Prosperity made Easy

Delight thyself also in the LORD; and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart. Psalm 37:4 

There is no doubt about it; all human beings have some desires. We all have some aspirations in life. There are some things we want to have, status we want to achieve, heights we want to reach, places we want to go and so on. Many flood prayer houses and mountains in the quest for these desires. In the verse of the scripture above, David offers us a simple way out to meet our desires. It is in just one word: Delight!

One thing you will discover is that no matter what you desire to be or have, it is even far below what God has prepared for you. Paul says eye has neither seen it nor ear heard it (1 Cor. 2:9). It is so big it will beat your imagination. It is incomprehensible. You can’t figure it out. The best of your thinking and imagination on the idea is not anywhere near what God has prepared for you. Paul tries to capture it with some adjectives in his letter to the Ephesian church: 

Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us. Eph 3:20

Exceeding! Abundantly! Above all! That is what God has prepared for you. Hallelujah! 

But then how do you make this a reality? This is where most believers get things upside down. Sensing this great plan of God, some begin to pursue “greatness.” Some begin to invest in prayer. Moving from one prayer gathering to another; from one mountain to another; seeking God and “bombarding” the gate of heaven. 

But friend, that is like putting the cart before the horse. God wants you to be great much more than you want it. In fact the Bible says he has pleasure in your prosperity (Job 36:11). He wishes above all things that you prosper and be in good health (3 John 2). God needs people to finance the Gospel. He needs people to build churches for Him. He needs people to sponsor missionaries. Like the General Overseer used to say, God is looking for divine treasurers. 

Delight in the Lord

Friend, the way out is not in running after those things. It is not in pursuing things. It is in delighting yourself in the Lord. A delight is something that makes you very happy; something that gives you great pleasure or satisfaction. When God becomes your delight, your pleasure, your satisfaction in life, then the Bible says He will give you all your desires. While other men are running here and there looking for what is not lost, look at what David said he would pursue: 

One thing have I asked of the LORD, that will I seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the LORD and to inquire in his temple. Psalm 27:4

When you have no other pursuit outside of God, when God becomes all you think about, all your want to please, all you want to live for, then you are in for something great in your life. 

If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. Col 3:1-2

Delight in His Word

But the Lord answered her, "Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her." Luke 10:41-42

According to the Master, only one thing is necessary; only one thing is needful; only one thing is important in life, and that is delighting in His word. When His word becomes your preoccupation; when your thought is centered on His word in meditation, you are in for a great ride in destiny.

David caps it all for the man that takes delight in the word of God.

… but his delight is in the law of the LORD, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers. (Psa 1:2-3)

When the word of God becomes your number one priority in life, your life becomes evergreen. You will not know what is called dryness. You will be ever fruitful. No wonder that was the only condition God gave to Joshua when he took over from Moses (Joshua 1:8).

Ministry 101: Gleanings from Chapter One of Gbile Akanni’s “Tapping God’s Resources for Life and Ministry”

It is not everything that works that God approves. 

No matter how fruitful you are, if you are not faithful you are not successful. 2 Tim. 2:5

Ministry: 1 Cor. 3:5

 What, after all, is Apollos? And what is Paul? Only servants, through whom you came to believe—as the Lord has assigned to each his task. NIV

Note the word “assigned”—ministry has to do with an assignment. It is simply an assignment, a task that the Lord has given a person to do. Each one simply does the work which the Lord gives him to do.

1 Cor. 3:6-8

 I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God has been making it grow. ⁷ So neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow. ⁸ The one who plants and the one who waters have one purpose, and they will each be rewarded according to their own labor.

In ministry, there are planters and there are waterers. The same God who assigned Paul to plant, also appointed Apollos to water what was planted.

Consider this: Is it possible for Apollos to fulfill his ministry if Paul has not planted? No. Suppose Paul said, “No, how can I plant and another person will come, water it and get the credit for it?”

Apart from planting and watering, another person is also appointed and assigned to reap. The man who reaps, comes home with many sheaves that he did not know how they were planted, watered and weeded. People may ignorantly rate him higher than the planter. If you do, you are offending God.

So ministry is not competitive, but rather cooperative and complementary. What one man is assigned to do may actually become the basic resource for another person to carry out his own portion of the work. It is only the ‘ground’ that was ‘planted’ that can be ‘watered.’

Ministry is not an independent, exclusive property of an individual, even if that individual has been used of God to start it. Some people’s ministry begins only where some ended theirs. This is the basic principle to understand in order to tap God’s resources for ministry.

God’s assessment of a man is not necessarily in terms of quantity of activities. It is how faithfully he does what he is told to do even if it is a routine without excitement.