ADORATION – Reflect on God’s Greatness
GOD IS OMNISCIENT Elihu says that God is the one “who is perfect in knowledge” (Job 37:16), and John says that God “knows everything” (1 John 3:20). The quality of knowing everything is called omniscience, and because God knows everything, he is said to be omniscient (that is, “all-knowing”).
Here are a few examples of God’s limitless knowledge as portrayed in Scripture:
- He knows when we sit, when we rise, and what we think (Psalm 139:1–2)
- He knows words we will say before we speak them (Psalm 139:4)
- He knows the days of our lives before we are born (Psalm 139:16)
- He knows every possible future (1 Samuel 23:11–13)
Praise God Because He is Omniscient
Praise God that he sees everyday and every moment of your life. Praise God that he knows every place you have ever been. Praise God that he knows all without striving to know. He knows because He IS omniscient not because he works to gain knowledge as we do.
CONFESSION: Confess your sins to God and receive his continued mercy.
“If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.” 1 John 1:9
THANKSGIVING: Giving thanks to God for his specific blessings in our lives.
“Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth. Worship the Lord with gladness; come before him with joyful songs. Know that the Lord is God. It is he who made us, and we are his; we are his people, the sheep of his pasture. Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; give thanks to him and praise his name. For the Lord is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations.” Psalm 100
SUPPLICATION: Bring your requests to God.
- Bring your personal prayer requests to God.
- Pray for opportunity and boldness to share the gospel. Pray by name for your friends who do not know Christ.
- Pray for Christian Challenge leaders as they gather this weekend to pray and prepare for the semester.
- Ask God to use Challenge to bring students to himself.
- Pray for yourself as you read the scriptures.
SCRIPTURE READING:
1 Corinthians 3 Christian Standard Bible
The Problem of Immaturity
3 For my part, brothers and sisters, I was not able to speak to you as spiritual people but as people of the flesh, as babies in Christ. 2 I gave you milk to drink, not solid food, since you were not yet ready for it. In fact, you are still not ready, 3 because you are still worldly. For since there is envy and strife among you, are you not worldly and behaving like mere humans? 4 For whenever someone says, “I belong to Paul,” and another, “I belong to Apollos,” are you not acting like mere humans?
The Role of God’s Servants
5 What then is Apollos? What is Paul? They are servants through whom you believed, and each has the role the Lord has given. 6 I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. 7 So, then, neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth. 8 Now he who plants and he who waters are one, and each will receive his own reward according to his own labor. 9 For we are God’s coworkers. You are God’s field, God’s building.
10 According to God’s grace that was given to me, I have laid a foundation as a skilled master builder, and another builds on it. But each one is to be careful how he builds on it. 11 For no one can lay any foundation other than what has been laid down. That foundation is Jesus Christ. 12 If anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, costly stones, wood, hay, or straw, 13 each one’s work will become obvious. For the day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire; the fire will test the quality of each one’s work. 14 If anyone’s work that he has built survives, he will receive a reward. 15 If anyone’s work is burned up, he will experience loss, but he himself will be saved—but only as through fire.
16 Don’t you yourselves know that you are God’s temple and that the Spirit of God lives in you? 17 If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him; for God’s temple is holy, and that is what you are.
The Folly of Human Wisdom
18 Let no one deceive himself. If anyone among you thinks he is wise in this age, let him become a fool so that he can become wise. 19 For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God, since it is written, He catches the wise in their craftiness; 20 and again, The Lord knows that the reasonings of the wise are futile. 21 So let no one boast in human leaders, for everything is yours— 22 whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or things present or things to come—everything is yours, 23 and you belong to Christ, and Christ belongs to God.
SCRIPTURE REFLECTION:
Do you enjoy a favorite speaker, author, blogger? Do you learn much from certain people because of the way they think, write, and craft their words? Thank God for gifting those people with the wisdom, discipline, and opportunity to study, learn and disseminate their knowledge to us. These different thinkers/communicators are a gift to the church. God multiplies their efforts as we glean from their work. Learn. Give thanks. Don’t fixate. These men and women, if they are Christ followers, are simply “servants” of God and his church. The only celebrity in the universe is God. All of creation exists to serve him. That includes those tiny and yet “God-loved” specks in the cosmos called humans who live on a tiny planet they call earth. There are no hero specks, no celebrity specks…God alone is worthy of all worship and praise and honor.