I can remember the few times when I was on the receiving end of someone’s service or kindness and, when thanked, they replied, “It was my pleasure” or “I was glad to do it!” Such a response tells me that what was done, although it had me in view, was not done out of duty or obligation but for the real joy the one serving had in serving. To speak of doing something because “it was my pleasure” must mean that there is a free delight in the doing and that what is done genuinely flows from the character and heart of the server. (That is, of course,  as long as such words are genuine and sincere and are not merely “learned behavior.”)

This thought crossed my mind this morning as I was reflecting on why God does what he does in our lives, in my life. Why is it that he sent his son to die, pours out his Spirit into my soul, patiently tolerates my slowness and stubbornness, faithfully pursues me and draws me toward himself? Is God obligated, in some sense, to do this? Must he do this because, someone, my mere existence demands that he act this way? Or . . .

My thoughts turned back to Philippians. Paul is writing about how God continues to be at work in the lives of those who have given over in faith to lives centered on Jesus. And Paul writes:

Work out your salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for [His] good pleasure. (Philippians 2:13)

And there it is! God is at work “in you . . . for his good pleasure.” God is doing what he is doing–in transforming grace and goodness–for his good pleasure. He does what he does in my life, in our lives, because it pleases him to do so.

This language is not found many places in the New Testament; the expression does appear a number of times in Paul’s letters. For example, Paul writes, in Ephesians 1:5, that God has undertaken to make us his children because of his good pleasure; he does this because it pleases him to do so.

I am not even sure that I can quite grasp the magnitude and wonder of this. But as I begin to see it, there is such a taste of freedom and joy and peace.

If God does what he does in my life because I am proving to be valuable or because I am measuring up or because he needs the help or because . . . well, because of what I contribute, in any way, to his pleasure and satisfaction . . . then when I fail at proving to be valuable or fall short of measuring up or am ineffective at helping him out, the risk is that he will stop working in and through me. I have become unprofitable.

But if God does what he does in completing what he has begun in us (Philippians 1:6) and continuing to be active in transforming grace because it is his genuine pleasure and delight to do so, then he will keep on doing it! That is, as long as he is faithful to himself (which he will forever be), then he will do what pleases him. And what pleases him is to extend himself to be at work in us. He will pursue me and love me, he will serve us and draw us and woo us, he will pour out his Spirit in the lives of those who are his and will guide them by his Word, because he is glad to do it.

Such pleasure! Such grace! Such a God!