Tonight’s sermon continued the alphabet series (The A-Z of Christian Faith) and looked at the subject ‘D is for Desire.’ We can rightly talk about the need for us to hunger and thirst for God and develop a spiritual desire, but ultimately, we love because God first loved us (1 John 4:19). Our love and desire for God are the direct result of God’s love and desire for us. God’s desire is for us to be His people, a desire that is manifested in the love of God the Father (see Luke 15:11-32, 1 John 3:1-3) and in the love of Jesus the Bridegroom (see Eph 5:25-27, Song of Songs 7:10).

The Father-heart of God

The fact that God loves us is so familiar to many of us that this profound truth can seem like water off a duck’s back to us. Ducks’ feathers are waterproof; they have a gland at the base of their tails which produces an oil that spreads and covers the birds’ outer coat so that water forms droplets on the feathers, but doesn’t permeate them. Water doesn’t wet them in the way that it wets other things!

duck

And this life-changing truth that God’s desire is for us, that God loves us, can seem so familiar to us that we fail to let it transform us and change us and shape us in the way that God wants it to. God’s Father-heart of love means He will never turn us away; He is always ready to lavish love on us (see Eph 3:17-19), wanting us to live in the identity we have as children of God. He is a good, good Father’ to us; we are not defined by the lies of the enemy but by our identity as God’s children: ‘my name is child of the one true King,’ as Matthew West puts it. Human fathers may not have always demonstrated love to us, but God’s Father-heart can melt our hearts of stone and give us the security and self-worth which all need.

The Bridegroom’s Heart of God

God desires our fellowship and company as a bridegroom longs for his bride (see Is 62:3-5, Song of Songs 4:7, 9). The image of the church as bride of Christ with Christ as bridegroom is given in many parts of Scripture (see Matt 25, Luke 5:34-36, John 3:27-29, Rev 21:2-3), but we often feel uncomfortable with the notion of talking of God desiring us. We need to acknowledge, however, that human romance and love is actually a reflection of divine romance and divine love, not the other way around. When we are secure in the love and desire God has for us, we can love our neighbours as ourselves, for we understand the depth of God’s love for us. Ezek 16 and the book of Hosea give us glimpses into the passionate love God has for His people: the ‘reckless raging fury that they call the love of God.’ (‘The Love of God’, Rich Mullins) We all have this deep yearning to be fully known and fully loved (see 1 Cor 13:12), unconditionally accepted and cherished; this deep longing can only be satisfied in God.

D is for Desire: God’s desire for us, God’s love for us, igniting desire and love within us. How can it be that God loves us so? We’ll never fathom it; we’ll never be able to explain it. But we can experience it; we can revel in His love; we can delight in the fact ‘I belong to my beloved, and his desire is for me.’ (Song of Songs 7:10)

desire