"Who Is Like You, O LORD" - 12 December 2021

 

“Who is like you, O LORD, among the gods? Who is like you, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders” (Exodus 15:11 NKJV)? We draw near to you through Jesus Christ with a true heart in the full assurance of faith.

O faithful Lord, we pray for your Church in all nations, our denomination, this congregation, and Village Baptist Church, Vision Community Church, Waterloo Rd. Church of Christ, and Wildewood Christian Church. Lead and guide your churches in sound doctrine, strengthen and fortify us in utmost loyalty, and supply all of our needs richly in Christ Jesus, so that we may learn to devote ourselves to good works, so as to help cases of urgent need, and not be unfruitful (Titus 3:14).

God of steadfast love, please call, convert, and save those who have never submitted to and relied on your Son, and please reclaim those who have “wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs” (1 Timothy 6:10).

We implore you, merciful Father, to look compassionately on the sick and sorrowful, beleaguered and besieged, heartbroken and harried (…). And we pray especially for those hit by tornadoes: In Monette and Leachville, Arkansas, Hayti and Caruthersville, Missouri, into Tennessee and on to Mayfield, Kentucky. We ask you to restore and bless them body and soul in Jesus Christ, and may the resources – physical, emotional, spiritual – be richly supplied that they may rebuild. And bring comfort to the grieving.

O LORD, who is a man of war (Exodus 15:3), as Moses once called you, we beseech you on behalf of our soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines. We ask for your strengthening presence to guide them, protect them and keep them strong in their duty; and for any who have been in combat and are riddled with horrible memories, fierce dreams, shame-filled regrets, and intense anger, bring them the sustaining, health-restoring aid they need and grant them your unshakeable peace.

God, mighty over the nations, we ask for the nations of the world that you would please turn the violence, saber-rattling, and tyranny on its head – especially in Ethiopia, Myanmar, Nigeria, Russia and Ukraine. Direct the leaders along with the citizens of each country toward greater and greater justice, peace, and civility that all the peoples of the nations may flourish in health and hope, your Church be safe from harm, and your Gospel make progress.

God of our fathers, look on and guide these United States of America, our leaders, our citizens, and all residents to include the judges of our Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals. Preserve us from all enemies and from all falsehood; move us to a more considerable moral integrity; restrain us from accepting and indulging ungodly, destructive lifestyles, habits, and addictions; and arouse us to become exporters of goodness and virtue, rather than of vice and villainy.

Finally, O God, we pray for you to orchestrate the jet streams and weather patterns in such ways that we may have all of the showers we need to take care of our necessities.

All we ask here, Lord, we ask in faith and in the name of Jesus Christ your Son and our Lord. And we pray as we have been taught, saying, Our Father…

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

"Was America Founded as a Christian Nation?" (Rev. Ed.) by John Fea. A Review

Image
  John Fea is a professor of history at Messiah University in Mechanicsburg, PA. A university founded in 1909 by the Brethren in Christ Church. He originally published "Was America Founded as a Christian Nation? A Historical Introduction" in 2011, and it was revised in 2016. This 328-page paperback is packed full with Colonial and American history, drawing from original sources to answer that question. It is a book written "for the historically minded and thoughtful reader who is looking for help in sorting" out this question, avoiding polemics (xix). Since we live in a sound-bite culture, Fea recognizes that it is difficult to have a sustained dialogue on this topic, but he makes a valiant effort toward having that sustained dialogue. The book reads fairly straightforward, and doesn't seem to get bogged down in the contentious mudpuddles or bogs. In the end, Fea seems to get his point across. To answer the reigning question if America was founded as a Christian...
Read more

Union with Christ - An Application

Image
  (This was my weekly letter to my congregation on Wednesday, 21 February 2024) This morning in my devotional reading, I was working through 1 Corinthians 8. Though I’ve read these words a huge number of times over the years, today one verse caused me to stop and take stock.  Paul wrote, “ Thus, sinning against your brothers and wounding their conscience when it is weak, you sin against Christ ” (1 Corinthians 8:12). What struck me is a couple of things. First, in God’s saving work, we are – by grace alone – united (hitched, bonded, ingrafted) to Christ so much so, that what happens to us happens to him, and what is his becomes ours (think of Galatians 2:20, for example). As Sinclair Ferguson put it, “through union with Christ all that is his by incarnation becomes ours through faith” (“The Christian Life,” 110). Let that percolate in your heart for a while. Your fear, anxiety, tears, and so forth, he feels. And his “ Peace, be still ” is yours. Second, the way we treat one an...
Read more

"Ah, Lord! We are Animated by Anger and Anxiety, Fear and Fury..."

Image
I hesitate to put this out there because of the combative environment we are in at present. But I think some souls will take courage from this, and some will also join with me as we get to the end of this little composition. I am struck by the words of God in Zechariah 8. As he rehearses the waywardness and faithlessness of his people in the past, he clearly declares that he " set every man against his neighbor " (8:10). That got me thinking long ago. I started putting the pieces together and realized that one of God's acts of judgment is division, setting a man against his neighbor. That's what happened when he divided his people into the northern tribes and southern tribes (see 1 Kings 11:26-40). Because of Solomon's turning aside, allowing his wives to turn his heart away from the God of his father, David, the Lord brings about a rift in God's people. And this pattern of divisive judgment runs throughout Scripture. On the other hand, truthful unity is the g...
Read more