Listen to YouTube: ‘One Day Matt Redman Lyrics’
Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and His righteousness
And all these things shall be added unto you - Allelu, Alleluia
We cannot live by bread alone, but by every word
That proceeds from the mouth of God - Allelu, Alleluia
Ask and it shall be given unto you, seek and ye shall find
Knock and the door shall be opened unto you - Allelu, Alleluia
(Karen Lafferty © 1972 Word Music)
You may have heard that the Government is allowing churches to open from 15th June. There are many restrictions about what can and can’t happen if we open the premises, these can be summarised as - you can come to church to pray by yourself – something I hope you are doing in your own home. Before opening the premises there is a 12 page ‘Risk Assessment’ that needs to be completed, as well as a thorough cleaning of the premises in between each time the premises are opened. We would also need to keep a register of who comes in so as to ‘track & trace’ if there were an outbreak of the virus. Having considered all of the above, there are no plans to open the premises at the moment, but this will be reviewed as soon as the Government make any further announcements.
Today’s bible reading was written by someone who recognised you don’t need to be in a particular building to pray and know the presence of God. Paul wrote this letter while in prison, in Rome. Read: Colossians 1: 9-14
Wouldn’t you like someone to be praying this prayer about you? It is a great prayer to memorise, or to personalise (e.g. God I ask you to fill me...), but the greatest blessing is to do what Paul is doing, pray this prayer for another person or group of people.
Let’s focus on verse 10, which is the heart of the prayer and which we can summarise as:
To live a life which pleases God
To live a life which shows the goodness of God
To live a life strengthened by the power of God
Now if I had written this prayer, I would have reverses the last two phrases because I would be thinking we need to be ‘growing in the knowledge of God’ before we can truly ‘bear fruit in every good work.’ But then as I considered the events we read about in ‘The Acts of the Apostles’ I can recall a number of occasions where the good works come before the knowledge of God which shows that doing good things can lead us towards knowing God, just as knowing more about God should lead us into doing good works.
Perhaps the order of the last two phrases isn’t very important because they both flow out of the first phrase – pleasing the Lord. This is explained in more detail the second part of verse 9. In this verse we are reminded again that the purpose of God’s Holy Spirit is to help us to know God and respond to what we have learnt. This verse gives us a great phrase to use in prayer both for ourselves and for others – ‘ask God to fill you with the knowledge of his will’
This whole prayer is about Paul wanting the believers at Colossi to know God in every aspect of their lives and that every part of their lives will then reveal their love for the Lord their God - so we could summarise these three phrases into one phrase ‘To love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul and strength’
Use these lyrics to inspire your own prayers, asking God to help you to live a life which glorifies him in every aspect of it - your heart, soul, strength and mind.
O breath of love, come breathe within us, renewing thought and will and heart;
Come, Love of Christ, afresh to win us, revive Thy church in every part.
O wind of God, come bend us, break us, 'till humbly we confess our need;
Then in Thy tenderness remake us, revive, restore, for this we plead.
O breath of life, come sweeping through us, revive Thy church with life and power;
O Breath of life, come, cleanse, renew us, and fit Thy church to meet this hour.
(Elizabeth A P Head 1850-1936)
Sing along to YouTube ‘Build your kingdom here’ by Rend Collective
There will be a guest writer on Friday and I will write again on Sunday - Stephen