“This book of the law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it. For then, you will make your way prosperous and then you will have good success.”
– Joshua 1:8
It’s so hard to choose one verse to pray, according to here in Joshua chapter one. Each of these verses, particularly in the beginning verses five through nine, God’s promises to Joshua but the reason I choose Joshua 1:8, I want to lead us to pray according to it is because, well, it says it at the end, the key to prosperity and success in life. Now, keep in mind, when we read prosperity and success, this is the best kind of prosperity, and the best kind of success. It’s not a worldly picture of prosperity, a worldly picture of success.
May we not simply read God’s Word, but meditate on it day and night.
This is good success, right? Success. That which matters most, in this world and in eternity. The prosperity that will never, ever end. Do you want that? I’m guessing you do. I do. I don’t know anybody who doesn’t want true prosperity. That doesn’t want good success, right success. So what is the key? How do you get prosperity success like that? Joshua 1:8 says, “This book shall not depart from your mouth.” Isn’t that interesting? From your mouth.
So, from speaking it, “For you shall meditate on it day and night.” This is part of what meditation is. It’s saying God’s word, it’s speaking God’s word, it’s letting it soak into you. It’s interesting. When you read through the Bible, you actually don’t see commands to read like you see commands to meditate on God’s word. So it’s not just kind of read the word as if you’re checking off a box, or use a podcast episode based on the word that’s kind of monotonous routine.
We Pray For Prosperity And Success
No, you meditate. That’s the whole aim of this podcast in a sense, is to just spend a couple of moments meditating on a verse and letting it lead us to pray. Why? Because we know that if we will meditate on His word and be careful to do according to what is written in it, we will have a prosperous way and we will have good success in our lives.
And so we pray for this. God, we want prosperity and we want success in every right way. God, we pray for prosperity and success in all the best ways possible. And God, we pray that you would help us toward that end to meditate on your word, day and night. God, teach us what that means in our lives. Help us to do that from the moment we wake up in the morning to prioritize meditating on your word, not even just reading it, but meditating on it.
Joshua 1:8 Prays For People Groups Around The World
At night before we go to bed before we fall asleep to meditate on your word, and this way for this book, your word not to depart from our mouths, as we say it over and over again to ourselves, to our own hearts, in our own lives, and God as we spread it, God help us to proclaim this word continually, we pray. To people around us, God help us to proclaim this word that brings prosperity and success to people around us today, and to peoples around the world.
So God, we pray for the people in China. God, hundreds of thousands of them who need your word. God, we pray for the people today. East Asia, God please, please help us, help somebody from your church to go and proclaim your word to them. That they might meditate on your word, that they might have prosperity. That they might have good success.
God, we want this for every people group in the world. We want this for the people right around us, and we want this in our own lives. So help us to take you at your word in Joshua 1:8 and meditate on it day and night, trusting that you will lead us to true, good prosperity and success forever. In Jesus’ name, we pray, Amen.
David Platt serves as a pastor in metro Washington, D.C. He is the founder of Radical.
David received his Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and is the author of Don’t Hold Back, Radical, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Before You Vote, as well as the multiple volumes of the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary series.
Along with his wife and children, he lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area.
