“His mouth is full of sweetness.
And he is wholly desirable.
This is my beloved and this is my friend,
O daughters of Jerusalem,” (5:16).

Happy Valentine’s Day! I find it such a sweet gift to be in His book of passionate love on this day. And today’s chapter is somewhat steamy. Okay… not somewhat… more like stupendously steamy.

Passion for life and love did not evolve. We were created as passionate beings, created in His image. And more and more, I’m beginning to grasp why the Lord included this communication of love between man and woman in His Inspired Word. I believe He so wants us to understand the passion He has for us, that we in turn would passionately desire Him completely and Wholly.

In reality, it is our passion that envelopes, consumes, and motivates every thought, word, and deed in our hunger and search to experience love in life. It makes sense that His greatest commandment is about love, loving Him, passionately and Wholly.

And He said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ ³⁸ This is the great and foremost commandment. ³⁹ The second is like it, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ ⁴⁰ On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets.” (Matthew 22:37-40).

When we Wholly Desire Him, we will begin to love like Him. Oh, what better Valentine’s gift could we give to Him, and to our loved ones, than to love like Jesus?

Today, let us fix our eyes on our incomparable God as we consider just twelve of the infinite realities His Word reveals of Him Who Is Wholly Desirable.

Consider Him Who Is Wholly Desirable

• Consider His great goodness and marvelous lovingkindness; He Is Wholly Desirable!
  • How great is Your goodness,
    Which You have stored up for those who fear You,
    Which You have wrought for those who take refuge in You,
    Before the sons of men!
    ²⁰ You hide them in the secret place of Your presence from the conspiracies of man;
    You keep them secretly in a shelter from the strife of tongues.
    ²¹ Blessed be the Lord,
    For He has made marvelous His lovingkindness to me in a besieged city, (Psalm 31:19-21).

• Consider His choosing us to dwell with Him; He Is Wholly Desirable!
  • How blessed is the one whom You choose and bring near to You
    To dwell in Your courts.
    We will be satisfied with the goodness of Your house,
    Your holy temple, (Psalm 65:4).

• Consider His mercies that are over all His works; He Is Wholly Desirable!
  • The Lord is good to all,
    And His mercies are over all His works, (Psalm 145:9).

• Consider His goodness in the day of trouble; He Is Wholly Desirable!
  • The Lord is good,
    A stronghold in the day of trouble,
    And He knows those who take refuge in Him, (Nahum 1:7).

• Consider His love that is beyond comprehension; He Is Wholly Desirable!
  • “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life,” (John 3:16).

• Consider His Holy Spirit, our Helper forever; He Is Wholly Desirable!
  • “I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever,” (John 14:16).

• Consider His kindness that leads us to repentance; He Is Wholly Desirable!
  • Or do you think lightly of the riches of His kindness and tolerance and patience, not knowing that the kindness of God leads you to repentance? (Romans 2:4).

• Consider His free gift of eternal life; He Is Wholly Desirable!
  • For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord, (Romans 6:23).

• Consider His way of escape in every temptation; He Is Wholly Desirable!
  • No temptation has overtaken you but such as is common to man; and God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, so that you will be able to endure it, (1 Corinthians 10:13).

• Consider His God-Breathed Word that equips us for every good work; He Is Wholly Desirable!
  • All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work, (2 Timothy 3:16-17).

• Consider His gifts that are always good and perfect; He Is Wholly Desirable!
  • Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow, (James 1:17).

• Consider His faithfulness to forgive; He Is Wholly Desirable!
  • If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness, (1 John 1:9).

How do we respond to Him Who Is Wholly Desirable?

Have you ever had the thought that if we treated every day like Valentine’s Day, we would be a lot better at loving? Our inclination towards self-love has a way of catapulting ourselves onto the center stage of life. But oh, if we would really see Him as Wholly Desirable, above anything this world has to offer, we would move ourselves out of the limelight in surrender and selfless love.

We can learn much from the passionate pleas recorded in the Scriptures, penned by those who yearned for this single-purpose passion in their life.

Oh, Lord, give us a passion like David, that we would seek to behold Your beauty all the days of our life; for You Alone Are Wholly Desirable!

One thing I have asked from the Lord, that I shall seek:
That I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life,
To behold the beauty of the Lord
And to meditate in His temple, (Psalm 27:4).

Oh, Lord, give us a passion like the sons of Korah, that we would thirst for You and not be satisfied apart from Your Presence; for You Alone Are Wholly Desirable!

As the deer pants for the water brooks,
So my soul pants for You, O God.
² My soul thirsts for God, for the living God;
When shall I come and appear before God? (Psalm 42:1).

How lovely are Your dwelling places,
O Lord of hosts!
² My soul longed and even yearned for the courts of the Lord;
My heart and my flesh sing for joy to the living God, (Psalm 84:1-2).

Oh, Lord, give us a passion like Asaph, that we would desire nothing on this earth besides You; for You Alone Are Wholly Desirable!

Whom have I in heaven but You?
And besides You, I desire nothing on earth, (Psalm 73:25:).

And please, Lord, give us a passion like Paul, that we too would expend all that we are to know You and to grow in our understanding that You, and You alone, are Wholly Desirable!

More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ, ⁹ and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, ¹⁰ that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; ¹¹ in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead, (Philippians 3:8-11).

Oh Lord, please empower us, that the trials and challenges of life would not dissuade us from the most worthy of all pursuits. Oh Lord, create a passionate hunger in us to give all that we are in striving after Your calling, that we would take hold of Your Son and the life we have in Him Who Is Wholly Desirable!

Not that I have already obtained it or have already become perfect, but I press on so that I may lay hold of that for which also I was laid hold of by Christ Jesus. ¹³ Brethren, I do not regard myself as having laid hold of it yet; but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, ¹⁴ I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus, (Philippians 3:12-14).

Let’s Grow Together!