The Everyday Prayer

Re:Verse passage – Ephesians 5:15-21 (day three)

“And do not get drunk with wine, for that is dissipation, but be filled with the Spirit…”

Substance use makes sense as an attempt to avoid otherwise painful places of a person’s inner world. A person seeking such relief will experience shame from others. And now in addition to the internal agony the person lives with, that person must also navigate feelings of disgrace and rejection. It’s awful. Fortunately, Paul’s words here offer compassion. He acknowledges how hard the world is on a person’s heart (“the days are evil”). His words convey the understanding that people do reach for all kinds of things to ease the pain. And then he says that there is a way to the soothing you’re looking for that will not use you up like you are disposable and worthless. That way is the Spirit of God himself.

Re:Verse passage – Ephesians 5:15-21 (day two) 

speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody with your heart to the Lord; v. 19

Although the Bible study literature stops at verse 18, it should not surprise you that I am happy to include the next two verses. It also shouldn’t come as a shock that Ephesians 5:19 was a verse I learned early in my musical studies. To think that scripture was so explicit about the role of music in our daily lives,  not to mention its profound role in corporate worship, I was delighted and humbled. We were all created to sing, that is a maxim not requiring debate. Whether you sing as well as I is immaterial. God did not misspeak when he commanded his children to sing praises to him. You have breath in your lungs, and you have a voice to sing.

None of this should come as a surprise coming from a worship pastor, but I would challenge you to think of music as a barometer of your spiritual health as well. There are chapters of my life where I have struggled and felt hopeless or depressed. Times where I really struggled with my purpose. I have noticed that in those times I didn’t want to sing. I didn’t have a soundtrack running through my head, and nothing sounded right. This was a clear indication to me that I was allowing myself to drift from who and what God called me to be. Since those days I have become more mindful to listen to the music of my heart to help diagnose my spiritual health.

Your song may not always be peppy and upbeat, but allow the Holy Spirit to fill your mind, heart, and voice with the songs of Heaven to help navigate this journey. Don’t allow the adversary to steal your song.

ADDENDUM: This is already a longer post than usual, so please forgive the extra addition. Today is Election Day. I want to encourage you to pray. Not that your candidate win, but that the Lord’s will be done. Our hope cannot be tied to a person other than Jesus. If we do that and that person loses, what does that say? Jesus cannot lose. Pray that God would give you strength and courage to Love Your Neighbor more fiercely tomorrow that you did today, and may we all be secure in the purpose and plan of God.

Re:Verse passage – Ephesians 5:8-14 (day seven)

 for you were formerly darkness, but now you are Light in the Lord. vs 8

You were darkness itself. Before you were adopted as a child of the light, you were eternally separated from God with sin darkening your soul. Verses 3-7 showed us that immorality, impurity, covetousness, and crude humor are symptoms of this darkness.

Despite our best efforts to walk in the light, these deeds of darkness have a way of sneaking back in don’t they? Darkness is who we were and that past continues to have its hold on our life. We let it back in out of familiarity, thinking the taste of darkness won’t completely extinguish our light. Though it may not be extinguished, participating in such deeds causes our light to become more dim.

We need repentance to recharge our light by reaching the darkest corners of our heart, even those places where we are holding on to the familiarity of our past. Repentance allows us to personally walk in the light as children of the light to help the light to shine in the darkest parts of the world.

Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound
that saved a wretch like me.
I once was lost, but now I’m found;
was blind, but now I see.

—John Newton, “Amazing Grace”

John Newton’s life story is a powerful example of transformation. Once hardened by his role in the slave trade, he lived in spiritual darkness. But during a fierce storm, when he feared for his life, he cried out to God in desperation, and his prayer was answered. God spared him, opening his eyes to his need for grace and setting him on a new path.

Newton’s words echo the promise that we, too, can move from darkness to light. As Paul writes, “You were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord.” To live in God’s light is to see life in a new way, to embrace hope, and to walk forward with purpose. Newton’s hymn reminds us that God’s grace is always enough to turn our darkest moments into a new beginning.

No matter where we start, God’s grace meets us there, leading us to light and life.

Re:Verse passage – Ephesians 5:8-14(day five)  The NIV translates verse 11, “Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them.”  I like that picture and imagery. NOTHING!!  Not acting. Not thinking. Not looking. Not questioning. Not wondering.  When we even consider or dabble in those deeds of darkness, in a sense we “face” toward them.  Our attention moves to them.  Paul’s solution face the opposite direction. Towards God and His light and love. What compels us to do that?  The priority and passion of pleasing Him. Notice all our attention and affection move from those deeds of darkness to pleasing the Lord. We move from nothing to all. All our time. All our thoughts. All our actions. All our questions and concerns. We mentally, emotionally, and spiritually shift to learning about the Lord and His character and nature, so that we might please Him.

Re:Verse passage – Ephesians 5:8-14 (day four)

In The Great Divorce, C.S. Lewis beautifully depicts God’s light. When the narrator steps into the heavenly realm and into the light, he experiences it’s warmth and freedom, but it also makes him feel exposed. This tension of freedom and exposure runs throughout the book, and it is exactly the tension that many of us feel as we wrestle with sin.

When we get things out in the light, confessing and repenting of our sin before God and others, the truth is that we are exposed. We are vulnerable and we feel the tension of taking what was once hidden and putting it in the light. But the good news is that our vulnerability is met with the kindness of Jesus. He meets us where we are, removes our sin and shame, and replaces it with freedom.

Exposing our sin to the light is uncomfortable, the light might hurt our eyes at first. But it is the only path to freedom.

Re:Verse passage – Ephesians 5:8-14 (day three)

“It is disgraceful even to speak of the things which are done by them in secret.”

One might read this passage and conclude that it’s giving Pharisee. As in, “God, I thank you that I’m not like this person here because I don’t stoop to the level of acknowledging those shameful things.” The sense of these remarks by Paul is not the policing or surveillance of conversations people have, though, but rather the beauty and elegance of people whom God has made and who bear his image. Paul isn’t saying, “Watch your language,” but instead, “As we necessarily speak of horrific things, we remember with sorrow that with each deed of darkness the glory of a living, breathing human being is abused and disrespected.”

Re:Verse passage – Ephesians 5:8-14 (day two) 

for you were formerly darkness, but now you are Light in the Lord; walk as children of Light  v. 8

The people who walk in darkness
Will see a great light;
Those who live in a dark land,
The light will shine on them. Isaiah 9:2

This passage from Isaiah is one used every year during Advent, so you can imagine how quickly I made the connection to it. We have been neck deep in preparations for the season for quite a while now. The idea of being ‘children of light’ has always resonated with me. Paul has just reminded the readers not to rely on former ways of thinking and acting, but to be transformed by who Christ has called them to be. It is in this knowledge that light is being shone on every thought, word, and deed. We must measure everything by that light. It will be one of the distinguishing characteristics of believers in the world. It’s one of the reasons I love big bright sanctuaries. I want there to be an abundance of light to remind us that we are no longer to cower in shadows, but to live out our faith in the glorious light of Christ.