Wednesday, June 25, 2008

Daily - 6/25/08

Philippians 1:1-11

1 Paul and Timothy, slaves of Christ Jesus, to all the holy ones in Christ Jesus who are in Philippi, with the overseers and ministers:
2 grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
3 I give thanks to my God at every remembrance of you,
4 praying always with joy in my every prayer for all of you,
5 because of your partnership for the gospel from the first day until now.
6 I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work in you will continue to complete it until the day of Christ Jesus.
7 It is right that I should think this way about all of you, because I hold you in my heart, you who are all partners with me in grace, both in my imprisonment and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel.
8 For God is my witness, how I long for all of you with the affection of Christ Jesus.
9 And this is my prayer: that your love may increase ever more and more in knowledge and every kind of perception,
10 to discern what is of value, so that you may be pure and blameless for the day of Christ,
11 filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ for the glory and praise of God.

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Paul is writing this from prison. Look at verses 8-11 – these are very similar to the verses from Ephesians yesterday. In the Ephesians passage he talked about comprehending "the breadth and length and height and depth" of Christ’s love. Today he talks about that love increasing "ever more and more in knowledge and every kind of perception, to discern what is of value."
This is another glimpse of the abundant life. This is a transcendant life where you don’t care if you’re in jail because you know it’s God’s will. Jail doesn’t matter, beatings don’t matter, shipwrecks don’t matter, hunger and thirst don’t matter. All that matters is God.
Something to spend a lifetime striving for.