Rabbi Schneider - You can Move God's Heart
I'm going to read to you an astounding, profound verse that is a conundrum. Have you ever heard that word "conundrum"? That's something like, how do we get our head wrapped around this? So I'm going now to the fourth chapter to the ninth verse. The Shulamite bride or King Jesus is talking to his bride, and listen to what King Jesus says to his bride. "You have made my heart beat faster, my sister, my bride; you have made my heart beat faster with a single glance of your eyes, with a single strand of your necklace. How beautiful is your love, my bride! How much better is your love than wine..."
Let's pause. Let's think about this. Jesus is saying to you, my beloved friend, my dear daughter, my dear son in the Lord, my brother and sister, He's saying to you that when you love Him, when you look at Him with love in your eyes, it actually excites Him. "You have made my heart beat faster," He said, "with a single glance of your eyes". Do you know that you can make God's heart beat faster? That when you choose to love Him, when you choose to step out in faith in order to obey Him, when you sacrifice something because of your love and fidelity to Him, that moves His heart. I know we can understand it. "How can I move God?" we wonder. How could little me, this beam that's been created from the dust of the ground, how can I move the Creator? But you do.
Remember the Bible tells us that the angels in heaven rejoice over one sinner that repents. The Hebrew Bible tells us that we have the capacity to grieve or make sad the Holy Spirit. Jesus feels us. In fact, whatever you're feeling, He can feel. Think about that. He feels your feelings. And when you choose to love Him... and love is a choice, right? Love demands sacrifice. Jesus said, "Greater love has no man than this: when a man lays down his life for his friends". So that when you do something that involves a sacrifice unto the Lord, whether you choose to praise Him, whether you choose to change your behavior in order to please Him, whether you choose to reorder your life so it lines up with God's word.
For example, one thing that you can do that's very practical that I've tried to incorporate in my life is when I wake up in the morning, rather than let my flesh rule, which my flesh might be tired, you know, I might feel groggy, I might feel downcast maybe because of a dream that I had last night. But what I do is I make a conscious decision to not allow my emotions or my flesh to rule me. But instead what I do is I wake up in the morning and I get into the Word of God. And lately what I've been doing as I've been going to Psalm 103, Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless His holy name.
And the psalmist goes on, and forget none of his benefits, who pardons all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases, who renews your life like the eagles and satisfies you with good things. In other words, I get up and I make a decision to love my Creator by getting into His word, overcoming my emotions, choosing to praise Him and be grateful. And you can do the same thing. And when you do that, when you rise up out of the darkness to love Him and praise Him, it makes His heartbeat faster. He sees one of His little ones choosing to sacrifice overcoming the devil, overcoming their emotions and pleasing Him by choosing what the Bible calls the sacrifice of praise. So Jesus says here, "You have made my heart beat faster, my sister, my bride, you have made my heart beat faster with a single glance of your eyes".
Every time you choose to love Jesus, and love again involves sacrifice, whether it's your time, your talent, your treasure, honoring Him with your finances, witnessing to Him even when you know you might be rejected, using your talent to serve Him, picking up the phone calling somebody gets to bless them because you feel Jesus has put that person on your heart, reaching out to a stranger just communicating the love of God, walking out of the grocery store blessing the cashier, saying, "I just want you to know Jesus loves you. God bless you today". Whatever you do for Him, it moves His heart. and it makes his heart beat faster.