The Pursuit of Pleasure, His Pleasure

“Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor and power: for Thou hast created all things, and for Thy pleasure they are and were created” (Revelation 4:11, KJV).

This morning, as I walked and talked with God, I was overcome with the wonders of a summer day in the Sierras. The trajectory of my walk took me off the beaten path and brought me upon some glorious wildflowers. In that moment, I became aware that, more than likely, the only human eyes that would ever gaze upon those flowers were mine. It was as if God had created them just for me and my pleasure. Unexpectedly, as my heart filled and overflowed, so did my eyes, as a moment of wonder turned into worship. In that time of worship, I began to sing the verse that is printed above.

We live in a world that is pleasure-driven, all too often taking the pleasures that God created for us to enjoy and profaning them. Take, for example, God’s creation of food and drink and sex—created by God for our pleasure when enjoyed within His stated boundaries. But when these are pursued without the knowledge that they are God-given and protected by His loving and logical boundaries, the desire for food becomes gluttony, the desire for drink becomes drunkenness, and the wonderful gift of sex and sexuality becomes perversion.

God created us for the pursuit of pleasure—His pleasure. When we endeavor to live for His glory and enjoy the pleasures that He has created within the framework of expression that He intended, He then receives pleasure from the very ones He has created.

As I sang unto Him, “…and for Thy pleasure they are created…,” I began to ponder just how easy it is to forget that, as children of God in Christ, our greatest pleasure will only be realized when we make the goal of our living and breathing and doing and speaking to bring Him pleasure. Or, as the psalmist David prayed, “Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Your sight, O Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer” (Psalm 19:14).