Passage for this week: 1 Corinthians 2:9
Resource: Pray The Word Podcast by David Platt
How to use this resource: The questions below should be read after you and your family have spent time listening to the resource, and after you have had time to read through the passage carefully and slowly. Following your family time discussion (using the questions below, or your own questions regarding this text), close in prayer and ask your kids how you can be praying for them and let them know how they can be praying for you as parents.
Family Devotional Question For This Week:
1. What stands out to you the most from reading this passage? What did you learn that is new to you from this passage? What did you learn that caused you to remember something you’ve known, or what has been reinforced from reading this passage?
2. As David described, this week’s devotional leads us right into verse 9. As our lone question this week, How does this verse present us with two ways to live: according to God or according to this world?
(Potential answers: It would be helpful to read through verses 6-9 for this week’s devotional time. from those verses we see, again, the wisdom of the world at odds with higher, loftier, unseen wisdom that belongs to God and that God grants to those who have Christ revealed to them as Paul had witnessed firsthand (see Acts 9:1-19). It is this very wisdom – the wisdom of God – that has provided us as Christians with the possibility and power through the Holy Spirit to live a transformed life for the glory of God. This is why Paul is again quoted from Romans 12:1-2 “I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.” So as we continue to live in this world, we can either ask God to continue the work that He began in us through the acceptance of the merciful sacrifice of Jesus Christ, to continue sanctifying us, purifying us, making us holy as God is holy… Or, we can forget the love of God that has been offered to us through salvation by neglecting to spend time in His word and neglecting prayer that seeks to have Him transform our minds. Let us be diligent in seeking and remaining steadfast to what no other worldly power or proclamation can come near – which is the power of our God!
Isaiah 64:4 says this from the ESV translation: “From of old no one has heard, or perceived by the ear, no eye has seen a God besides you, who acts for those who wait for him.” Finally, you can see how Paul places emphasis on certain phrases and takes this verse to reveal God’s works for mankind are works of love and sacrifice seen in Jesus Christ.)
Prayer Prompts For This Week:
– Pray that God would change our way of thinking, our desires, our plans so that we are not living according to the ways, the thoughts, the desires, the plans of this world, what this world says is what’s most important.
– Pray that we would desire to experience the high life in this passage’s sense – not the high life according to this world – but the high life according to God’s Word, and living according to God’s wisdom. Pray that God would change our thinking, change our desiring, change our acting, change our deciding, change everything about our lives to align with God’s word and His perfect and infinite wisdom..
– Continue to pray for one another and write down or remember the requests of each person. Either have one person pray over each request, or delegate those prayer requests so that each person prays for something or someone specific.