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MARCH 3, 2011
WILL I SUCCEED (PART 2)
Today’s devotion continues Jim Hiskey’s series on success. Part 1
“This book of the law shall not depart from your mouth...then you will have success.” (Joshua 1:8, NASB)
Have you ever heard of Dallas Willard?
Many people around the world have. Many have not. Though we have only briefly met, I look to him as a mentor.
PGA Tour winner, Bill Rogers and I met Willard a couple of years ago. A professor at the University
of Southern California School of Philosophy and author of The Divine Conspiracy and The Spirit of the Disciplines, Willard was
one of the instructors of the Jesus Way Conference we attended, along with more than 2,000 others at the Grand Hyatt, situated on the Riverwalk in San Antonio.
After one of the sessions on the subject of “Apprenticing Jesus,” I caught Willard in
the hallway. We were alone for a minute, two at the most. He’s a man my age, early seventies, soft face, few wrinkles. We stood face to face.
“You can teach this in golf,” he smiled, almost childlike.
“I can?” I asked. He’d gotten my attention.
“With one difference. The Kingdom takes a little better hold than a golf club.”
I smiled.
In a more recent book, The Great Omission, Willard speaks further on the discipline mandated of God’s people to get “a better hold on the Kingdom”: “If I had to—and I don't
have to—choose between all the disciplines of the spiritual life,” Willard writes, “and take only one, I would choose Bible memorization...because Bible memorization is a
fundamental way of filling our minds with what they need.”
He is speaking of the disciplines such as prayer, Bible study, solitude, fasting, etc. He means the discipline, the top discipline, is Scripture memorization.
Reading these words is like hearing his voice. He continues, “‘This book of the law shall
not depart out of your mouth.’ That's where we need it! In the mouth. Now, how did it get in your mouth? Memorization.
“I often tell people I can give them one verse worth more than any college education, and that is Joshua 1:8. It
will guarantee them the life they only dimly dream to be possible.”
I’ve pondered this statement for months. When I first read it, I thought, this is such an overstatement. I asked
myself, do I really believe this one verse is worth a college education? Really.
Then I looked back on the 50-plus years of ministry God has privileged me to have and the
impact of the Word of God that has been “hidden in my heart,” and concluded, Yes, I really do. I believe that if a person commits this one verse to memory—and applies it—precisely, he or she will be successful in what matters most in life. And this success is defined by the One who created us and knows
what true success is.
Where is the most important area of your life that you want to succeed? Take a careful look at this great
promise of God. Write it on a card and carry it with you. Think about it each night before you sleep and the first thing in the morning. Take it with you. Look at it during the day as often as you can.
Before you know it you will have memorized it.
As you do, note the conditions.
They hold the key for your true success.
--
Jim Hiskey
March 3, 2011
Copyright 2011 Links Players International
The Links Daily Devotional appears Monday-Friday at www.linksplayers.com.
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