God’s heart is important for those who want to experience his presence. God has heart. If we are to practice God’s presence, he must have our hearts.

God said, “I have found in David the son of Jesse a man after my heart, who will do all my will.” (Acts 13:22)

What does it mean that David was after God’s heart?

It means David pleased him and thereby inspired his affection. The direction of David’s heart pleased God’s heart. David was directed toward God in love, trust, and obedience.

Examples

Here are some of the things David wrote that demonstrate this:

“How lovely is your dwelling place, O LORD Almighty! My soul yearns, even faints, for the courts of the LORD; my heart and my flesh cry out for the living God.” (Psalm 84:1–2)

“I love you, O LORD, my strength. The LORD is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer; my God is my rock, in whom I take refuge. He is my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.” (Psalm 18:1–2)

“O God, You are my God; I shall seek You earnestly; My soul thirsts for You, my flesh yearns for You” (Psalm 63:1)

“I trust in You, O LORD, I say, ‘You are my God.’” (Psalm 31:14)

“Bless the LORD, O my soul, And all that is within me, bless His holy name.” (Psalm 103:1)

David came as close to obeying the great commandment as anyone ever has: “You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.” (Deuteronomy 6:5)

As a result, he moved God’s heart.

God’s heart

That God would speak in this way reveals something ultra-important about him. He has heart. He feels. God has affections. He is love. He cares what we do and think and say and seek and love.

This explains why he describes himself as a jealous God (see Exo. 20:5), because he wants our love and responds to our love or lack of it.

He delights in those who love, trust, and obey him.

Our obedience

Obedience is crucial to being a person after God’s heart. Immediately following God’s statement of affection for David, he added the explanation: David “will do all my will.”

That was not incidental because the situation that prompted God to commend David was King Saul’s disobedience. God had told Saul what to do and how to do it, and Saul had violated the commandment. He had not been careful to obey.

The prophet Samuel rebuked him, “Now your kingdom shall not continue. The LORD has sought out a man after his own heart, and the LORD has commanded him to be prince over his people, because you have not kept what the LORD commanded you.” (1 Samuel 13:14)

Our hearts

Those who successfully practice God’s presence understand the central importance of the heart. They understand God’s heart. They understand God wants their heart. It’s all about the heart.

So to practice God’s presence is to monitor our hearts. Whom do we love supremely? Trust and obey supremely? Desire supremely? Delight in supremely? To whom do we ascribe ultimate value and surrender what we most value? For whom do we live?

All this rests on a relationship with God through faith in Jesus Christ, for no one can please God apart from his beloved Son (John 14:6; 1 John 2:23). The most important and necessary way we walk after God’s heart is to believe and love his Son, of whom the Father spoke the ultimate words of affection: “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well-pleased” (Matthew 3:17).