A CHRISTIAN'S SUNDAY MORNING PRAYER
My Father and My God,
As one whom You have regenerated and redeemed, I believe, through the teaching of Scripture, that You: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, are the sovereign Creator, Ruler, Sustainer, and Governor of all things that You have created in heaven and on earth. It's in You that I, and all creatures, live and move and have our being. It's You, O Lord, who gives life, breath, health, sickness, riches, poverty, and everything else in this world for Your glory and the good of Your church. As one whom You have redeemed, I, and all believers, are your purchased possessions; we belong to You. You alone are God. I am finite and ignorant of so many things; You alone are infinite wisdom and You know ALL things.
Help me, Father, to trust You in times of adversity, confusion, temptation, and depression. I know that nothing happens by chance but all things come by Your Fatherly hand. Therefore, by the help of the Holy Spirit, I can be patient in adversity, even though I struggle to be calm; I can be thankful in prosperity as You richly bless me, even though I often fail to give You thanks as I ought; and for the things that are future, I can have comfort, confidence, and courage that nothing will or can separate me from Your love, since all things are so in Your hand that without Your will they cannot even move. But even in this, I get fearful, anxious, discouraged, angry, confused, and depressed.
So, Lord Jesus, I cry out to You! Help me, dear Lord! Help all your redeemed; help us trust your hand of Providence; help us have great confidence in Your wisdom in all things, especially the things we don't understand. Help us remain steadfast in the faith through difficult days. Strengthen us to faithfully walk in the way of Your Word. Fill us, Holy Spirit, with Your holy presence and Your inspired, infallible, inerrant Word. Rule and control our minds to serve You with joy, gladness, and godly resolve.
Forgive me and all Your people when we sin in our thoughts, words, and deeds, which is daily! Redirect and recalibrate our minds continually to the ethic of Scripture. Cause us to keep short accounts with You and confess our sins moment by moment. I fall so utterly short of glorifying You. Lord, I hate my sin! I hate the daily struggle against sin! I hate what sin has done to humanity! I hate that sin, my sin, eclipses Your glory and exalts man! I hate that sin, my sin, distorts Your glorious image! I hate that my sin caused You, Lord Jesus, to suffer God's wrath for my sin! O Lord, forgive me! O Lord, forgive all Your sheep in our daily struggle. Forgive me for not rightly, diligently, and daily reflecting Your glory! As the Apostle Paul declared in Romans 7:24-25, "O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? I thank God—through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, with the mind I myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin."
Thank You, dear Father, for sending Your Son, Jesus, to redeem me and a multitude of sinners from every tribe, tongue, and nation, and making us saints in Christ. Thank You, Lord Jesus, for fulfilling all the demands of the Law of God in my place, in the place of all that were given to You by the Father. Thank You for absorbing the wrath of God against all my sins, and against all the sins of all Your sheep; thank You for satisfying the justice of God on my behalf and on behalf of all Your people by Your inexpressible anguish, pains, and terrors on the cross. Thank You that Your perfect passive and active obedience merited my salvation and forgiveness! Lord Jesus, Your perfect work merited my entrance into the holy of holies, so that I come boldly into the throne of grace covered in Your righteous robes! Thank You, Holy Spirit, for applying all the benefits of Christ to my account; thank you for regenerating my soul and creating faith in my heart; thank You for breaking the power of sin in my life; thank You for Your intercession and assurance as You speak to me in and through Your Word. Thank You for illuminating my mind to Your Word of Truth! Thank You, Holy Spirit, for engrafting me into Jesus' spiritual body, the church! Thank You for the blessed virtue of forgiveness and the comforting assurance that I am and forever will remain a child of God!
O my God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, O how I love You! I want to serve You well! I want to live for You! I want to be with You! Help me, O GOD; help me persevere; keep me on the straight and narrow path; never let me go; forgive me when I sin, comfort me in trials, strengthen me in temptation, uphold me in tribulation, encourage me when discouraged for You are my Good Shepherd Who cares eternally for Your sheep. I am one of Your sheep! Tend me and "Guide me, O my great Jehovah, pilgrim through this barren land; I am weak, but You are mighty; hold me with Your powerful hand. Bread of heaven, bread of heaven, feed me now and evermore, feed me now and evermore."
I ask all this in Jesus' Name, Righteousness, and Authority!
Amen!
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LOVING ONE ANOTHER
“If someone says, "I love God," and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen? And this commandment we have from Him: that he who loves God must love his brother also.”
—1 John 4:20-21
THROUGHOUT THE BOOK of 1 John, the apostle is concerned to exhort Christians to love one another, not just in word but in action. And John emphasized this in many ways. For instance, 1 John 2:8-9 he calls us to love one another because love is what God commands. In chapter 3:14-15, John said believers need to love one another because true love is the evidence that we have been made a new creation in Christ. Love is the evidence that the Spirit of God has changed us from the inside out, from darkness to light. Jesus said to His disciples in John 13:35, “By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you love one another as I have loved you.” In 1 John 4:7-16, John argues that we ought to love one another because God is love, and God demonstrated His love by giving His Son for our redemption. Therefore, if we have been adopted into the family of God and are being conformed into the image of Jesus Christ, then we ought to love one another in the same manner that God has loved us. But John knows it’s a challenge to manifest this kind of love in the life of the church because of remaining rebellion, and so he continually exhorts believers to love one another.
“IF SOMEONE SAYS, "I LOVE GOD," and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen? And this commandment we have from Him: that he who loves God must love his brother also” (1 John 4:20-21). John is saying that our love expressed to one another as Christians demonstrates the reality of our claim to love God. It is easy to “say” you love God, but the real proof is whether you love other believers. You see, John was writing to warn the congregation against the Gnostic false teachers who said it didn’t matter how you lived –only the spiritual things mattered. Therefore, you could treat others any way you wanted, and it really didn’t matter. But John says true love is always manifested by good deeds –“If someone says, ‘I love God,’ and hates his brother, he is a liar.” In other words, if someone says he loves God yet has no love for Christians then his claim to love God is false –he’s a hypocrite. John says it even stronger, “he is a liar.”
THE VISIBLE EVIDENCE of our love for God is always demonstrated by our practical love towards other Christians in deeds of kindness, helping one another, and sharing with those in need (James 2:14-26). John makes the point very clear when he wrote the following words, “By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. But whoever has this world's goods, and sees his brother in need, and shuts up his heart from him, how does the love of God abide in him? My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth” (1 John 3:16-18). Does the direction of your life (not the perfection) demonstrate that you really love God, or do you wear the hypocrite’s mask?
Friday Devotional: May 29, 2026
In Christ,
Pastor S. Henry
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