Not deserving

This morning I was overwhelmed with God's kindness to me.  I was drawn to Psalm 37.

Psa 37:3-4
Trust in the Lord, and do good;
dwell in the land and befriend faithfulness.
Delight yourself in the Lord,
and he will give you the desires of your heart.

There are desires of my heart that I don't believe that I deserve.  As I read that verse this morning, I was brought to tears thinking about just how unworthy I am of his love.

What does it look like to delight yourself in the Lord? What delights you?  Delight - a great sense of pleasure or gratification.  First thing that comes to my mind when I think of delight is my wife and kids, not really them on their own, but my relationship with them.  It is in the intimacy of the marital relationship that I delight in my wife, and it is in the silliness of being a dad to silly kids or in the pride of watching my kids make good decisions that I find delight. 

So maybe it is in relationship that we delight in the Lord.  How do I relate with God?  Changing seasons is one time when this happens for me.  There is something about seeing the created world go through predictable changes that draws me close to God.  There must be something about feeling connectedness to all that is happening around me.   I find delight in what God is doing around me.  I think it reminds me that He is the sustainer of creation; that He is the sustainer of me.

We are going through this stage in our lives of walking through the application process with Engineering Ministries International (eMi).  When I think of being a missionary, I don't think of having my desires met.  Seems like missionaries are supposed to "go without", and generally struggle through life.  I try hard to not think ahead and plan ahead of what God is doing, but at the same time, I have ideas of how I think things may work out, I have desires.  What if I feel that God is in the process of giving me the desires of my heart, AND it includes going to the mission field?  I feel unworthy.  I am unworthy.  But here in Psalms, it says that if I delight myself in the Lord, he will give me the desires of my heart.

God, thank you.  Thank you that along with all of creation you sustain me.  Not only that, but you give me the desires of my heart.  I delight in you, in all of you.