God delights in us!

"The Lord your God is with you.

He is a mighty, victorious warrior who saves.

He will take great delight in you;

He will rest in his love, no longer rebuking you,

He will rejoice over you with loud singing and shouts of joy."

Zephaniah 3:17 (This is a conglomeration of the ASV, NIV, NASB, and ESV translations)

God is with us. And He is Mighty! Victorious! He saves us!
And on top of all of that, He delights in us? That completely blows my mind!

He will rest in his love, no longer rebuking you:

The ASV says, "He will rest in his love."
The NASB says, "He will be quiet in his love."
The ESV says, "He will quiet you by his love"
And the NIV says, " in his love he will no longer rebuke you."

Well those all seem to be saying different things so I sought out some additional information and the commentaries I read emphasized the fact that God is saying He will be silent as to our sins, no longer will he punish us for them (because of His Love which bore the punishment for us in Jesus).

And we know from Romans 8:34 and 1 John 2:1 that not only will he refrain from holding our sins against us, but that Jesus himself is our advocate and he is interceding for us at the right hand of God!

God is able to rest in His love, in His delight of His image-bearers, who he created and said "behold it was very good" (Ge 1:31; 2:2).

He will rejoice over you with loud singing and shouts of joy:
In Luke 15:7, Jesus tells us there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent.

And in Isaiah, God's rejoicing over us is compared to a young man's joy over getting married to his bride.

So not only does God not hold our sins against us, but
     he rejoices over us with songs of joy!

I don't know about you, but this is super hard for me to wrap my mind around. The fact that God actually delights in me and rejoices over me?

I've been reminded over and over again to think about who God says I am, and to focus on those truths instead of the lies I'm usually telling myself.

God says I am a new creation of infinite worth.
I am deeply loved.
I am completely forgiven.
I am fully pleasing.
I am totally accepted by God.
I am absolutely complete in Christ,
ACCEPTED IN THE BELOVED.