As I thought about tonight and our theme for tonight, I thought about this crazy thing we do in our family. Sometime after dinner and cleanup, after bathtime and PJs, we huddle up with our kids around the Bible, we read a story together, we pray for our family, our church, our neighbors, for the needs around us, and then we do this thing. It’s kind of like talking, but it’s not talking. It’s more beautiful than talking, and usually happier. You use your vocal cords, but you change the rhythm of your voice and the pitch (highness and lowness) to make a different kind of sound. We have a book with lots of lines and funny symbols that guides us.

My eight-year-old has the hang of it (with some tuning issues). My four-year-old really gives it her all, but she isn’t winning any competitions. My two-year-old loves to do this thing — it comes as naturally as eating or drinking or liking dump trucks. You probably know what I’m talking about. In fact, many of you are here tonight because you love to do this beautiful, inexplicable thing. It’s called singing.

It’s utterly ordinary to you now, but when you stop to think about it, it’s one of the strangest things human beings do — isn’t it? I mean, how would you describe singing to an alien who’s just landed on earth and never heard someone sing before? It’s hard, isn’t it? You hear it all throughout history and all over the world, but it’s not at all essential for life. You don’t need it to survive. You must eat and drink and breathe and walk, but you don’t have to sing. Someone could live a whole life, seventy or eighty years, and never sing. I’m sure those people are out there. They’re really, really sad, but they’re out there.

God Sings

So, why do we sing? Why would the infinitely creative, infinitely powerful God alter our brains and vocal cords to give us the capacity to make melodies and harmonies? I think it’s because some things in life are just too good to be said.

For example, I can say, “I love Jesus.” I can say, “I really love Jesus,” and I do. I can say, “Jesus is my greatest Treasure,” and he is. I can say, “Jesus is the greatest, most trustworthy, most satisfying, most glorious Treasure in the world.” Can I get an amen? Or I could sing, “Hallelujah! All I have is Christ!” I don’t even have to sing it well — and it still says more than words can.

God gave us singing because there’s a joy greater than words. And there’s a joy greater than words because that’s the kind of God we have. All the singing in the world is an echo of the song at the heart of the universe. He’s the Song of songs, the God who made lungs and mouths, whole notes and half notes, major keys and minor keys, symphonies and, yes, country music. Did you know our God is a singing God? Zephaniah 3:17:

The Lord your God is in your midst,     a mighty one who will save;he will rejoice over you with gladness;     he will quiet you by his love;he will exult over you with loud singing.

It’s not just singing, but loud, happy singing. You were made in the image of that God. So, I shouldn’t be surprised when my two-year-old sings nonsense in his crib in the middle of the night. He was made, knitted together in his mother’s womb, to remind me of God. Of course he sings. Of course we sing.

God gave us singing because he loves to sing, but he also gave us singing because we were made to worship — to glorify him by enjoying him forever. It’s not enough to know, study, or describe this God. To really know him is to enjoy him, to treasure him, to worship him. And that’s why I wanted us to begin this evening of seeing, savoring, and singing in a favorite psalm, Psalm 4. We’re going to look first at the melody, then at the minor key, and lastly the chorus.

The Melody

Psalm 4:7 has become one of my favorite verses in all the Bible. I read through the Bible several times over years before I ever noticed it, but once I saw it, these words lodged themselves in my soul, and I’ve come back to them again and again:

You have put more joy in my heart     than they have when their grain and wine abound.

More than the world has at its very best!

Notice, David doesn’t say, “You have given me great joy.” He could have said that, but he didn’t. He also didn’t say, “You have given me as much joy as those in the world have in their finest meals and fullest pleasures.” No, he says, “You have put more joy in my heart than they have when their grain and wine abound.” If it’s a word that has grabbed me, it’s that word more.

As David weighs the joy he’s found in God against all the greatest joys on earth — the most expensive experiences, in the most exotic places, with the most famous people — he finds all those other offers wanting. He prefers what he’s tasted through faith over anything else he might see or do or buy, because he knows that God holds out more joy. I wonder if you believe that.

Do you believe that if you went all in with Jesus — if you had to give up everything else you have and love to have him — you’d be happier than you’d ever be without him? I know some of you do — that’s why you’re here. You can’t think of Christianity any other way. You don’t know Jesus only as Lord and Savior, but also as your greatest Treasure. You’re part of the “Fellowship of More Joy.”

“It’s not enough to know, study, or describe this God. To really know him is to enjoy him.”

Others of you, though, have never heard someone talk about Jesus like this. Savor Jesus? How do you savor a person, much less someone you can’t see? What does that even mean? I’m glad you asked, and I’m glad you’re here. I want you to hear that there really is something in life worth singing about — there’s someone worth singing about. There’s a joy too great for words. “You have put more joy in my heart.” For tonight, we’ll call this greater joy the melody. But I chose the psalm for a second reason.

The Minor Key

I’ve loved verse 7 for years, but it’s taken on even more meaning the more time I’ve spent in the psalm. Now, experts wrestle over the specific circumstances, so we don’t know for sure what David was experiencing. We do know that he’s in trouble and that he’s been sinned against, because of how he begins the psalm:

Answer me when I call, O God of my righteousness!     You have given me relief when I was in distress.     Be gracious to me and hear my prayer!How long, exalted men, will my honor be insulted?     How long will you love what is worthless and pursue a lie? (Psalm 4:1–2)

You could call this the minor key. We heard the melody: “You, O God, have given me more joy.” Now here’s the minor key: suffering. In David’s case, it was serious and prolonged pain. The king’s honor has been insulted, and people close to him have been lying about him. Who was it in this case, and how exactly did they wrong him? Again, we don’t know for sure. David had so many enemies and so many trials that it’s truly hard to know.

Many, however, read Psalms 3 and 4 together as morning and evening psalms and therefore believe they’re about the same event. And the superscription on Psalm 3 tells us that he wrote that psalm “when he fled from Absalom his son.” In 2 Samuel 15, when David was king, Absalom (his own son) led a conspiracy and tried to take his father’s throne by force.

Again, Psalm 4 may not be about Absalom (though I think it is), but it’s about some betrayal, and it’s helpful for me, anyway, to think about a particular betrayal. His third son really conspired against him, lied to him and about him, recruited an army of traitors, and then tried to kill him.
Again, my kids are eight, four, and two. I literally can’t imagine one of them hurting me like this. But they might.

All of this — the betrayal, the lying, the threats, the grief and sorrow and anger — really changes how you hear the joy in verse 7, doesn’t it?

You have put more joy in my heart     than they have when their grain and wine abound.

Really? You can say that in these circumstances? Could you say that if someone hurt you like this? Maybe someone has already hurt you. When he says, “when their grain and wine abound,” I can’t help but think he’s thinking about Absalom, who was sleeping in his father’s house, feasting on his father’s grain, and getting drunk on his father’s wine.

And yet David can say, “As happy as Absalom might be right now, I’m happier.” Even now. Even here. Even while he absolutely wrecks this father’s heart. This is a man who sees, savors, and sings, even in suffering.

His joy in God carries him through the valley — and it shines even brighter in the valley. How great and satisfying is this God that he can give joy — more joy — in pain like this! We hear how the dark minor key draws out and amplifies the melody.

Some of you are struggling to sing in this season. You have something heavy weighing on your mind right now, and you can barely focus in worship, much less sing. It might not be the betrayal of a child, but it stings like that — and like his, the sting might last for months or years or longer.
I think if David were here tonight, he might say, “If you know the God who is with me in my valley, you can still sing. Even now.” In fact, you have to sing. It’s the only way you’ll make it through.

And this psalm teaches us that it’s not just about getting ourselves through. Remember, David is singing to the people suffering with him — he’s singing them through their pain. And he wrote his song down so that God’s people could sing these lines again and again and again. That’s what the psalms are. And his song still sings today, doesn’t it? He’s singing us, all these thousands of years later, through our sufferings of various kinds.

“There is a joy in this world that is deeper and more intense than your pain, whatever your pain is.”

So, if you’re here tonight and going through something hard, who needs to hear you sing through this? Whose faith might be strengthened by hearing you, in all your pain, cry out, “You have put more joy in my heart, even now”? How could anyone feel joy in a situation like this? By finding a joy deeper and more intense than the pain. If you don’t hear anything else, know that there is a joy in this world that is deeper and more intense than your pain, whatever your pain is. That’s the kind of joy God holds out to you in Jesus, in the gospel, in his word.

The apostle Paul wrote a phrase for this kind of happiness: “sorrowful, yet always rejoicing” (2 Corinthians 6:10). In a world like ours, with lives like ours and heartaches like ours, that’s the right kind of happy. Sorrowful — genuinely, even persistently, brokenhearted — and yet always, always rejoicing.

No matter how hard life gets, we always have more than enough reasons in Christ to rejoice. And that brings us to the chorus.

The Chorus

We’ve heard the melody: this greater joy God gives. We’ve felt the minor key: his terrible suffering. And we’ve seen how his joy shines through that suffering. But what is the joy he experiences? Does David tell us any more about the “more joy” that God gives? Let’s look at verse 6:

There are many who say, “Who will show us some good?”

I think David’s talking about the faithful people around him, people who are suffering with him (perhaps hiding with him from Absalom), and they’re asking, “Who can show us anything good?” Is God going to let us have anything good? We’re doing the right thing here, and yet we’re the ones suffering. We’re the ones being driven out of the kingdom and running for our lives. And the ones doing evil are getting all the good. They’re safe. They’re well-fed. They’re on their third bottle of good wine. What’s up with that, God? Why am I doing the right thing if I just keep getting beat up by life? And why wouldn’t I do the wrong thing when those people seem to be doing so great?

You’ve probably been tempted this way at some point. You’ve wondered why your Christian life is so hard at times, and why people diving headlong into sin seem to have it easier or better.

How does David shepherd the pain and confusion of these hurting friends? He lifts their eyes to remind them where to find that more joy. Here’s the end of verse 6 into verse 7:

“Lift up the light of your face upon us, O Lord!”You have put more joy in my heart     than they have when their grain and wine abound.

The people around him were looking for safety and justice and some comfort; he was looking for something better than all of that — far better. He wouldn’t settle for getting his things back. A throne with all that power wasn’t big enough for him anymore. No, he wanted the Good that’s better than all those other goods. The reason his joy is strong enough to endure betrayal is because God is his joy. This is the chorus. “Lift up the light of your face upon us, O Lord!” The joy’s in his face — it’s in him.

He makes the same point in verse 3: “Know that the Lord has set apart the godly for himself.” I think that for means “for relationship.” In the gospel, God is not just trying to prove his grace and mercy when he forgives us — he doesn’t save us from a distance — no, he wants to know us. And he wants us to know and enjoy him.

This is the same joy as Psalm 16:11:

You make known to me the path of life;     in your presence there is fullness of joy;     at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.

And now, in Christ, we say with the apostle Paul,

I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ. (Philippians 3:8)

David’s chorus in the valley was his greater joy in God himself. That joy kept him from bitterness. That joy kept him from being paralyzed with despair. That joy freed him to love those around him and encourage them not to return sin for sin. That joy allowed him to lie down and get some rest: Verse 8 says, “In peace I will both lie down and sleep; for you alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety.” Because God is his joy, he can have joy, real joy, more joy, even when his life falls apart. He can sing in his deepest, darkest valleys.

This man is a miracle. He’s an emotionally miraculous man. Who responds to suffering like this? He’s the kind of man I want to be. No one sees, savors, and sings through this kind of suffering — unless God does this kind of miracle in them. And that brings me back to singing.

Prophet, Priest, and Song

I started by saying that singing isn’t necessary to human life — like eating, drinking, and breathing — but the longer I think about it, and the longer I spend in verses like these, and the longer I sing, the more I wonder if it’s not the most human thing we do.

Remember that Jesus — the greatest human who ever lived, the Son of God in the flesh — sings. In a couple precious places, we actually hear him sing. He suffered more than David, far more, and yet with more joy, far more. Hebrews 2:10–12 says,

It was fitting that he, for whom and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, should make the founder of their salvation [Jesus] perfect through suffering [the cross]. For he who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one source. That is why he is not ashamed to call them brothers, saying [this is Jesus speaking, quoting Psalm 22], “I will tell of your name to my brothers; in the midst of the congregation I will sing your praise.”

And he actually sang. Remember that night of the Lord’s Supper, after the bread had been broken and eaten, after the wine had been poured and consumed, after he had given his last words to his disciples, how did they end the night together? Matthew 26:30 says, “And when they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives.” Can you imagine? On the night he was betrayed, hours before he bore the sins of the world, in his deepest, darkest moment, he sang.

For the joy set before him, he endured the cross. David bore the awful betrayal of a son, but the Father sent his beloved Son to bear the betrayal of the whole world — to bear your betrayal against him, your sin. And Hebrews 12:2 tells us that it was joy that sustained him — more joy than the world has ever known, even when their grain and wine abound. He knew that joy, before the foundation of the world — between the Father, Son, and Spirit — and he’s now become that joy for us, our Treasure in the field, our Pearl of great price.

What happens in the heart when it experiences real saving faith? John Piper argues that faith in Christ is not saving unless it includes an “affectional dimension of treasuring Christ.” Nor is God glorified as he ought to be unless he is treasured in being trusted. Saving faith in Jesus Christ welcomes him forever as our supreme and inexhaustible pleasure.

What Is Saving Faith? explains that a Savior who is treasured for his all-satisfying worth is more glorified than a Savior who is only trusted for his all-forgiving competence. In this way, saving faith reaches its God-appointed goal: the perfections of Christ glorified by our being satisfied in him forever.

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2022, Crossway Books

Endorsements

This remarkably insightful book is guaranteed to deepen our understanding of saving faith. It will also cause us to reexamine our approaches to evangelism and assurance of salvation. John Piper explains that to truly ‘receive’ Christ in faith cannot mean merely fleeing to Christ reluctantly as an escape ticket from hell, but must mean welcoming him into our lives as our greatest treasure. Piper is careful not to add any works requirements to justification by faith alone, but he explains more deeply the affections that will characterize genuine saving faith. This is a crucial message for twenty-first-century evangelical Christians.

Wayne Grudem, Professor, Phoenix Seminary

Being a Christian means placing faith in Jesus. What could be simpler? How can ‘saving faith’ require a book to explain? Piper argues from both Scripture and church history that the true answer to this question is elusive, subtle, and glorious and troubling in its implications. He shows why so many believers are absentee in living out the faith they may at one time have expressed. He thereby invites readers to refine and renew their own faith by the grace God gives to receive the riches he offers in Christ. ‘We will spend eternity discovering the wonders of the experience of saving faith,’ Piper states. Read this book and start now.

Robert Yarbrough, Professor, Covenant Theological Seminary

It is a great honor to commend this book to everyone who desires to understand the nature of saving faith. John Piper’s thesis is provocative but does, I think, accurately represent the overall thrust of the New Testament. Reading this thoughtful and life-giving work will prove transformative for many who take the time to ponder its implications.

Andreas Köstenberger, Professor, Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary

My son, give me your heart,     and let your eyes observe my ways. (Proverbs 23:26)

This simple proverb is embedded in a series of exhortations and warnings about the dangers of prostitutes and drunkenness. Its simplicity masks its profundity. In thirteen words, it cuts to the heart of parenting and, when consistently embraced, orients everything else we do in raising our children.

The two exhortations together express the remarkable exchange that we’re after in our fathering and our mothering. As our children grow up in our homes, we want to receive something from them, and we want them to receive something from us. We want their hearts, and we want them to have our ways.

Heartbeat of Parenting

The biblical calling on parents is to raise our children in the discipline and instruction of the Lord (Ephesians 6:4). There are many aspects to this calling. We teach and admonish. We establish rules and enforce them. We provide instruction and correction. We rebuke and train and equip our children for life. But if we are seeking to raise them “in the Lord,” then we must keep our eye on the ball. We are after their heart.

It’s easy to lose sight of this. It’s easy to give instruction and discipline because we want our child’s obedience, or because we want some peace and quiet, or because we have important work to do and the fussing, whining, quarreling, and provoking happening in the kitchen is an interruption.

Of course, correction is important. Fussing, whining, quarreling, and provoking are all sins to be addressed. We do want their obedience, and we’re responsible to God to instruct them and discipline them. A peaceful home is a blessing to everyone in it. But it is far too easy to address the sins and lose sight of what’s ultimate. It’s possible to lose sight of the fact that what we really want is obedience from the heart, peace and quiet from the heart. What we want is their heart.

“Is the heartbeat of your parenting, ‘My son, give me your heart’?”

This means that our instructions, admonitions, warnings, corrections, exhortations, and discipline must all flow from our desire to gain their hearts. Ask yourself: When you’re setting the rules, are you after their heart? When you instruct them in God’s laws, are you after their heart? When you enforce the rules, whether God’s laws or house rules, are you after their heart? When you say yes to their requests, are you after their heart? When you say no to their requests, are you after their heart?

In all that you do as a parent, is Solomon’s proverb present in your words, attitudes, and actions? Is the heartbeat of your parenting, “My son, give me your heart”?

Now, seeking their heart is only one side of the equation. The other side is what we hope to give to them. “Let your eyes observe my ways.” A better translation might be, “Let your eyes delight in my ways.” The word observe does not refer to mere disinterested attention. It shows up in passages like these:

The Lord takes pleasure in those who fear him, in those who hope in his steadfast love. (Psalm 147:11)

The Lord takes pleasure in his people; he adorns the humble with salvation. (Psalm 149:4)

The Lord reproves him whom he loves, as a father the son in whom he delights. (Proverbs 3:12)

When a man’s ways please the Lord, he makes even his enemies to be at peace with him. (Proverbs 16:7)

The sense of the exhortation is this: “My son, look with delight upon the way I conduct myself. Gladly accept my way of life.” In other words, the call is not merely for the son to observe his father’s conduct, but to aspire to imitate it, to follow it, to make his father’s ways his own.

Our ways refer to our habitual conduct, the pattern of thoughts, words, attitudes, and actions that define us. In other words, this is our actual way of walking in the world. It’s not mainly about what we profess, but what we practice. Think of it as your standard operating procedure. This is what our children are exhorted to gladly observe, accept, and follow.

In this sense, the manner of our speech is as important as the content of our speech. It’s not just what we say and do, but how we say and do it. So consider your attitude, your demeanor, your tone of voice, and ask yourself some probing questions.

Do you give instruction with exasperation or with cheerfulness? Do you correct with patience or with frustration? If someone else were in the room when you exhort and discipline your children, would they describe your tone as harsh or firm? Biting or kind? Angry or gentle? What sort of “way” are you asking them to gladly imitate and own? One that abruptly reacts with sharp intensity, or one that wisely responds with sober-minded stability?

Giving Their Hearts to God

These two exhortations hang together. Our ways will be more delightful to them if we are gladly seeking their hearts. One of our fundamental callings is to be the smile of God to our children. That is the heartbeat of our ways. And in reflecting God’s smile, we are also seeking their hearts and calling them to observe, receive, accept, and own our ways.

“Ultimately, we want our children to give their hearts to God. Giving their hearts to us is practice.”

But not just our ways. Ultimately, we want our children to give their hearts to God. Giving their hearts to us is practice for this ultimate giving. They give their hearts to an earthly father (and mother) so that they can learn to give their hearts to their heavenly Father. Gladly observing and imitating our ways is a stepping stone to observing and imitating God’s ways.

But perhaps we can say even more. Jesus tells us that there is a way of receiving children in his name that is also a receiving of Jesus himself. “Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me, and whoever receives me, receives not me but him who sent me” (Mark 9:37). The two acts of receiving — receiving children and receiving Jesus — become one, because the first is done in his name. When you receive children in Jesus’s name, what do you have in the end? You have the children, and you have Jesus.

Similarly, there is a way your children can give you their heart that becomes, over time, and by the grace of God, a giving of their heart to God. They give their heart to you, and, if you’re teaching them rightly, they give their heart to you in the name of Jesus. And when they do that, who has their heart in the end? You do, and he does.