ADORATION – Reflect on God’s Greatness
GOD IS SELF-SUFFICIENT
All things are God’s to give, and all that is given is given by Him. He can receive nothing that He has not already given us.
Acts 17:24-28
The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by human hands. 25 And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything. Rather, he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else. 26 From one man he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands. 27 God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us. 28 ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’ As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’
Praise the Self-Sufficient God
You rely on God for everything. Praise Him because He is self-reliant. Praise Him that He gives freely. Confess your reliance on Him.
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: Bringing our requests to God.
- Bring your personal prayer requests to God.
- Pray for those in your life who do not know Christ. Ask God to give you opportunity to have gospel conversations and to build trust with them.
SCRIPTURE READING:
James 5:1-11 – New Living Translation
Look here, you rich people: Weep and groan with anguish because of all the terrible troubles ahead of you. 2 Your wealth is rotting away, and your fine clothes are moth-eaten rags. 3 Your gold and silver are corroded. The very wealth you were counting on will eat away your flesh like fire. This corroded treasure you have hoarded will testify against you on the day of judgment. 4 For listen! Hear the cries of the field workers whom you have cheated of their pay. The cries of those who harvest your fields have reached the ears of the Lord of Heaven’s Armies.
5 You have spent your years on earth in luxury, satisfying your every desire. You have fattened yourselves for the day of slaughter. 6 You have condemned and killed innocent people, who do not resist you.
7 Dear brothers and sisters, be patient as you wait for the Lord’s return. Consider the farmers who patiently wait for the rains in the fall and in the spring. They eagerly look for the valuable harvest to ripen. 8 You, too, must be patient. Take courage, for the coming of the Lord is near.
9 Don’t grumble about each other, brothers and sisters, or you will be judged. For look—the Judge is standing at the door!
10 For examples of patience in suffering, dear brothers and sisters, look at the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord. 11 We give great honor to those who endure under suffering. For instance, you know about Job, a man of great endurance. You can see how the Lord was kind to him at the end, for the Lord is full of tenderness and mercy.
SCRIPTURE REFLECTION:
As we live the “already/not yet” time between the advents of Christ, we experience a real tension. Our hearts long for justice to be done, even though we know that we rightly deserve to be judged ourselves. As we experience life in the Kingdom of God now in part, we are being changed, but are not yet fully changed. How do we deal with this tension? What does it look like to honor God in this already/not yet Kingdom? We can take a clue from farmers. They wait for the soil and the rain to collaborate in delivering life giving crops, but the farmer doesn’t just wait, he works. This is grace and grit together. The soil producing food and the clouds delivering rain are “common” grace gifts of God. The famer can do nothing to force the soil or the clouds to give up their gifts; he can only wait in patient endurance. However, the patient farmer is not waiting passively. He works the soil, he plants the seeds, and he watches for weeds. He is actively patient. We too must actively wait on God. In this already/not yet kingdom we take decisive and consistent action to obey God and do what we believe he has called us to do. As we take these faithful actions, we must not become anxious and demanding, believing that somehow it all depends on us. We must balance action and patience, or trusting and obeying. To lose our grip on either of these things is to quickly lose our balance in the world.