Now All Glory To God

October 28, 2016

Now All Glory To God

May he, as a result, make your hearts strong, blameless, and holy as you stand before God our Father when our Lord Jesus comes again with all his holy people. Amen.

1 Thessalonians 3:13

Thank you Paul! Your words not only bring conviction to my spirit, your words also bring healing and direction. In his benediction that closes chapter three (1 Thessalonians 3:11-13), Paul shows us his foundation that allows him to pray even more exceedingly than we can imagine. His prayers are thoroughly grounded on the character of God and entirely focused on that which God can and will do through faith in Jesus. In this brief benediction, he affirms his own faith and trust in “God our Father and our Lord Jesus.” (Verse 11) In the concluding verse quoted above, Paul affirms his faith in Jesus coming again in final victory. In between these two verses, Paul confirms his allegiance to the command of Jesus: “This is my command: Love each other” (John 15:17).

Paul’s prayer life was thoroughly grounded in his vision of God’s character and of God’s purpose for the followers of Jesus. It is this vision that inspired Paul to share this benediction with his friends in Ephesus: “Now all glory to God, who is able, through his mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think” (Ephesians 3:20). I wonder how our prayers might change if we took Paul’s benediction to the Ephesians and made it the prologue to our prayers.

Let’s try this and begin our prayers, “Now all glory to God, who is able . . .”

Sē’lah

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(Selah is a word that appears in the Book of Psalms that I often use as the Complimentary Closing in my correspondence. Its meaning, as I use the word, is to pause and think about these things.)

These meditations are written by Alex M. Knight as he seeks the life in Christ as his way of life.  The meditations are published on the BLOG, http://seekingthelifeinchrist.blogspot.com/ and they are also distributed on the Constant Contact email server. You may subscribe to this email service by sending an email to: amkrom812@gmail.com. The BLOG is also available on Amazon Kindle, by subscription.

Publications by Alex M. Knight:

·        Seeking the Life in Christ, Meditations on the New Testament and Psalms has been published and is now available at Amazon.com in paperback and Kindle.

·        The second edition of  First Think – Then Pray is available on Amazon Kindle.

·        Meditations on The Story of My Life as told by Jesus Christ has been released as an e-book on Amazon Kindle.

Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.