Text: Philippians 2:1-11
Today, in response to the gospel message we’ve heard over the past eight days, let’s spend some time sitting quietly before the Lord.
Let’s acknowledge our condition,
confess our sins,
receive His grace,
rejoice in His forgiveness
and cling to the living hope that is ours in Jesus.
To guide your prayer time this morning, consider using this prayer:
Prayer of confession [for believers]*
based on Philippians 2:1-8
Lord, we come confessing.
You tell us that if we are in Christ, there is great encouragement,
comfort in love, and participation in the Spirit.
But we often lack the affection and sympathy that should be a sign of this.
We are not of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind.
Instead, we are anxious about our own ideas
and sometimes we use love to exclude instead of binding together.
We operate from a position of selfish ambition and conceit
and do not have the humility to count others as more significant than ourselves.
We look only to our own interests and not to the interests of others.
O Lord, give us the mind of Christ —
to serve one another without thought of status or position.
May we know what it is to be truly humble and emptied of self and to wholly love.
Amen.
reminder
Our next study – on 1, 2 & 3 John – will start tomorrow, February 5.
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*Used with permission from Cornerstone Presbyterian Church, Franklin, TN
I have been hearing many messages lately where humility is a large part of the theme. Needing to be reminded of this!
Praying for you Annalee!
In response to Rachel…Jesus’ main message when He was here on earth was for us to repent…I think it is very important for us to be closer to Christ to continue this practice…however we need to ignore the enemies pulls to push us into that corner and cover us with guilt…instead repent and move past it into “receiving his grace and rejoicing in his forgiveness.” “…but unless you repent, you too will all perish.” (Luke 13:3b)
Love your insight to remind us to move past the guilt we feel!
Stacey – thank you! That definitely helps. Repentance obviously is a crucial part of the Christian life, but moving past guilt and into grace brings us closer to Christ. The enemy desires for us to feel faulty, Christ desires for us to feel freedom. Thank you!
Praying for you AnnaLee. Thank you for being so honest about where you are struggling. I feel like I’m dealing with many of the same things you said, but definitely wasn’t reacting the way you did. You’ve been a blessing to me today :) thanks
Speak to me Oh Lord through SRT! My word for the year was “humble.” This prayer brought so many parallels to my life and my sins…I have trouble using love to exclude instead of bind together; to operate from a position of selfish ambition instead of humility…especially in my quest to serve The Lord and reach out to others! I focus so much on what’s going wrong around me instead of focusing on the good…and what’s funny is I am a pretty positive person…but inside my head when I am around non believers, I judge! No judging allowed here! That is for Christ to do, not me!