Created Desire #2: PLEASURE Part One

Psalm 16:11: "In your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore."

Satan did not invent pleasure, at God’s right hand there are pleasures, He LOVES pleasure! The longing to feel pleasure is a universal human need and it is good, not sinful, although the ways that we seek pleasure are often sinful. There is a reason why you feel a pure sense of pleasure when you do certain things.  Most Christians don’t struggle with the idea of serving God but the idea of enjoying Him, that’s an entirely different story.   It doesn’t seem to fit into the picture of glorifying God by denying yourself. How can I be committed to glorifying the Lord in my life by pursuing pleasure or enjoyment? But God Himself is a pleasure seeker and has made us to be pleasure seekers; we just have to learn to pursue pleasure the RIGHT way. 

Eric Liddell was a British Olympic runner; you may know him from the movie chariots of fire. 

He said, “I believe God made me for a purpose, but He also made me fast and when I run, I feel His pleasure.” Running is not spiritual, it’s physical, but when we do what God designed us to do we bring Him pleasure – we can’t separate the physical and the spiritual!  If we pursue pleasure our own way, it’s selfish. If we pursue bringing pleasure to God, it’s righteous. Eric Liddell brought pleasure to God by running. You bring pleasure to God when you faithfully do what He has called you to do.  For many women this includes serving your families – by cleaning your houses, by washing the dishes and making sure your family is fed.  You bring pleasure to God when you spend time with your family and kids or when you bring soup to a sick friend.  BUT we have separated the spiritual from the physical and we deny that these things are spiritual activities.  We must being to think like God in these matters!

So often we do things because they bring us pleasure, we selfishly pursuit happiness in worldly terms instead of focusing on bringing God pleasure which will bring us the greatest pleasure. Churches have often encouraged people to deny pleasure; they have taught that if something is pleasurable then it must be wrong.  Yet God says, pursue me, I’ll show you what real pleasure really is. 

Why do we sin?

Hebrews 11:24-25 ²⁴ By faith Moses, when he became of age, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter, ²⁵ choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the passing pleasures of sin. (NKJV)

Sin produces immediate pleasure, that’s why we sin.  We sin because we believe that it will provide us a pleasure that is superior to the pleasure of following God.  Have you ever noticed how many Christians think that that all the fun stuff is sin and all the boring stuff is righteousness?  In fact, there are a lot of people who think that all the fun will be in hell; that people will hang around, shoot pool, joke with friends and party it up in hell and that heaven will be the place where it’s boring, we sit on clouds and play harps all day. This is a lie – hell will be deathly boring because everything good, enjoyable, fascinating and interesting is derived from God. Our belief that God and living for Him is boring is non-sense, its heresy, are we so arrogant to think that fun was created by humans?

Sin doesn’t make life interesting, it makes life boring – it robs us of fulfillment and makes life empty. Drug addicts are convinced that without their drug they can’t live happy lives yet everyone around them can see that drugs make them miserable. Heaven won’t be boring; it will be filled with eternal pleasures

Yes, sin brings temporary pleasure but it always ends up bringing death and destruction. The enemy is so devious, he lures us in with the pleasure part of sin, and he makes sin seem so attractive, he tells us that God doesn’t want us to have any fun; he tells us that God is boring. The enemy has been lying for years, he is a master liar and he knows that if we figure out the whole pleasure thing then he will lose his grip on us forever.  We will only win the battle of temptation if we begin to find pleasure in the Lord.

There are too many miserable Christians out there and this is why:
• They love God enough that they can’t enjoy their sin
• They love their sin enough that they can’t enjoy God

One of the secrets to overcoming sin is believing that the pleasures of following God are better than the pleasures of sin. John Piper says: sin is what we do when our hearts are not satisfied with God.  God does not call us to holiness to keep us from a life of pleasure, holiness is not drudgery.  Instead God calls us to a holiness that fully releases perfect pleasure forevermore.

Stay Tuned for Part Two:  tomorrow I’ll post why God created you and how you can pursuit the greater pleasures of God…