Silas
Beloved of All
Your burden for parents, spouses, children, friends and others to know the Lord more deeply is a beautiful reflection of God's own heart for His family. It is right to bring them before Him and ask that He would create spiritual hunger and draw each one into real fellowship with Himself.
Scripture teaches that the battle is largely for the mind. What occupies our thoughts shapes the direction of our lives. To set the mind on the flesh brings emptiness and separation from God, but to set the mind on the Spirit brings life and peace and joy. Whatever we sow we will reap. If we sow to the flesh we reap corruption, but if we sow to the Spirit we reap life. That is why renewal is so needed. Romans 12 calls us to be transformed by the renewing of our minds, and that renewal comes as we set our minds on things above where Christ is, rather than on the worries of this life, the deceitfulness of riches, or the desire for other things that choke the Word.
Part of that renewal is learning to have the mind of Christ and to be renewed in the spirit of our minds. God wants to replace wrong thinking with truth, and to remove blindness so that His light can shine in our hearts. He does this most directly through His Word. The heavens declare His glory and all of creation speaks of Him, but He has given us the Bible as the clearest voice of His truth, and the Bible is its own best interpreter as we compare Scripture with Scripture. You do not need another book or system to understand Him. Simply reading the Bible with an open heart, waiting on the Lord, is enough for Him to teach you. Encourage your loved ones toward that simple, consistent reading, whether in print or on an app, and trust God to give understanding and to help them retain what they read.
Yet hearing is not enough. The Word warns us not to deceive ourselves by being hearers only. A hearer who does not do what the Word says is like a person who looks in a mirror and then walks away and forgets what he looks like. The blessing comes to the one who looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues in it, not forgetting what he heard but doing it. Pray that God would make your family not only hearers but doers, whose actions correspond to what they profess to believe.
This also involves what we allow to fill our minds day by day. When the mind is unoccupied it will replay what we have put into it. If we fill it with the trash of the world, that is what returns. If we fill it with worship and the things of God, those are the thoughts that will surface and shape us. The enemy seeks to capture minds through all kinds of enticements, so we need to guard our thoughts and commit our ways to the Lord, trusting that He will direct our steps as we lean not on our own understanding.
God has also placed responsibility within the family to care for one another practically and spiritually, and that family love is a picture of His larger family. As you pray for those you love and for those you guide and serve, continue to bring your requests to God with thanksgiving, trusting His promise that His peace, which passes all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
Joining with you in prayer, Father, we ask that You would grant to these parents, spouses, children and friends a true hunger for You. Give them wisdom and revelation, set their minds on Christ, and renew them in the spirit of their minds. Help them to love Your Word, to understand it, to remember it, and to walk it out in daily life. Fill them with Your love poured into their hearts by the Holy Spirit, let Your light shine where there has been darkness, and guard them from the enemy. Make them fruitful, bearing the fruit of a life sown to the Spirit, and let them know the life and peace that comes from a mind stayed on You. We ask this in the name of Jesus, who has secured victory over sin and death, Amen.
Scripture teaches that the battle is largely for the mind. What occupies our thoughts shapes the direction of our lives. To set the mind on the flesh brings emptiness and separation from God, but to set the mind on the Spirit brings life and peace and joy. Whatever we sow we will reap. If we sow to the flesh we reap corruption, but if we sow to the Spirit we reap life. That is why renewal is so needed. Romans 12 calls us to be transformed by the renewing of our minds, and that renewal comes as we set our minds on things above where Christ is, rather than on the worries of this life, the deceitfulness of riches, or the desire for other things that choke the Word.
Part of that renewal is learning to have the mind of Christ and to be renewed in the spirit of our minds. God wants to replace wrong thinking with truth, and to remove blindness so that His light can shine in our hearts. He does this most directly through His Word. The heavens declare His glory and all of creation speaks of Him, but He has given us the Bible as the clearest voice of His truth, and the Bible is its own best interpreter as we compare Scripture with Scripture. You do not need another book or system to understand Him. Simply reading the Bible with an open heart, waiting on the Lord, is enough for Him to teach you. Encourage your loved ones toward that simple, consistent reading, whether in print or on an app, and trust God to give understanding and to help them retain what they read.
Yet hearing is not enough. The Word warns us not to deceive ourselves by being hearers only. A hearer who does not do what the Word says is like a person who looks in a mirror and then walks away and forgets what he looks like. The blessing comes to the one who looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues in it, not forgetting what he heard but doing it. Pray that God would make your family not only hearers but doers, whose actions correspond to what they profess to believe.
This also involves what we allow to fill our minds day by day. When the mind is unoccupied it will replay what we have put into it. If we fill it with the trash of the world, that is what returns. If we fill it with worship and the things of God, those are the thoughts that will surface and shape us. The enemy seeks to capture minds through all kinds of enticements, so we need to guard our thoughts and commit our ways to the Lord, trusting that He will direct our steps as we lean not on our own understanding.
God has also placed responsibility within the family to care for one another practically and spiritually, and that family love is a picture of His larger family. As you pray for those you love and for those you guide and serve, continue to bring your requests to God with thanksgiving, trusting His promise that His peace, which passes all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
Joining with you in prayer, Father, we ask that You would grant to these parents, spouses, children and friends a true hunger for You. Give them wisdom and revelation, set their minds on Christ, and renew them in the spirit of their minds. Help them to love Your Word, to understand it, to remember it, and to walk it out in daily life. Fill them with Your love poured into their hearts by the Holy Spirit, let Your light shine where there has been darkness, and guard them from the enemy. Make them fruitful, bearing the fruit of a life sown to the Spirit, and let them know the life and peace that comes from a mind stayed on You. We ask this in the name of Jesus, who has secured victory over sin and death, Amen.
