God is love. God is wrathful. He is both of those. We cannot comprehend the degree to which He is both. Most of us fail to equally emphasize both. We generally fall too far to one side or the other. No matter which extreme we go to, virtually every one of us wrongly moderates both the love of God and the wrath of God. We simply do not have the intelligence or purity to understand these two characteristics of God. No matter what you hear on the street or from a pulpit, we are not “just all God’s children”. No matter how many times you sing “When We All Get To Heaven”, that does not make it true. Certainly God created all and in that sense we are all His children, but not all are adopted into His family, destined to live with Him eternally in heaven. Not everybody is going to heaven. The Bible speaks of a clear delineation between those who have put their faith in Christ and those who have not. Those who have trusted Christ receive a love that we simply cannot comprehend. Those who do not trust Christ will receive a wrath that we simply cannot comprehend.
God is wrathful but wrath is not what He longs to execute. God is love and that is what He longs to execute. Zephaniah 3:14-17 spells out what God has in store for those who trust Him, “Sing, O Daughter of Zion; shout aloud, O Israel! Be glad and rejoice with all your heart, O Daughter of Jerusalem! The Lord has taken away your punishment, he has turned back your enemy. The Lord, the King of Israel, is with you; never again will you fear any harm. On that day they will say to Jerusalem, “Do not fear, O Zion; do not let your hands hang limp. 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.” NIV
Surely Jesus sang during His earthly life, in fact Matthew 26 speaks of Jesus and the disciples singing a hymn before heading for the Garden of Gethsemane. But Zephaniah 3 is the only place in the Bible where God is specifically pictured as singing and He does it in rejoicing over you, the believer in Him. God wants very, very much to love. He created you to love, to fellowship with. Do you suppose God created you: to help with His work? help Him figure out some problem or dilemma? for your beauty? to add some purity and holiness to the world? to explain things, help Him understand some stuff? to teach Him how to love? to hear you sing? to watch you paint? so you could write songs? God created you so you could fellowship with Him, so He could love you. That is His heart’s desire.
We emphasize all sorts of spiritual disciplines. We talk about how to read the Bible, how much to read, when to pray, where to pray, how to pray, how to give money, how much money to give, how to meditate, etc. and etc. One thing we fail to emphasize is making ourselves available for God’s enjoyment. I have an idea that “being still and knowing that He is God” is a big part of this. If we will be still, He will show us His love. When was the last time you got still before the Lord and asked Him to somehow, someway, enjoy you? Have you ever asked Him to wrap His arms around you and simply love you? Have you ever asked Him to sing over you? rejoice over you? take delight in you? let His love wash over you in wave after wave after wave? You do not know what you are missing!