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How can we thank God enough for you in return for all the joy that we feel before our God because of you? Night and day we pray most earnestly that we may see you face to face and restore whatever is lacking in your faith. Now may our God and Father himself and our Lord Jesus direct our way to you. And may the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another and for all, just as we abound in love for you. And may he so strengthen your hearts in holiness that you may be blameless before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his saints. (1 Thessalonians 3:9-13)
May this be a terrific Tuesday for you, dear Friend! May time spent with God be the blessing you have been seeking. May we be open to listening to the Lord as we go about our day. May the busyness of our days not cloud our thinking or hearing, for God speaks to us daily!
We just went through a special day of giving thanks to God for all we have received. What made that day special for so many was the fact that we were visited by family and friends that we couldn't wait for them to arrive. In our house, news of no school for our grandchildren made us excited with the thought that their arrival might be sooner than later. Trips to the grocery store reflected we were to have children in our home (actually it made the cashier wonder just what troops we were hosting at our place!). The sound of the car doors opening completed our joy knowing the children and grandchildren were here! This is what Advent is like as well. We have the promise of Christ's second coming and the joy of celebrating His first visit to the earth; we combine the preparation for both as that special season we are in, Advent. Part of Paul's joy was the experiences of being with those whom he loved worshipping. For him there was nothing like "face to face" visits and chances to talk about faith and how it may grow among us. And there would be nothing better than to be present in person and experience love that has grown both for God and for each other. And, Paul adds, "And may He so strengthen your hearts in holiness that you may be blameless before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all His saints." Being together in worship and faith communities, learning and praising God together serves to make us stronger and we pray, holier before God. True worship would also allow us to confess our sins to the Lord and to become more holy and blameless before Him.
Our time away from our church in Gonzales made us appreciate more the brief time we spent in worship this Sunday. People took time to come and greet us and even share how they missed us and thoughts they had had about events in their lives made them think of us. One dear brother stayed up super late watching the A&M-LSU game and he wondered what I would have said about it before prayer time. I added, it would have been before the offering time! Such is a loving community that blesses me and I pray blesses others. More importantly I pray it makes us stronger, holier, and purer before God and each other, for we affirm what we will certainly say during our Communion ritual this Sunday, "Christ will come again." We should add, "And I shall be ready!"
PRAYER; Loving Father, for those with whom we worship, we thank You. We are blessed by the love and fellowship that strengthens our faith and our hearts before You. We pray that today, right now, the cleansing we need from our sins would begin so that we may truly know that before You, we are blameless and holy. This we pray in Christ Jesus' strong name, amen.
Have a great and blessed day in the Lord! Live a life that is holy and blameless by imitating the life of Jesus!
Eradio Valverde
