Spend time in prayer and silence with God asking him to meet you and speak to you.
Bible Reading
I pursued my enemies and overtook them;
I did not turn back till they were destroyed.
I crushed them so that they could not rise;
they fell beneath my feet.
You armed me with strength for battle;
you humbled my adversaries before me.
You made my enemies turn their backs in flight,
and I destroyed my foes.
They cried for help, but there was no one to save them—
to the Lord, but he did not answer.
I beat them as fine as windblown dust;
I trampled them like mud in the streets.
You have delivered me from the attacks of the people;
you have made me the head of nations.
People I did not know now serve me,
foreigners cower before me;
as soon as they hear of me, they obey me.
They all lose heart;
they come trembling from their strongholds.
The Lord lives! Praise be to my Rock!
Exalted be God my Savior!
He is the God who avenges me,
who subdues nations under me,
who saves me from my enemies.
You exalted me above my foes;
from a violent man you rescued me.
Therefore I will praise you, Lord, among the nations;
I will sing the praises of your name.
He gives his king great victories;
he shows unfailing love to his anointed,
to David and to his descendants forever.
– Psalm 18:37-50
Devotion
When I was in middle school, my Dad told my siblings and I that we can each have $25 if we got A’s in all of our classes for the marking period. My siblings and I worked hard for the entire marking period and we received A’s in all of our classes. When my Dad saw our report cards, he fulfilled his promise and gave each of us our reward. We couldn’t believe that we got the money and we responded by thanking him for keeping his promise!
Psalm 18 ends with the fulfillment of God’s promise to David. David defeats his enemies and is enthroned as the King of Israel, just like God said would happen. David’s response when he sees the faithfulness of God is to bless God by giving Him honor and praise. David proclaims that it was God who accomplished all these things, not himself. This is the nature of praise: to give God credit for who He is and for what He has done. David doesn’t proclaim that these things happened because of his skill, influence or plans but because of who God is and what God has done.
When good things happen to us, we can respond by giving ourselves the glory or giving God the glory. David understood that God fulfills His promises and David was experiencing that. The same is true for us today. God still fulfills His promises. However, the question we must ask ourselves is will we respond like David to those promises?
The Big Question
Who do you give honor and glory to in response to the different situations in your life? Do you give God glory or do you give yourself glory? What can you do to develop a continual response of glory in your everyday life?
Conclude in prayer and silence reflecting on what you’ve learned.