A Different Delight

Meditation on Psalm 16:3

“I say of the holy people who are in the land, ‘They are the noble ones in whom is all my delight.’”

On Sunday mornings I drive about a half an hour to attend a church.  After I part my car and walk into the lobby, someone usually greets me.  After this, I enter the ‘sanctuary’ and sometimes greet even more people, shaking their hands and talking with them.  I sit down in a green cushioned pew and wait till the service begins.  Depending on how my week went or the quality of my time with the Lord that morning, my mind is either ready for the service or in a thousand different directions.  However, I confess that I am not thinking about how the little old lady sitting in front of me is all my delight.  Nor am I pondering about how the young couple sitting behind me brings me great joy or the teenager sitting the next pew over makes me smile.  Yet this is exactly what this verse says!!  “I will say to the holy people in the land, ‘They are the noble ones in whom is all my delight.’”

God’s people are ‘the holy people in the land.’  God told the Israelites in Exodus 19:5-6, “Although the whole earth is mine, you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.”  Thus the Israelites were the holy people among all the nations or at least that was God’s desire for them.  This is echoed and applied to Christians in 1 Peter 2:9.  “But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.” 

The holy people in the land are the ‘saints’ or in today’s society we would call them the true Christians, the followers and lovers of Jesus Christ who treasure him above all else.  It is not our own righteousness that makes us holy; rather, it is the Person and work of Jesus Christ: “Both the one who makes people holy and those who are made holy are of the same family.  So Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers and sisters” (Hebrews 2:11). “And by that will, we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all” (Hebrews 10:10). 

What does it look like to be holy?  It means that a person is set apart, pure, doing what is right and seeking and devoting himself/herself to God’s glory above all other things.  They are marked by obedience to God’s commandments (Deuteronomy 28:9), abstinence from immorality and greed (Ephesians 5:3) and thus purity of heart, compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, patience, forgiveness and love (Colossians 3:12-14).  They walk in the path of righteousness that leads to holiness (Romans 6:19) and they cleanse themselves from wasteful things so that they will be special vessels, useful to the Master and prepared for any good work (2 Timothy 2:20).  Whenever someone pursues after God, these qualities will be evident in their lives!  

These people are the ones who are ‘noble’ or ‘excellent.’  There is no 'nominal Christian' to them.  They follow Christ and love him even when it is not popular.  They seek pleasure from Christ.  As a result, they are the ones we take pleasure in.  If a teenage boy tells his friends, ‘No’ when they tempt him to view pornography or watch an immoral movie, we should be quick to affirm him of his choice and say, "You made us proud when you said no."  When a father chooses his spouse and children over a greedy promotion that promises more money but would consume his time, he is one we should delight in. Patience with children, humility in ministry, forgiveness to those who have hurt us and ridding the house of anything impure, including many television shows—the people who do these things should be our delight!  Let these people be our 'celebrities,' not the ones on television.

Can you and I honestly say that we delight in our brothers and sisters in Christ who do these things?  If not, why not?  Is it possible that we do not desire God's glory through them?  If this is the case, then I must check my own heart until I can say along with King David, the author of this Psalm, “I will say to the holy people in the land, ‘They are the noble ones in whom is all my delight!”