Scripture: 1 Kings 3.  

OBSERVATION
(What is God saying here?)

1 Kings 3:10-14 (NLT)

10 The Lord was pleased that Solomon had asked for wisdom. 11 So God replied, “Because you have asked for wisdom in governing my people with justice and have not asked for a long life or wealth or the death of your enemies – 12 I will give you what you asked for! I will give you a wise and understanding heart such as no one else has had or ever will have! 13 And I will also give you what you did not ask for—riches and fame! No other king in all the world will be compared to you for the rest of your life! 14 And if you follow me and obey my decrees and my commands as your father, David, did, I will give you a long life.”

APPLICATION
(How Can I apply what God is saying here to my circumstances today?)

I believe that God is extremely happy with His kids that are unselfish in their requests to Him and who not only show an unselfish love towards Him, but also to the people that they come into contact with. You see, I am fairly confident that most of us will push for the best job that is available, even if we knew that it would bring unnecessary burden on us and/or our family; we would take the bigger and better vehicle, even if we knew that it would be a burden to us in payments; we would rather be first in line at the buffet so that we could get the choice foods, even if we knew that others may not have eaten in the last two days, or may not have eaten as good as we have. As the son of a great king, Solomon had been used to the having his own way, and many times at the expense of seeing many under the reign of his dad, go without. Even in this position, Solomon could very easily have found more to ask for in order to fulfill the normal lusts of a man in charge, like he was. Instead, he knew that he was challenged with an awesome responsibility, and because he wanted to make sure that he had all that he needed to properly, and fairly rule his people, he asked for wisdom to do an even better job of ruling and leading his people. Oh that we would do more of this today as we take on leadership roles. We may have tremendous amounts of talent to use in our leadership roles, but when dealing with other people, we have no idea what it takes to truly meet their needs and best utilize their God-given skills. Let’s stop and think about our role, then let’s get with the Master and ask Him to lead us and guide us, and to give us the wisdom it takes to lead unselfishly, beneficial to all that we lead and honoring to the Master. God saw Solomon’s heart and He gave him much more than he asked for. It would be joyous to look at our day, or week or year and thank God for blessing us with much more than we ever asked for. But that’s the kind of God that we serve, so let’s not be surprised when we see things like this happen! Praise be to God!

PRAYER
(With God’s help, what am I going to do differently today because He said it?)

Father You are awesome! You have made us to be like You and even though I could only imagine that You must look on us in disgust or disappointment many times. Yet I believe that You will honor the sincere, unselfish requests that we may make of You, all because of Your love for us. It is evident from the story of Your servant Solomon that You will honor and bless the soul that seeks after Your heart and has a desire to be like You in every way. I pray that this may be a day in which You will honor the sincere prayer of my heart to grant me the wisdom to deal with my fellow man in a way that will honor You; to make right decisions for those over whom I may have leadership responsibilities and the wisdom to make those decisions in a way that will not only be honoring to You, but also beneficial to them so that they too may be drawn closer to You. I pray for the wisdom to discern the man You have chosen to lead my church as pastor. Many things are made to look good on paper in a resume, but Father I know that You are very familiar with the hearts of each man behind the resumes and You know the man that is needed to lead a peculiar flock such as ours, so I place my sole dependence on You to guide my team and I to the right man for this leadership position. I want Your kingdom to grow in Avon Park and I would really like for our church to be a vital contributor of that growth, please bless us with everything we need to make the right choices in our future leader so that Your work may be accomplished.

 

àWords underlined may be a hyperlink to a song that God laid on my heart while sharing this devotional this morning. Click it and be blessed by the song, like I was when I listened to it! …… I would be overjoyed to have the opportunity to pray with you about a need in your life that may, or may not have been highlighted by this Nugget today. Why not drop me a note and tell me about it? You may email me at:
nuggetsfromgodsword@yahoo.com.
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