It’s a good question to ask. Can we be pleasing to God? What does he think about us? What are his thoughts towards us?

Too often, we view God like we view our earthly father. As a child, before we had any thoughts of God, we looked to our earthly father. He was like God to us. The problem is that every earthly father falls short of modeling God as our Heavenly Father. The result is that we approach God a lot like we approach our imperfect, earthly father.

I believe one of our biggest hinderances to receiving God’s love is a wrong perception of his attitude towards us.

Under the old Covenant, the people were required to perform many rituals and sacrifices to please God. These works, duties, and rituals were all part of a cleansing process that appeased God and allowed the people to come to him. But under the new Convenant, Jesus became our sacrifice. He performed all of the works, duties and rituals that were required by the Law. He fulfilled the Law for us (Matthew 5:17). Under the new Covenant, all that’s required to please God is to believe in Jesus.

In John 6:28, Jesus’ disciples wanted to know how to please God. They asked Jesus, “What shall we do, that we may work the works of God?”

This is a great question!  We should all ask ourselves, “Lord, what would you like me to do? What are the works that you require of me?  What must I do to be pleasing to you?”

Take a moment and ask yourself these questions. Then, either written or mentally, make a list of the works you can do for God that would please him. You got ‘em?

Now, let’s see how Jesus answered the disciples.  Jesus responded, “This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He sent.”

Did you catch that? The work of God is that you believe in Christ. What pleases God is that you put your hope in Christ because he fulfilled all the Law. It’s the work of Christ that makes you worthy–it’s not what you do or don’t do. Jesus completely pleased God, and our requirement is to simply believe that. When we fully trust that Jesus paid the full price for our sins and we receive him in our lives, then we are pleasing to God. It’s not about being good enough or doing all the right things–it’s about believing.

The writer of Hebrews put it this way, “Without faith (without believing), it’s impossible to please God” (Hebrews 6:11a).

When you believe in Christ, and trust in his work on the cross, then you are pleasing to God. Very pleasing! There’s nothing more you can do to make yourself worthy. First John 5:12-13 sums it up well: “So whoever has God’s Son has life; whoever does not have his Son does not have life. I write this to you who believe in the Son of God, so that you may know you have eternal life.”

In Christ, you are perfectly pleasing to God! He is madly, passionately in love with you. He talks about you incessantly with great pride. He rejoices over you with singing and dancing (Zephaniah 3:17). You are his favorite! You are pleasing to God!

Prayer: Father, show me just how pleasing I am to you. Show me how much you love me and rejoice over me with singing and dancing.

Soon after we arrived, we decided to go exploring. We started by climbing on top of the “big rocks”. We quickly noticed that we could jump from rock to rock, never touching the ground. It was only about four feet to the ground, but in my son’s mind, it was 400 feet and there was hot lava all over the ground! Danger!

As we leapt from rock to rock, I was amazed at my son’s courage. Even my wife wouldn’t jump over some of the huge gaps. (She had to trample through hot lava to keep up with us.)

After hours of jumping, Caleb successfully made all of the courageous leaps. Except for one. It was towards the end, and it was quite a large leap. I was surprised when he took two steps back and went for it.

As he landed on the side of the rock, I knew he wasn’t going to make it. His sandals began to slip, and he started to slide down. I leapt over him and quickly grabbed his hands and pulled him to safety. He caught his breath and finished our last few leaps back to home base.

I share this story because it reminds me of what this battle with fear is like. As we leap from situation to situation, there are times we feel like we’ll drop hundreds of feet into hot, burning lava. You see, fear has a way of exaggerating things. What may seem like a four-hundred-foot drop into hot lava may only be four-foot drop to solid ground.

So, most of us never jump–we never get in the car, we never go to the grocery store, we never get married, we never have children or we never take on that new job. The risk seems more than we can handle, because fear has a way of blowing everything out of proportion.

As my son sprang from rock to rock, I was there with him the whole time. I watched him, protected him and instructed him with each leap. In the same way, your heavenly Father will be with you to watch over you, protect you and instruct you with each leap of your life. If I–an earthly father–can take care of my son, how much more can God–a heavenly Father–take care of you?

And, if you do begin to fall, cry out to your Father. Just as I went before Caleb and lifted him out of danger, so God will go before you, and lift you up out any danger. He cares for you. He loves you more than you know. Through Christ, you can come to him for strength and peace and courage.

“If you make the LORD your refuge, if you make the Most High your shelter, no evil will conquer you; no plague will come near your dwelling. For he orders his angels to protect you wherever you go. They will hold you with their hands to keep you from striking your foot on a stone” (Psalms 91:9-12).

Prayer: Father, give me the strength and courage to leap from boulder to boulder, situation to situation. I trust you to go before me and protect me, and pull me to safety when I fall.

As I stopped him on his way to our bedroom, I asked him if he’d like me to lie down with him. Half asleep, he nodded. So, I picked him up and carried him back to his room. As I held him close to me, he quickly drifted off to sleep.

The next day, when I asked Caleb about his little morning quest to our bed, he explained that he had been afraid and wanted to sleep with us. Yet, last night, it wasn’t our bed that gave him peace to sleep–it was being in the presence of his father.

That is so true with God, our Father.

Immediately, I think of Psalms 23 verse 4: “Even when I walk through the dark valley of death, I will not be afraid, for you are close beside me.”

How many of you know this “dark valley”? I believe many of you do. One of the primary symptoms of a panic attack is a terrible fear of death. Many times, I thought I was going to die–my heart racing, my mind spinning, couldn’t catch my breath–truly, a dark valley.

The first recorded experience of fear in the Bible is when Adam had sinned for the very first time. God called out to him, and Adam answered, “I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid” (Genesis 3:10). This first episode of fear resulted when Adam was separated from God–he was away from his Father’s presence.

When fear strikes, I call out to God in prayer, and when I do, I can sense his presence as it melts away all fear. God is real and he is ready to help you through this dark valley of fear if you’ll trust him.

You may respond, “But Russell, I don’t know how to experience the presence of God in my life.”

Here’s where you start: Jesus came to earth to make a way for us to come into our Father’s presence. He is our bridge, our mediator, our sacrifice that was given to us to usher us into the presence of God. Because of Jesus, we can enter into God’s presence. “That is why we have a great High Priest who has gone to heaven, Jesus the Son of God. Let us cling to him and never stop trusting him. This High Priest of ours understands our weaknesses, for he faced all of the same temptations we do, yet he did not sin. So let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God. There we will receive his mercy, and we will find grace to help us when we need it” (Hebrews 4:14-16).

Prayer: Dear Jesus, I know that my life is not perfect. I truly am a sinner, separated from God. You are the Bridge that restores my relationship with God. I put my faith in you. This day, I turn away from the wrong things I am doing. I believe you died, was buried for three days and rose again to newness of life. I receive you into my life. Receive me into yours. Help me to experience the presence of God each and every day in my life so that all fear must flee. Thank you Jesus, for it is in your name that I pray. Amen.”