USE THE MANUAL

Colossians 1:3-14 (NRSV)

In our prayers for you we always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, for we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints, because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. You have heard of this hope before in the word of the truth, the gospel that has come to you. Just as it is bearing fruit and growing in the whole world, so it has been bearing fruit among yourselves from the day you heard it and truly comprehended the grace of God. This you learned from Epaphras, our beloved fellow servant. He is a faithful minister of Christ on your behalf, and he has made known to us your love in the Spirit.

For this reason, since the day we heard it, we have not ceased praying for you and asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of God's will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, so that you may lead lives worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, as you bear fruit in every good work and as you grow in the knowledge of God. May you be made strong with all the strength that comes from his glorious power, and may you be prepared to endure everything with patience, while joyfully giving thanks to the Father, who has enabled you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the light. He has rescued us from the power of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

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Let us press on to know the Lord.
- Hosea 6:3 (NRSV)
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I have an intricate mantle clock. When it broke, I decided to repair it myself. To replace the broken part, I removed most of the gears and then put them back in place. I did not have an instruction manual but used logic and trial and error. When everything looked correct, I wound it up. Nothing happened. No gears turned, no hands moved, no ticktock sounded.

Too often we try to figure out God in a similar trial-and-error way. We are content to define God based on opinion and experience. Mostly we end up in error. We may create an image of God as judgmental, uncaring, or irrelevant. Then we may turn away from God because we do not like what we see.

We come to know God through diligently studying and meditating on the scriptures, our manual. The greatest task to which we can devote ourselves is coming to know God. Knowing God as revealed in Christ gives us hope, meaning, and stability; and it motivates us to godliness. When we grasp true knowledge of God through the Bible, God will move in our lives with power.

Prayer: God, give us a diligent heart that seeks to know you. Amen.

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY:
The more we study and meditate on scripture, the more fully we will know God.

-- Robert La Forge (New Jersey, U.S.A.)

PRAYER FOCUS: Those who teach the Bible