Desired by God: Discover a Strong, Soul-Satisfying Relationship with God by Understanding Who He Is and How Much He Loves You

by Van Moody, Susy Flory (With)

Overview

Popular pastor and acclaimed author Van Moody reveals the secret to a fulfilling, life-sustaining relationship with God: a deep understanding of just how much he loves us.

We were made to be in relationship with God, wired to love and be loved by him. We feel truly whole and complete only when we have a vital and passionate relationship with him. In Desired by God, pastor, author, and speaker Van Moody reveals the secret to a strong, grounded, lasting relationship with God: a deep understanding of who he is and how much he loves us.

As the story of the Bible makes clear, God’s pure and earnest love for people is continually given and rejected, before it is finally accepted. To understand how he can keep pursuing us like this, we need a fresh and accurate picture of him, full of ardent desire and relentlessly in pursuit of his people. Desired by God gives us a refreshing, eye-opening picture of God, who wants with all his heart for us to know him. And when we see him clearly and fall in love with him, we will find ourselves more grounded, satisfied, and cared for than we ever dreamed possible.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780718077594
Publisher:	Nelson, Thomas, Inc.
Publication date:	08/14/2018
Sold by:	HarperCollins Publishing
Format:	eBook
Pages:	272
Sales rank:	1,022,022
File size:	864 KB

About the Author

Van Moody serves as pastor of the Worship Center in Birmingham, Alabama. In addition, he is on the board of Joel Osteen's Champions Network, is a member of Dr. Oz’s Core Team, and is an associate trainer in Japan for Dr. John C. Maxwell’s EQUIP leadership organization. Moody, his wife, Ty, and their children, Eden Sydney and Ethan Isaiah, live in Birmingham, Alabama.

 

Susy Flory is the author or coauthor of five books, including the New York Times bestseller Thunder Dog. Her articles have appeared in Today's Christian Woman, Enrichment Journal, Guideposts books, Kyria.com, and with Focus on the Family. 

Nationally acclaimed mental health expert, trauma therapist, and life coach Dr. Anita Phillips is recognized as a leader for her ground-breaking work at the intersection of mental health, faith, and culture. Dr. Anita is a dynamic sought-after speaker who has appeared on multiple news and television outlets and is the host of the fast-growing podcast In the Light with Dr. Anita. She holds degrees from the University of Maryland, Regent University, and the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Dr. Anita lives in Dallas, Texas, with her husband, Michael Phillips, an education advocate and author.

Read an Excerpt

CHAPTER 1

Signed, Sealed, Delivered, I'm Yours

Deep within every human being there still lives the anxiety over the possibility of being alone in the world.

Søren Kierkegaard

As Søren's love for the lovely Regine grew ever deeper and stronger, he continued to write her beautiful letters. They were letters only a man in love could write.

"I am happy, indescribably happy, for I know what I possess. And when it storms and roars in the workshop of my thoughts, I listen for your voice," he wrote. "When I stand in a crowd amidst noise and uproar that do not concern me, then I see the open window, and ... the distance between us vanishes and you are mine, united with me, though a whole continent were to separate us." As with lovers since the dawn of time, Søren was inexorably drawn to Regine and wanted to spend more time with her.

Søren's heart belonged only to Regine, and he saw her face always. "Everywhere, in every girl's face, I see features of your beauty." He also described her as his true north with his "I" magnetically pointing always to her, and said she "transfigured" him. His fantastical descriptions illustrated how he felt he'd found his heart's desire and soul mate.

Happily for Søren, Regine welcomed his attention and his visits, and, as lovers do, they began to exchange gifts. In one letter Søren said, "I am enclosing a scarf. I ask you to accept it and desire that you alone may know that you own this trifle." Not only did he want to know that his gift was appreciated by her, but he asked her to keep it a secret between the two of them. The scarf was meant to serve as a visible and tangible proof of the growing bond between the lovers.

By paying attention to his conversation and his letters, it would have been easy for anyone to see Søren was madly in love with Regine. His words, whether spoken or written, clearly revealed his behavior and the passion of his heart. God's words are like that too. If you pay close attention, His passion for us is as obvious as Søren's for Regine.

The love, or lack of love, you have for someone is revealed by your actions toward him or her. The agreements God made with humanity flowed from His intense love for us. In the Old Testament, God's love was on display through the agreements, or covenants, He entered into with humanity. Part of the reason many people misunderstand God and His actions in times past is because they don't understand how God behaved in accordance with those covenantal agreements. The Bible is not just a story of religion or the history of God's chosen people; it is the story of God's love on display through His covenant journey with humanity. Throughout history God has been trying to lavish His love on His people, a love on display when He reached out to humanity and connected to them in a formalized way.

In the ancient world, when two parties made a covenant they would say it aloud, or write it and sign it, and the covenant would henceforward be legal and binding. There are three different types of these old-world covenantal agreements.

First is the grant covenant. A grant covenant is when a greater person and a lesser person enter into an agreement, with the greater one taking on all the obligations. The lesser one only needs to receive the covenant.

Grant covenants are also referred to as covenants of promise or unconditional covenants. God made grant covenants with Noah, Abraham, and David because He loved them and their families so much that He wanted a formal agreement to seal and signify their bond. In the biblical cycles of God's love given, rejected, and accepted, the grant covenants were God giving His love to His people and formalizing it with a binding agreement. God was doing all the work, and all the people had to do was accept the agreement and pledge themselves in a solemn bond to their Creator.

If you're a parent, you're familiar with this kind of relationship because you are in a grant-covenant relationship with each child. A newborn baby needs love, care, and attention to his or her needs twenty-four hours a day. As the parent, you plan and prepare for that baby, and when you finally bring that little one home, you spend most of your twenty-four hours a day thinking about what that baby needs and providing for those needs. For several years the work and the effort flow one direction. All the baby has to do is eat, sleep, grow, and develop. If everything goes the way it's supposed to, soon your little one is smiling and cooing at you as he or she learns how to return your love. That's about all you can expect for a while because a new baby needs to grow and develop before he or she can give back the love, affection, time, resources, and care you are pouring into the relationship. But as that baby grows into childhood, adolescence, and then adulthood, the relationship and the special bond between you grows too (especially if he or she learns how to be obedient, which seems to be harder for some children than others).

If you're not a parent, you can still see this kind of grant-covenant relationship in other ways. Perhaps you've been a caregiver, providing for someone close to you who has special needs due to illness, disability, or age. Many of us have cared for someone with different forms of dementia, including Alzheimer's, and as the dementia progresses the relationship becomes one-sided, much like a parent taking care of a young child. As a senior adult with dementia travels that long journey into the shadowy world of memory loss and confusion, he or she might forget not only names and dates but also how to get dressed or how to use a toothbrush or a knife and fork. As a caregiver, you step in and pour your love, affection, time, resources, and care into a relationship where you will not receive it all back.

If you've not yet been a parent or a caregiver, maybe you've been the proud owner of a pet. That, too, is a picture of a grant-covenant relationship. A new puppy or kitten requires a great deal of time and attention (not to mention money). As a pet owner, you're responsible for all your pet's needs. While it's fun to have a new pet in the house, it's also a tremendous amount of work, especially when it unintentionally destroys something or has an accident on the rug. Your puppy or kitten receives all your love and your care without even realizing the cost because you've taken on all the obligations.

In the grant-covenant relationship, God is the greater party and takes on all the responsibility. And here's the key — He doesn't mind, because He loves His people. From the beginning, He took the role of father and treated us as His children, making a grant covenant the best type of covenant. God wants to give His children everything He has.

The grant covenant between God and Noah came into existence after Noah and his family exited the ark after the flood. In Genesis 9, God starts with the command to "be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth" (v. 1). Then He gives Noah a promise never again to destroy the earth by flood. He seals His promise with a rainbow, almost like Søren pledging his love to Regine with the scarf.

To understand the impact of this grant covenant between God and Noah, think about what Noah and his family had just experienced. Never before in the history of the earth had it rained, yet for forty days and nights it rained constantly. Every single person on earth, except for the four men and four women on the ark (Noah and his wife, and his three sons and their wives), perished in the epic flood caused by the deluge. Imagine the fear that must have poured into Noah's heart every time it began to rain after that.

While all their friends and extended family were dying, Noah's family was stuck on a boat with a massive number of animals, trying to feed and tend for them all. (That might make your own caregiving tasks seem not quite as bad, right?) The stress of this, added to the worry about what might happen next, must have been unimaginable.

But even so, Noah was faithful to the Lord. He obeyed and trusted God in a situation where he had no context — he'd never seen rain and knew nothing about boats or taking care of wild animals. But he believed God and was faithful to the Lord in a wicked world. It would have been much easier to follow along with the crowd of unbelievers and do what everyone else was doing. But Noah didn't. He believed God and so he stood out from the crowd, his belief saving him and his entire family. So God rewarded him with a grant covenant.

God said, "This is the sign of the covenant I am making between me and you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all generations to come: I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth. Whenever I bring clouds over the earth and the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will remember my covenant between me and you and all living creatures of every kind. Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life. Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth."

Even though Noah and his family had entered into a beautiful new covenant relationship with God, they still faced many challenges. When they did finally get off the ark and down onto dry land, the landscape of the earth had significantly changed. Everyone and everything they'd ever known was gone. It's difficult for us to imagine this sort of full-scale trauma.

Many of us are like Noah, having been through traumatic experiences that have led to fear and worry dominating our lives. But that's what makes the love of God so powerful through the grant covenant He makes with Noah. No matter what we have been through, or how challenging or devastating our circumstances, God promises to provide and take care of us. The covenant sign of the rainbow was a great comfort for Noah. Every time it threatened to storm or actually did pour down rain, he could remember the rainbow and know that God was still in control.

It's the same for us today. When a devastating hurricane like Katrina, Harvey, or Irma hits, or when a deadly tsunami wreaks havoc, God's love is still on display. We experience His love and care not only through rainbows, but through people taking care of one another.

In the same way that the people in Noah's time tried to live without God, one of Noah's sons named Ham, along with his descendants, attempted to do the same. God was simply not important to them. Ham and his descendants built the first high-rise the world had ever seen: a massive building known as the Tower of Babel. They wanted to build an empire and they wanted to do it on their own, using their newfound power for their own gain, so they rejected God's love and the grant covenant God had established with Noah.

Ultimately, the plans of Ham and his descendants were foiled. God confused the people by causing them to speak in different languages. They couldn't understand one another so they stopped building the tower, their superpower plans faded away, and as a result they scattered throughout the earth per God's original plan and direction.

God's disappointment in this group of people must have been intense and painful. He had given them the earth to enjoy and repopulate, and instead they rose up and created plans of their own. They tossed aside the grant covenant God had put into place. Imagine if Regine had thrown the beautiful scarf Søren had given her in his face. Or as if your child, or your aging parent with dementia, who you've loved and cherished and sacrificed so much for as you've cared for all his or her needs, shouts hate for you. It's hard. It's painful. It's heartbreaking.

But all was not lost. Although there was an ungodly line of people who had disregarded the Noahic covenant, there was a godly line of people still on the earth. And one of those people was named Abram (also known as Abraham). He didn't know it, but he was about to join with God in another grant covenant.

This next grant covenant had even more incredible promises built into it — powerful and significant promises stretching all the way through the Old Testament and into the New. This grant covenant would change the fate of humanity with a completely new nation and a new religion.

POINTS TO REMEMBER

• The love you have for someone is revealed by your actions toward him or her.

• The covenants God made with people, as recorded in the Old Testament, flowed from His intense love for us.

• In the ancient world, covenants were formal, legal, and binding agreements. There were three types of covenants.

• The first type of covenant was a grant covenant. In a grant covenant, God is the greater party and takes on all the responsibility, like a parent for a child.

• Perfection was not required from Noah; he only needed to trust God.

• God put the rainbow in the sky as a sign of His grant covenant with Noah and his descendants.

QUESTIONS TO PONDER

1. Have you ever written or received love letters before? Did you keep them? Do you ever go back and reread them? How do they make you feel?

2. What kind of covenant agreements do we make today? Have you ever entered into a covenant with someone?

3. When God and Noah entered into a grant covenant, what happened with Noah's descendants that disappointed God? How do you think God felt when this happened? Did their behavior change the grant covenant?

4. Have you ever had someone reject a gift you've given? What emotions did it stir up inside of you?

CHAPTER 2

C'mon ... Just Believe!

We should not look back unless it is to derive useful lessons from past errors.

George Washington

Young George Washington was known as a hard worker. George's father passed away when he was eleven years old, so young George knew he'd have to make his own way in the world. At the age of seventeen, he was already well on his way to success as a county surveyor in Virginia, and before long he saved enough money to buy some land of his own.

Years later after a distinguished military career, George married in his thirties and settled in for a happy period as a farmer. He became very successful, eventually increasing his land holdings at a place called Mount Vernon to more than eight thousand acres.

Then came the call to duty. Since he was successful, happy, and content, it wasn't something George was particularly looking for. Plus, he didn't really want to leave his beloved wife, Martha. But the colonies needed him in this important fight to birth a new country — the United States of America. For the love of this land, George answered the call.

In June of 1775, when George was forty years old, Congress commissioned him to take command of the army besieging the British in Boston. He thought he'd be back home in Mount Vernon by the fall, but he ended up serving, and serving well, for eight years. After this difficult task was done and he had resigned his commission, hoping to retire from the army for good, George was called on again to go to Philadelphia and head up the Constitutional Convention.

Yet again George tried to retire, but to no avail when he ended up unanimously elected president of the brand-new United States of America. His country needed him, and because he loved his country and he loved the people of his country, he answered the call by leaving Mount Vernon once again to serve as our first president.

Fortunately for America, he put aside his own interests to establish our nation when he would have rather been at home working on and expanding his farm. Because of his sacrificial service, his name has become synonymous with love of country, freedom, honor, and loyalty. George Washington sacrificed much for this fledgling country. He didn't have to do what he did; he acted out of honor, love, and a strong sense of calling.

The book of Genesis tells the story of a man much like George Washington. His name was Abraham (also known as Abram) and he, too, had a successful farm. A few generations after the flood had destroyed the earth and construction on the Tower of Babel had been halted, Abraham was born in a land called Ur, located in modern-day Iraq. He married a woman named Sarai and eventually moved to Haran, in modern-day Turkey, where he became a wealthy landowner. He had great land holdings and vast herds of livestock, and he employed a large number of people. Running a large estate is like running a company, so essentially Abraham was an entrepreneur and the CEO of his own company.

Then, just like George Washington, Abraham got a call out of nowhere. The stakes were high, but it was a one-way agreement. God would be doing all the work.

Go from your country, your people and your father's household to the land I will show you. I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.

(Continues…)

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Excerpted from "Desired by God"
by .
Copyright © 2018 Vanable H. Moody, II.
Excerpted by permission of Thomas Nelson.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

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Table of Contents

Prologue: A Love Story, xiii,
Introduction: The Love Story to End All Love Stories, xix,
Section I: Who Is God Really?,
Chapter 1 Signed, Sealed, Delivered, I'm Yours, 3,
Chapter 2 C'mon ... Just Believe!, 13,
Chapter 3 Achy Breaky Heart, 23,
Chapter 4 Ugh! More Rules. Really?!, 35,
Chapter 5 I Love You ... This Much, 45,
Section 2: Love On Display,
Chapter 6 Unconfined, 57,
Chapter 7 The Good Shepherd, 71,
Chapter 8 The Fixer, 83,
Chapter 9 Father God (Not the Godfather), 93,
Chapter 10 More Than Enough, 107,
Chapter 11 Simple, 117,
Chapter 12 No Mountain High Enough, 129,
Chapter 13 Reliable GPS, 141,
Section 3: Living Loved,
Chapter 14 The Gift of Freedom, Part 1, 157,
Chapter 15 The Gift of Freedom, Part 2, 169,
Chapter 16 The Gift of Hope, 181,
Chapter 17 The Gift of Favor, 193,
Chapter 18 The Gift of Forgiveness, 207,
Chapter 19 Love Found, 221,
Acknowledgments, 231,
Notes, 233,
About the Authors, 240,