Prayer Establishes Our Release to God
My Desire: God’s Will

Scripture Reading: Psalm 40:1-7

Key Verse: Psalm 40:8

I desire to do your will, O my God;
your law is within my heart.”

David was described as the “man after God’s heart.” As David walked with God, he learned deep truths about God. His deep thoughts, written in Psalm 40, are a far cry from his childhood days as a shepherd boy. David’s learning did, indeed, start in those early days while he cared for his father’s sheep. From facing the wild animals that were there to harm the sheep, to facing Goliath who wanted to harm David’s fellow Israelites, David was learning more and more about the God he served!

After years of victories and defeats, David had learned one of the greatest truths about God. He writes about this in Psalm 40. The single most important ingredient in the God-man relationship is our desire to do God’s will. In verse six, David reminds us that sacrifice and offerings were not what God was looking for. Burnt offerings and sin offerings were not God’s greatest requirements. After all the years of walking with God, David concluded that his desire to do God’s will was the greatest gift he could offer!

Is God’s will at the top of your priority list today? Have you taken your own desires and voluntarily demoted them below God’s desires? I realize this is, indeed, easier said than done, but have you done it? In your daily prayers, do you continually say the words, “Not my will, but your will be done”? Let me challenge you to say these words until you mean them.

“Father, my flesh cries out for control of my life. I fight my flesh and the evil one to give you full control—nothing more or nothing less than your will being done in me. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.”