I know how hard it can be to wake up early on Sunday mornings when you’d much rather sleep in. But I get myself up, then fight with the kids to get them ready, drive to church—usually with the kids fighting in the back—and hope to make it to worship on time.

What’s the motivation?

I didn’t grow up in church, so it wasn’t a habit I picked up as a child. After Mom became a born-again Christian, she occasionally forced me to go to church. But it didn’t stick. I remember no sermons. No songs. I made no friends. It was just a time of shoegazing and doodling in the bulletin and, at best, going through the motions. Stand up. Sit down. Pretend to sing and listen. It was not a place I wanted to go.

Fast-forward several years, and I came to believe in Jesus as my Savior and desired to follow Him with my whole life. And, surprise, surprise, I came to love church! I wanted to be there with other Christians, worshipping God together.

What changed?

My desires.

In Psalm 27, David wrote about what he desires most of all:

One thing I ask from the Lord,
    this only do I seek:
that I may dwell in the house of the Lord
    all the days of my life,
to gaze on the beauty of the Lord
    and to seek him in his temple (Psalm 27:4).

David wrote this psalm as a fugitive, hunted and surrounded by enemies both at home and abroad. Nevertheless, he had confidence in the Lord. He confessed that God was his stronghold and protection, and therefore he had no one to fear.

At this point, he might have been in the wilderness, far from Jerusalem, the Tabernacle, and the ark, and therefore far from the Lord’s presence on earth. He longed to be close to God. And what motivated that desire? His mother didn’t force it. And it wasn’t out of tradition, habit, or legal threats. David was motivated by beauty! He longed to be in the Lord’s house “to gaze on the beauty of the Lord.” The term no'am conveys pleasantness, delight, grace, and favor that proceeds from God.

David was motivated by beauty. It was the goal he sought. He wanted to gaze on it, not just for a day, but all the days of his life. His desire was voluntary, coming from the heart, and transforming his behavior from the inside out.

Why?

We always act with some goal in mind. And we choose our goals based on what we value. We naturally pursue what we find desirable—and beauty is desirable. We want to gaze on beauty. When our vision of beauty changes, our desires change accordingly, and our choices follow. Transformation does not come by resisting what is ugly, but by learning to love and seek what is truly beautiful—in this case, God.

Beauty speaks for itself!

God is beautiful, and I think we see evidence all around us of how God has put that longing for beauty in our hearts. Creation reflects the Creator’s beauty but is not meant to be a substitute for it. His beauty is ultimate, and our desire for it motivates us in a way an external legal demand never could. The law can curb behavior, but beauty can awaken desires that change our hearts and minds from the inside out.

While David looked for God’s beauty in the tabernacle, we find it in Christ, who came and “tabernacled” among us:

The Word became flesh and made his dwelling [or “tabernacled”] among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth (John 1:14).

Jesus is glorious—full of grace and truth. When Jesus’ beauty has captivated your heart, no one will have to force you to seek the Lord—you will do so willingly and freely, because you prize the Lord for who He is.

Christian transformation does not come simply from learning new information or forcing yourself to do what is right despite what you want. You can be a hearer of the Word without being a doer. The deepest and truest transformation comes when our desires change, so that, instead of being inordinately enamored with the beauty of the world, our hearts are captured by the beauty of the Lord. As our loves change, so do our desires and goals. Our life will spontaneously and naturally follow the desire we have “to gaze on the beauty of the Lord and to seek him in his temple.”

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Shawn Lazar (DPT, McMaster Divinity College) is the pastor of Gateway United Baptist Church in Denton, TX. Purchase his book One-Point Preaching here and his latest book Once Saved Always Saved? here.