One Voice

November 24, 2017

One Voice

Then all of you can join together with one voice, giving praise and glory to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Romans 15:6

Read Romans 15:1-6

I treasured the opportunity to provide a benediction, a blessing, for my congregation as we closed our Sunday morning worship service. One of my favorite benedictions was inspired by today’s reading:

I bless you with the promises of God.

As followers of Christ Jesus

may you live in complete harmony with each other.

May you join together with one voice,

giving praise and glory to God,

the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

May God fill you completely with joy and peace

because you trust in him.

May you overflow with confident hope

through the power of the Holy Spirit.

AMEN

One voice! What does that mean? The church where Cheryl and I worship is a microcosm of our community. We cover all the political spectrums, we are straight and gay, and we are multi-ethnic, multi-racial, and multi-cultural. Before Thanksgiving, we gathered for a dinner which was followed by a Thanksgiving worship service. In the dining hall, Cheryl enjoyed chatting with a man who is in his mid-eighties, and I enjoyed watching the children run and play. We visited with a woman who had just returned from a mission trip to Guatemala, and with a man who was excited about participation in an upcoming spiritual retreat. I do love our part of the Kingdom of God.

My Takeaway: One voice? When we gathered in the Chapel for our worship service, with one voice we, as varied and different as we are, all sang together,

Now thank we all our God,

with heart and hands and voices,

who wondrous things has done,

in whom this world rejoices;

who from our mothers' arms

has blessed us on our way

with countless gifts of love,

and still is ours today.

Now Thank We All Our God

The United Methodist Hymnal

Text: Martin Rinkart; Trans. by Catherine Winkworth

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.

Copyright © 2017 by Alex M. Knight

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.