Please feel free to print out anything you find on this website. And feel free to use them in your study, your teaching, your devotions... We hope and pray they will be a light in the darkness, bring healing and restoration to you, your family, your congregation...

The Truth you find here can attack, with precision, every point of darkness that might yet remain in you and release—right there—its light of hope. Also, ask the Holy Spirit to help you bring others before God's Throne so the same light can burst upon their understanding. You can pray like Paul did,

...that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto those you hold before Him the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him: the eyes of their understanding being enlightened; that they may know... what is the exceeding greatness of His power to usward who believe...

Soak in the whole passage from which this is taken, Ephesians 1:15-23. And please don't stop here. Go on, at least, through Ephesians 2:1-7. It can change your life. The wonder of a shared life with the Lord Jesus awaits.

 This month we are aiming toward that special quality the Holy Spirit remains ready to bring into the heart of any believer. It is the quality of joy. Amazingly, it will have two companions—patience and longsuffering. All too often, these two, stand ready to rob the heart of joy. This is because too many of us seem to think that joy is the result of some good circumstance. Well, this is so—if the circumstances of our lives revolve around who we are and where we are in Christ.

See this prayer from Colossians 1:10 & 11 and remember it came from a man who was in chains. Paul wrote to the Colossians from the prison in Rome where he was held because he proclaimed that Jesus was the Son or God.

That ye might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God; Strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power, unto all patience and longsuffering with joyfulness;

The following is an interpretation of Colossians 1:11-14 from J.B. Phillips’ New Testament in Modern English. This book of his was an inspiration to me in my earlier years of knowing the Lord. You should find this passage helpful and encouraging as you face what may seem to be the unlikely results of your having trusted the Lord Jesus as your Savior. I say “unlikely results” because many who come to the Lord are surprised by the attacks coming against them. There are many, new and old believers, who wake up to realize that things are happening in their lives that do not immediately bring joy. But then—without knowing from whence it comes, they awaken to the realization that there is a deep and most unusual joy at work in them. Paul captures some of this in the following:

“As you live this new life, we pray that you will be strengthened from God’s boundless resources, so that you will find yourselves able to pass through any experience and endure it with courage. You will even be able to thank God in the midst of pain and distress because you are privileged to share the lot of those who are living in the Light. For we must never forget that He rescued us from the power of darkness, and reestablished us in the Kingdom of His beloved Son, that is, in the Kingdom of Light. For it is by His Son alone that we have been redeemed and have had our sins forgiven.”

The words in the title of this article seem not to belong together in the same string of words. But, Paul found they fit together quite well. The same was so of other early believers.

In fact, the saints who went before us even learned to include words like “shipwreck, shame, trouble, distress, perplexity and persecution” and then go on to speak of a rejoicing that could only be born from the heavens where they learned that Jesus is enthroned at the right hand of His Father. Here’s an example from Paul: For our light affliction, which is but for a moment—it is but a short time by comparison with the joy that awaits us—worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory—II Corinthians 4:17.

Paul wasn’t the only one to find joy in the midst of tribulation. While he was still …breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord (Acts 9:1), some believers were already …rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for His Name (Acts 5:41). They were being dishonored and were enduring indignity and abuse on account of their testimony for Jesus. But in it all, they were full of joy. Can you figure that out?

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After praying through Colossians, we will spend Day 21 through Day 31 learning to rejoice. We can discover that Scripture about joy has in it the blessed energy of the Holy Spirit to release it within our own hearts. This will prove beneficial for all days to come.

Devotions

(JANUARY) I pray that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ,the Father of Glory, might give unto you a spirit of wisdom and revelation in acknowledgment of Him.
—Ephesians 1:17

(FEBRUARY) I pray that the eyes of your understanding might be flooded with light so you may know, in a way no one can take from you, what is the hope of God’s calling upon your life.
—Ephesians 1:18a

(MARCH) I pray you might know by the same enlightenment what are the riches of the glory of God’s inheritance in the saints, so you may know how valuable you are to God.
—Ephesians 1:18b

(APRIL) I pray you might
know, with a continuing enlightenment, the exceeding greatness of God’s enabling power for us who are believers, even the same power He used as a force of divine energy when He raised Christ out of death’s dominion.
—Ephesians 1:18a,19

(MAY) I pray the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ will give to you, according to the opulent wealth of His glory, the governing power of His Spirit in your inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith like that His grace has given you.
—Ephesians 3:14,17a

(JUNE) I pray that you, having been rooted in and built upon a foundation of love, might have the strength to lay hold on, with all the saints, the breadth and length and depth and height of the love
of Christ.
—Ephesians 3:17b-19a

(JULY) I pray, thus, that you might be filled with all the fullness of God.
—Ephesians 3:19b

(AUGUST) I pray your love will abound more and more toward a full knowledge and perception of what is right, and that you will be able to discern the more excellent way in your life.
—Philippians 1:9,10a

(SEPTEMBER) We pray that you will be sincere and free from anything offensiveas we approach the Day of Christ.
—Philippians 1:10b

(OCTOBER) We continue to pray and to ask that you will be filled with an acknowledgment
of God’s will, in all wisdom and spiritual understanding.
—Colossians 1:9

(NOVEMBER) We pray that you will walk in a manner worthy of the LORD, with every desire to please Him and that you will carry out your responsibilities in a way that is satisfactory and helpful to others, that you will be fruitful in all you do,
with an increasing acknowledgment of the Lord God.
—Colossians 1:10

(DECEMBER)  We pray that you will be strengthened by the enabling power of God’s Spirit, leading to His ruling government in you that will carry you through to a steadfast endurance in all you do, and that you will always be slow to avenge any injury, all the while maintaining your joy.
—Colossians 1:11-1

The Covenant Promise
...and the Sure Mercies of David