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Ephesians 1:22-23
Pastor Stephen Lauer
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Episode Transcript
[00:00:03] Now, as we turn once more to hear from God and His Word, let's approach him and seek his help together in prayer.
[00:00:13] O God, our King, we thank youk that in youn we have all of our needs met. We thank youk that yout have drawn us to yourself, that we can know youw and that we can have freedom from the things that oppress us from our sin.
[00:00:30] And we can have a confidence that you will bring us through this life, and that you will bring us one day into glory.
[00:00:39] And that you will carry us through every trial and every problem, every pain and difficulty, whether you take it away in this life or whether we continue to have to experience it. Yet you are with us and you will bring us through that.
[00:00:54] And for that we give thanks.
[00:00:56] But we confess our Father that we have doubts, we have worries, we have unbeliefs, and we have all sorts of things that turn our eyes away from you and onto things that then begin to trouble us.
[00:01:16] And we lose sight of your promises and of all that you offer us.
[00:01:23] So God, as we come to your Word now, we ask that you would grant us the spirit of wisdom and understanding, that by his power we would be drawn to know the hope of our calling, all that yout offer us in this life and in the life to come. That our hope that we would, by your Spirit, know it, understand it, and hold fast to it.
[00:01:56] We ask, too, that you would open the eyes of our hearts, that not just our minds would know with certainty and sureness, but that our hearts in all the fullness, all the areas of our hearts, knowledge, will, emotions, desires, that you would open the eyes of our hearts so that in all of these areas we might be drawn to know the riches that yout give us in Christ.
[00:02:30] And we ask too, that as yous do these things, we might know Christ and His power, the power that yout are working in him and through, through Christ in us for our salvation, that we might go from your presence, confirmed in these things, strengthened and ready to serve you.
[00:02:50] Bless us and be with us as we consider your word together. For Jesus sake. Amen.
[00:02:57] We're going to read now From Ephesians, chapter one. Our sermon text will be verses 22 and 23.
[00:03:04] We will begin reading in verse 17.
[00:03:11] Ephesians 1.
[00:03:14] I'm sorry. We'll begin reading in verse 15 and read through verse 23.
[00:03:21] Hear God's word. For this reason, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints, I do not cease to give thanks for you. Remembering you in my prayers that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe according to the working of his great might, that he worked in Christ when He raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age, but also in the one to come.
[00:04:32] And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.
[00:04:48] Please be seated.
[00:05:01] I want to look this evening, especially at verses 22 and 23, where the Holy Spirit tells us that the Father gave the Lord Jesus Christ as head over all things to the church and that Christ is head of the church.
[00:05:20] We talk about that because it's found in a number of places in the Bible. But we don't speak too often of maybe in our normal language every day English, of people being the head or someone being the head. Maybe the headmaster of a school.
[00:05:37] Maybe you might say someone's the head of a department.
[00:05:42] Those might be some places we know. This idea of someone being the head, you might know those from one that's maybe a little closer to what the way Paul's using the word head here, head of the church is. When we talk about people being the head of state.
[00:06:00] Now that's a big grown up term, not a kid term. To be the head of state means that you're the president or that you're the king of a country.
[00:06:09] You're the guy on top. You're the guy in charge of everybody and everything.
[00:06:14] You hold the power in that nation or that country.
[00:06:20] You rule over everybody and everything. You're the head of state and you represent the nation. You act on its behalf. Maybe you act in diplomacy to make peace. Maybe you act in war to defend your country.
[00:06:36] That's what a head of state does, and he rules over the country itself to care for the people, to make sure that there's justice and order, that people can live their lives in a peaceful way and conduct their business and so forth. That's what heads of state do.
[00:06:54] That's kind of similar to the way Paul is using the word head, though, we'll see. He says more than that in the morning service sermons. We've been learning about the kings of Israel. God gave Israel King Saul and then he gave Israel King David.
[00:07:12] And then eventually, maybe we'll get to King David's sons.
[00:07:17] King David and King Saul were the heads of state for the nation of Israel.
[00:07:22] And the story as we've been learning about it in Samuel, and if you remember, the Book of Judges, illustrates just why it is that nations need a head of state or king.
[00:07:35] When God gave Israel Saul and then David, Israel was in a sad state of affairs. She had all kinds of problems from without enemies that were coming and oppressing her, like the Philistines. If you remember the story of Goliath.
[00:07:52] Goliath and the Philistines would come and wage war. They would come and raid the Israelites, steal their crops, take Israelites away as slaves and so forth. They caused all kinds of trouble for the nation of Israel. And then, of course, the people of Israel had all kinds of problems.
[00:08:10] The biggest problem, of course, was that they wouldn't worship and serve the Lord their God the way they were supposed to. They would go worship idols. But they had other problems. They fought with each other. They lied, cheated and stealed. All kinds of problems all over Israel.
[00:08:26] Israel needed a head, a king, and God gave them Saul. Of course there were problems with Saul, but then he gave them David, a king, a man who was a man after God's own heart. And he came and he saved Israel from all her enemies. He put, put down the Philistines, put down that threat. And then he went and waged war against the Ammonites and all the other nations around Israel that they had trouble with. And he gave Israel peace, peace and safety. He was their deliverer from their enemies without.
[00:08:59] But he also established justice and order for Israel within.
[00:09:07] David was just the kind of king that Israel needed to deal with her weaknesses and her problems. He was her head as a king or head of state. Now you can see then how kings or heads of state are very useful for human beings. We have all kinds of problems. We don't rule ourselves. We cause trouble. And then other people around us cause trouble for us. And we need a good ruler, king or head of state that will deal with our problems and protect us.
[00:09:41] Here in Ephesians 1, Paul is teaching us about how salvation, the deliverance that we have from our sin and from our enemies in this world, and the salvation that culminates in the eternal inheritance, eternal life, how that whole salvation depends not on us, but upon God and what he does. That salvation and deliverance is not something we do, but it's something God does, that it's a gift, we use the word grace, that it's gracious. The whole of this first chapter is, is in various different ways. Paul showing us that our salvation doesn't depend on us, but it depends on God and what he does for us in Jesus Christ. And here at the very end of the chapter, Paul tells us that God has given us a head or a king ahead of the church, Jesus Christ, and that our salvation depends on him and on him alone, what he does for us as our king and head.
[00:10:54] Put another way, negatively, God hasn't given the church a human head or a human only head. You might say a man who is only a man. Jesus is the God man. He hasn't given us a man like David who was a good king but had failures.
[00:11:12] He didn't give us a bad king like Saul.
[00:11:16] He didn't give us a president like one of the modern day heads of state. He didn't give us President Trump or one of the other presidents who might be wise at times, who might be a failure at times. He didn't give us a human king or head.
[00:11:32] He didn't even give us a head like the Church of Rome claims he didn't give us a bishop in Rome who's the head of the, the visible Church, the only head of the church of Jesus Christ. Its only king and savior and deliverer is Jesus Christ himself.
[00:11:52] Christ is your head and your king. We're going to look at what the Holy Spirit through Paul says about Christ being our head. First, as we look at the power of our head, the power that Jesus has as our head.
[00:12:05] Secondly, that Jesus is the head who's given for the church the power of the head head for the church.
[00:12:14] And then thirdly, how Jesus is the head of the body.
[00:12:19] I'll add something there, that Christ is the head not just for the church, but of the church as his body.
[00:12:26] So first, the power of Christ our king and head.
[00:12:37] Paul's prayer here, this section that we read beginning in verse 15, Paul tells us how it is that he's praying for the Ephesian Church. You've come to know Jesus, you have faith in him, you have salvation. But I'm praying that you would come to know more. You need to grow in your faith.
[00:12:56] And he prays for several things, but the last thing he prays about, prays for in verse 19 is that the church that we, the church would come to know the immeasurable greatness of God's power toward us who believe.
[00:13:14] Paul prays that we would know the greatness, just how great God's power is for us who believe.
[00:13:25] Now, if we need to know more about something, it means that maybe we don't know enough about it.
[00:13:31] Right?
[00:13:33] That's kind of obvious.
[00:13:35] But if we need to know more about God's power, it's safe to infer, especially his power, that God is working in us who believe.
[00:13:44] It's, I think, safe to infer that the reason we need to know more about God's power working in us is because we are weak.
[00:13:55] We don't have the power to work our own salvation in ourselves. And so we need to know more about God's power working in us.
[00:14:06] And we'll keep that in mind as we work through this section, that we need to know more about Christ's power, God's power working in us for our salvation because we're weak.
[00:14:20] Paul's prayer let's look at this here.
[00:14:23] Because this whole idea of Christ being our head connects back to knowing about God's power.
[00:14:32] He prays in verse 19 that we would know the immeasurable greatness of God's power toward us who believe according to the working of his great might, that he worked in Christ when He raised him from the dead and when he seated him at the Father's right hand in the heavenly places.
[00:14:49] Paul says, I pray that God would reveal to you so that you believers would know more about God's power, His power that's working in you.
[00:15:01] And then he points to where we would see that power, not looking inward, interestingly enough, not looking at examples of that power specifically in ourselves. But he says, now I want you to know more about this power, and you're going to see that power at work, the power that's at work in you. You're going to see it displayed as God revealed it working in Jesus.
[00:15:29] How do we know? How then do we learn more about God's power working in us, especially as we see it displayed in how God works in and through Jesus, our Savior? You see what Paul is saying there?
[00:15:42] And that's the framework for why it is that he brings up Christ and Christ is our head and king.
[00:15:52] Specifically.
[00:15:54] He lists two things, two ways in which God displays the power that he's working in us. He displayed it by raising Christ from the dead and in exalting him to the Father's right hand and giving him the power over all things. Those two things in his resurrection and in his exaltation and his enthronement in heaven, making him the head over all things. It's of course, then the second of those two, not the resurrection, but his ascension and his becoming king over all things, head over all things. That second idea that we're going to be focusing on here.
[00:16:31] So as we look at the power that Christ as our head has, we see that it's his headship, his power over all things.
[00:16:45] What kind of a power does Jesus, our king, our head, have over all things?
[00:16:53] We think of earthly kings. They have a power over lots of things. King David had a power once he was on the throne in Jerusalem. He had a power to reign over Israel. How did he exercise that power?
[00:17:07] Over what did he reign? Well, certainly he didn't reign over everything in the world. It was just over the nation of Israel, over the people that were under him, who God had placed him there to care for.
[00:17:21] And you couldn't even really say that David reigned over all things in Israel.
[00:17:28] He didn't reign over, as it were, every single grasshopper and, you know, everything that was happening in every Israelite home.
[00:17:39] He had a kind of legal reign. He could pass, he could make laws, he could enforce God's laws, and he could exercise his power through force, right through teaching people and then through force instructing them in the right way to live, trying to lead them in that. Then when they wouldn't follow it, he could use soldiers or policemen to enforce his reign. That's the kind of power that earthly kings have.
[00:18:03] It's through the rule of law and through external means to enforce those laws. What kind of a power does King Jesus have over all things when he reigns as head of the church?
[00:18:18] Verse 19 and 20 tell us this.
[00:18:22] The power that the Father works in Christ, when he raised him from the dead, seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age, but also in the one to come.
[00:18:37] The Father seated Christ the Son at his right hand.
[00:18:43] Now, does God have a right hand or left hand?
[00:18:47] Does he have a body?
[00:18:49] No, God doesn't have a body. We know that God is a spirit.
[00:18:53] So when it speaks of God's right hand, it's imagery. It's the idea that when God is reigning on his throne, it's like a king who sits on a throne and he places his trusted advisor or his co regent at his right hand. And that person reigns with him and exercises his power and his Authority in his kingdom, in an earthly kingdom in say, David's time, the king might have someone who helped him in his reign, who sat at his right hand.
[00:19:27] And anything that that adviser or co regent did would be an act of the king. And so he would exert the power and authority of the king as though he were the king himself. That's the imagery here that we're getting. When he says that Christ Jesus is at the right hand of the Father.
[00:19:46] That is to say that Jesus is at the right hand of the throne of heaven and that he's reigning and exercising authority over all of heaven and over everything that God as the king of heaven and earth reigns over, that is to say, all things.
[00:20:05] What is the nature of Christ's power and authority as our head?
[00:20:10] He has God's authority as the Creator, right? As the one who made everything.
[00:20:18] God has power and authority over everything.
[00:20:21] He can create, he can destroy, he judges and he can be merciful and forgive.
[00:20:28] Jesus has that full divine power over his creation, sitting at the right hand of the. Of the Father.
[00:20:39] This is then the nature of Christ's authority as had over the Church. He has power over everything, Everything because he has the divine power of God.
[00:20:53] What is the extent of his authority? Well, we keep saying everything, so obviously everything he's made all the stars, all the planets, all, all the things of the physical creation, but also all of the people, especially in this creation. Christ has power over all men.
[00:21:12] But Paul singles out a list of things. He talks about powers and principalities, authority and dominion and every name that is named.
[00:21:25] What is he talking about there?
[00:21:28] These are powers and principalities in the heavenly places.
[00:21:35] Which rulers are these? It's not referring to the earthly rulers, it's referring to heavenly authorities who, as it were, sit and exercise some kind of power in heaven.
[00:21:47] Who is this? These are the angels whom God has created who exercise his authority under Him. When God created the world, He. He also created angels. And as we read through the Bible, we find that God uses the angels as his agents, his messengers, to exercise his authority in various parts of the creation, to do all sorts of things.
[00:22:14] The angels are far exalted above earthly powers, earthly kings. What Paul is saying here is that Christ has authority over the most exalted of rulers, rulers and powers, the angels themselves, whom God uses directly to exert his power and authority in the creation.
[00:22:33] How far does Christ's power extend? Not just over physical things and people, but over everything, including the most exalted of angels who do God's will in other words. Jesus is holding God's providential power, the power by which God governs everything in the universe, he even the spiritual beings.
[00:22:56] There is nothing which is not under Christ's headship or reign.
[00:23:03] Finally, we note Christ's greatness.
[00:23:06] There's no power greater than God.
[00:23:09] And if it's God's power that reigns over everything created, then it must be the greatest power of all. And Paul calls it an immeasurable power, a power that you can't measure in any way.
[00:23:25] Christ as our head and King has nothing standing in his way.
[00:23:30] There's no power or authority that can oppose him.
[00:23:34] But Christ will bring it under his feet.
[00:23:39] You see Jesus as the head over his people, the Savior of his people, greater than all spiritual and all earthly power. Powers greater than our president, greater than every head of state.
[00:23:53] He rules. Not just the good angels, but of course by inference also the evil angels, the fallen angels and the devil.
[00:24:02] That's a comforting thought for those who know Christ.
[00:24:07] Christ is the one who died for you, his church.
[00:24:11] The one who has power over everything, over your heart, is the one who gave Himself for you.
[00:24:20] He's on your side.
[00:24:22] The Father has given all things into his hands so that he can exercise it for you. And that's our second point, that Christ is head for the church. He's the King for you, his people.
[00:24:38] A king is supposed to rule on behalf of his people. This is supposed to be true of all authority, whether it's parents in the home, whether it's teachers in the classroom, whether it's the state governor, the president.
[00:24:52] All authority is given not for the sake of those who rule, but it's given for the sake of those who are led or ruled.
[00:25:02] In King David, you see a good example of this. He uses the authority God gives him to protect, to defend his people, to provide for them, to order everything so that justice and righteousness would flourish in Israel.
[00:25:18] You've been looking at a bad example in King Saul.
[00:25:21] God gave him authority to care for his people, to lead them.
[00:25:25] And what does he do?
[00:25:28] He's selfish, he's weak.
[00:25:31] Eventually he becomes paranoid.
[00:25:34] And when God says, I'm going to give David as a good king to my people Israel, what does Saul do in his selfishness? Instead of being delighted that God would reign over his people through somebody better, he tries to kill God's good provision in David.
[00:25:50] He's a self serving king.
[00:25:53] He uses authority for his own selfish ends. But the Father gave the Son Jesus. And as our head for us, he gave him for us. That means his rule is a good thing.
[00:26:08] If we've experienced bad leadership or bad authority in our lives, it might be a little terrifying to think of someone being head over us who has all the power in the world.
[00:26:20] And yet that's not so with Jesus. We need not be terrified of Him. He is head over for our sakes, for our good.
[00:26:29] How can we know this?
[00:26:33] We can know this because the one who exercises all authority in heaven, on earth for us, gave Himself for us.
[00:26:44] He went to the cross for you.
[00:26:49] He suffered and died for you.
[00:26:52] And God gave him that authority for you, so that he would care for you, protect you, defend you, deliver you from all evil.
[00:27:04] He who died for you will never misuse the authority has, but only use it for your good.
[00:27:12] And consider how he uses authority.
[00:27:15] Earlier in chapter one, this Ephesians, chapter one, Paul tells us that the Father has blessed us with all of the blessings heaven has to offer, all of it. He's blessed us in Christ, our hand just about anything good, not just about, but everything. And anything good that you can think of that the Bible promises comes to us in Christ. And Christ uses his authority to to give those good things to us.
[00:27:48] That includes the gift of the Holy Spirit, the down payment and seal of your eternal inheritance. How can you know that you're saved? Because the Spirit's working in me. He assures me I have faith in Christ and in him eternal life.
[00:28:04] I deal with struggles with my sin.
[00:28:08] What's the answer? That Jesus is working in me as my King, to subdue my heart, to take away those sinful desires and to fill me with joy and love and peace.
[00:28:21] All of those things come from Jesus, our head and king. That's how he uses his authority for you.
[00:28:29] He is head for the church.
[00:28:34] Finally, Paul tells us that Christ, who is head of the Church, is head of the Church, which is his body.
[00:28:46] The church is his body.
[00:28:49] Now, here we find that we diverge from that idea of the king being a head of state. And we find something more, something bigger, something deeper, something that has even more power than a kingly power. You might say he is the head of the body, a king.
[00:29:11] When we think of a king and his power, we think of legal authority. We think of coercion, right?
[00:29:18] When the king has to get something done and people don't listen, he sends the police or he sends the soldiers and they force people to do things.
[00:29:27] But here Paul signals to us that Jesus headship for us is great as a king's headship, but it's something greater and something More wonderful.
[00:29:38] It's not just an external legal thing. It's like a head's relationship to the body.
[00:29:45] What's going on here? Well, just think about the metaphor there.
[00:29:50] The Bible tells us in 1 Corinthians 12 and in other places that we are members of the body of Christ.
[00:30:00] In other words, that every believer, every one of Jesus shape that he's drawn to himself and given the gift of faith, has become a member of Christ's body.
[00:30:12] That implies that we're parts of a whole, and that whole is all connected to Christ, the head.
[00:30:21] There's a union or a connection that every believer shares with Jesus as our head.
[00:30:29] Something that's deeper, greater, and far more wonderful than just someone ruling by the rule of law.
[00:30:37] It's not just a legal, contractual thing.
[00:30:40] This is a relational thing.
[00:30:44] Yes, Christ has all authority in heaven and on earth and is head over all things. But insofar as we have a relationship with Jesus, it's not just a legal one one, it's a relational one. It's a personal one, we might say, like a body in its head. It's an organic one, the head in the human body, the head governs the body, doesn't it?
[00:31:10] Our head, our mind, directs the body where it should go. It makes sure that the body is provided for. Right?
[00:31:18] You in your mind decide to eat, to protect, to clothe and to care for the body.
[00:31:25] You do that because there's a unified whole. And we have the same idea here. Jesus is connected with us, his church. And because of that connection, he cares for us, he loves us, he provides for us. And like the body, has a nervous system that flows from the head, that innervates and governs the body. Christ as head of the church, indwells his people through His Spirit.
[00:31:54] He gives us life through His Spirit. He guides our hearts and directs us through His Spirit. He gives us faith through the working of His Spirit.
[00:32:03] And when he causes us to obey him when he rules and governs in our hearts, it's not a negative, external, coercive thing.
[00:32:15] It's by His Spirit as He moves our hearts to want and desire the good things that he calls us to.
[00:32:25] Just like our hands and feet don't resist when we move them in a healthy body, right? They move freely as the head directs. In a similar, analogous fashion, Jesus guides, governs and directs us by his spirit and word.
[00:32:45] Paul later is going to talk about how Christ, as our head, gives a growth that comes to the body so that we grow spiritually as his spirit indwells Us. And power flows from him through the Spirit to us.
[00:33:03] That's a relationship that no earthly king has with his subjects.
[00:33:09] Even the best and wisest of earthly kings can't claim any of those wonderful things that you have with Christ. Your head.
[00:33:19] Paul had something peculiar here. We've already hinted at it in the analogy of head and body. But he adds that the Church, which is Christ's body.
[00:33:31] He adds one more thing. He says it's the fullness.
[00:33:36] The Church is his, that is Christ's fullness.
[00:33:42] Now you may remember when we read from Colossians chapter 1, in Colossians 1, he said that Christ was the fullness, that God dwelled fully in Christ. Here he's saying something different, a different kind of fullness. He says that the Church is the fullness of Christ as our Savior and Head, not as the Son of God in himself, but as our Savior, as the God man united to his Church. The Church is the fullness of Christ.
[00:34:15] There's something about the Church here that completes Christ.
[00:34:20] You might think of it this way.
[00:34:22] Without the Church, Christ's saving work isn't completely complete in this sense. Not that he needs us for his own sake, but he needs us so that he can fulfill and complete his work as our Savior and Mediator. And in that sense, we are his fullness.
[00:34:44] That's wonderful. No earthly king can claim that of his people, that somehow he has full and he has fulfilled the by his people.
[00:34:58] But flip it around.
[00:35:00] If the Church is the fullness of Christ, then Christ, with all authority in heaven, on earth, reigning from the right hand of God in heaven, will not rest until all of the members of his body, the fullness of the Church, is drawn to Himself and united with Himself, the head.
[00:35:23] We're weak.
[00:35:26] He is strong.
[00:35:28] We stray.
[00:35:29] He brings us back, we wander.
[00:35:34] He calls us to Himself and he does so, uniting us to Himself by His Spirit through faith.
[00:35:42] This is a wonderful king and head that God has given us. One who will not rest until all is done. That we as a church are complete and complete Him.
[00:35:53] And that final, that very last phrase kind of seals it. This whole chapter is about, we said, screwing into our minds that salvation is of God and not of us. That it all hangs and depends on Him. And Christ's headship, His kingship over the Church. That's what this is about.
[00:36:14] If the Church is the fullness of Christ, if there's this way in which the Church, as it's drawn to Christ, completes him, Paul wants to remind us one last time.
[00:36:29] The Church's fullness doesn't depend on us. It doesn't depend on you and me and our doing anything for our salvation.
[00:36:38] The fullness of the Church depends on Christ, who fills all in all.
[00:36:45] There may be a sense in which we complete Christ, but we only complete Christ as he fills us and draws us to Himself.
[00:36:55] That's what Paul was saying here as he enters each of the members of his body, each one of his people, by his spirit drawing them to himself.
[00:37:07] Then there's one unified body that fills and completes him.
[00:37:14] There you have it. Christ, his head. I think we've kind of drawn out maybe, and you might say beat to death every word in these two verses.
[00:37:24] But you have a picture here of a head who is greater than any earthly head in every imaginable way, in the nature of his power and its extent, how far it goes, how wonderfully and marvelously he works, how committed Jesus is to the salvation of his people, all of this.
[00:37:46] So the question is, do you know this Jesus?
[00:37:51] If salvation depends upon him and upon being united to him as head, do you know Him? Do you sustain this relationship as members to a head, members of the body to the head?
[00:38:07] Christ is calling you.
[00:38:09] Come to Me. We heard it this morning. Come to me. All who are weary and heavy laden. All of your weakness, all of your problems, all of your struggles, all of your sin, everything that tears you from others, that keeps you alienated from God, Christ says, you have all of that, but I have what you need. Come to me. Find rest and peace in me.
[00:38:34] And we can say with Paul, Jesus is saying, I will fill you and complete you and perfect your salvation. Let's pray.
[00:38:43] O Lord our God, we see two things at once as we contemplate your Son and what you have done in him for your church.
[00:39:00] We see how marvelous he is. We see how wonderful and loving you are.
[00:39:05] But we also see how far we have to come.
[00:39:11] If his power needs to be infinite and immeasurable in order to save us, which it does, then we acknowledge that we are utterly incapable and powerless to save ourselves.
[00:39:25] So we acknowledge freely our God, our weakness, our frailty in every area, whether it be in our relationships and how we treat others, whether it be on our own, as we live selfishly and pursue our own aims, or whether it be our ignoring you, doubting you, denying you, or whatever our failings.
[00:39:53] Father, we confess freely our weakness and our sin.
[00:39:57] But we thank you that you have sent your Son, that we in him might be made complete.
[00:40:06] And in that we rejoice.
[00:40:08] We thank you that you promised to freely give us all things in Christ your son.
[00:40:13] So we come and we seek from your hand the many things that we need.
[00:40:19] We ask, oh God, for our physical bodies that you would sustain, heal them. That you would grant us strength for this week to serve you and all of our colleagues. We ask that you would be with us who are in school or who are teachers as we finish up this school year.
[00:40:39] We ask that you would grant us great joy in learning about you and your creation, and that as we finish the school year, we would give a good account for what we have learned.
[00:40:49] We ask your blessing on those who are going through a season of change, those who may be graduating and moving on to work or to more schooling, bless and be with them.
[00:41:01] We ask that you would bless those who may be moving for a new job or for other reasons. Lord, we ask that you would give them all they need, oversee all the details and go with and before them.
[00:41:14] We ask that you would be with those who are single, that you would comfort them and be near them.
[00:41:23] Those who are aged, we ask that you would sustain them, heal their bodies, comfort them in their aches and pains, grant them good rest each day. We ask, O God, that you would provide for all of our needs as you promised to do in Christ Jesus, in whose name we pray. Amen.
