In Philippians 1:1-11, the message centers on gospel partnership, prayer, and spiritual growth. Explore Philippians 1:1–11 and discover how gospel partnership, prayer, love, discernment, and spiritual growth shape a life worthy of Christ. Rather than treating the passage as abstract theology, the sermon traces what these truths reveal about God, the gospel, and the way followers of Jesus are called to live.
A major emphasis is the believer's response to God through prayer, surrender, worship, and spiritual hunger. The message challenges passive Christianity and invites listeners to pursue God intentionally, trusting that transformation grows as we bring our desires, habits, and decisions under the authority of Scripture. The goal is a faith that moves beyond information into communion with God and obedient action.
Along the way, the message engages themes including Philippians 1:1-11, gospel partnership, prayer, and spiritual growth. These ideas help place the primary passage within the larger story of Scripture and show how its theology speaks to real spiritual formation. At its heart, the sermon helps answer questions such as: What does Philippians 1:1-11 teach about gospel partnership, prayer, and spiritual growth? It also considers how should gospel partnership, prayer, and spiritual growth shape the way Christians live?
For someone studying this passage, exploring the Christian faith, or looking for practical biblical teaching, this sermon offers a clear path from the text to everyday discipleship. The invitation is to hear what Scripture says, receive it with humility, and take the next faithful step in following Jesus.
What does Philippians 1:1-11 teach about gospel partnership, prayer, and spiritual growth? | How should gospel partnership, prayer, and spiritual growth shape the way Christians live? | How can believers apply Philippians 1:1-11 in everyday life?
Philippians 1:1-11, gospel partnership, prayer, and spiritual growth, philippians 1, 111 gospel partnership, gospel partnership, spiritual growth
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Put your seatelt on. Let's do this. We're starting a brand new series in Philippians. Uh Philippians is known to a lot of people as a book about joy. Everybody say joy. >> Rejoicing. Finding joy in tough circumstances. And if I were to ask you today with a show of hands, how many of you want joy in your life? That should be everybody. The rest of you, you're going to be depressed forever. No, I'm just kidding. Um I want joy. Do we do we want joy as a church and as as a people? Yeah. >> Come on. And and I I will say with joy, it's hard to define. It's hard to define joy because the world has tried to take it and and make it into something different. And there's a a plethora of definitions. And the the secular definition I'm going to put up on the screen for you. It says joy is the feeling of pleasure, the feeling of elation, the feeling of happiness that's based on some sort of accomplishment, success or good fortune externally. Okay? Again, this is a secular definition. This isn't a biblical definition. The downside of this definition is that joy is a feeling and joy depends on accomplishments. It depends on success or some kind of external reality or someone else or something else outside affecting you. But biblical joy is a fruit of the spirit. It's an evidence of God's working in your life, a confidence and an inner peace that comes from choosing to trust God and trust that God will fulfill his word. Isn't that good? This is the biblical definition. This is the world wants to focus on the outward. But joy truly comes from the Holy Spirit on the inside of us. For the Christian, joy has to do with the assurance that God is in control and that we can trust him completely. Church, again, we live in a world that does not produce a lot of joy. There's chaos. There's complaining. There's constant comparison. But we still we can still have joy because our God is bigger than all of that. Like I I don't know about you, but but when I go on Facebook, when I go on Instagram, when I go on any of my social media platforms, like somebody needs to help me with my algorithm a little bit because every other ad in my feed right now is some kind of supplement to help me with stress. Anybody know what I'm talking about? And there's like five I got five different ones. And what's really funny is I have three and they all have different names and but they're all from the same company. And I'm like, how is this like they're trying to they're trying to corner me? You know, like are you in a perpetual state of a midlife crisis? Are you paying off student loans for a degree that you can't get hired for? Can you afford a house when your income hasn't grown 300% with the housing market? Right? This is like the intro to all these videos. Like gas prices is climbing. Is that stressing you out? Groceries costing five times more than it was when you were getting raised as a child. Do you have brain fog? What is brain fog? Are there microlastics in your blood? Are you having trouble focusing? Then buy this supplement. Get this mood booster. Like get all these things. Like, isn't it amazing how the world wants to sell you peace and joy, >> but God gives it freely, >> I don't want a supplement. I want the Holy Spirit. >> I want the fruit of joy. If you're waiting on external situations to get right, to be joyful, you are going to be waiting a very long time. If you're waiting on the supplement to kick in, you're going to be waiting a minute. take this for 30 days. I'm sorry. All right. All right. I'm done. Again, the the all these things if you're waiting on the external, it's not going to happen. It's going to it's going to take too long. The government's not going to fix the external, but God can fix your internal. Joy for the Christian is a fruit of the spirit. The Bible says love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control are evidence of the spirit of God. Joy is connected to Jesus, not our circumstances. I'm not joyful because of my circumstances. I'm joyfilled because of the God who's over my circumstances. Y'all see the difference? I'm not joyful because of my situation. I choose joy because I trust Jesus. There's a great commentary that said, "Biblical joy is a choice to respond to external circumstances with an inner contentment and satisfaction. I trust God. I trust in God. I'm defined by God. I'm satisfied with God above all else. The world can completely fall apart, but my confidence is not in this world. It's in him. Romans 8:18 says, "For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory or the joy that is to be revealed to us." >> So joy is part of the Christian experience. >> Yes. >> But how do we get to a life of joy? It's not just like fake happiness. You ever been around somebody that they're just like smiling all the time and it kind of creeps you out just a little bit? Like, why are you so happy all the time? This can't be possible, right? And then you realize they're just like covering up for their anxiety. Like, I have to be happy. It's not faking it. It's a deep contentment that God is with us in everything. So, what are some of the decisions and practical steps to impact our joy? And we're going to we're going to dive into that for the next 10 weeks. All right. So, I know you got vacations. I know you got summer and all the things, but if you if you want to continue to walk with us in this, we we'd love for you to be a part of this series. But let me be before I get to all this, I need to kind of go through some of the history and background of Philippians. The letter to the Philippians was written around the year 62 AD about 30 years after the death of Jesus and his resurrection. It was written to a small group of house churches, not just one church like this, but many different gatherings in many different places in the city of Philippi. And it was a letter written by their founding pastor, the Apostle Paul. Paul had planted this church and he wrote this to push them to trust God and to walk in joy. And what's crazy is he wrote this from a prison cell. Some people say it's in different places, but we're we're pretty sure that it was in Rome outside the coliseum. And you can you can throw that picture up here on the wall behind me. This was his prison cell. And I don't know if you can see this because of the chair. That hole in the ground, that's his toilet. Just imagine the smells. Imagine just the the lack of of light and sunshine. Some some of the photos actually show a hole coming in through the ceiling where light may have come down in that moment. But Paul endured more suffering than any pastor or church planter that I've ever met in my life. He was physically beaten so many times. Scripture says that he lost count. He was flogged. Flogging is where they take these these big dowel rods and they just beat the the mess out of you. And they were they were actually holding him in prison asking him all of these questions, being falsely accused. And they were beating him with these rods. WHAT DO YOU KNOW ABOUT THIS? WHAT DO YOU KNOW ABOUT THAT? I DON'T KNOW ANYTHING. And they would just keep beating him and beating him and beating him. They falsely accused him. Paul had been arrested multiple times. He was chased by angry Miles multiple times. He was lied about, shipwrecked, left for dead, and yet through all of that maintained a passionate demeanor and love for God. Listen, if if Paul was following a fake religion, he probably would have quit >> a long time ago. >> If this wasn't the real deal, like Paul would have been peace, I'm out after one beating. But Paul had an encounter with Jesus. Paul loved God and had a love for God's people. His attitude was, "If I'm in prison, then maybe I should take some time to write. He wrote with honesty, with humility, with an abiding passion to choose joy." And I believe Paul's perspective should be our perspective. So, as we read this, there's some blessings right at the beginning of the scripture that Paul begins to pronounce over the Philippian church. And I believe that these are blessings for us today. If it's a blessing for the church, we are the church. Amen. >> And if we'll truly believe these blessings, I believe that they will produce joy in your life. So here we go. Philippians 1:1 says, Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus to all the saints in Christ Jesus who are at Philippi with all the overseers and the deacons. So this is again, this is not just a Passover verse where we just, oh, let's get to the good stuff. This is the good stuff. Paul selfidentifies as the author. This is important because he's an apostle. And so we know that this is from the Lord. He names his immediate disciple who is Timothy. Only apostles and disciples of apostles could write letters to the church. And that's how this ended up within the canon of the Bible. Paul is writing to the Philippian church. It's an area that's that's part of what is modernday northern Greece. You can throw that map up behind me. It's almost directly east of Rome and northwest of Jerusalem. There's Rome. That's where Paul is. And then Philippi is right up in here. And then Jerusalem is all the way down there. All right. So just think about the logistics of even just getting this letter to the Philippian church. It's kind of crazy. So backing up really quick, Paul writes to all the Christians in the church, and that's including us. And notice right out of the gate, he mentions both ends of the leadership spectrum. I know the church has like changed a lot of these names and things to mean different things, but he was talking to the overseers and the deacons. The overseers would have been the pastors or the elders, the board of the church. And the deacons are the servants, the servers, the volunteer team, those that are volunteer and helping being a part of the church. So to everyone that is a part of making church happen, this letter is for you today. This is for for all of us. And this is a honestly this is one of the most powerful pronouncements of blessing from from an apostle to the Christian church. I want you to get this. This is Philippians 1:2 says, "Grace to you and peace from God our father and from God our father and from and from the Lord Christ Jesus." I don't know why that my my It doesn't say I want to park here for just a minute. Sorry, my my scriptur is all jacked up. Grace to you and peace from God our father. Almost every single letter that Paul writes, he starts with grace and peace to you. And again, we can sometimes read that and go, okay, this this seems like a pretty standard greeting like hello, you know, like dear friends, you know, like this feels really standard. But if we can lock in on this for a second, I want you to see how how powerful this is because of two words. Grace and peace. Say grace >> and peace. >> Grace and peace are gifts from God. And if we will fully embrace the grace of God and the peace that comes from Jesus Christ, it will bring us joy. Grace is very misunderstood in the church. Grace is the power of God at work in us. and it's in work through us which helps us live for God. So Paul is saying may God's grace and power flow in you and through you inside of you and outside of you. God not only wants you to live for him but the grace of God is the power of God to live for God. We And again, we've misappropriated the meaning of this word, grace. We think often times, and we'll say this like, "Oh, I just need some grace today because I screwed up." We think grace is on the back end of a mistake, right? I cussed out my coworker or I gossiped or I got drunk or I made a mistake online. I lied. I cheated. So now I just need God's grace. Anybody been there before? Yeah, >> it's okay. I've been there, too. >> No, on the back end, you need mercy and forgiveness. >> Grace is not the same as forgiveness and mercy. >> Forgiveness and mercy is needed on the back end of the mistake. When God says, "I'm I'm not going to extend judgment to you. I'm not going to send a lightning bolt down and smite you in this moment. I'm going to put all this judgment on Jesus." That's mercy. >> Amen. Mercy is you getting to keep your job. >> Mercy is God restoring your marriage after you made a massive mistake. >> The mercy of God is on the back end, but the grace of God is on the front end. >> It empowers you to live for God. I need this grace so that I can move forward. It's it's the moving forward way that God empowers us to live in a way that pleases him. In Titus 2 11-12, it says, "For the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people." It teaches us to say no to ungodliness and worldly passions and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in this present age. Grace is the power of God to live for God. It's through Jesus actively working within us. And that should bring you some confidence in God, which brings some joy into your life. I need a little grace today. I need a little power today because in my flesh, I can't do this on my own. Right? When Paul says, "May the grace of God be on your life." Our answer should be, "Yes, I'll take it. Give it to me, Lord. I need your grace." Some of us think again that we only need grace when we mess up. But I need grace to keep from messing up. >> I want to be so filled with the power and the spirit of God that I walk in the grace of God every day in my life in a way that pleases him. And I just get to walk in this constantly. Grace, Lord, let me walk in your grace. Let me move in this way. Yeah, I'm going to need mercy because I'm going to screw up. Yeah, I'm going to need forgiveness, but Lord, let me walk in grace so that I'm not worried about sinning anymore >> because I'm living worthy of the gospel. I'm living worthy of the calling. >> I don't want grace to bail me out. I want grace to keep me out. >> So Paul says, "Grace to you." And then he says, "Peace, grace, and peace from God." In the original Greek, it's the word Irenier. It's the peace that emanates from the presence of God. It's a God- centered stillness for you where nothing can rattle you or separate you from the peaceful confidence that God is good and that God is in control. Like, I don't know about you, but that right there gives me joy. That I can walk in the blessing of his peace. Paul writes this in another letter in Romans 8:38. For I'm convinced that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor demons, neither the present, nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Church, God is pleased with you. He is for you. He's concerned with you. He loves you. And he's never rattled by the things that rattle you. And and y'all, if if this does not give you joy, I don't know what else will. That we can lean on him, that we can trust in him. Like, I I'm two verses in and I'm not I haven't even started preaching the good stuff yet. Isn't the word of God awesome? Like, what an opening line. What an opening blessing. He says, "THE GRACE OF GOD and the peace of God, let it be upon you. Let it be working within you." It's not just a cordially yours greeting. It's so much more. Grace and peace. That blessing brings peace which brings joy. And that blessing brings power which brings joy. And to start to have joy, we need to remember that we have these blessings that they're spoken over us that they're accessible to us. We remember our blessings from God. And the second thing is we need to learn to pray for others. Remember Paul was wrongfully imprisoned for a couple of years by this point in writing this letter. And he does not take this letter as an opportunity to complain to the church. That's good right there. I could just preach on that all day long. He didn't use his platform and his moment to complain about his present situation and circumstances. Because how many people are doing that now today in the church? He doesn't complain or grumble in any of his letters. And he didn't even start his prayer by praying for himself. He didn't make it about him. He wasn't, "Oh me, oh my, my life, me, me, me." No. Here's what he does. Philippians 1:3. I thank my God in all my remembrance of you always in every prayer of mine for you. Making my prayer with joy. Another translation say making my joy complete. Part of building a life of joy is choosing, get this, it's choosing to think about other people more than yourself. I actually put in my notes a little more drastically. Choosing to think about other people for once in your life. >> Stop thinking about yourself all the time. We live in a world again of trying to become somebody. Help yourself only. Be your best self. ME, MYSELF, AND I. How about you start thinking about others? Why? Because as someone who has fought depression before, the best way to stay depressed is to stay focused on yourself and what you're lacking. Like, I get depressed reading self-help books. They're supposed to help me, but I'm just thinking about myself the whole time. It makes me realize how jacked up my life is. Bro, I need Jesus. Because again, self self-focus, self-pity, it will never bring you joy. It's just going to bring you down. Even if you're focusing on the great things in your life, like I'm all about some gratitude. And we we'll talk more about that. And I and and again, we can focus on the good and like we can focus on oursel in the good and we can like I'm going to have a love me day. Anybody have one of those? We call them a treat yourself day. Treat yourself. That's from Parks and Wreck. Anybody? Yeah. You know what I'm talking about. Like I want to buy some stuff for me. Like get me a Batman suit. Like let's go. I want to I'd want to be like Darth Vader. That would be what I would want to buy for sure. Like I want to buy stuff for me, right? I want to spend time alone golfing by myself. I want to sit in a tree in the woods and wait for a deer and not shoot it. I just want to sit there and breathe by myself. Myself. Me. Myself. And I Are you getting the picture here? >> Yes. But here's the thing. Those are fleeting moments. Many times we do things to escape the reality that we're self-pied. Self-focused and insecure. But here's what's beautiful, and Paul's showing us this right now. Giving focus to others will bring you joy. Imagine Paul in prison. You can throw that throw that picture back up again of him in the prison. Imagine him for a moment leaning back against the wall and beginning to write this letter to the church and just saying, "Man, I love the church in Philippi." Man, these are my people. Like, like, bro, I I miss these people. Like, man, I miss getting coffee with Austin. Like, bro, Topeka, her cooking is so good. Like I cannot wait for the next time we have some Indian food up in here. Right. Like ah dude Ryan crushing it today. Like I love it when you sing. I love it when you worship. Just imagine Paul in this moment and he's thinking about all these people and his heart is beginning to fill up with joy that every time I think about you something shifts. I miss them so much. Sorry. I'm not sorry. I love this church. I love my church. But imagine the massive smile on Paul's face as he writes,"I thank God every time I think about you." If we would start thinking about others more than ourselves, praying for others, focusing on the good in others instead of the bad. That's a good one there. Like being critical of others is not a spiritual gift. Tell that to all the Tik Tok preachers, man. I'm telling you, God will begin to birth more joy in you if you will shift your mind away from yourself and begin to think about others. It's a heart adjustment. It's a mindset shift. We're going to get into this later in Philippians 2, but it says, "Do nothing out of selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility, consider others more significant than yourself." That's going to be a fun message, church. I'm pleading with you. Put others ahead of you. Think of others ahead of yourself. Stop being so focused on you. I'm not saying that you have to not be about yourself at all. Like look in the mirror and make sure you look okay when you walk outside. But here's the thing. Joyful people are selfless people. Joyful people are interested in others. Joyful people are focused on others. Joyful people believe the best in others. Joyful people choose to see the good and they speak blessing over others instead of gossiping and cursing. >> Then Paul gets really specific. He says in verse three, I thank my God in all my remembrance of you. In verse four, it says, always in every prayer of mine for you, all making my prayer with joy because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now. Paul keeps a good attitude with the church. His perspective is right in this moment. Like I've worked with church people for a long time. My so is my my family. And it is not easy. You're not easy. I love you all. But here's what Paul doesn't do. He doesn't highlight the negative. Like I'm I'm sure that there were fights and drama and all kinds of issues when he was starting to grow that church, but he doesn't call any of that out. He stays focused on the pl on the positive and the blessing that they are. He keeps his focus on the good that they've done. Because whether you want to believe it or not, the church has done way more good than bad in this world. Like I wonder sometimes if Tik Tok preachers and nasty church people online if they would focus more on the good of the church instead of the bad, maybe the church would be a more joyful place to be. >> You hear what I'm saying? >> Like like I know I said I'm saying Tik Tok preachers a lot. I'm so tired of all of these people online that aren't even a part of a church talking about how horrible the church is. >> Like can we have a good attitude about what God is doing here? Wouldn't it be like the enemy to come in and try to divide the church >> and bring disunityity again? Why do so many Christians even they want to scream more about the injustices of the church more than being joyful in Christ? Why do we why why are we doing this? Because true joy doesn't get as much self attention. True joy doesn't get as much self attention. Paul focused on the good that they were doing. Let me encourage you. If you want to grow in joy today, learn to focus on the good in the people in your lives and not just on your own self. Like, thank God for the good that's in your children. >> Choose to focus, choose not to focus on all the pain points. Like, I've got four kids. My wife and I the other night, we were just like overwhelmed with all of the moments from the day. Like this kid was smacking that one. This kid lit something on fire. Like it was just like, you know, and we had to stop mid-con conversation. Like I I I actually stopped this. I'm taking credit here, okay? And I was like, gosh, can we just focus on something good in them? Like cuz these kids are amazing. They really are. And God's got this. Yeah. I I I want to ship them off to another country sometimes, but they are such a gift from God. >> Y'all hear what I'm saying? >> Like I if if they weren't difficult, then they wouldn't need you in their lives. >> Because parents, you're the disciplemakers. You're the ones that need to help train and develop them. Like, thank God for the good in your marriage and not just be consumed with all the things that that they're not doing right. or that are imperfect. Because like, let's be real, that is the plot to every Hallmark movie. Betty, I'm talking to you. I love you so much. All right. The plot of every Hallmark movie is the girl has some negative issue with her current partner and then she runs off with some Christmas tree farmer with with five o'clock shadow all the time. >> You know what I'm talking about. And he's broke. He's broke. Come on. What if you would focus on the blessing of that relationship and all of the good things and watch how your heart fills with joy when they come through the door when it's do we have to have date night to let's have date night, right? Focus on the blessing of having a job instead of hating the job that you have. Focus on the blessing of having a house instead of wishing that you had your neighbor's house. Like they they wish they had my house for sure. Thank God for the resources that you have. Because again, when our perspective is off and we're ruminating in our mind on oursel, it depletes us of joy. Philippians 1 5-6. because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now. Again, the church has been has been financially helping Paul in all of his ministry that he's been doing. In verse six, I am sure of this that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ. >> There's a day of judgment coming. And here's what Paul is saying. He's saying, "I am sure of this, THAT HE WHO BEGAN THAT GOOD WORK IN YOU. >> We'll see it to completion." >> How many of y'all know that God's done some good things in your life? >> Amen. >> Guess what? He's not done. >> Somebody say that. He's not done. >> He's still got work to do. And the God who started the good thing will bring it to completion. What an amazing promise. A promise that we can hold on to. A blessing that we can we can take and we can memorize this verse that the same God that started you on this journey, the journey to living worthy, to living axios in your life, he's going to finish what he started. >> Yes, >> God's going to continue it. But notice how Paul says that I am sure of this. Some of us aren't sure. I'm not always sure. God, you I love that we sang the song. God, you led me this far and now I feel like I'm abandoned. You brought me into this moment and now what's going on? Some of us have lost our confidence in God and we've gotten self-pitiful. Again, notice I look at the Lord or I look at myself. Everything is good when I'm looking at him, but when I look at myself, I see everything around me and I'm just ready to fall. Maybe we've been complaining in our mindset. And again, we've been depleted of this joy. We're lacking joy. And I'm church, I'm trying to help you restore your joy today. Be confident in the God who's made a promise to you. This is a promise that if he started it, he's going to finish it. The God who started things in your career, in your parenting, in your company, in your marriage, he will complete good things because God doesn't just start stuff. He sees it through because he's good. Verse seven, it is right for me to feel this way about you all. because I hold you in my heart. For you are all partakers with me of grace, both in my imprisonment and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel. For God is my witness. How I yearn for you all with the affection of Christ Jesus. This is so good, so beautiful, so much love here in this moment that he's expressing towards this church. And even as I'm reading this, I I bet you all of you have forgotten that he's writing this from a prison cell. I'm just again I'm imagining Paul. He's sitting there. Throw that throw that slide up again. He's sitting there in this prison, forgetting the room that he's in thinking about this church, thinking about these people. He's forgetting the smell, the hunger, the darkness, the rats, the threats of fgging. He's just in a place of joy in prayer. It's right to feel good about the people who are a blessing to you. The people that are praying for you, who bring you joy. Listen, God will grow your love for people as you build them in prayer. I need to say that again. God will grow your love for people as you build them in prayer. As you remember the blessing that they are in prayer, God will build them up. God will build you up. And church, if you struggle with people in your life, pray for them. >> Amen. >> Begin to pray real affectionate prayers and say, "God, I hold them in my heart." I I've my dad and I have a really good friend. He says this all the time. I'm holding you in my heart. Or I'm holding this prayer of yours in my heart. He likes to say, I'm holding it in my mountain. I'm holding it with love and affection. I want this to succeed. Pray for people and let God grow your heart for them. Because I'm just being honest with you. The greatest prayers that have changed my life forever is when I'm praying for people that have hurt me. When I pray for people who have done wrong to me in my life. And it's not praying God smite them. No. I'm praying big prayers for them that God would bless them even greater than he's blessed me. That'll do a doozy on your on your heart when they hurt me and I wanted to do everything short of sin to ruin their life because honestly there was no way to truly reconcile in many of those situations. but instead realizing that I can reconcile with them in prayer. This is powerful. When I think about the pain that they caused, I start praying and believing that God is with them. I start praying and believing for great things from God for their life. Do they deserve it? Absolutely not. But it starts to give me joy because I stop drinking the poison of bitterness and anger and I set it down and Jesus floods me with joy. He floods me with love. He floods me with his presence. It releases you of self and allows for more of Jesus in your life. More of him and less of me. >> And this is so good. I there's there's actually we're on the back end of this message and in the final verses Paul has seven things that he prays for for the church and I want this to be our prayer today. It says this in verse 9. And it is my prayer that your love may abound more and more with knowledge and all discernment so that you may approve what is excellent and be so pure and blameless for the day of Christ filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ to the glory and praise of God. Notice here he doesn't give some kind of generic prayer. Like sometimes we do that like when you when you're mad at somebody and God's like, "You need to pray for them, right?" And we just we start like this. We just go, "God, would you just uh gosh, I can't think of anything good. Um would you just bless them?" Right? Just generic blessing, right, over over that person. God, whatever it looks like, whatever it sounds like. Yeah. Whatever you want to do, you know, God your will, your way, right? And we and we we Jesus juke our way out of praying for somebody, right? You're quiet because y'all do it. But when we see how specific this is, like this is this gets really intense. It's a powerful prayer that you can pray over your kids, you can pray it over your spouse, you can pray it over your co-workers, and the knucklehead that cuts you off on the interstate. Like people you strongly dislike, you can pray this for them. And there's seven things. And you can write these down. I've got them all listed here. He prays that their love abound more and more. That God praying this God would they grow in their love for you. Lord, would they grow in their love for scripture? God help them that they would grow in abundant love for people. The second thing he says, he prays that their knowledge abound. I want them to know God's word. that they would know God's will. Let them become the greatest in their field. Let them become the greatest in all that they put their hands to. He prays for their discernment, for their ability to discern good and evil from the flesh and the spirit. God, I pray that you would let them see that they're walking in victory versus walking in evil. Let them see the difference. That's his prayer. The fourth thing he prays that they approve what's excellent to have wisdom and clarity that that that you guys would not need a pastor to tell you what is right and wrong. You'll just know it because of the discerning power of his spirit within you. Amen. >> And then he prays for them to have purity. What did Jesus say in Matthew 5? Blessed are the pure in heart for they will see God. I'm praying that you walk in purity, that you walk in holiness, that you walk in a blameless life before God. This is specific, guys. He prays that they would be blameless for the day of Christ. Like again, we're all going to be judged one day. But Paul is saying this, I want you guys to walk in such holiness that God is waiting up in heaven in excitement and anticipation to judge you. where he's getting fired up for full life people to show up. Soon to be Axios church. Hey, let's go. He's excited for you to show up because of the blamelessness that you've been walking in. And the fi
