We only need to look at the way the Lord created Adam to see his intimacy with him.  It says in Genesis 2:7, ‘The Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and the man became a living being’.  What a wonderful picture of intimacy at its deepest level.  God breathes his life into his creation and because of his breath we become a living being, able to communicate and have profound intimacy with our creator.  The truth is that if God removed his breath of life from us, we would die!  In Acts 17:28 it says, ‘In him we live and move and have our being’, which, in other words, means that without the Lord and the life he gives, we would cease to exist.  However, because he lives, this means we can live also and experience the intimacy that God intended for his creation in the beginning.  The Lord walked in the garden with Adam and Eve and the Lord walks with you!  In Deuteronomy 31:8 he says, ‘The Lord himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you.  Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged’.  He won’t ever desert you!

When my mother-in-law because of medical reasons, had to be taken into a care home this was the first time she and my father-in-law had been apart.  Neither of them wanted this to happen and fought against it for some time, but gradually my husband’s dad recognised that his wife needed medical attention 24 hours a day and therefore this was the only option.  They had been married many years and still loved each other deeply.  Each day for three years my father-in-law would go to the home where his wife was and sit in her very small bedroom with her.  Even though she could hardly communicate with him because of the medical condition she had, he would sit beside her and hold her hand.  He spoke to her, he helped her eat; he looked after her every need for many hours every day.  He did this because she was his delight!  When she died after 66 years of married life, he was heartbroken for his friend, his darling, his beloved, his delight had gone!  Love means not walking away during the hard times of life and my father-in-law did not once walk away.  He found enormous pleasure in just being with her.  While she was alive, he gave of himself to her in such a remarkable sacrificial way, demonstrating to all around just how much he adored her.  He didn’t do that because he had to, he did it because he wanted to; he loved her so much.

His love is such a wonderful reflection in a small way of how much God loves every single one of us.  He won’t leave us when times are bad, he is always there showing us how much he cares.  Even the smallest cry for help he will hear because he is so close to each of us. He doesn’t stay because he has to; he stays because he wants to!

In the Bible in Zephaniah 3:17 it says, ‘The Lord your God is with you, he is mighty to save.  He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing’.  This has always been a very special verse for me and I have always enjoyed reading and meditating on it.  However, one day in the early hours of the morning, God brought the reality of this verse home to me.  I don’t know whether I was asleep or awake, I don’t know whether I was genuinely hearing this or in the Spirit, but I know it was real.  I heard the sound of God singing over us, his creation and it was incredible.  The sound was loud, but gentle, it was melodic and tuneful, it was filled with harmonies even though it was only one voice.  The song was saturated with the greatest joy I have ever known and on hearing the sound it made me want to explode with joy.  It was bursting with creativity and God’s enormous pleasure was within every note.  The sound of his voice didn’t just fill my mind; it seemed to me that even the whole universe was not big enough to contain this most amazing voice.  I had never heard such stunning singing; it was truly not of this world.  As I was listening to God’s song, the Lord spoke to my heart and said, “Nancy, I constantly sing songs of delight and joy over you; I sing like this over everyone!”  I knew from the Bible that the Lord sings over us, but now I had heard the beautiful sound of his voice for myself.  It was genuinely incredible; words cannot even begin to describe it, no adjectives I could use would do it justice!  It was a sound that I wanted to listen to forever.

When my late husband used to go into our studio to record a song, he will often tell the singer to make the lyrics bleed.  What he meant by this was for the singer to really live the lyrics and allow their emotions to be released through the song.  When I heard the Lord’s song, the thought that occurred to me was that if Ray had been producing the sound, he wouldn’t have needed to tell the Lord to show emotion or passion it was already there in huge quantities. His love and passion for me was so evident.

Today – listen to his song of joy over you!  You may not have the same experience as me, but my prayer will be that as you meditate on the word of God and let it take root within you – you will know that he is constantly singing songs of delight over you!  He loves you so very much and rejoices over you always!  Tune into Heaven’s sounds today and listen to the greatest symphony ever as he delights in you and rejoices over you!

I heard recently what happened to Fred Astaire, the greatest dancer ever, when he was attending an audition to get a job before he was famous!   After his audition, the Director of the show wrote the following words on his report on Fred, ‘can’t sing, can’t act, can dance a little!’  We can laugh at this now knowing that Fred went on to be one of the most amazing singers, actors and exceptional dancers of his time, but I am sure those words must have hurt.  However, despite the negative comments, Fred went on to prove his critic wrong!

I was walking down a street with a group of friends in Spain one day, when one of them said in my hearing, “The only thing Nancy has going for her is the shape of her body!”  When the others chastised her for her words, she went on to explain that in her opinion without my body shape I would look nothing!  I laughed at what she said with the others in the group, but later thought to myself that if I had been insecure those words could have deeply hurt me.  I had gone through years of hearing my late husband, Ray tell me that he thought I was beautiful (even though he saw me at times at my worst!) and therefore her words didn’t hurt as much as they would have if I hadn’t known the deep love of my husband.  When we know that God delights in us, when we really know that he loves us warts and all, then we can deal better with the criticisms that life often brings.

The way to know his love is to keep reading the Bible and sit in his presence daily.  When we soak ourselves in him and his word, when we listen to the truth and hide it deep within us, then we will experience how the truth can set us free from the lies the enemy can fool us into believing. Do remember it was the lies of the serpent in the Garden of Eden that eventually led to sin and fear.

Recently I heard a story of an 80-year-old man who had felt he had ‘lost’ his salvation.  He was so disturbed that all he could do was to cry at the top of his voice, “I am lost!  I am lost!”  His wife took him to the home of Smith Wigglesworth, an amazing man of God to ask if Smith would pray for him.  When Smith met the couple, it was impossible not to hear the utter despair in this man’s voice as he shouted at the top of his voice, “I am lost!  I have committed the unpardonable sin.  I am lost. I am lost!”  When I heard this story, I was already thinking in my mind what I would do or say to change this man’s condition, however what Smith Wigglesworth did just didn’t occur to me!  Led by the Holy Spirit, Smith Wigglesworth commanded the lying spirit to come out!  In a moment, the evil spirit left and the man was completely free!  What a lesson for us all.  We must not allow the lies of the enemy to find a place in our lives.  The devil knows that if he can capture our thought life, he has won a mighty victory over us!  Today and every day – eat the truth of God’s words and keep them alive in your heart!

I love the fact that when you cultivate your relationship with God, he can speak at any time and tell you to do something that will change someone’s life.  One day, I was sorting out my mail at my computer and saw a letter from a lady who had initially contacted me by telephone asking for prayer.  I felt a little nudge to contact this lady again and there and then wrote a little note and felt from the Lord I should include a copy of my book, ‘Oasis of Hope’.  I did what I felt the Lord wanted me to do and prayed that the note and the book would encourage her.

Some weeks later I got a letter back from her to tell me that the day my book and note arrived was the day after she had seen a close friend die!  She had been reeling from this death and was finding it difficult to have any hope for the future, when on her doorstep arrived my encouraging note and a book containing wonderful stories of hope!  As she read the book, the stories filled her heart with real dynamic hope.  She wrote to me and said, “You have no idea what a blessing this has been at just the right time.  When your letter arrived a friend of mine had just died.  I had sat watching her slowly slip away to the Lord the previous day and because of other negative stuff happening in my life, I was really floundering in a place of despair and hopelessness.  This precious book has been a literal GODSEND!”

She started to do the spiritual exercises at the end of every chapter and was finding that the exercises were encouraging her and bringing her much needed refreshment.  On the back of the card she sent to me was the printed words ‘Blank Inside’ to which she had put a little note that said, “Not any more!”  She was no longer void of any hope, but instead she was filled with God’s hope for the future.

When you spend time with Jesus and dwell in his presence you can’t help but know more of how much he loves and delights in you!  When you begin to believe that truth, your life will never be the same again!  Try it today and you will see!  Smith Wigglesworth, a powerful man of God who lived many years ago said,  “If we only knew how precious we were in the sight of God, we would scarcely be able to sleep for thinking of his watchful loving care.  There is nothing like it.”  This is so true; there is nothing in this world that comes even close to the thrill of knowing how much God delights in each of us.  Let’s decide today to keep cultivating our relationship with him, lets begin to hear his voice and do what he is calling you to do.  As you do – God will change your life totally.

When Ray and I responded to the call of God on our lives to leave our home, our car, our families, our friends, our church and our jobs in Ayr in Scotland and travel to Wolverhampton in England the sacrifice seemed so small.  We left a beautiful seaside resort in Ayr, our three bedroomed bungalow, our sporty car and two very good jobs to work with British Youth for Christ.  We didn’t know anyone in Wolverhampton apart from two dear friends whom we had got to know the previous year and so they invited Ray and I to live with them.  They lived in a house, which they rented in the red-light district of Wolverhampton.  The house had dampness running down some of its walls and prostitutes touting for business outside, yet we never looked back once because we were so excited at the journey God had us on.  As the years passed, people would often ask us about the sacrifice we had made, but it didn’t even occur to us that it was a sacrifice!  We had fallen in love with Jesus and we only wanted to do what he wanted us to do no matter where that was or what that entailed!  Knowing all the ups and downs, the good and the not so good times, the pain and the hardships we have been through since our call in 1980, the question is, would we do it all again?  The answer is a resounding YES!  There is such fun, adventure, laughter, joy and delight in getting to know God and following his will for our lives which far outweighs the painful and hard times that we often experience.

The truth is that the more you get to know the Lord, the more you realise that there is so much more to know!  Even though Paul had incredible heavenly visions, even though he was caught up into paradise and heard things he was not permitted to tell others, he still poured out a cry from his heart, “I want to know Christ.”  We will never get to the end of knowing all there is to know but the more you do know, the more you want to know!  The more you experience his delight and his joy, the more you find you cannot live without really knowing him.  There is no other way of knowing the Lord, other than spending time with him.  I know how easy it is for our attention to be taken up with the worries and cares that this world brings, but if we don’t tend the garden so to speak, the weeds will grow so quickly and begin to squeeze the joy, laughter and delight out of our hearts.

When someone doesn’t spend time with the Lord his or her spiritual light within dulls and they can easily fall away!  Falling away from God never happens overnight, it’s always a process.  If you stop spending time alone with him, you will find that the temptation to do wrong seems to burn more strongly within you!   However, when you spend time with the Lord and keep his word in your heart, then when temptation comes you can fight it much more easily.  Experiencing Jesus and his joy is the best antidote ever to sinning! Discover who he really is today!

If I were to become one of your friends, then I would need to make sure I spent time with you.  I would ask you questions and I would answer your questions.  I would find out about your background, your family and your experiences.  I would want to know your thoughts, your hopes, your dreams and I would share mine with you!  I wouldn’t spend time with you because I have to, but I would spend time with you because I want to.  That is what friendship is all about.  The same is true with the Lord.  In order to really know him, we need to spend time with him, but we don’t spend time with him as a duty, rather we linger in his presence because spending time with him is so pleasurable!  If your time with God is not a pleasure, then dare I suggest that perhaps you have never really known him?  To know him and to walk with him means that similar to the disciples on the road to Emmaus, our hearts will burn within us with excitement and immense joy.

When Jesus spoke with the woman at the well, he told her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water”.   It’s living water he wants to give us, not old, stale, stagnant, boring water.  It’s joy everlasting!  He wants to give us pleasures forevermore.  If we really know Jesus and the pleasures he can give us, then we would be running into his presence!  Oh we so need to know him in this way!  The more we get to know Jesus, the more we realise he is not like the picture sometimes painted of him.  He is not an angry God ready to hit you over the head with a big black Bible every time you do something wrong!  He is indeed the God of joy and pleasure and therefore it is fun, exciting and such an adventure to share our lives with him.

Psalm 16:11 says, ‘In your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore’.  Come on – let’s be a pleasure seeker!  Let’s hang around the source of all joy and let his wonderful fragrance fill our lives.  There is such joy in knowing Jesus but that’s not to say that every day is a laugh a minute; sometimes life can be very hard and difficult as we all know especially in this last year, however, even in those difficult times because Jesus is with us we can find real joy in his presence!

A number of years ago, I made a conscious decision to get up even earlier in the morning to spend more quality time with the Lord.  I was on holiday and so before anyone else was awake, I went and sat at the pool and read my Bible.  No one else was there but as I sat reading and praying the presence of God would come down upon me!  Two hours later, I had to drag myself away to go to breakfast with the others; my time with Jesus seemed far too short.  My heart was filled so full that I was ready to explode with joy and delight!  That’s our Jesus – why not get to know him today?

There is a story that is told of Karl Barth the Swiss Reformed Theologian whom critics say is amongst the most important Christian thinkers of the 20^th century.  One day at the end of a lecture he was asked what was the greatest thought that had ever gone through his mind.  The audience waited with baited breath to hear what one of the greatest minds of the 20^th century would give as his answer!  After a brief silence and with everyone straining to hear the wisdom that would come from his mouth, he said these words, “Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so!”  If we really believe the fact that God loves us and that he sent Jesus into the world to show us clearly how much he loves us, this will change our lives forever!

However, hearing that God loves you and experiencing it are two very different things.  Although we can hear the words, sometimes we can miss the experience of the reality of those words.  Recently, a lady came to my Spiritual Health Weekend worn out from illness and the pressures of life and in need of a touch from the Lord.  Before she came she had said to the Lord, “If you really love me, then please pick me out and give me a gift from Nancy.”  At the Spiritual Health Weekends we often through different methods randomly pick people out of the crowd, pray for them and give them a gift.  This particular lady had been badly abused in her youth but also during 2011 had many physical things go wrong.  She had experienced three very serious asthma attacks, one which ended in the resuscitation room as well as bronchitis, on top of other existing chronic illnesses including diabetes, osteoporosis, bursitis in her hip, both kidneys damaged, clinical depression, an eating disorder and various other medical problems.  As well as this, her sister lost twins and her mum got diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease!  She came to the weekend desperate for a touch from the Lord and that is what she got, in more ways than one.

Right from the beginning of the first meeting, God began to work in this woman’s life. In the sessions she felt God reach deep into her soul. Throughout the weekend, the Lord continued to work in this lady’s life by showing her how much he loved her.

At one point as two of my team were praying with her, Zoe felt from the Lord that she should give her a complimentary copy of my book, ‘Oasis of Hope’.  She smiled and thought, “Lord, I asked you for a gift from Nancy and here it is!” 

On the last day of the conference, she expressed to us that she felt God had done open-heart surgery on her as he revealed the depth and vastness of his love to her.  However, God had not yet finished telling her how much he loved her.  During one of the sessions, her name was randomly picked out of a basket filled with names.  We prayed for her and gave her a special gift never realising that this is what she had asked God to do before she came to the weekend.  She thought God had already blessed her with one of my books, but here was God again highlighting her.  She said that it was like God was shouting from the rooftops, making sure she had heard that he REALLY, REALLY loved her!

Your name might never have been picked out of a basket, but today God wants you to know that he really, really loves you.  He hasn’t forgotten you!  He never will leave you nor will he ever forsake you!  He won’t fail you ever!  Don’t just listen to me telling you that God delights in you, but instead ask him to show you how much he loves you and I have no doubt that through various ways he will certainly do so.

When Adam and Eve lived in the Garden of Eden they were surrounded by pleasure.  The Lord wanted them to enjoy the place of bliss that he had created for them both.  That’s how the Lord wants us to live today!   He wants us to enjoy his love, to know what it means to live in his delight and to know the sunshine of his pleasure upon our lives.  However, the truth is many of us live in fear, worry, concern, insecurity and rejection.  Oh, to have our eyes opened to see, feel, know and experience his amazing love, his wonderful delight, his enormous pleasure and his deep, deep joy in us.

When we first realise that the Lord truly delights in us, the experience changes us forever!  When I first realised that God loved me and never ever would reject me, it was a life changing experience.  I was only six years of age, but the transformation in me was easily seen!  I danced and jumped for joy on my bed!  My mum and dad had a really difficult job trying to get me to sleep that night, because I knew something supernatural had happened to me!  I had asked God to come into my life and he did!  I knew it not just because others told me, or even because the Bible told me, I knew it because I could feel his love and his deep joy burning in my heart!

Not only did I recognise God’s pleasure and delight in me, but also, I could not help but express my delight and my joy in him.  My heart exploded that night with joy and my six-year-old body could not stop expressing it by dancing on my bed.  I may not dance on my bed anymore, but the deep delight and joy of knowing God has never left me.  Because of what Jesus did on the cross two thousand years ago we can experience a real, joyful, dynamic, powerful life!  Oh, the Gospel is such good news!  When we begin to understand all that Jesus accomplished for us, our hearts cannot help but explode with great delight and enormous joy!  Have you got joy living in your heart?  Have you experienced real delight in the depth of your being?  When you do, you just have to let it out!  It’s impossible to keep such joy locked away.  The Gospel is good news to all.  It’s like finding a huge treasure chest filled with priceless jewels and realising they are all yours!  When we begin to understand that God loves us and delights in us; when it dawns on us that his pleasure is in us and that he has given us life to the full, a gift so amazing, so incredible, when we truly understand his redemption plan, it’s then that we will want to put on our dancing shoes!

Today discover real joy, discover he truly loves you, discover the riches of his grace and then put on your dancing shoes – come on – its time to dance!

The more you get to know the Lord, the more you recognise that he is an extravagant God.  His design of the universe displays his generosity and creativity.  In the Bible when Jesus miraculously provided food for 5,000 men, which with women and children probably means around 15,000 – 20,000 people, there was more than enough food for everyone plus there was loads left over!  Our God is more than generous.

When Simon Peter gave the Lord a loan of his boat so that Jesus could sit in it and preach to the crowds, the Lord showed his outstanding generosity to Peter.  It is recorded in Luke 5:4 that after Jesus had finished teaching, Jesus told him to go into the deep waters and put down his net.  As an experienced fisherman, Peter knew that it wasn’t the right time of day to fish and also informs Jesus that he and his friends had worked hard all night and caught nothing!  However, Peter goes on to say that because Jesus was telling him to do it, he would obey.  The Lord met his obedience with an incredible catch. Peter had given Jesus the use of his boat not expecting anything in return, but what the Lord did completely overwhelmed him.  You can never outgive the Lord for our God is so generous!

I remember a time when we desperately needed a holiday but didn’t have enough money to pay for a rented lodge in a place we had been before.  We knew this was an ideal place to go, but when I looked on the Internet, I realised there was only one lodge left but because it was the school half term the cost was hugely inflated. As we prayed, God told us not to call about the lodge until the day before the school holiday started!  It was really difficult to wait until the Friday, but we knew we had heard from God and therefore we just had to be obedient. So many times, during this walk of faith, we would get thoughts in our heads which told us that when we called on the Friday the lodge would be gone but we chose to believe God.

On the Friday, I lifted the phone and with my heart beating wildly called the people responsible for the holiday complex.  I not only told them that we would like to rent a lodge for the week, but I also asked if they would give us discount.  I mentioned that on a previous visit I had paid a much less amount for the same lodge.  They laughed at the amount I suggested and said even if they did reduce the price; they would never reduce it by that much!  They said there was a lot of interest in this lodge so they expected it to be rented by the end of the day, however they did say they would call us later if the lodge was still available. We continued to hold on to God’s word and in faith we began to pack our cases!  At around 4pm, they called me to tell me the lodge was still available and asked, “How much would you like to pay, Mrs Goudie?”   I told her our price!  We got the lodge!  God answered our prayer and provided a holiday for us.  Our God is mega generous.  When you are in need, when money seems short, when the impossible raises its head, then remember the power and the generosity of God and believe that he will provide for you!

You only have to look at the human body to discover God’s design is incredible and immensely beautiful.  Each of us is an incredible human being made and created by an incredible God.  When my husband Ray was alive, he often said that he could imagine the scene when Adam first sees Eve.  God’s creation would have been perfect in every way and therefore Ray was sure that Adam’s eyes would have bulged with excitement.  His heart would have been beating wildly as he saw this incredibly beautiful creature standing beside him and Ray felt that all Adam would have been able to say was “WOW!”  And that is exactly what happened.  Adam was blown away by this incredibly beautiful and amazing friend, companion, partner that God created for him.  He was stunned with the beauty of his soul mate.

I want to tell you today that each of us is amazing!  You are incredibly beautiful.  You, like Adam and Eve, have been made in the image of God.  You are incredible!  You are stunning! God looks at us every day with sheer delight and pleasure in his heart.   His pleasure is not dependant on our gender, colour, shape or size; he loves us from the inside out!  He created us with beauty and joy.  Even though we live in a fallen state where illness or other physical ailments are present, I want to remind you today that you remain his choice pearl, his wonderful creation, his joy and his delight!

We so often look at ourselves with a critical eye.  We are not the right shape, colour or size that we want to be!  We wish we had a smaller nose, longer legs or a better temperament.  We complain at the way God made us and we forget that the greatest artist ever has created us!  He did not make a mistake when he made you or me!  He created us with love and passion, he created us with beauty and grace.  The truth is that each one of us is different and yet so special.

A number of years ago I remember my husband Ray telling me, “Nancy I’m glad I’m me!”  I laughed and said “What do you mean?”  He told me, “I don’t want to be Billy Graham, Andrew Llyod Webber or any other human being.  I love the way the Lord created me. I love the creativity he put in me.  I love what he has called me to do. I am glad the Lord made me, me.”  Can you say the same?  Are you glad you are you or do you always want to be someone else?  Do you always want what other people have?  When you realise the beauty and creativity God has placed within you, when you realise what incredible gifts you have, when you begin to know the Lord’s delight in you – then you too like Ray will be able to say – I am glad I am me.