For Malia and Sasha Obama to be blessed with strong and healthy friendships
Perfume and incense bring joy to the heart, and the pleasantness of one's friend springs from his earnest counsel.
�Proverbs 27:9(NIV)
Holy Lord, You are a loving God who calls us into relationship, first with Yourself and then with one another. Today I praise and thank You for Your love and friendship in my life, and I bless you for putting in my heart the need to love and be loved. I love You, Holy God with everything in me, everything I am able to summon within myself, I lift in love and worship of You.
I lift before you Malia and Sasha Obama today, asking that You would bless them with strong and deep friendships that encourage them and keep them humble, enriching their lives with great joy and delight. Give them friends who want to know them for who You have made them, and not because of their father�s position. Keep them from negative and dark influences, Lord, and set each of these young women in the midst of godly and Christ-centered circles of influence that will cause them to rely on You in all things. I ask this in Jesus� loving name, amen.
The sorrows of those who run after another god shall multiply;
their drink offerings of blood I will not pour out or take their names on my lips.
The LORD is my chosen portion and my cup; you hold my lot.
The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places;
indeed, I have a beautiful inheritance.
I bless the LORD who gives me counsel; in the night also my heart instructs me.
"All who have not their foundation and trust in God must necessarily be often in a state of irresolution and uncertainty; and those who do not hold the true faith in such a manner as to be guided and governed by it, must be often carried away by the overflowing floods of errors which prevail in the world."
(Commentary from Heart Aflame: Readings From Calvin On the Psalms)
Hebrews 1:3
This Son perfectly mirrors God, and is stamped with God's nature. He holds everything together by what he says--powerful words!
The purpose of a mirror is to "display in perfect clarity a faithful representation of an object or person." Jesus is a perfect mirror of God. He is the mirror of God to the world.
Then, on top of that, he holds everything together by his words! The ESV says he "upholds the universe by the word of his power." That's pretty intense, isn't it? How often do we think of Jesus as holding our universe together? I don't. When I think of Jesus, I think of my savior. I think of him dying for our sins, then being raised from the dead. I even think of him returning in triumph. But I usually don't think of him holding everything together. But if he is, in fact, the exact representation of God to us, then he has that power. That makes him pretty important, eh?
Does this change my view of Jesus? Not much really, I already hold him in the highest esteem. But perhaps it changes my level of respect just a little bit. You don't want to get too casual with the One who is holding your world together.
Carpe vita eternus, friends!