Click above to listen to Delight from the album The Voice (recorded at the George Lucas Skywalker Sound Studio). If you enjoy, consider purchasing the song, album download, or CD from Amazon, iTunes, or stantonlanier.com (where sheet music is also available).

Are your desires coming true in 2014?

It’s a matter of perspective, right? Sometimes I question, “Are my motives pure?” Sometimes I wonder, “Am I desiring the right things, the best things?” Several years ago an ancient scripture verse became like a compass, a “true north,” for these kinds of questions around desire.

My perspective began shifting from achieving to receiving, and from striving to surrendering. One of the ways I like to express this is, “I want to line my ‘push’ up with God’s ‘pull.’” It’s not always easy — or realistic — to be joyful and happy, but Delight helps me remember to focus on the good news in life (rather than the bad), as well as the good I can do. I love John Eldredge’s thought in his book Epic that life is an adventure to live rather than a problem to solve. This piano melody also resonates with this idea.

I believe great blessings and surprises await us in the second half of 2014. The secret is to align our heart’s desires and delights with God’s grace and goodness, and to ask for His guidance. When I feel alone or wonder if some desire will come true, God faithfully provides as I surrender results to Him.

What desire or adventure in your heart seems God-sized and impossible without His help?

“Delight yourself in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart.” — Psalm 37:4

“Direct me in the path of your commands, for there I find delight.” — Psalm 119:35