: God desires to give you the desires of your heart. Allow your spirit to grasp it. Breathe in the joy, knowing your dreams are safe in the hands of the Lord; they will come to be. But this verse gives an instruction first, followed by the promise. The instruction, “Delight yourself in the Lord” precedes the promise of Him giving us the desires of our heart. As a lawyer, I can’t help but analyze this verse, do a word study, research definitions and language translations, and discover meaning and context in order to determine what it means first to delight myself in the Lord so that He can give me the desires of my heart. DELIGHT Here is what I found: “Delight yourself in the Lord.” According to Strong’s Concordance, the word delight here is an amorous and romantic term. Strictly translated it means: soft, delicate, dainty, to be pampered or to take exquisite delight in. In literature it is used in reference to the amorous ways of a woman and specifically the way she moves. This was a bit surprising to me at first, but what a beautiful picture it creates. It is such an expressive way of describing the kind of love, affection and attention we should pay the Lord. We should be in awe of Him, we should gaze upon Him with such adoration and fascination as to be mesmerized. This is Song-of-Solomon love. The Song of Solomon is a book in the Old Testament that contains a collection of poems written between lovers. It is a picture of the kind of love we are to have with Jesus. There are verses in this book that take my breath away, like Chapter 1, verse 2, which reads, “Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth, for his love to me is better than wine.” This is the kind of writing and emotion that romantic movies and books make millions of dollars from. But how do we engage in this kind of love and “delight” with God? The use of the word delight in Psalms 37:4 suggests that in relation to our movement with, worship of, and rhythm with the Lord, we are to be delicate, and this infers an element of vulnerability. To be pampered requires you to allow others to attend to you and do for you. Even though “spa treatment” is a dream for many people, it can be uncomfortable in the beginning and requires the ability to trust the person doing the pampering. As I think about this, the same is true of our intimacy with the Lord. In order to truly receive the deep things from Jesus, it does require us to let down our walls and learn about His core nature – that He is trustworthy. As I meditate on this, it makes more and more sense to me. At the very heart of our dreams lies our deepest, most vulnerable self. At the heart of all of the fear we can attach to our dreams – fearing they may not come true, worrying about what happens if they do – lies the fear that if we really go for it, will we be disappointed? Will we be rejected? The only way to overcome these fears is to be engaged in a Song-of-Solomon kind of love relationship with Jesus, to be able to truly delight yourself in Him and to know that He can be trusted with your deepest, most secret self … even your dreams. DESIRE And, as we are “delighting ourselves in Him” we are promised that He will grant us the desires of our heart. Even this word, desire, has a lover connotation. De Sire: “de” meaning of, and “sire” from the root verb meaning to father. (This is the term universally used among horse breeders where famous racing stallions are specifically used to breed or “to sire” what is hoped will be the next generation of race-winning stallions.) So the very word, desire, literally translated means “of the Father.” When I realized this, it was like a bell going off in my head. Our “desires” are not in and of themselves selfish or carnal. In fact, our desires are those things which are born of, bred from, or fathered in us by our Heavenly Father. My desires are the very things placed in me by God Himself. No wonder they have such a stronghold on our souls and spirits! Could it be that to pursue our dreams, to relentlessly hold onto them, to believe in them, to work to become the person who can walk in those dreams, could all of those things actually be the way we fulfill our highest godly calling? I believe, yes! But this is also why the Psalm 37:4 formula is so important. I understand how people do, more often than not, pursue their dreams in a carnal, self-motivated fashion. I lived and worked in Los Angeles connected to the Hollywood industry for ten years and that gave me more than a glimpse into a world of empty, aching people who were doing nothing other than pursuing their dreams. Thus, the formula: delight yourself in the Lord first, then He will give you the desires of your heart. But again, as a lawyer, as an analytical thinker, I need practical directions. How do I be delicate in my interaction with God? How do I picture the Lord and look upon Him with amorous affection? While I understand romantic love and am still madly in love with my husband after 24+ years, at first I didn’t fully understand how to have this kind of affection for the Lord, nor was I sure how to get to that place. Knowing that my “desires” are “of the Father,” I asked Him: “Heavenly Father, show me how to fall in love with You, to live in a place of sheer delight and wonder with You. Show me how to look upon You, to be enamored with the way you move.” It was those last few words that rang in my ears, in my spirit, “Show me the way you move.” He whispered in my ear, “I move through My Holy Spirit.” And I was prompted to those certain character traits the Bible calls the Fruit of the Spirit. These are the things that evidence the presence of God in a person’s life. They are listed in Galatians 5:22-23 as: love, joy, peace, patience, gentleness, goodness, faithfulness, meekness and self-control. And something moved in my spirit. I don’t need a physical picture of God as a man to see His love, to feel His love, to live in His love, to be in love. All I need to do is see His Spirit move. I found myself thinking about great friends who live far away from me and how, when we do finally get together, we run toward each other and scream and laugh. And I realized, that’s our love and joy for each other. And I understood, that is seeing the way the Spirit moves. This is the practical direction I needed: Instead of trying to picture God, whom we have never seen, consider the ways you have “seen Him move” through others, through circumstances, through moments. The more I pictured smiling faces, the more I remembered the embrace of family, the more I listened to the laughter in memories, the more I was overcome by the presence and love of the Lord. Picturing those moments in my mind, I realized I was watching the Spirit move … because He is love. He is joy. He is patience. Think about how it has felt when you have really needed someone to be patient with you. You were having a bad day, you were enduring a hard emotional aching, you needed a boss, or a spouse or a friend to understand and cut you some slack, and when they gave it to you with arms open wide – didn’t that act of patience, generosity and love overwhelm you in such a way that the difficult thing became more bearable? That is God in action; that is His Spirit moving. Take it up a notch. To “delight yourself in the Lord” is not so much to see Him moving in others or in circumstances around you; it is for you to delight yourself in the way He moves—in such a way that the way you move becomes His movement. This is why the “fruit of the spirit” evidences God in us. When we offer that kind of understanding and patience toward others, that is us delighting in the way God moves so much so that we embrace His Spirit and the way we move becomes His movement. The way we love is actually Him loving through us. I also thought about love as described in the Bible. In the book of 1 John 4:8, we are told that God is love. Then, in 1 Corinthians 13 there is the classic description of what love is. In the past, I have read this passage and viewed it as a list of the ways I need to put my own needs aside and permit someone else to get away with hurting me. I didn’t see it as what love is but rather what I had to lose. This is an odd way to read it, I know, but perhaps you have felt the same way one time or another, that in order to “be loving” you had to suffer neglect. But as I was asking the Holy Spirit to reveal truth to me, I read it again and suddenly it was no longer a long list of all the ways I have to give up my own right or my own needs. I was now able to see it as “the way in which the Spirit of God moves.” Read this 1 Corinthians 13 passage again now and see it with me as the way in which God extends His love to and through you: “No matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I’m bankrupt without love. Love never gives up. “We don’t yet see things clearly. We are squinting in a fog, peering through a mist. But it won’t be long before the weather clears and the sun shines bright! We’ll see it all then, see it all as clearly as God sees us, knowing Him directly just as He knows us! “But, for right now, until that completeness, we have three things to do to lead us toward that consummation: “Trust steadily in God; By meditating upon love as a means of seeing God move, you discover yourself becoming enamored with the beauty of God. You become so captivated with Him that it is natural and easy to live love. This is when you will, as Psalm 37:4 says, be delighting yourself in the Lord! I encourage you to begin your year right. Sure, start the exercise routine and go on a diet, or whatever else it is that you have resolved to do this New Year. But if nothing else, delight yourself in the Lord and watch how, this year, without further delay, you begin walking in the fullness of your deepest desires and dreams! C. Weekly Scripture MeditationWeek ONE - Ezekiel 12:21-23: No More Delay! D. Resource Corner
As a practicing lawyer, Elizabeth A. Nixon is familiar with the legal authority behind decrees and she skillfully unpacks biblical and practical insights regarding their importance. Decrees Inspired by the Psalms will teach you how to:
The book offers 43 decrees. These include personal decrees based on a number of Psalms, such as Psalm 23, 24, 31, 112 and 127, among others. Five decrees are inspired by the Psalmic Hebrew language. There are also Decrees for the Seven Mountains or spheres of influence, inspired by Psalm 24. A great devotional tool!
There is no greater power than the love of God. There is no mightier weapon than His heart revealed. And God is longing to unleash this awesome might through you! God wants His believers to rise up in the power of His love and change the world around them. He wants you to become a love warrior that unleashes the fullness of heaven everywhere you go. In this two-CD teaching, Patricia King shares on how God is drawing you fully into His heart and fully into His power. All you need is love … and the Lord is waiting to fill you to overflowing with His heart and passion. Declare a love war today. And see the power of God flow through you as never before. These items can be ordered on line at our Store or by calling our toll free order line at 1-866-765-9286.And remember, God loves you with an everlasting love! |
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