"We Give Thanks, O LORD, with Our Whole Heart" - 5 February 2023

 

We give you thanks, O LORD, with our whole heart; before the gods we sing your praise; we bow down toward your holy temple and give thanks to your name for your steadfast love and your faithfulness, for you have exalted above all things your name and your word. On the day we called, you answered us; our strength of soul you increased (Psalm 138:1-3). Hear us again as we pray for your world and Church.

We pray that the day will soon arrive when all the kings of the earth shall give you thanks, O LORD, when they will hear the words of your mouth, and sing of the ways of the LORD, for great is the glory of the LORD (Psalm 138:4-5). To this end we pray for you to raise up men and women, individuals and families, who will take the Gospel of Jesus Christ into all lands, to every tribe and ethnic group. Bless the work of Mission to the World and Mission to North America. Fill their manpower gaps and their monetary essentials. Open doors that no one can shut and grant them favor with local officials. Also, we implore you on behalf of this country, and all nations, including Guinea; Guinea-Bissau; and Guyana. May governmental leaders be fair and just and may their citizens be well and whole. In those places where women, girls, the elderly, the crippled, and those of the supposedly wrong people groups are routinely violated and treated with scorn, we pray you to raise up wholesome protectors and moral adjudicators who will “do good; seek justice, correct oppression; bring justice to the fatherless, plead the widow's cause” (Isaiah 1:17).

Though you, O LORD, are high, you regard the lowly, but the haughty you know from afar (Psalm 138:6). Enrich the faithful work of your Church in all places, including this congregation. But we also pray for Christ the King Catholic Church, Corpus Christi, Holy Trinity, and St. Charles Catholic Church. Empower us, one and all, to lovingly and humbly display the Gospel of Jesus Christ in our inner interactions and external enterprises. Make “Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Colossians 1:27) to be the heart of who we are, what we do, and what we proclaim. Teach us to profit and lead us in the way we should go (Isaiah 48:17).

Though we walk in the midst of trouble, you preserve our life; you stretch out your hand against the wrath of our enemies, and your right hand delivers us (Psalm 138:7). With certainty that you deeply care for us, we beseech you to look on the privations of your people, whether sick, penurious, persecuted, prosecuted, or smashed (...). Stretch forth your healing, helping, upholding hand and lift their hearts. 

O LORD, you will fulfill your purpose for us; your steadfast love, O LORD, endures forever. Do not forsake the work of your hands (Psalm 138:8). And now we pray as Jesus taught us, saying, Our Father, who art in heaven…

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