Full of the Spirit

Jesus prayed often and often alone.

Jesus taught his disciples how to pray.

Addressing God with intimacy as Father.

Honoring the Father, that he might be honored in the world.

Relying on Father to sustain them.

Appealing to the Father for grace.

Owning our sinfulness.

Petitioning the Father for forgiveness.

Recognizing that forgiveness comes with recognition that it is to be extended to others.

Petitioning the Father to keep them from falling prey to temptation.

It matters if we pray, who we pray to, and how to pray.

We don’t always get what we want because what we want may come from selfish desire.

It may sound like we want something good, like a family member wanting to stay with us, or for the to stay alive. But what if their staying with us drives them to depression because of stagnation, or if they by staying alive, they would continue to suffer painful illness?

Since we cannot know the future, we might end up sending the world careening toward catastrophe.

Jesus raises a hypothetical question to follow up his prayer.

If one of his disciples asks a friend for help in desperation, but the friend does not immediately help them, he might if they continually appeal to him.

They should ask again, not in harassment but in showing genuine concern through persistence.

Jesus makes it plain that his disciples are to “ask, and it will be given you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you.”

That givenness comes by way of a lived life of faith in him, hence asking the Father in the first place.

There is no need to fear what the Father gives because he will not inflict injury upon his children instead of good gifts.

Jesus makes plain that the greatest gift that the Father gives is the gift of his own Holy Spirit to those who ask.

Paul encouraged the Colossians to continue to live their lives in Christ, rooted and established in faith.

The faith that they were given is best expressed as thanksgiving.

There were false teachers among the Colossians, distorting the Gospel, ie. philosophies, deceit, traditions, or elemental forces.

In Christ the whole fullness of God was bodily present with them, and the disciples of Christ come to fullness in Christ giving his Spirit to them.

Through spiritual circumcision in baptism the disciples’ bodies were made dead to sin and transformed, made fully alive in Christ through faith in the power of God.

The power of God came to them by way of Christ’s death and rising to life, triumphing over any other possible power or authority.

Therefore, there is no need to condemn or force others to participate in either rituals or festivals, neither worshipping any other spiritual being, over-focusing on visions or philosophies, because they only hint at what has been made plain to them in Christ.

Those that hold fast to Christ will be nourished and grow in the fullness of the Holy Spirit with strength that is from God.

Today, we need to know how and to whom we pray.

As the people of God living the resurrected life, we have access to the Father by way of Christ, made real in the present by the Holy Spirit.

It is the life of the Spirit that motivates us to bring all honor and glory to the Father.

We come to maturity in God as the Spirit convicts us of our sins.

We bring honor to God by repenting of our sins and renouncing evil.

We grow into maturity as we continue to live as Christ did in the fullness of the Spirit.

It is the Spirit of God that reaches out in love to all others that they might come to live in the fullness of God.