Zephaniah 3:19

For the Lord your God is living among you.
He is a mighty savior.
He takes delight in you with gladness.
With his love, he calms all your fears.
He rejoices over you with joyful songs.

I have recently decided that this is my very favorite verse. I get goosebumps every time I read it. Think about it: the God of the universe is living among us. He's not far away in heaven gazing down at us offhandedly and moving us around like game pieces on a monopoly board. He is AMONG us--constantly. He delights in us--with gladness--not because we are his pitiful creation and he HAS to keep an eye on us but because he WANTS to. He created us just so he could delight in us and we, in turn, could delight in and bring glory to him.

But I think the part that gets me the most is the singing. Probably because singing is something that I enjoy and is such a big part of my life. When I am singing, I think of it as my gift to God. My unique way to worship him. Yet, in this verse, I am told that God, the creator and sustainer of everything, is singing over ME. He is rejoicing over little, old, sinful Jennifer, with all my warts and failures and shortcomings. And, he's not singing some sad, tragic melody in a minor key. No way!!! He is rejoicing and singing over me--joyfully!

The video above is a live version of Hillsong Unite performing their song Mighty to Save, taken right from the words of Zephaniah 3:19. The chorus says

Savior, he can move the mountains,
my God is mighty to save, he is mighty to save...

Just like many of you, Jeff and I have scaled our share of mountains in the past nine months. Actually, many of them seemed more like mountain ranges than "mere" mountains. So, when I sing this song Sunday morning in worship (it's our first Sunday on worship team; I can't wait!), I am going to be thinking about my Savior, who has moved entire mountain ranges for us this year and who will surely move them again as we stand at the bottom of those inevitable future mountains and/or mountain ranges. God is mighty--and good!