Raison d’être
Bless the Lord, all you His hosts, you who serve Him, doing His will. Psalm 103:21 NASB
Will – What does it mean to do God’s will? We often think it must mean fulfilling His commandments and ordinances or listening to the guidance of the Spirit or acting in righteous ways. But I’m not so sure. The Hebrew word is ratson. Ratson is typically used to describe favor, desire or delight. It is not typically used to describe the execution of orders or the fulfillment of tasks. The synonym, haphets, is a word about delight. It seems that the basis of “doing God’s will” is really about feelings, not actions. Notice how TWOT describes the word:
The more normal Qal construction occurs initially in Gen 33:10 to describe Jacob’s wishes toward Esau. rāṣâ is frequently used in prayers (Deut 33:11, 24) and religious greetings (II Sam 24:23). The root frequently describes God’s pleasure with his servants, particularly referred to the Messiah (Isa 42:1). rāṣâ serves as the “B” word in the beautiful parallel phrases of Ps 147:10 [H 11]. The “A” word in the first hemistich is a synonym, ḥāpēs (q.v.). rāṣâ is also used in passages dealing with the favor of men (Mal 1:8) and a father’s son (Prov 3:12). It is used in contexts requiring the favor of a king (I Sam 29:4) or the favor of a people for their king (II Chr 10:7). It is used of the satisfaction of a debt both in the sense of atonement for sin (Mic 6:7) and fulfillment of ritual requirements (II Chr 36:21). [1]
We have a difficult time with this. If doing God’s will is really about feelings, then what are all the commandments about? But the point in Hebrew is that actions are not divorced from feelings. The “favor” of the Lord is discovered in the mitzvot. Duty is not the raison d’être of my existence. Love and delight are the reason I exist, the purpose of my being here. If I perform the mitzvot out of duty, even if the duty is clear and required, I have obscured and perhaps missed a vital component of the action. My duty to the Lord must arise from my love for Him, not simply from my obligation to His word.
Can I love God and not do what He asks? I wonder if that is even possible. What kind of description characterizes a relationship that complies to expectations but does not involve compelling feelings of genuine care? Military, perhaps? A relationship of submission to authority? Certainly not a relationship where tenderness, intimacy and genuine concern motivate the action. Duty does not require love, but love certainly expects duty.
To do God’s will is to love him wholeheartedly—and act accordingly.
Topical Index: ratson, will, delight, duty, favor, love, Psalm 103:21
[1] White, W. (1999). 2207 רָצָה. In R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer, Jr. & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament.
On this (love) hangs the Law and the prophets. On His delight hangs also my own delight.
I was a very sick girl. I performed for love for decades and it drove me into the ground and nigh near broke me off. I had it exactly backwards. I had the jumper cables on the wrong terminals and the battery drained dry.
Do I clean the kitchen because I want to feel good, or do I clean the kitchen because I already do feel good? Duty says the first. Love says the second. Adrenaline was what I used for duty, and duty is better than running away from love, but it is still not love. I accessed adrenaline by use of fear; I accessed fear by use of beliefs about love that were not true; I believed that I would not, in fact, be loved if I did not clean the kitchen. I was exhausted.
I repented for believing things about love that were not true, and was healed of chronic fatigue and its related issues, but then ran smack into a problem. When you repent for using panic, then what do you go with to clean the kitchen? I found that, at the end of my day, what I had been performing for all these years – namely, love – I did not, in fact, know very much about. If I am to do the delight of the Lord, then that means that the gas in my tank to do it with must be His delight, and not my own. Children know better than we do on this one. They go run and play BECAUSE they feel delight. They feel the delight of their parents in them, too. They trust the world, and to that exact extent, they expend that delight. I had forgotten what that was.
I found that all the methods of the flesh are unholy because they presuppose the wrong source for the power to perform. If I start from myself as a source for righteousness, then I am going to be using various flavors of fear, guilt and shame as my power plant – my motivation, and my gods – namely, what I am trying to APPEASE. And my battery cables are never going to get farther than getting plugged into my own tail. All in the name of righteousness, of course. Children know better than this!
To trust in the Lord is to look to Him for the motives, the methods, the reasons and the rewards. If I cannot do that, either because I do not know how, or because some sin (self focus) is still obscuring my ability to see that how, then it is going to be more honest if I sit down, like a little child, and pout “I do not want to play”. At least, then, there is a chance for change. Trust in Him is HOW I am supposed to get through my day, but pleasure is WHAT I was given to determine WHEN I am, in fact, pleasing Him. I have found that, if I have the guts to leave the kitchen dirty until I have refused to listen to all the usual lies about love that I used to use to clean it with, then the Truth has a chance to show up and show me the real reasons to clean the kitchen. The real reasons for love are always going to come packaged with the delight of the Lord. I have to trade in what I think is my own delight, though, first. Wanna witness the real clash of the Titans? Just come to my house some days and witness the funny stuff that goes on in my kitchen!
Laurita, I would recommend this book to you:
“The Practice of the Presence of God: The Wisdom and Teachings of Brother Lawrence”
(also a “kitchen servant!”)
Skip, As a veteran of the US Armed Forces and a volunteer to veterans who suffer from PTSD, homelessness, addictions and mental health issues often as a result of their service, I take issue with your characterization of the military as being one of “a relationship that complies to expectations but does not involve compelling feelings of genuine care”. The idea that patriotism, love of country, love of your fellow citizens, love of freedom is the prime and cardinal factor of those who serve may be misunderstood, misinterpreted and even mocked by those who have never worn the uniform, but not by those who do, have or will. To be willing to lay down your life for this country requires more than blind obedience of submission to authority, it too, requires a love that acts. On the field of battle there are few, if any, soldiers (American or Israeli, especially) who risks life and limb out of a sterile sense “duty” or blind submission to authority. They do so for their friends. And there is no greater love than that of one willing to lay down your life for your friends Those who serve for the sake of duty alone and blind obedience to authority we call terrorists and they serve the death god Allah.
Please find a better example.
Noted, but I didn’t actually say what you think. I suggested that the military MIGHT be an example. I did not say that it was. And the point is about taking orders regardless of feelings, not about the absence of feelings of camaraderie or compassion. In a military hierarchy, orders prevail even if feelings of duty are essential. You are right in your description of the actual circumstances, but generals still send men to their deaths on the basis of orders.
Anyway, I got your point. Thanks.
Skip, I am sorry if snapped at you. Forgive me. More than a few of us old Vietnam era veterans have long memories when it comes to people not appreciating our service to our nation, though it did indeed sometimes involve following orders that we may have not liked from Generals who will yet answer for their sins of war committed in the name of duty, honor and Country. I believe that your heart is pure and I now understand that it is difficult to find an example of duty without ‘the feelings of genuine care’ that your readers can relate to and easily understand. I just wanted to remind everyone that our servicemen and women aren’t automatons or jingoistic fanatics, but they are motivated by, as you say, “feelings of camaraderie or compassion”. I stand down.
got it. I so appreciate what you did and what our soldiers do. I am so proud of Rachel, my daughter, for serving and I LOVED being with her on the carrier
because we love Him..
A Man and His Mission
The Servant-King
These are (basically) the three levels of living. Duty, Drudgery or delight.
Now hear this:
~ Then I said, ‘Behold, I have come (in the scroll of the book it is written of Me) to do your will, O God ~
Question #1 – Who has come to do the will of the Father? Who was born of virgin. one starry night, in the little town of Bethlehem?
Helpful household hint:
~ Jesus (Yeshua HaMashiach) said unto His disciples, “My meat is to do the will of Him that sent me, and to finish His work” ~
and?
“I have glorified You on the earth: I have finished the work which You gave me to do.”
Mission Impossible? No. Mission Accomplished!
The long-promised Messiah has come!
My sins are gone
I’ve been set free!
My God, my Savior has ransomed me!
And like a flood, His mercy reigns
Unending Love, Amazing Grace!