Read 1 Corinthians 1:4-9

In an interview about his book The Church Awakening: An Urgent Call for Renewal, pastor and author Chuck Swindoll worried that the church today is too focused on entertainment rather than worship. He offered this perspective as a corrective: “When you come Sunday, you’re going to focus on One who is eternal, and we’re all going to meet him together. And in doing so, we’re going to leave different than we came because we will have been in his awesome presence, and we will be ignited by the work of the Spirit within us.”

Paul’s pressing word for the Corinthians was much the same. But before he began exhorting and correcting them, he first affirmed the power of God’s grace in their lives. Compared to other epistles, he spent less time commending them and more time commending God to them. God is the One in whom they should boast and find their true identity.

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Read Colossians 1:3-23

Roman emperor Caesar Augustus understood the value of political propaganda. In addition to his military victories that ended a civil war and his extensive public works campaigns, he also commissioned poets to sing his praises. Virgil, who wrote the Aeneid in honor of Augustus, also penned these lines: “He shall have the gift of divine life, shall see heroes mingled with gods, and shall himself be seen by them, and shall rule the world to which his father’s prowess brought peace.”

Despite the lofty attributes ascribed to him by poets, Augustus did not in fact have divine life. But as we see in our passage today, there is One who is truly worthy of such lavish praise. The apostle Paul wrote a magnificent hymn of praise to Jesus, every word of which is true. This text also describes how our identity as blessed in Christ flows from His unique being and nature.

We’ll focus on two parts of our identity mentioned in this passage. First, we have been rescued and redeemed from the power of sin (vv. 13–14). We had no claim based on our own merit or qualifications to enter the kingdom of God, but we have been given this privilege based on the work of salvation that Jesus accomplished for us (v. 12).

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Read Philippians 4:4-20

In 2013, the animated film Frozen was released—and within days, millions of parents heard the same refrain from their daughters: “I need an Elsa doll! I need an Elsa dress!” Stores quickly sold out their stock of Frozen merchandise, from dolls to costumes to lunch boxes. Two years later, Elsa dolls were still among the top five best sellers from online retailer Amazon.

Many of us think of praying for our needs in the same way: “God, I need a job! God, I need a car! God, I need healing from this disease!” Often our requests are reasonable; human existence does require food, shelter, health, and provision for our physical needs. And God welcomes our requests and cares about what happens to us. But notice that throughout our study of God’s blessings, we have not seen any of these items mentioned. Perhaps God’s perspective on our needs differs from our human viewpoint.

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