Tonkawa,
For the next 4 weeks, we’ll walk through Psalm 27, a Psalm of David that guides the believer to “look upon the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living (Psalm 27:13).”
Last week we saw David’s instruction to see the goodness in the Lord in the land of the living in that we are to remember the works of God; think about them, meditate on them, sing about them. What is David’s next instruction? Gaze on beauty.
“One thing have I asked of the LORD, that will I seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the LORD and to inquire in his temple (v4)”
You might not know this intellectually, but you do know it inwardly: You were made for beauty.
God so designed and fashioned the human heart to crave what is beautiful and wonderful and lovely and happy and holy. There’s a reason humans are drawn to these things, whether it be music or art of food or fill-in-the-blank; it’s what we were made for.
For David, the man after God’s own heart, the key to the point of life, the key to seeing the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living, was not trying to gaze at beauty less, but gazing at beauty more; gazing at the beauty, wonder, and majesty of the Lord.
Doug Wilson writes:
“We serve and worship the God who overwhelms, who delights to overwhelm. At His right hand are pleasures forevermore—a cascading waterfall of infinite pleasures, with no top, no bottom, no back, no front, and no sides, nothing but infinite pleasure in motion, and every one of those pleasures is attached to His promises.”
But believers haven’t always nailed this, have we? We’ve often set happiness and holiness at odds; against one another, with phrases like, “God doesn’t want you happy, he wants you holy.” Beloved, this is not so. The Lord does in fact want us happy, which is precisely why He teaches us to be holy. Holiness IS happiness. Happiness IS holiness. I can confidently say, from the biblical testimony, my own life experience, and the experience of millions of believers for thousands of years, the happiest people are the holiest people, the people who waste themselves being thrilled by God; loving the Giver of the gifts by enjoying the gifts, loving the echo,
