Mona Selden writes daily devotions for her church, Marion Baptist, in south-central Virginia. She is co-host with her pastor on The Mosaic of Marion podcast. Her writing and teaching are done with the desire to help others get to know God better through His Word. Her blog, Filled to Overflowing, combines her passion for photography and writing. Mona’s husband is USAF Retired. They are enjoying their nearly empty nest with a married daughter and a son in college.
…may the Lord do what is good in His sight.”
2 Samuel 10:12, NASB
We are taught throughout Scripture to pray according to God’s will. We bring our requests to God and ask for His assistance or provision while asking for His will to be done. The story of a battle between the Israelites and the sons of Ammon in 2 Samuel gave me a fresh way to pray for God’s will to be done.
In chapter 10 of 2 Samuel, the sons of Ammon are coming against the Israelites in battle, and they have hired the Arameans to help. Joab, the commander of King David’s army, has placed his choicest men against the Arameans and the remaining people of Israel against the sons of Ammon. He knows the battle is in front of him and behind him; he is surrounded by the enemy. As he gives the battle charge, he makes this statement: “… may the Lord do what is good in His sight” (2 Samuel 10:12, NASB). His desire was for the Lord’s will to be done, that the outcome of the battle would be according to what the Lord saw as good.
When we are praying for the things that are weighing heavily on our hearts, if we are able to ask the Lord to do what is good in His sight, then we are acknowledging some truths about God. First, we are acknowledging that we indeed desire for the Lord’s will to be done. We may have our desired outcome of the situation, but when we have allowed Jesus to be Lord of our lives, we surrender those outcomes to His will. We then desire for the outcome that is according to His will.
We are also proclaiming that God is good. We cannot ask God to do what He sees as good if we don’t believe that He is good and He does good (Psalm 119:68). We must cling to the fact that God will bring good out of the situation (Romans 8:28), even if His answer doesn’t seem good at the time.
Finally, we are declaring our belief that God is sovereign and we trust in His sovereignty over the situation. God is in control of all things. Nothing happens that He does not ordain or allow. All power, authority, and dominion belong to Him and Him alone.
Asking God to do what is good in His sight is not just something to tack on to our prayers. They are words straight from His Word, which confirm for us and relay to Him the desires of our hearts. Praying that God would do according to what is good in His sight sets our sights on God and His goodness. They allow us to fully trust Him for the outcome.