FAST 2026 | Delight - Pastor Rusty Nelson

We trace how delight in God reshapes desire, discipline, and daily life, drawing from Psalm 37 and Psalm 27. David’s singular focus under pressure becomes a model for moving from visiting God to dwelling with God, replacing anxiety with unhurried affection and relational trust.

• Delight as softening the heart so God plants new desires
• David’s one thing focus amid conflict in Psalm 27
• Desire narrowing attention and clarifying pursuit
• Abiding over occasional visits to cultivate peace
• Prayer with thanksgiving reframing anxiety
• Relational faith versus transactional religion
• Discovery and guidance flowing from communion
• Fasting as posture for desire, not performance
• Confidence born from knowing God’s nature and ways

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome, Scripture Declarations, Opening Prayer
• 2:10 Psalm 37 And The Meaning Of Delight
• 7:30 Desire, Discipline, And God’s Grace
• 12:20 Psalm 27: Confidence In Conflict
• 20:00 Narrowing Desire To One Thing
• 27:30 From Visiting God To Dwelling With God
• 34:40 Anxiety, Prayer, And Unhurried Affection
• 41:30 Abiding Unlocks Discovery And Guidance

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

Well how many have your Bibles today? Come on, take them, hold them up.

SPEAKER_01: 0:04

Welcome to the Rock Family. For more information about our church. Say this with me. What his word says I am. I can join us from Rusty Nelson.

SPEAKER_00: 0:19

I can be what his word says I can be. So right now, I will hear his word, I'll receive his word, and I will obey his word because I love his word. I want you to take your Bibles and turn with me to Psalm 37. And then when you get to Psalm 37, I want you to flip over to Psalm 27. Psalm 37. This is a passage that Pastor Scott set in alignment for today. And I want to read it. It's actually very special to me. I found this scripture when I was 14 years old. This is my life scripture. It's one that from the time I had no idea what my life would look like. This passage, this scripture, became a part of my life. And I want to read it to you. In verse 3, it says, Trust in the Lord and do good. Dwell in the land and befriend faithfulness. I love that, man. Why don't you just make faithfulness a friend? Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart. I want to say that one again. Delight yourself in the Lord. Now, my dad, when I was growing up, I'm going to give you a good dad joke. Well, my dad, when I was growing up, he used to tell this all the time. He said, You know, I'm like the lightning bug that backed up into the fan. I'm just delighted to be here. Alright, that was terrible. Alright, forget that. Father, I did that for you. All right. Greg, help me after that, please. But delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord. Trust him. And he will act. Let's pray. I thank you today, Father, for your word. I thank you for your promise. I thank you for the friendship of faithfulness. Because, Lord, I was young. And now I'm older. A lot older. And I've never seen the righteous forsaken or his seed begging bread. Thank you for your faithfulness. I ask you, would you let my tongue be the pen of a writer? If I could write your heart today, it would be the greatest honor that you could ever give me, other than knowing you, is to make you known today. And I ask it in Jesus' name. And everybody said. Amen. Something about this passage, delight yourself. Today we kick off this week, and the word is delight. I've just kind of, as I studied this, just delight, it's the delight of the soul. The delight of your mind, your will, your emotions. It's the delight of your spirit man who, if you know Jesus, you were born again. Born not of the flesh, but of the spirit. So God has given you the ability. You have an innate born-again ability to hear the voice of God. To not only hear his voice, but to know his heartbeat. Not just to know his acts, just what he does, but do you know that God has set you up to know who he is? His character, his nature. And here is this passage, and it says, delight yourself in the Lord. This doesn't mean that God's gonna give you everything you want, he will give you the desires of your heart. You know what it really means? It means he plants the right desires in us when we delight in him. Can I say that again? It's not, man, God's not a genie. You know, it's not we're gonna take that, come on, Jesus, I need you. It's not we get these three wishes and these desires that we can conjure up many times just from an emotion and a whim sometimes, and what makes us feel good. No, God takes us beyond what makes us feel good, and he brings us into a place how we live good. So he's not saying here, I'm gonna give you everything you want. No, he plants in us the right desires when we delight in him to do the right thing. The word delight here in this passage actually means to delight. It's really interesting. It means to be soft. Now I'm not talking, I'm not talking about soft people. But what it's talking about is to be delicate, and it literally means to become soft and tender toward God. So he said, delight yourself, become soft and tender toward God, and he will give you this exchange. The things he desires for you will now become the things you desire for you, and he says, There, your tenderness will bring you into the realness of my voice, and I will lead you in what is right. If you'll just learn to delight. Well, that was poetry. I love Philippians 2 13. It says, It is God who works in you both to will and to work, for his good pleasure. In other words, he says, it's his work in you for the will. What God gives, he gives you the desire. I wasn't even looking for him when I was younger. He came and found me, he put a desire in me. You wouldn't be here today if you didn't have a desire to be here. Now, maybe somebody drug you here, and and some of you have looked like you're at a you're at a cow at a new gate, but everything is fine. But here's the reality: God put a desire for you to get up this morning and be intentional, put some clothes on and show up at church today. Or watch online today. He gave you that desire. That's a gift. He not only gave you the desire, but God gives you the discipline, not just both to will to do what is desirable, but he gives you the ability to do the discipline. He gives you the will, the desire, and he gives you the discipline to pull it off. That's a gift from God. It is self-control. It's what Paul said to Timothy. He said, God has not given you a spirit of fear, but a power and of love and of self-control, which means self-empowered discipline, not just human effort. I have started many a fast and broke them. Has anybody ever? I have started, I've started many in my life that I never finished. I mean, it was two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun. Talk to me. I would drive by and I would hear it say, hello. You say, You've done that. Yes, I've done that. Did I want to do it? Yes, I wanted to. That's why I did it. You do what you want to do. And there have been times I have said, God, I need the discipline. I need help me. Give me the desire and give me the discipline. He said, Son, I've got grace for that. You just got to come hang out with me and watch what I have to give you. See, you can't understand delight without aligning desire. One of my other passages, and this is going to be kind of the sign point. I've preached this passage when Pastor Scott said, Would you take, and Pastor Bret said, Would you take the delight? It's going to be our first week. I said, Do you know how many times I've preached that? Psalm 27. It's one of my life passages as well. He said, No, would you take that? And God began to show me things about delight that I have never seen before. Things I didn't understand. Things he's just kind of at 61. He's walking me into a new understanding and kind of a revelation saying, here's what I was doing all along. You just had no idea. See, when you follow me, you don't know what's around the corner. But if you will understand that I am the author and the finisher of your faith, I'm waiting on you. I've got you behind, and I'm waiting on you ahead. If you'll just get in between and follow me what's ahead, and know that I'm protecting you behind, I'm gonna take you places you have no idea how you got there, and you have no idea even what to do when you get there. I'm just leading you. That's why Paul was David would say in Psalm 27, he said, The Lord is my light and my salvation. Whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life, of whom shall I be afraid? When evil doers assail me to eat my flesh, my adversaries and foes, it is they who stumble and fall. Though an army encamp against me, my heart shall not fear. Though war rise against me, yet I will be confident. That I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in his temple. For he will hide me in the shelter of the day of trouble. He will conceal me under the cover of his tent. He will lift me high up on a rock. And now my head shall be lifted up above my enemies all around me, and I will offer in his tent sacrifices with shouts of joy. I will sing and make melody to the Lord. Hear, O Lord, when I cry aloud, be gracious to me and answer me. You have said, Seek my face. So I said, My heart says to you, Your face. Your face will I seek. See, this psalm was not written from a place of comfort. This psalm was written out of conflict. It comes from a man who's in a storm. David's world right now was very unstable. But his heart was centered. Some scholars believe this was the time he was running from Saul. He's hiding in caves. He's got his men. He's trying to, he's running for his life because the king is trying to kill him because he knows he's been destined for the throne. He's jealous of him. Other scholars believe this could have been the time when Absalom had risen up and he was running from his own son. That's the conflict he's writing this from. This entire chapter of this entire psalm is coming out of a place of desperation. We don't really know for sure. However, here's what we do know. He is surrounded by enemies. He is betrayed or abandoned by people close to him. Anybody know what that feels like? He is forced away from the sanctuary of God. He's living in fear. He's in danger. He's living in uncertainty. He's clinging fiercely to God's presence at this moment. He is actually choosing worship over worry. But here's one thing you don't hear in this psalm. He never says, Lord, get me out of this. He never says, Lord, fix the situation. And he never prays, Lord, take out my enemies. He only prays one thing. It's the narrowing of the heart. It is the simplifying of desire. What he's asking is actually the centering of the soul. Because the louder life gets, the more clearly we must know what we desire. In other words, when life gets noisy, desire needs clarity. David lived his life giving God access to his heart. He would say, Search me, try me. God, here, here's my life. You alone have I sinned against you. God, I didn't, no one else did this. He was one who was willing to take personal responsibility. What was it that made David of a man of a pure heart? What was it that made David a man after God's heart? That's a huge statement. And that's before Jesus. Here he is as this king. He is this mastermind of war. He is a man that as a teenager took the head off of a goli off of a giant. I mean, he's a man's man. But yet he's got a tenderness that allows him to walk with God in such a way that he's willing, in the middle of a massive attack, he is willing to not say, God, take out my enemies. He's saying, God, let me see you. Hear me. This fast is to help us posture our lives for clarity. And it all begins with desire. Desire is the narrowing of the heart. One thing have I desired and ask of the Lord, and that will I seek. This warrior, this strategist, he reduces his entire life to one holy obsession. It's like a flashlight. It's like if you got, I had a flashlight, I left it at home. It's a bummer when you leave your illustration at home. It was a cool flashlight. It's one of those you, it's like a shotgun, you know, a flashlight. You pull in, you zoom it out, and man, you can see everything around you. You can get distracted by everything around you and not looking what's ahead of you. But then all of a sudden you take it and zoom it in, and there is a pinpoint. There is a focused light. That's why he said, The Lord is my light. The narrower the beam, the clearer the path. David is filtering out the distractions for one thing. He is zooming in the lens to Jehovah. He is magnifying the Lord so that everything becomes dim and distorted around him so that he can see him. See, it's checking desire at the door. It's searching my motive, what stirs me, what attracts me, what is distracting me from God. It begins with one thing. And David eliminates these distractions. He doesn't make a list, he brings one focus, and that is God. He has fixed his eyes. He's saying, My desire is for you. That's why the scripture says in Hebrews 12, 2, fix your eyes on Jesus, the author and the finisher of your faith. See, desire is not what you feel, it is what you choose. It's what you want. Even for sin, our desire is attracted to something. We start yielding, we start giving in to that. And in that moment, that desire can go haywire. That desire can go the wrong direction. But God put a desire in you. He put something in you that would want him. And he gave you the ability and a grace gift if you will trust him to give you the discipline to know how to walk it out. You got to know this that what you desire determines what you pursue. And what you pursue determines who you become. Desire always precedes pursuit. That will I seek implies intensity. It implies intention. You don't drift into his presence. You don't stumble into devotion. You decide your way into God's presence. Please hear me, man. It says Moses turned to see the sight. He could have walked on, kept moving, but there was something intriguing. There was a desire in him. I want to go and see what that is. I want to see. I've got this, I have got this curiosity. Man, there is a spiritual curiosity that I believe God is wanting to bring to life again into the church. We say the church needs to awake. No, the church needs to get curious again about the things of God. You decide your way, you get up in the morning with determination because desire reorders authority. Who you yield authority to, who and what you will give your authority to. Here's David. He's a king, but now he's bowing. Kingdom desire dethrones self and enthrones God. Can I say that again? Are y'all with me today? Kingdom authority. This this kingdom desire dethrones self, but it enthrones God. You gotta know this. That may many want God to bless their plans, but they never want to become God's dwelling place. I'll just sela. Amen. Everybody wants God's plans. I don't need your I need your purpose. I need your how many books can we go to a Christian bookstore? How many online Amazon can you find how to find your purpose? Well, I realized this a long time ago. I found my purpose in his presence. Everything else was self-centered, self-aware, putting a brand on it, trying to build a kingdom my own. But man, the moment I was in his presence, I realized what it was all about, and there is nothing. What a God, what a God, what a God, what a God. See, desire reveals what you're willing to lay down. What you're willing to fill your life with. But here's the thing I have found out about God. He will not fill what is already full. Because you were so full of yourself. It was hard to find himself. See, what would you change in your life if your life narrowed to one holy desire? What would change in you? What would change in me? If everything about Rusty narrowed to one holy desire. See, this fast positions us to narrow our desire. We're taking out food at a moment. We're taking out social media, a hurried life. We're letting things go. To slow down and enjoy. Take joy in him. Learn to delight in him. Because delight is about dwelling. It's not just about a visitation. This is about a habitation. He said that I may dwell in your house all the days of my life to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord. Desire draws you in, but it is delight that keeps you there. Try this out over. Desire. I want to. That's what draws you in. That's the enticement. You say, you mean God is enticing me? He wants you today. It was such a sweet presence of the Lord in worship, but it's got to go beyond the music. It steps outside the music. It steps into a place. Place is a person. It steps you into Him, and in Him we live, we move, we have our being. This whole thing starts taking life when you know the life of God that is inside of you. Purpose starts taking shape, and it's desire that draws you in, but delight is what keeps you there. Listen, I thought that woman was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen in my life. I still remember I was singing adoration. Praise, praise, praise, praise. I was 18 years old on her father's platform. My dad was preaching a revival. She walks into the back door while I'm singing praise, and I went, Praise Jesus. Oh God. To the one who sent this righteous thoughts. Some things never changed. But here, I'm trying. I'm getting old, I'm trying. I'm trying. Desire drew me in. But it was delight that started bringing us together. See, David goes from chasing God to dwelling with God. He goes from delighting in God to knowing the very character and nature of God. See, this delight we're talking about, it's all about dwelling. It's not about visitation, but habitation. It's an abiding thing. It's not Sunday attendance. Thank God you're here. It's good to see you here. But it's about daily abiding. All the days means consistency. It's not emergency spirituality. It's not living your life with God on a 9-1-1 level. It is about a 4-1-1 place. It is about knowing him. That is the most intimate word in the scripture to know him. It is intimacy. It is coming into him. It is him coming into you. It is getting to know not just what he does, but knowing his nature and knowing his heartbeat. See, you can visit God and still live anxious. You can live in anxiety. The anxiety in the church today, there's one survey that says about 45% of church-going Christians reported personally experience a mental health challenge. It includes anxiety and related struggles. In another survey, 43% of Christians reported having experienced mental health issues. Anxiety, depression, and 91% said mental illness is a it's been stigmatized in the church, so they don't even know how to deal with it. We've actually become anxious for everything instead of being anxious for nothing. That's what Paul would say in Philippians, be anxious for nothing, but in everything, by prayer and supplication, everything by coming in and spending time with him with thanksgiving. Let your request be made known to God and the peace of God that surpasses all understanding. Will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. I know what it is to battle mental battles. I know what it is after a wreck to have a brain injury and to come. I know what anxiety feels like. I had I had lived in some la land, and just because I'm an optimist, man. The glass is always half full. Always. And I said that to Dr. Rutland one day, and I said, hey, it's everything's okay. At least the glass is half full. And he said, that's the most demonic thing you could ever say. He said, I don't care if it's half full or half empty. The key is it's just half. I went, thanks a lot, Doc. I feel good better about myself. But this entire thing of learning what it is with thanksgiving, understanding what this delight means. Delight is learning to gaze. Gaze in the Hebrew means to linger, to behold, to remain. It means to soak, to see deeply. It's intimacy language. David is saying something that is very intimate to him. He said, I want to gaze upon your beauty. Delight is unhurried affection. That's what it is. To delight means I'm not in a hurry. Our marriage. This relationship. When we're always in a hurry, we can't sit down and truly find out where someone is. But devotion to delight is it's unhurried affection. It transforms your perspective. David's surrounded by enemies. He stares at God. He's not looking at the enemy, he's looking at God. He's running for his life. And he's saying, But there's just one thing. I have funnel this thing down. Everything in my funnel is trying to captivate my mind. And I'm letting only one thing get through. So I'm staring at you. I'm going to keep my eye on you. I don't know how you're going to do this. I don't know how I'm getting out of this. Because delight doesn't deny reality, it reframes it through the lens of God's nearness. Are you guys hearing me today? It doesn't deny reality. I've just wanted to look at some people through the years and go, would you just tell the truth? Well, I'm not sick. Yes, you are. Well, I don't have it. I'm not sick. You are. And you're giving it to me. And I don't want it. Talk to the hand. No, it doesn't deny reality, but it reframes it through the lens of God's nearness. When God becomes your delight, fear loses its voice. The Lord is my light and my salvation. Whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life. Of whom shall I be afraid? It restores this awe of God because when we lose the awe of God, we sever the joy of the adventure of following Him. Who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. The one we dwell in. The one who dwells in me. Because what you dwell in is what you will rely on. So many just want to visit God in crisis. You only know a crisis God. So many few want to know Him in peace. Delight sustains what discipline cannot sustain alone. Delight. Worship just got to move past the music into the secret of abiding. It's where we discover. Discover. It's a revelation of residence. It's residing in him. Because delight is found in this place of dwelling. And in dwelling, you start to discover. To inquire in his temple. Do you not know your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit? You didn't have to come here to meet with God. You came here to celebrate with other believers. To grow as a body. But you are the temple of the Holy Spirit. You have of God. You're not your own. You were bought with a price. Therefore, glorify him in your body, my body, which belongs to him. We were redeemed for that. To inquire in his temple, to be able to now have communion. Because discovery is not the first step, it's the fruit of desire and delight. David isn't seeking answers. The guys would begin to come. He's not seeking answers. It's because he knows in God's presence answers find me. When I'm with him, it's like the things I'm searching for. I believe in trying to seek out questions, answers for questions. I think sometimes we've lost the art of the question. And we're letting other people answer questions we should be giving an answer for. But it's not just to fill our head with something. There's something that God is doing. And something that happens when we delight. Jesus said in John 15, he said, You know what? If you abide in me and my words abide in you, you'll ask whatever you desire. And it'll be done for you. And this whole abiding. Because delight unlocks discovery. He that dwells in the secret place shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. There's a discovery that starts happening when we delight in him. It's the divine order. You don't discover just by chasing answers, you discover by staying close. Jesus didn't look at his disciples and say, Here, follow me from a distance. Now remember what it meant for a rabbi. When a rabbi said, Come and follow me, it was to follow him so close that the dust he that came up from his steps in a dusty desert. You were so close to the rabbi, following so close behind that the dust he kicked up got all over you. So he wasn't saying, follow me from a distance. He was saying, come and follow me so close. Learn what it is to put your head on my chest that we find John had found there. He why? Is that some weird place? No. It's to know his heartbeat. It's to know what he thinks. It's to know why he feels that way. It is to know what pleases him. It is to know why he is doing what he's doing. He wants you to take him to a place not just to find an answer, but to find his heart. The secret place becomes a strategy room. It's this place of abiding. It's inquiring because it's so relational, it's not transactional. The word inquire means to search, to ask, to investigate. It means to receive instruction. You see, when we inquire of the Lord, we're not treating him like a vending machine. I ask you give. I'm gonna throw these spiritual coins in, and I need you to give me something. That's transactional. But relational is about connection, it's about trust, it is about a conversation with God. It's not just getting answers from him, it means we're seeking him, not just his help. You say you don't need his help, yeah. I got a bunch of things I need his help for. But if I've got him, I already have his help. See, this transactional walk with God can skew our view of God Himself. And it impacts our view of ourselves. It's like the type of leaderships. You know, there are two types. The one is a transactional leader. You do this, I'll do that. It's tasks, it's performance, it's outcomes, it's exchanges and expectations. But a relational leader, it's different because it's trust, it's connection, it's knowing people, not just using people. Leading from relationship, not just requirements. So when we lead or when we pray in this fast, God doesn't want us just completing tasks and checking boxes. I did that, did that, did that, no. He wants relationship, he wants you to know the heart behind the action. He wants you to know this relational delight. That when we move from just punching and the clock and checking the box into relationship, it's a place of intimacy. God makes his ways known to those who stay close to him. I'm almost done. In other words, those who linger in his presence learn his heart. Those who linger in his presence learn his heart. This fast is setting time to linger. It's getting rid of distractions, remaining in his presence. It says in Psalm 103, I love this passage, it says, but he made known the ways, his ways to Moses, his acts to the children of Israel. Israel saw God's miracles, his outward works, but he said Moses came close. So I taught him my heart, I taught him my nature, I taught him my patterns, I taught him the rhythms of heaven. He's my friend. Man, to be a friend of God. I've prayed God, I delight in you, soften my heart. Take me back to Psalm 37, soften my heart so I can see you. Give me your heart what you desire. God, to take away a stony heart and just give me a tender heart to you. I want to hear your voice. God didn't sanction pastors to just hear his voice, he sanctioned you and I to know him. It's discovering him. It produces confidence. It's when you discover his heart, you gain a confidence to walk out his will. When you know you start growing in this confidence in him, it's discovering his nature, his character that fuels confidence. Because you're no longer guessing, but you're being guided. It's that kind of clarity that removes fear, it's the kind of revelation that produces boldness. You know what? Later on in the Psalm, here's what David proclaims. It's an incredible statement. He said, Though an army encamp against me, I will not fear. In this I will be confident. You know why? Because when you delight and you narrow the gate for one thing, clarity flows from communion. It's not about having direction without devotion or some revelation without a relationship. No, it's about knowing him. So here's what David said. I turn my face toward him, that's my desire. I delight, I gaze upon his beauty so I can discover his ways. Every time I've found out another trait of God, you know what it's caused in me? It's caused me to thank him. Be appreciative. Just to thank him. Because this is reality. This year, only heaven knows what waits us in 2026. Only heaven knows. Not some of these social media prophets are just building another fan base. I wish I had a platform to just look at most of them and go, shut up.

unknown: 37:21

Shut up.

SPEAKER_00: 37:26

But then I realized I allow them to be my distraction. And so when I have an anointing to do, turn them off. And don't listen. Just that's what we're doing this week. You don't need another prophetic word to get you out of bed in the morning. He's already provided everything that you need for life and godliness. This isn't just to know about him, this is to know him. To know him, the power of his resurrection, the fellowship of his suffering, being made conformable to, to die to what he died for, so that you can live this life, walk this out, be an expression, being an embrace. There's something about a smile in the smile. There's something about someone who's been with Jesus. They've got something in their speech. They've got a lingo about them. They've got a sound. We know you were with him because you speak like a Galilean. You talk like you've been with Jesus. We know you've been with him. You can't hang out with Jesus and not start loving like him and not start talking like him. You cannot pick him up. You got to get him out of your pocket and put him on a lampstand. I love him. David said this in Psalm 27. He said, I would have lost heart unless I had believed. He said, Listen to me. He said, I if I didn't believe all this, I'd have lost. I would have lost my faith. But he endured, not because the conflict vanished, but because his heart stayed fixed. It wasn't the absence of warfare that sustained him. He was the focus of his desire that secured him. You are the air I breathe. Your very presence living in me. He lived anchored in his presence, not circumstances. The safest place in any storm is not the absence of trouble, but the nearness. Of God. It's amazing. It's amazing. That's how much he loves us. I wanted to find out how old was David when he wrote those passages? Was this in the beginning? Because man, when I found that passage in Psalm 37 when I was 14, I had no idea what desires of my heart he would give me. Can I just tell you something? You didn't know this. And I didn't know this. But you were that. I didn't see that when I was 14. But when David wrote it, it was in his old age. Because that's where he said, toward the end, he said, I was young, and now I'm old. And here's the friend of faithfulness. He said, I made his faithfulness my friend. And I've never seen the righteous forsaken. I see begging bread. A people of delight. People of delight. Father, I thank you for your word today. I thank you for your faithfulness today. God, you called us. You set us apart. And we are grateful.

SPEAKER_01: 41:53

We hope and pray this message was encouraging and impactful. Join us live on our website or Facebook on Sundays at 9 and 11 a.m. You can stay connected with us on Facebook and Instagram at The Rock Family. Have a Jesus filled week.