THE FATHERS IN WHOM GOD DELIGHTED - PART 7

FRIDAY 12 SEPTEMBER 2025

Reference: Deuteronomy 10:15 New King James Version (NKJV)

"The LORD delighted only in your fathers, to love them; and He chose their descendants after them, you above all peoples, as it is this day."

Now watch this: Our first segmentary differentiation reads:

"The LORD delighted only in your fathers, to love them."

When it comes to this segment, we can gain a revelatory recognition that God's delight is a statement of notion from which another truth is inferred or follows as a conclusion. So the truth of God's delightful preference exerted on behalf of our fathers - is fully governed by or established by means of another accepted truth denoting that God loved our fathers.

This equally implies that there is a distinction to be made between God's delight and God's love, even though they are identical subject matters. And therefore, in my last article, I shedded light on the aspect of God's wonderful delight in our fathers, but in today's article, I'll continue with an insight into the manner in which His delightful interest evolved into practical love, which is a symbol of unmerited favour that made our forefathers stand out.

The very next distinction of divine power stated in the above versified reference is:

To love them: LOVE.

God's favourable disposition and "delight" in our fathers resulted in their special recognition and godly fame, but His "love" resulted in their patriarchal excellence THROUGH their demonstrations of faith, as seen in Hebraic awakening intimation numbered as Hebrews chapter 11. On account of God's love, our fathers responded back by faith.

Here are few details of their responses as recorded in Hebrews chapter 11:

Now...by FAITH the people of old received their commendation...

By faith Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain, through which he was commended as righteous, God commending him by accepting his gifts. And through his faith, though he died, he still speaks. By faith Enoch was taken up so that he should not see death, and he was not found, because God had taken him. Now before he was taken he was commended as having pleased God. And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him. By faith Noah, being warned by God concerning events as yet unseen, in reverent fear constructed an ark for the saving of his household. By this he condemned the world and became an heir of the righteousness that comes by faith.

By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance. And he went out, not knowing where he was going. By faith he went to live in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise. For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God. By faith Sarah herself received power to conceive, even when she was past the age, since she considered him faithful who had promised. Therefore from one man, and him as good as dead, were born descendants as many as the stars of heaven and as many as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore (verses 1-12).

The list of our forefathers' responses was ongoing throughout the chapter but the point I want us to acknowledge is that God's love impelled them to respond to Him from the standpoint of the right exercises of faith, which is far from an airy interest or low enthusiastic way of responding to such extraordinary love.

Now watch this: Johannine literature reveals that we love because He first loved us (1st John 4:19 NIV). In other words, as SUPERIOR saints in the natural world, we are well positioned to respond to a life-changing love of God. So God loved us first before we could do so, and act in love. And Christ's coming was a substantial proof of God's great "delight" evolving into His unconditional "love." I could assumably suggest that all of humankind should remain in a state of awed appreciation and dumbfounded wonderment that God Himself found expression in human appearance or was made manifest in the flesh, on account of this love.

Now when a person surrenders his life to Jesus, he automatically responds to God's love by FAITH in Christ. To that effect, Pauline epistolary expression numbered as Ephesians 2:8 reads, "For it is by grace you have been saved, through FAITH..." (NIV). Stay tuned for part 8.

Scripture Reading - Jeremiah 31:3; Psalm 136:1; John 3:16; Romans 8:38-39; 1 John 4:8.

Guided prayer:

Gracious heavenly Father, I honour and bless you today for loving me unconditionally, beyond any human understanding, and for demonstrating it in Christ, for my salvation and unending access to abundant life through faith, in Jesus' Name, Amen.