Love Notes

Based on Jeremiah 11:1-12:17, Psalm 118:13-14, Proverbs 27:8, Colossians 4:1-18.

What a mess, LORD,  we have made Your world! The whole land is desolate because we have forsaken our heritage and turned Your truths upside down, and no one takes You to heart. Thus we, who belong to the You, continue earnestly in prayer, being vigilant in it with thanksgiving, fervently seeking Your wisdom to walk by Your Spirit toward those who are outside, who are do not yet know Your will, O GOD. We weep because for they are like we were once: lost but not yet  found.

Why do the wicked prosper? And why O GOD, are You so often near in the mouth but from from the heart?I feel like Jeremiah, who heard You talk about the Green Olive Tree whose branches are broken. Then I remember how violently I was pushed -- in order that I might fall, in order that You might help me when I called for You, in order that You might become my salvation.

Thank You for the ministry we have received in Christ, O GOD, and help us by Your Spirit to fulfill it. Open to us a door for You to speak through us the mystery of Christ as we ought to speak. May our speech always be with grace, seasoned with salt, and may we know how we ought to answer each one. Help us walk in wisdom, redeeming the time and laboring fervently in prayer for those who are blinded or deceived, plundered, or put to pain that does not profit.

In Your name, O LORD, we will bear witness, both reading and being Your epistles! Retrieve the lost and wandering ones, O GOD, that they might fulfill all You desire for them to receive in You! Hear hear us say again today, as the psalmist wrote s long ago, "The LORD is my strength and my song; He has become my salvation."

This photograph is by Kristofer Rowe.