Sunday Musings: He Will Joy Over You With Singing

(from my upcoming book Fruits of the Spirit: Joy)

Zephaniah 3:17

The Lord thy God in the midst of thee is mighty;

He will save,

He will rejoice over thee with joy;

He will rest in His love,

He will joy over thee with singing.

Joy. We use it as a noun. The thing we’re supposed to feel. The thing we’re supposed to express. The thing we’re supposed to strive for. The thing we all hope for.

But here, “He will joy over thee with singing,” it is used as a verb. Something that God does, something that we can do.

Usually we’ll replace the word joy with rejoice or enjoy as the verb, or joyful or joyous as the adjective.

But in this passage, in this translation, joy is the verb, the action word that God will do over us.

So not only will he rejoice (verb) over thee with joy (noun), He will joy (verb) over thee with singing (verb).

It’s an odd turn of phrase, and perhaps it’s simply how they spoke at the time of this translation. This is the King James Version and we’re dealing with 400 year old English which has gone through many changes since then although not as much as it did prior to this (try reading

Beowulf in it’s original English and you’ll see what I mean).

So I thought I would look at other translations of this.

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.

-ESV

For the Lord your God is living among you.

He is a mighty savior.

He will take delight in you with gladness.

With his love, he will calm all your fears.

He will rejoice over you with joyful songs.”

-NLT

The Lord your God is with you.

He is a hero who saves you.

He happily rejoices over you,

renews you with his love,

and celebrates over you with shouts of joy.

-GW

Yahweh your God is among you,

a warrior who saves.

He will rejoice over you with gladness.

He will bring you quietness with His love.

He will delight in you with shouts of joy.”

-HCSB

As it turns out, no matter what translation you use, this all sounds lovely, and comforting.

God, the Great Yahweh, is with you. You. He’s with YOU. He’s hanging out by your side. He is your Savior. He is your Warrior. He is your hero!

He’s better than Superman.

I watched the TV shows, Lois and Clark, and Smallville, and I always thought it would be great to have Clark Kent as my friend, ready to rescue me from falling off buildings and being swept up in tornadoes and flying me all over the place. My own personal hero. But even with all of Superman’s abilities – and there are quite a few – he still doesn’t measure up to God’s. Because Clark is just a character created by a human, and God is real. And God can do all the things Superman can do and so much more.

Superman cannot, no matter how he tries, give you eternity with God.

But God can. Further, God has the wisdom to know the best thing to do in every circumstance. God doesn’t make mistakes. He creates people who make mistakes, but God doesn’t make mistakes.

So now that we’ve established that God is your own personal superhero, know that, he takes delight in you. He rejoices over you. He thinks you are absolutely wonderful.

And He can quiet your soul with His love. He can restore you and give you rest. He can renew you. Are you tired, I mean exhausted tired? Tired in body, in soul, in spirit, and mind. Tired in your emotions and all you have to contend with and at the seeming futility of the fight? Do you wonder where you can get the strength to carry on? Do you just want to curl into a ball in bed with the covers over your head and sleep forever? Or maybe you just want the couch and Netflix or a good book.

Believe me, I understand this. As I enter my golden years, I am now starting to feel the effects of birthing and raising seven children, mostly on my own. I’m EXHAUSTED. And I haven’t even reached retirement age yet, where the government says, “Here, you can rest now.” I am still carrying a heavy backpack up a mountain.

We all need rest. We all need time with no demands, no questions, no need to talk.

You can give it to Him, and He will renew and restore you.

Further, He celebrates you. Maybe you can’t see the ticker tape, parades, and the great big sign, or the trophy, but He CELEBRATES you with shouts of joy and singing. He SINGS over you.

We know we are supposed to sing to Him, that our singing, no matter how good or bad it is (He doesn’t care) is powerful. Our singing is powerful! Our singing is prayer. Sometimes noisy, sometimes gentle, sometimes joyful, sometimes reverent, but all of it is powerful.

How much more powerful is His singing over us?

In the beginning when God sang, His songs created trees and rivers and mountains. Now He sings over YOU.

He joys over you with HIS singing.

What do you suppose He is creating when He does that over you?

The mighty Warrior, the mighty Hero, the mighty God, joys over you with His singing. I wrote a song for this. Disclaimer - I wrote the lyrics. I did not write the music or sing the song. Enjoy. https://suno.com/s/p9aHew38tRfsfShd

Sing Over Me