He Will Joy Over Thee With Singing Is a Noise God Makes

A man told me he has been in an argument for thirty one years with somebody who is not participating.

His father said one sentence to him when he was fourteen. He can quote it. He can tell you the room, the time of day and what was on the table.

And every single thing he has done since has been, in some part of it, an exhibit. The degree was an exhibit. The house was an exhibit. He told me the car was an exhibit and he laughed when he said it, and then he stopped laughing.

His father is alive. They speak. His father has never once referred to it and, as far as this man can tell, does not remember saying it.

That is the specific horror of this, and I want to name it accurately: he is running an appeal against a verdict that only one of the two parties knows was handed down.

There is a sentence in Zephaniah that goes at that from a completely unexpected direction, and it is not about approval at all.

The verse describes a sound, not a judgement

Here it is.

The LORD thy God in the midst of thee is mighty; he will save; he will rejoice over thee with joy; he will rest in his love, he will joy over thee with singing. (Zephaniah 3:17, King James Version)

Read what He is described as doing. Rejoicing. Resting. Singing.

None of those are verdicts. A verdict is a finding delivered after an assessment, and there is no assessment anywhere in that sentence. What is described is a state and a noise.

He will joy over thee with singing. The picture is a Father making an audible sound of delight over somebody, which is a completely different category from approving of them.

That is why it is useful for a man running an appeal. An appeal is aimed at a verdict, and you cannot appeal against singing. There is nothing there to argue with. There is only somebody either receiving it or standing outside the room while it happens.

You are being sung over rather than assessed. Zephaniah 3:17 says he will joy over thee with singing, which is a sound rather than a finding. It is His Spirit, Romans 5:5 shedding the love of God abroad in our hearts, who carries a noise like that into a chest that has been braced for a ruling.

The other line, and where it sat in a life

The verse about the Father speaking over a Son is placed somewhere very specific, and the placement is the whole point.

And lo a voice from heaven, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. (Matthew 3:17)

That is said at Jesus's baptism, which is before the ministry. Before the miracles, before the teaching, before the cross. Nothing on the exhibit list has happened yet.

So the sentence is not a review. It is an announcement, made in public, in advance of any performance, and the pleasure in it is not caused by anything achieved.

I have watched that verse do more for men in their fifties than anything else I preach. Not because it flatters anybody. Because it destroys the schedule they have been on, which is the schedule where the good sentence comes after the exhibits.

You are spoken over before the exhibits rather than after them. Matthew 3:17 puts the beloved and the well pleased in front of the ministry rather than behind it, and it is the Holy Spirit, described in the same passage as descending like a dove, who is present in that scene as the announcement is made.

God renames a place that had a name like that

There is a passage in Isaiah where God deals with a name people had been given, and He does not argue with the people who gave it.

Thou shalt no more be termed Forsaken; neither shall thy land any more be termed Desolate: but thou shalt be called Hephzibah, and thy land Beulah: for the LORD delighteth in thee. (Isaiah 62:4)

Hephzibah means my delight is in her.

Notice the method. He does not go back to whoever called them Forsaken and win the argument. He issues a different name, and the reason He gives is for the LORD delighteth in thee, which is again a statement about His own state rather than about their record.

That is the only way out of a thirty one year appeal. Not winning it. Being renamed by somebody with the authority to name.

You are named by delight rather than by a description somebody handed you. Isaiah 62:4 issues a new name and gives His own delight as the reason. It is the same Spirit, Ephesians 1:13 sealing us after we believed, who is named as the seal on a name that was issued rather than earned.

Accepted, and where the accepting is located

Paul puts the whole thing in three words that are worth reading slowly.

To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved. (Ephesians 1:6)

Accepted in the beloved. The acceptance is described as located inside somebody else.

Which means it is not measured against a performance, because it was not issued on the basis of one. It is a position rather than a score, and a position is not the sort of thing that can be improved by another exhibit.

And there is a line in the Psalms that says the same thing from the other end:

For the LORD taketh pleasure in his people. (Psalm 149:4)

Taketh pleasure. Present tense, ongoing, and the object is a people rather than a performance.

You are accepted inside somebody else rather than on your own showing. Ephesians 1:6 says he hath made us accepted in the beloved. It is the Spirit of God, Romans 8:16 bearing witness with our spirit that we are the children of God, who does the telling that no achievement has managed.