May 21 - Colossians 1:3-5
“We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all the saints— the faith and love that spring from the hope that is stored up for you in heaven and that you have already heard about in the word of truth, the gospel that has come to you.”
As I read these verses, I thought about that first sentence. Do you thank God for the people you are praying for? I always get so caught up in the prayers and requests that sometimes I don’t even think about this part of it. God is the source of all good things and for that we give Him thanks, but He is also the source of our friends. We don’t do this alone. He places in front of us those people that need us, those that will help us, those that simply love us because we exist, not because of what we can do for them. So, as I pray for my friends, I want to remember to thank God for them because He brought these people into my life and I’m so grateful.
Faith, hope and love … Paul intertwines these three continually throughout his writings. In 1 Corinthians 13 he tells us that the greatest of these is love, but look what he does with this here!
Faith and love spring from hope. Hope is stored for us in heaven. I have an image in my mind of this glorious golden treasure chest nestled into soft pillows of cloud with gems and golden chains, pearls, silver and rainbows of color pouring out of it. But hope comes from this treasure chest … the rest is just ornamentation. The imagery is glorious. As hope is poured out, fountains of faith and love flow, bubbling up from the river that finds its source in heaven.
You know, if hope is stored in heaven … it comes as an eternal, infinite gift. We will never run out of hope, which means we will never run out of faith and love.
There have been times in all of our lives where we feel as if all hope is lost. We can no longer see the light at the end of the tunnel, so we worry and fret, doing everything in our power to change the outcome. But, the promise from God is that hope is eternal … hope is infinite. We may not see it today, but it is there and soon we will experience it again.
While we’ve experienced times where hope is gone, we also know that we can turn a corner and find our hope once again. Hopelessness ends … every time. Hope will always return.
This is the Good News of Jesus Christ. He brought hope to the world and through it come love and faith. Nothing that we can do will change this fact. Christ is the hope of the world.
“We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all the saints— the faith and love that spring from the hope that is stored up for you in heaven and that you have already heard about in the word of truth, the gospel that has come to you.”
As I read these verses, I thought about that first sentence. Do you thank God for the people you are praying for? I always get so caught up in the prayers and requests that sometimes I don’t even think about this part of it. God is the source of all good things and for that we give Him thanks, but He is also the source of our friends. We don’t do this alone. He places in front of us those people that need us, those that will help us, those that simply love us because we exist, not because of what we can do for them. So, as I pray for my friends, I want to remember to thank God for them because He brought these people into my life and I’m so grateful.
Faith, hope and love … Paul intertwines these three continually throughout his writings. In 1 Corinthians 13 he tells us that the greatest of these is love, but look what he does with this here!
Faith and love spring from hope. Hope is stored for us in heaven. I have an image in my mind of this glorious golden treasure chest nestled into soft pillows of cloud with gems and golden chains, pearls, silver and rainbows of color pouring out of it. But hope comes from this treasure chest … the rest is just ornamentation. The imagery is glorious. As hope is poured out, fountains of faith and love flow, bubbling up from the river that finds its source in heaven.
You know, if hope is stored in heaven … it comes as an eternal, infinite gift. We will never run out of hope, which means we will never run out of faith and love.
There have been times in all of our lives where we feel as if all hope is lost. We can no longer see the light at the end of the tunnel, so we worry and fret, doing everything in our power to change the outcome. But, the promise from God is that hope is eternal … hope is infinite. We may not see it today, but it is there and soon we will experience it again.
While we’ve experienced times where hope is gone, we also know that we can turn a corner and find our hope once again. Hopelessness ends … every time. Hope will always return.
This is the Good News of Jesus Christ. He brought hope to the world and through it come love and faith. Nothing that we can do will change this fact. Christ is the hope of the world.
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