Gospel Pray-Reading
They will be my people, and I will be their God. I will give them singleness of heart and action, so that they will always fear me for their own good and the good of their children after them. I will make an everlasting covenant with them: I will never stop doing good to them, and I will inspire them to fear me, so that they will never turn away from me. I will rejoice in doing them good and will assuredly plant them in this land with all my heart and soul. Jeremiah 32:38-41
For the next series of gospel-sanity devos I want to lead us in an exercise of learning how to pray-read the Bible in light of the gospel. I’ll choose many passages and promises from the Scriptures and offer a prayer in light of who Jesus is and how he fulfills that portion of Scripture. Hopefully there will be a double benefit in this exercise: 1. Our prayer life will be enriched; 2. We will learn to look for Jesus in every passage of Scripture–for no matter how many promises God has made, they are all “Yes” in Jesus!
“Dear Father, thanks for the incredible scope and hope of the promises you made to us in this one passage from Jeremiah. We believe; help us with our unbelief, for these words seem almost too good to be true… and they certainly expose how little we know you and trust you.
Who are we that you would be so generous to a people like us? God, the only basis upon which we dare hope that right now you are only doing good to us, and that you will never stop, and that you actually rejoice in doing us good, is that you have already established your everlasting covenant with us in Jesus. We look only to Jesus for the fulfillment of such outlandish riches, privilege, honor and joy.
Jesus, because of your life of perfect obedience and your death upon the cross, we are assured of presently being the Father’s treasured people. We have the hope that our perfectly forgiven hearts will one Day only beat for and choose the glory of God. We have the guarantee that we will be safely “planted” not in a cemetery, but in the new heaven and new earth. Lastly, but way not least, we are promised that God our Father will deliver these grace-full gifts to us with all his heart and soul! Oh, my! Hallelujah what a Savior! Hallelujah, what a salvation!