Audio Transcript

Welcome back to the podcast. In our Bible reading this week, we hit Psalm 43. And within Psalm 43 we find one amazing little verse that unfolds into all sorts of implications, leading to a wonderful question from a pastor named Robert, who lives and ministers in Wisconsin. “Hello, Pastor John, and thank you for the way you have served and encouraged pastors like me, from a distance, over the decades through your faithful labors. I love Psalm 43:4, a life verse for me, and one I want to better understand. I know you love this text as well. ‘Then I will go to the altar of God, to God my exceeding joy.’

“If I remember correctly, somewhere I heard you translate the Hebrew of this text like this: ‘Then I will go to the altar of God, to God the joy of my joys.’ God is the joy of our joys. I cannot find where you said this, but you’re not the only one, as I have come to see this in other interpretations of this verse from Puritan Thomas Goodwin in the seventeenth century (Works, 4:392), to William de Burgh in the nineteenth century (A Commentary on the Book of Psalms, 380), to classic Hebrew scholars today (David J.A. Clines, Dictionary of Classical Hebrew, 8:166).

“So, can you walk us through the Hebrew briefly, and then explain what this means that God is the joy of our joys? I’ve historically thought of this text as saying what the ESV here implies, that God is the most exceeding joy above all other joys — a comparison. But you seem to indicate that this text is speaking of source — God is the joy, that is, the giver of all other joys. That changes the text completely. If so, expand on this. This seems like a huge discovery!”

Well, that’s not quite what I mean. I totally love what he loves here and want to get at it, because there is something really quite right. I don’t mean source when I say, “joy of our joys.” What I mean is, God is the essence of our joys. God is the substance of all our joys. He’s the best part of every joy if we are enjoying things rightly. So, he’s not only supreme joy — which is what the ESV brings out: our “exceeding joy” — but he is also the best part of all other joys. He is to be what makes all our joys most enjoyable. That’s what I mean.

‘Joy of My Gladness’

Let’s see if that’s so, and get the verse in front of us here. The psalmist is crying out to God, and he says,

Send out your light and your truth;     let them lead me;let them bring me to your holy hill     and to your dwelling!Then I will go to the altar of God,     to God my exceeding joy. (Psalm 43:3–4)

So, the psalmist identifies God as his exceeding joy, which the ESV, the NASB, the King James Version all translate “exceeding joy.” The Hebrew (śim-ḥaṯ gî-lî) has two different words for joy or happiness or pleasure. Literally, then, the phrase could be translated, “the joy of my gladness,” which in fact is exactly what’s in the margin of the old King James: “the joy of my gladness.” So, the question is, What does that literal phrase — “the joy of my gladness” — mean?

The ESV and the other versions take it to mean that, at least, he’s my best gladness. “The joy of my gladness” means, of all my gladness, he’s the best. And surely that’s right. I mean, at least it means that. God is supreme. God never made anything more valuable or more enjoyable than himself. So yes, God is our exceeding joy. That’s what it means to be God, I think, and that’s what it means to love God. But the question remains, Is that all the phrase means? Is there more implied in the phrase “joy of my gladness”?

Avoiding Idolatry

So, way back — I’m guiding our friend to where I actually said that (he said he couldn’t find it). Well, on February 26, 2006, it’s on the DG website on this text. I preached on this, and I remember it so clearly because it was twelve days after my prostate-cancer surgery. I chose this text precisely for that. So, way back on February 26, 2006, I preached on this, and here’s what I argued. I’ll quote two sentences:

God, who in all my rejoicing over all the good things that he has made, is himself, in all my rejoicing, the heart of my joy, the gladness of my joy. Every joy that does not have God as the central gladness of the joy is a hollow joy and, in the end, will burst like a bubble.

Now, the reason that insight is so important is because, without it, all our enjoyment of God’s gifts — the things that he’s made — would not honor God the way that enjoyment should. Or to put it in the form of a question, What keeps our enjoyment of pizza or friendship from being idolatry? That’s the question. Now, you could answer, “Because we always enjoy God more than pizza, and we always enjoy God more than friendship, and that keeps it from being idolatry.” And that’s true and that’s crucial. God is our exceeding joy, supreme joy.

“God is the best part of every joy if we are enjoying things rightly.”

But I think God intends to be glorified not only by being enjoyed more than pizza and more than friendship, but by being enjoyed in the very enjoyment of pizza and in the very enjoyment of friendship. I think God intends for us to enjoy his sweetness in the sweetness of chocolate, his saltiness in the saltiness of french fries, his juiciness in the juiciness of a sizzling steak, his friendship in the company of our friends, his brightness in the sunrise, and so on.

When Paul says in 1 Timothy 6:17, “Set [your hope] . . . on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy,” I don’t think he meant only, “Make sure you enjoy God more than everything he made,” but rather, “Make sure you enjoy God in everything he made” — under everything as the source of joy, over everything as superior joy, and in everything as the best part of the enjoyment of everything.

Thankfulness Is Not Enough

Now, you could also say that — and this is true — thankfulness for God’s gifts is another key to keep the enjoyment of God’s gifts from becoming god, to keep ourselves from becoming idolaters. To be consciously thankful that every legitimate pleasure in this life is a gift of God is a good thing. That’s a right thing. By all means, we should be thankful. It’s a sin to be ungrateful for every good thing God gives. Paul said in 1 Timothy 4:4, “Nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving.”

But here’s the issue. I want to push into this. Thankfulness is not enough to keep the enjoyment of God’s gifts from becoming idolatrous. Think with me about this. Why is that? Why is thankfulness not enough to keep God’s good gifts from being idols to us? It’s because we all know that someone may give us a gift we enjoy more than we enjoy the person who gave it. We know this.

Being thankful to God or anyone does not mean we love the giver more than the gift. It doesn’t. A cranky, mean-spirited old man may give you the gift you’ve wanted all your life, and you’re thankful. Yes you are. But you don’t like him. He’s cranky. He’s a mean-spirited old man. You’re not sure why he gave it to you, but he gave it to you, and you’ve wanted it all your life, so you’re thankful for it. If we’re going to glorify God in the enjoyment of his gifts, we have to go beyond thankfulness.

Taste and See, Smell and Feel

So, back to Psalm 43:4. “God is the joy of my gladness” means not only that he is better than the gladness I have in other things — that is, “my exceeding joy” — but that he is the best part of the gladness I have in other things. He’s the joy of my gladness. He is what makes the enjoyment of those other things more enjoyable.

When the psalmist says in Psalm 73:25, “Whom have I in heaven but you? And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you” — wow, what a statement — he might mean, “I desire nothing above God.” He might mean that. But it sounds like he means, “I don’t desire anything on earth of which God is not the chief part.” “I don’t want to enjoy anything,” he’s saying, “which is not also an enjoyment of God.” I want to enjoy God in friendship. I want to enjoy God in eating. I want to enjoy God in the pleasures of the marriage bed. I want to enjoy God in music and reading and rising early to see the dawn.

Now, if we’re onto something here, let’s see what some other significant Christian thinkers have said about this. Here’s the way Thomas Traherne put it: “You never enjoy the world aright, till you see how a sand exhibiteth the wisdom and power of God: And prize in everything the service which they do you, by manifesting His glory and goodness to your Soul” (Centuries, 13–14). That’s not mere thankfulness. This is enjoying God in our enjoyment of what he has made. Every part of creation is designed by God to communicate something of God. And when we enjoy that part of creation, we are to savor God in it.

Here’s the way Augustine put it in his prayer: “He loves thee too little” — speaking to God — “who loves anything together with thee, which he loves not for thy sake” (Confessions 10.29.40). Now, “for Thy sake” I take to mean this: we love what is not God properly by loving it for what we taste of God in it — not just out of thankfulness, but what we taste and see, smell and feel of God in it.

So, let us go with the psalmist to the altar of God — that is, to the cross of Jesus Christ — and enjoy the forgiveness of sins that he purchased there. And through that gift, let us know and enjoy God as our exceeding joy — yes, and as the gladness of all our joys.

I’m a pastor who teaches, writes, and edits for a living. On weekdays I spend most of my work time in front of a screen. No one pays me to lift, dig, carry, push, or even move (other than my fingers). My job is not physically taxing at all, though it is often emotionally demanding enough that I’d be happy to swap in some manual labor.

Not that I want to do physical labor full time! I enjoy reading, researching, thinking, brainstorming, writing, and editing. Yet I’ve learned that I cannot undertake those sedentary tasks at my best when my whole life is sedentary. My brain is served by bodily movement.

As I age, I sense more and more tangibly how much better I feel after exercise. In particular, I seem to think clearer, and more effortlessly, and more creatively, and with more focus and mental stamina. Overall, when exercising regularly, I sense that I have more energy, not only for further movement but for thinking and working hard with my mind. I’ve heard other people say the same.

But is this just in our heads, or is there any known biological basis for it? Can we get more clarity about this perceived mental clarity?

Build and Condition the Brain

A few years ago, I found a book by a professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, John Ratey. He spent most of his career on ADHD and co-wrote some of the key texts in the field. As a former amateur athlete and runner, he took notice over the years of what amazing “medicine” exercise seemed to be for his patients. Eventually, he put his findings together in the 2008 book Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain.

Now, if it sounds too good to be true — that exercise demonstrably improves brain function — remember what the prescription is: exercise. Apparently, many people want to just take a pill. Few want to exercise. The prescription may be simple, but it’s not easy.

Here’s how Ratey opens the book:

We all know that exercise makes us feel better, but most of us have no idea why. We assume it’s because we’re burning off stress or reducing muscle tension or boosting endorphins, and we leave it at that. But the real reason we feel so good when we get our blood pumping is that it makes the brain function at its best, and in my view, this benefit of physical activity is far more important — and fascinating — than what it does for the body. Building muscles and conditioning the heart and lungs are essentially side effects. I often tell my patients that the point of exercise is to build and condition the brain. (3, emphasis added)

“The point of exercise, in our sedentary modern lives, is building and conditioning our brains.”

How many of us have started some new exercise regimen because we felt overweight and out of shape, or were confronted with metrics from a doctor? We wanted to lower our cholesterol numbers, or lower the number on the scale, or live longer, or look better. All these benefits, motivating as they may be for millions, are at best side effects of regular exercise, Ratey says. The point of exercise, in our sedentary modern lives, is building and conditioning our brains.

He continues, “To keep our brains at peak performance, our bodies need to work hard” (4). “The brain responds like muscles do, growing with use, withering with inactivity” (5) — and movement activates the brain. And Ratey explains how it is that exercise improves learning — which matters to us as Christians seeking to love our Lord with heart, soul, strength, and mind.

How Exercise Improves Learning

As Christians, we call ourselves disciples, which means learners. Unbelievers may be content to leave the conscious pursuit of learning to their school days; Christians do not. Christianity is a teaching movement, from the Torah to the Psalms to the prophets and apostles and Christ himself, the consummate Teacher. So too, correspondingly, Christianity is a learning movement — in Christ, we are no less than lifelong learners. Brain function matters greatly to me not only as a teacher and editor but as a Christian. So, here’s “how exercise improves learning on three levels”:

First, it optimizes your mind-set to improve alertness, attention, and motivation; second, it prepares and encourages nerve cells to bind to one another, which is the cellular basis for logging in new information; and third, it spurs the development of new nerve cells. (53)

“Unbelievers may leave the conscious pursuit of learning to their school days; Christians do not.”

First, mind-set is no small issue today, in the age of dullness and distraction. If I can be more alert to the world, and to others, and to mentally challenging texts and sequences of thought, then I’m interested. Alertness is a deeply Christian pursuit, and a key reason many of us approve of caffeine but not recreational marijuana. And in a day when so many are woefully and tragically distracted by unceasing devices and the mirage of multitasking, we could hardly list many more valuable benefits than improved attention.

Second and third, modest exertion of the body, and endurance in it (say twenty minutes), produces a cascade of good effects in the brain and body, from neurogenesis (actually growing new brain cells) down to the nitty-gritty strengthening of “the cellular basis for logging new information.” To be clear, Christians have never had biblical reason to neglect or take lightly our lives “in the body” (2 Corinthians 5:10), but today, with what we’ve learned about the brain’s plasticity, and how exercise serves the brain, we have fewer and fewer excuses.

So, active bodies, with their increased heart rate and blood flow, improve learning. Exercise helps to develop new brain cells, encourages the binding of those cells, and improves our focus and eagerness to learn. Christians, of all people, would not want such discoveries to be lost on us.

How It Works

Now, it’s one thing to hear that moderate bodily movement improves learning, it’s another to hear specifically about three ways, and it’s another still to learn how it happens. For me, specifics like this motivate me even further, especially in those moments when I feel happy to stay sedentary and not take the uncomfortable step of overcoming inertia.

Back to the Harvard psychiatrist. Ratey writes,

Going for a run is like taking a little bit of Prozac and a little bit of Ritalin because, like the drugs, exercise elevates . . . neurotransmitters. It’s a handy metaphor to get the point across, but the deeper explanation is that exercise balances neurotransmitters — along with the rest of the neurochemicals in the brain. (38)

And we can go one step further:

BDNF [Brain Deprived Neurotrophic Factor, which Ratey calls “Miracle Grow” for the brain] gathers in reserve pools near the synapses and is unleashed when we get our blood pumping. In the process, a number of hormones from the body are called into action to help. . . . During exercise, these factors push through the blood-brain barrier, a web of capillaries with tightly packed cells that screen out bulky intruders such as bacteria. . . . Once inside the brain, these factors work with BDNF to crank up the molecular machinery of learning. They are also produced within the brain and promote stem-cell division, especially during exercise. . . . The body was designed to be pushed, and in pushing our bodies we push our brains too. (51–53)

Now, make no mistake, the above observations are not explicitly Christian. At their best, they are largely in the realm of what we might call “natural revelation.” How, then, might we reflect as Christians on these fairly recent discoveries in neurology and their relationship to our God and his calling on us in Christ?

Train to Serve Godliness

“Bodily training is of some value,” says Paul, even as he emphasizes that “godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come” (1 Timothy 4:8). Some value is a carefully crafted phrase. Doubtless, many in Paul’s own day, not to mention ours, held the human body in too high regard. They needed to hear that bodily training is of some value, not too much. Yet others — perhaps especially Christians who had been awakened to the far greater value of godliness — needed to open their minds afresh to Paul’s affirmation of any value at all.

Even as we affirm, and seek to celebrate, the far greater value of godliness, we might ask ourselves, practically, What tangible value do I see, and act on, in bodily training? And for those of us who do find value in exercise, we might also ask, Do I simply want to lose fat, look better, and live longer in this fallen world? Or might I find a value in bodily training that serves godliness and, among other things, the function of my brain in the service of Christ and his calling?

Put another way, might my Christian life — my godliness — be compromised because I’ve failed to love my Lord with all my mind? Have I failed to “embrace serious thinking as a means of knowing and loving God and people,” as John Piper pleads in the book Think (179)? This article, concerning exercise, may not reach “plea” level, but I am waving a little flag for readers to consider, perhaps for the first time, how modest, regular exercise could be a means of building and conditioning your brain for serious thinking — serious in the sense of energy, focus, clarity, and stamina. Serious in the service of Christ and Christian joy.

In B.B. Warfield’s “Religious Life of Theological Students,” he poses what seems to be an either-or dilemma for some: study or prayer? Warfield answers with a memorable both-and: How about “ten hours over your books, on your knees”?

Today, we might only add, “And how about after twenty minutes of modest exercise?”

http://rss.desiringgod.org/link/10732/15254960/new-identity-and-armor-against-the-devil