Monday, August 10, 2026
Scripture Readings
- Primary Reading: Joshua 24, Judges 1-2
- Secondary Reading: Psalms 92
Devotional Thought
Joshua gathers all the tribes of Israel to Shechem, and there, in the shadow of the mountains where Abraham first built an altar, he sets a choice before them: “choose you this day whom ye will serve.” The old warrior who led them across Jordan and watched Jericho’s walls fall will not let them drift into devotion by default. He rehearses God’s faithfulness from Abraham to the Red Sea to the conquest, then calls for a decision. And the people answer well—”we will serve the LORD”—but the very next chapters of Judges tell us how quickly that answer faded. A generation arose that “knew not the LORD,” and the land slid into cycles of sin, oppression, crying out, and deliverance. The book of Judges is a mirror held up to every heart that has ever made a sincere promise on a mountaintop and then forgotten it in the valley.
This is the ordinary danger of our own days. We do not usually abandon God in a single dramatic act; we drift. August has a way of exposing this. The long, hot weeks of summer can make faithfulness feel routine—the same prayers, the same Sunday mornings—while the grass withers and the wicked, as Psalm 92 says, “spring as the grass.” It can look as though those who ignore God flourish while the righteous quietly fade. But the psalmist sings a different truth: the wicked “shall be destroyed for ever,” while the righteous “shall flourish like the palm tree” and “still bring forth fruit in old age.” The palm and the cedar do not bloom overnight. They grow slowly, deeply rooted, and they endure.
That is the promise for the one who chooses, again and again, to be “planted in the house of the LORD.” Joshua’s generation had the witness of the stones and the memory of the Jordan. We have the same God, the same faithfulness, and the same call. The choice made once at Shechem had to be remade every morning. So it is with us. Psalm 92 teaches us to shew forth God’s lovingkindness in the morning and His faithfulness every night—a daily rhythm of remembering that keeps the heart from drifting.
Notice, too, that the psalmist does not pretend the wicked are not flourishing. He simply refuses to envy them. He knows their spring is brief. The deeper work is hidden: roots in the house of God, anointing with fresh oil, a horn exalted. The Lord is upright, a rock without unrighteousness, and He does not forget those who serve Him. Whether you are young and choosing for the first time, or old and still bearing fruit, the call is the same today: choose the Lord, and keep choosing Him, morning and night.
Reflection
- Joshua set up a stone as a witness because Israel’s promises could be forgotten so easily—what “stone” of remembrance has God given you, and are you returning to it daily?
- Psalm 92 says the righteous “shall still bring forth fruit in old age.” What would it look like in this season of your life to be planted deeply enough in God’s house to bear fruit for decades, not just for a moment?
Prayer
Lord God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the same yesterday, today, and forever: we thank You for Your lovingkindness in the morning and Your faithfulness every night. You have been our rock, and there is no unrighteousness in You. Forgive us for the promises we have made and forgotten, for the drift that creeps in when we stop choosing You. Plant us deep in Your house, like the palm and the cedar, that we might flourish and still bear fruit in old age. Give us grace this day to choose You afresh, to serve You with gladness, and to trust that the wicked’s flourishing is brief while Your kingdom endures for evermore. Amen.
Psalm Verse
Psalms 92:1 — “IT IS A GOOD THING TO GIVE THANKS UNTO THE LORD, AND TO SING PRAISES UNTO THY NAME, O MOST HIGH:”