Glorious, Powerful and Hope-Filled Gospel

Scotty Smith post:  A Prayer for Gospel-Saturated Communities

We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints, because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. Of this you have heard before in the word of the truth, the gospel, which has come to you, as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruit and growing—as it also does among you, since the day you heard it and understood the grace of God in truth. Col. 1:3-6

Gracious Father, we bring the Body of Christ before you today, and local churches in particular. To fail to pray for our church family is a failure in love, wisdom and hope—it’s the height of arrogance and presumption. For Satan hates your children, and until the day Jesus’ returns, he will do anything and everything in his power to sabotage your glory, by overt and covert attacks on your family.

Following Paul’s lead, we ask you to inundate, saturate and liberate our churches with the gospel of your grace—new church plants and aging communities alike. No gospel, no hope, for no other power is sufficient for the task. There’s no other story, motivation or resources adequate for the calling we’ve received and the mess that we are.

By the glorious gospel, bear fresh, unmistakable fruit in our midst. Renew, deepen and strengthen our faith in Jesus. It’s not the size of our faith but the object of our faith that matters most, so enlarge our capacity to see and adore Jesus. If we don’t see Jesus, we’ll only see one another, and that never bodes well in the Body of Christ. If we’re not gossiping the name of Jesus to each other, we’ll only gossip about one another. May his name be the most heard, loved and trusted in our churches. May his presence convict us, humble us and transform us. Failure to feast on Jesus will inevitably lead to biting and devouring one another, therefore…

By the powerful gospel, renew our love for one another, for the only thing that counts is faith expressing itself in love. Our relationships are constantly being assaulted and too often, we cooperate with the meanness and madness. Forgive us for the ways we hurt and fail each other—ways which contradict the gospel, ways which soil and sully the work of the kingdom in our cities. Father, don’t let us ever get used to loving poorly. Write new and compelling stories of reconciliation and restoration in our midst.

Lastly Father, by the hope-filled gospel, liberate our hands, hearts and resources for the work of your kingdom—in our cities and among the nations. The gospel runs to us that it might run through us. We know that with us or without us, the gospel will continue to bear fruit and grow throughout the world, but we very much want it to be with us, not in spite of us. By the gospel, revive us, transform us and free us for your sovereign and saving purposes. So very Amen we pray, in Jesus’ beautiful and exalted name.