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Water and Light to Grow

Water and Light to Grow

Words of Faith 9-26-19

Dr. Jeffrey D. Hoy © 2019

Jeff.Hoy@faithfellowshipweb.com

Faith Fellowship Church - Melbourne, FL

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Colossians 1

     [9] For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you and asking God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all spiritual wisdom and understanding.  [10] And we pray this in order that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and may please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God,

 

     This prison prayer is rich and revealing!  Paul and Epaphras prayed for the believers to know the will of God, to live a life worthy of the Lord, to have fruit in every good work and to be growing in the knowledge of God.

      Paul knew in his heart that it was not enough to find the path of God and see that reflected in a pleasing walk.  Our life with God is a growing and dynamic relationship.  We are never to stop growing in how much we know God.

      Now don't be confused here.  This is not about how much we know.  It is not about how much we know about the Bible or how much we know about God.  This is not about advanced degrees in systematic theology or epistemology.  This is not about being able to "sword drill" faster than anyone on the planet.  This is about knowing God. 

      The goal of God in your life is not for you to know a great deal about him or to do a bunch of things for Him.  He doesn’t want your work or your stuff.  He wants you!  One of the hardest things for us to grasp is how much God delights in us and desires for us to draw near to Him.  We tend to get so caught up in religious thinking and activity that we miss this point.  The God who knows everything about you wants you to know Him. 

      So, in this sense, the journey is the goal. What happens on the way and how we learn to know Him is really the most important thing?  Learning to trust wholly in the Lord while on the journey is more important than the Promised Land we eventually get to.  As believers, we should not only bear the fruit of good works. We are to experience personal spiritual enlargement while on the way. That personal spiritual enlargement occurs only as we know God more and more.

      Interestingly, the tense of the Greek here implies a habitual action.  This does not mean that we are to become religiously habitual or ritualized.  But it does mean that we are never to stop growing in this wonderful relationship that God has opened with us through the gifts of His Word and of His Son.  We may observe holy habits that draw us near to the Lord, but those habits are not the goal. Our knowledge of God never becomes past tense. The Lord's loving kindnesses indeed never cease, for His compassions never fail. They are new every morning; Great is Your faithfulness (Lamentations 3:22-23 NASB).

      Knowledge of God is the goal.  Knowledge of God is the means by which we grow personally. What rain and sunshine are to the nurture of plants, the knowledge of God is to the growth and maturing of the spiritual life.

 

      Father God, I want to grow.  Water me with Your Spirit.  Shine on me with Your light.  I want to grow in my knowledge of You, not just about You.  I want to experience the wonder of Your love, the awe of Your majesty and mystery of Your holy presence.  I want to know You more and more and learn to walk with You more carefully each day. In Jesus' Name.

 

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The Words of Faith devotion is published five days a week by E-mail, and our website, and our church app, excluding Federal holidays. Please feel free to forward this devotion to a friend who might be blessed by this devotion. Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture is quoted from the New International Version (R) of The Holy Bible. Copyright (c) 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved. Words of Faith (c) 1997, 2010 Jeffrey D. Hoy. All rights reserved. Permission is granted to forward this copyrighted material or use portions of it with appropriate notation of the source for non-profit purposes.  

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