Ephesians 1:17-18 I ask—ask the God of our Master, Jesus Christ, the God of glory—to make you intelligent and discerning in knowing him personally, your eyes focused and clear, so that you can see exactly what it is he is calling you to do. (The Message Bible)
A more strict translation of what Paul is asking for his friends in Ephesus is a spirit of wisdom and revelation so that they my know God better and the hope to which God has called them, but the way the Message Bible puts it is more the way we speak today. It makes me think about how I pray. Most of the time, I am drawn to pray for others when they are going through an illness or other personal difficulty. I tend to pray for them a few times and then something else crowds my mind and I move on to other thoughts and prayers. Rarely do I pray for others that they would know God better, that God would “make you intelligent and discerning in knowing him personally, your eyes focused and clear, so that you can see exactly what it is he is calling you to do.” I wonder what I would be like, what the church would be like, what our world would be like, if we prayed for this kind of knowledge of God with the same frequency and intensity that we pray about our physical traumas and the problems of those we love. What are you praying about this week?
Logan Memorial Presbyterian Church 