“And as for you, if you will walk before me, as David your father walked, with integrity of heart and uprightness, doing according to all that I have commanded you and keeping my statutes and my rules, then I will establish your royal throne over Israel forever, as I promised David, your father, saying, you shall not lack a man on the throne of Israel.”
– 1 Kings 9:4–5
I want to lead us to pray exactly this over each of our lives. Think about what God just called Solomon to, to integrity of heart. Don’t you want integrity of heart in your life? What a phrase, that there would be a holiness and a wholeness to your heart before God. That’s the phrase in the very beginning of 1 Kings 9:4–5, “If you will walk before me with integrity of heart and uprightness, with uprightness, with righteousness before God, doing according to all that he has commanded.” Don’t you want that to be true of your life?
God, we pray that you would help us to walk before you.
I want to do all that God commands me to do. “And keeping my statutes and my rules,” God says, and then he promises him, “When you do these things, I will establish a royal throne.” That was the promise to Solomon. And we see all throughout God’s word, his promises that we will experience his blessing. We will experience abundant life. Not everything going perfect for us in life. Let’s not have an unrealistic, unbiblical even, perspective of blessing. Jesus was blessed, abundant life, walking with the father, and he was crucified.
We have many persecuted brothers and sisters around the world who are walking in obedience to God and they are being imprisoned or slandered in different ways. So yes, there will be challenges in this world, but there is a life and a peace and a joy and a depth of abundance and fulfillment that is found when we walk before God with integrity of heart, uprightness, when we do according to all that he has commanded us and we keep his statutes and his rules.
Help Us To Walk Before God
So God, we pray together that it would be so in our lives. May it be so today. God, we pray that you would help us to walk before you. God, I pray this for every single person listening right now and for myself, with integrity of heart. So God, may our hearts be pleasing to you, our desires, our affections, our thoughts, things that no one else sees. May we have integrity of heart and uprightness. God, we pray for righteousness before you, for uprightness in your eyes. God, we pray that you would help us to do today all that you have commanded us to do, help us to walk in obedience to your word, your statutes and your rules, help us to keep them.
1 Kings 9:4–5 Prays That We Turn Away From Sin And Temptation
So, God, we pray, help us to turn aside from sin and every temptation we face. God, help us to obey you, for we know that obedience to you leads to life, that obedience to you leads to blessing. God, we want it to be said of our lives that we walked before you today, tomorrow, each day. We pray, oh God, with integrity of heart and uprightness, doing all that you command us to do at every moment, keeping your statutes and your rules.
So God, please may it be so, by the power of your spirit in us, by the grace of Jesus and the power of Jesus at work in us, apart from whom we can do none of these things, but in whom and through whom we can do all of these things. Help us to live in you Jesus today, and to experience the abundant life you have made possible for us. In Jesus’ name, we pray, according to 1 Kings 9:4–5. 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.
