Do we truly understand the gravity of these verses? That people who clearly felt they had spent their lives serving God will come to the final day only to discover they did not know the real God. They will discover their candy coated god was never real. Realize here too that these people even did miracles in the name of God. They cast demons out in His name. The Bible is clear that there will be false signs and wonders in these end days beloved and our discernment is sorely lacking. And look who it is that Jesus says away from me to! You who break God's laws! You know; the very laws hyper-grace swears don't matter anymore. The very laws that are never discussed anymore in seeker friendly circles. The very laws that do not exist in the prosperity gospel. Comical if not so profoundly sad.
So when I wanted to write about prayers for the coming year I went back to Scripture to see what God was saying. I did not find any verses extolling the virtues of earthly prosperity. I did not find any verses propping up cheap grace as a way to dismiss the laws of God. Instead He led me to the Book of Colossians, where we find the Apostle Paul praying for the congregation at Colossae. Let's take a look today and bring this as our prayer for our lives as we enter 2014.
For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you. We continually ask God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all the wisdom and understanding that the Spirit gives, - Colossians 1: 9 (NIV)
The first thing we need to realize is that our prayers need to be continual. The world treats New Years Day as an opportunity to resolve to change things in their lives. Unfortunately, these resolutions often end in failure and usually quicker than we ever would have thought. See what Paul says here. He has not stopped praying for the Colossians. We need to be more persistent and consistent in our prayers. Jesus tells a parable of a persistent widow who continually demanded justice from an unfair judge who finally relents because he realized she never would stop. Here is how that parable ends:
And the Lord said, "Listen to what the unjust judge says. And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?" - Luke 18: 6-8 (NIV)
Yet will we be found crying out to Him day and night and will He find faith when He returns? There is more however in verse nine for us to realize today. The first thing Paul prays for the Colossians is that God would fill them with the knowledge of His will through all the wisdom and understanding that the spirit gives. I guess as the world values things this is not as sexy as praying that every single day will be loaded with the blessings and benefits of God. In that blurb from Joseph Prince he even references a verse to prop up his selfish prayer. Of course Psalm 68:19 has nothing to do with what he claims:
Praise be to the Lord, to God our Savior, who daily bears our burdens. - Psalm 68: 19 (NIV)
Only in the mind of the Prince of Hyper Grace can a statement from God about bearing our burdens be twisted into justifying the belief that every single day will be loaded with the blessings and benefits of God. No beloved. We need to put down our carnal earthly desires and instead pursue this first prayer from the Apostle Paul. We need to pursue God to fill us with the knowledge of His will. We have the Holy Spirit inside of us! He leads us into all truth if we would just seek it! Unfortunately, seeking the will of God these days has also become an exercise in in pursuing what we want instead of what God wants. We usually get some idea in our head about what we want and then "pray for confirmation." Suddenly every little happenstance that comes our way we read confirmation into and hallelujah! God has agreed with our will. Then when it all falls apart at some point in the future we do not understand. There are three types of God's will beloved. One is is permissive will, or what He allows to happen. The second is His revealed will, which is the Word of God. Lastly, there is His decretive will for our lives, which is unknown by us and generally, God has no intention of revealing. The secret is simple. The more we study and know His revealed will, the closer we will be to His decretive will. If we would only pursue His revealed will with the same zeal we pursue our "confirmations", we would know that we know that we know - what sayeth the Lord.
