Does Jesus Delight in Me? Wrestling with God, Identity, and the Father Wound

As I start my day, like most days, sitting with my cofee watching my two rescue cats Ember and Ninja tear through the living room with chaotic precision, and sliding across the floor like they own the place, I find myself sitting in a strange contrast.

There is something grounding about those small, ordinary moments.

The noise.

The movement.

The unpredictability.

And yet, beneath that surface, there are deeper things stirring.

As I reflect back on the divine weight of Easter—the significance of Good Friday, the stillness of Saturday, and the quiet, victorious reality of resurrection—I can’t help but return to something that has been sitting on my heart for a long time now.

Not loudly.

Not in a way that interrupts everything.

But persistently.

Like a shadow that doesn’t leave when the light comes in.

And if I’m honest, it hasn’t faded.

It has intensified.

Especially over this first month at King’s Bible College.

Because while I’ve been learning, growing, studying, and immersing myself in Scripture—something deeper has been exposed.

Not externally.

Internally.

And the question that continues to surface is this:

Does Jesus actually delight in me?

Not just love me.

Not just save me.

But delight in me.

Enjoy me.

Take joy in communion with me?

That question has followed me into prayer.

Into quiet moments.

Into reflection.

And it hasn’t come with a quick answer.

There have been moments where I’ve sat there in silence, trying to pray, but the words wouldn’t come.

Just a kind of heaviness… like I’m present, but not fully able to reach Him the way I want to.

For months now, it has been like a steady drumbeat beneath everything else.

Sometimes quiet.

Sometimes overwhelming.

There have been moments of clarity.

But also many moments of doubt.

Many questions.

And many tears.

Because here’s the tension I can’t escape:

I understand the theology.

I understand that Jesus went to the cross as my substitute.

I understand atonement.

I understand grace.

I understand, intellectually, what the Word of God says.

But the question that remains is not in my mind

it’s in my heart.

How do I reconcile that truth at a deep, transformative level?

Not just know it.

But live from it.

Because there is a difference between understanding something

and being shaped by it.

And if I keep digging beneath that question, I begin to see where it leads.

It leads back.

Back into places I didn’t always know were still shaping me.

Back into the quiet architecture of my identity.

Because I’ve begun to realise something that is difficult to admit, but necessary to face:

Part of this struggle does not begin with God.

It begins with my experience of a father.

Or more accurately

the absence of one.

Outside of my brother Carl, I never had a consistent father figure in my life.

I never had a father who was present in a way that formed stability.

I never had a father who spoke identity over me.

I never had a father who delighted in me.

No voice that said, “I’m proud of you.”

No steady presence that made me feel seen without having to earn it.

And when something like that is missing not just once, but consistently it doesn’t leave a neutral space.

It leaves a gap.

And over time, that gap gets filled.

Not always consciously.

But deeply.

It shapes how you see yourself.

It shapes how you relate to others.

And without even realising it

it shapes how you see God.

Because in my humanity

in my brokenness

in the way I’ve tried to make sense of things

I have correlated my Heavenly Father with the earthly father I never received.

And that has consequences.

Because instead of seeing a Father who delights in me

I begin to assume something else.

That I am loved

but only out of obligation.

That I am accepted

but not enjoyed.

That I am saved

but not celebrated.

And when that belief takes root, it doesn’t stay abstract.

It affects everything.

It changes how you pray.

It changes how you approach God.

It changes how you sit in His presence.

Because instead of resting…

you perform.

Instead of receiving

you measure.

Instead of drawing close

you hold back.

And then something else begins to happen.

You start to look inward.

You start to assess yourself.

my mind goes down deep negative rabit holes

And what you see doesn’t always help.

I look at the sin that still lingers.

The parts of me that haven’t been fully crucified in the flesh.

The patterns I’m still working through.

The areas where I fall short.

I look at my mental battles.

The anxiety.

The depression.

The anger that still rises at times.

The shame that hasn’t completely let go.

And if I’m being honest truly honest

there are moments where everything tightens internally,

where my thoughts start circling faster than I can slow them down,

and I feel like I’m standing inside my own mind with no clear way out.

And in those moments, I sit in the quiet corners of my mind and think:

How could the Lord delight in that?

How could He look at all of this…

and not turn away?

And this is where the tension deepens.

Because this is not a lack of faith.

It is a conflict between what I know

and what I feel.

Between truth…

and internal narrative.

Between theology

and formation.

And somewhere in the middle of that tension, I’ve started to see something more clearly.

That part of what I’ve been carrying is this:

Living in the tension of wanting a kind of love…

in areas where I may never receive it.

There are parts of my story that will not be rewritten.

There are experiences that cannot be retroactively healed by circumstance.

There are moments I longed for

that never came.

And that reality is difficult.

Because it means facing something honestly:

That some of the love I desired in this life

from specific people, in specific ways

may never be fulfilled in the way I once hoped.

And yet, that doesn’t leave me empty.

It brings me to a different place.

A deeper place.

Because slowly sometimes painfully I am learning something else.

That my Heavenly Father

is all I need.

Not as a statement I force myself to believe.

But as something I am beginning to discover.

He is not a distant replacement.

He is not a lesser version of what I missed.

He is not filling a gap reluctantly.

He is sufficient.

Completely.

Fully.

And that doesn’t erase the tension overnight.

But it begins to reframe it.

Because if God is not shaped by my past…

then my past does not get to define who He is.

And that changes everything.

Because Scripture does not present God as reluctant in His love.

It reveals something far more intentional.

That He is a Father

to the fatherless.

Not symbolically.

Not loosely.

But personally.

And even as I reflect on my own story, I cannot ignore what has run through it.

The Sullivan bloodline

marked in many ways by addiction, poverty, and mental illness.

Patterns that don’t just appear once, but echo through generations.

Things that shape environments.

Things that shape identity before you even realise it.

And yet

that is not where the story ends.

Because God does not enter into perfect situations.

He steps into broken ones.

Not to overlook them

but to redeem them.

And that means He steps into the exact places where something was missing.

Not just to acknowledge it

but to meet it.

To restore what was broken.

To redefine what was misunderstood.

And to offer something that is not limited by human failure.

And when I begin to sit with that…

really sit with it

something starts to shift.

Not dramatically.

Not all at once.

But steadily.

Because I begin to realise:

That the question may not be…

“Does Jesus delight in me?”

But rather

What has shaped my ability to believe that He does?

And that is a different kind of question.

A deeper one.

One that requires patience.

Honesty.

And time.

Because transformation at that level does not happen instantly.

It happens through:

Repetition.

Exposure to truth.

And learning to sit in something long enough for it to take root.

And maybe that’s where I am right now.

Not at the end of the question.

But in the middle of it.

Learning.

Unlearning.

Being reshaped.

Not through striving

but through returning.

Again and again.

To what is true.

And there is something else I’m beginning to understand.

That delight is not dependent on perfection.

Because if it were

no one would qualify.

Delight is not built on performance.

It is built on relationship.

And relationship is not sustained by flawlessness.

It is sustained by presence.

And maybe just maybe

God’s delight is not something I earn

but something I learn to receive.

And that is not easy.

Because receiving requires vulnerability.

It requires letting go of control.

It requires allowing truth to override what feels familiar.

And sometimes, what feels familiar

is not what is true.

So I find myself here.

In this tension.

Not fully resolved.

Not completely settled.

But not where I was either.

Because something is shifting.

Something is being rebuilt.

Slowly.

Quietly.

And maybe that’s enough for now.

Not having every answer.

But staying.

Not walking away from the question

but not letting it define the outcome either.

Because if there is one thing I am beginning to hold onto, even if only lightly, it is this:

That God is not looking at me through the lens of my brokenness alone.

And He is not measuring me by the parts of me that are still in process.

And maybe His delight

is not something fragile that disappears the moment I struggle.

Maybe it is something steady.

Something rooted in who He is

not in who I am on my best or worst day.

And if that is true

then maybe I don’t need to force myself to feel it.

Maybe I just need to remain.

To stay in His presence.

To keep showing up.

To keep being honest.

To keep allowing truth to slowly reshape what I’ve believed for so long.

And maybe, over time—

what feels distant now

will begin to feel real.

Not because I earned it.

But because I finally allowed myself to receive it.

And until then

I will sit with the question.

I will sit on the deep reality of the Gospel 

Not as something that condemns me.

But as something that is leading me deeper.

Because sometimes

the questions we struggle with the most

are the ones that lead us closest to the truth.

And maybe this one

is doing exactly that.

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About the Author

Dylan Verdun Sullivan is the founder of Refined by Fire Press and an Australian author indexed in the National Library of Australia. As a Level 7 Local Guide with over 1.7 million views on Google Maps, he documents the intersection of faith, recovery, and the light found in ordinary places.

• Read the Memoir: Kissed by Death on Amazon
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• Connect on Instagram: @porkysparadise