10/14/2024
I was reading Lamentations 3 today, and there was one verse, Lamentations 3:22, that captured me; it reads: "Because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed, for His compassions never fail." This verse made me take pause, and to think about God’s great love for each of us and how, despite our unworthiness, He found it worthwhile to send His Son Jesus to die for us. I thought of all the sinners I pass each day and how their worthiness of forgiveness, prayer, and salvation is no different than mine was when I too was lost in sin, and walked each day in their shoes.
“I remember my affliction and my wandering, the bitterness and the gall. I well remember them, and my soul is downcast within me. Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope: Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. I say to myself, “The Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for him.””
Lamentations 3:19-24 NIV
Pastor E.M. Bounds reaffirmed this when he wrote:
"The highest state of grace is known by compassion for sinners. This sort of compassion belongs to grace and sees not only the bodies of people, but their immortal spirits - soiled by sin, unhappy without God, and in peril of being lost forever." E. M. Bounds
Our efforts in prayer for the sinful people in our lives are justified by God's actions on our behalf because, truly, there but by the grace of God go we; soiled, unhappy, and lost! God saved us, you and me, from my sin... He saved us from ourselves... through Jesus he has restored us.
Bounds continued by calling us to pray for those sinners we see each day. He voiced this in these words...
"When compassion sees dying people hurrying to God, then it breaks out into intercessions for these sinful people." – E. M. Bounds
Do our hearts ache for those who need God's grace, a move of the Holy Spirit, and Jesus Christ's redemption? This morning let's pray together for those who are trapped in sin, and who walk past us as we go about our everyday business. Let’s throw off the blinders that keep us from seeing the desperate need these souls have for redemption, and how our own sad eyes have been blind to all these souls who may be floundering in their sin, lost, and who need our prayers for salvation. How is it that we can walk past them each day without nary a thought, nor a prayer? God, open our hearts to those we have been blind to all these years, and give us the words to pray, and courage to deliver the gospel message to them.
Prayer:
Father thank you for your love that has saved us from sin through the life, death, and resurrection of your Son Jesus Christ. Thank you Lord for not consuming us, but giving us hope, and every new morning filled with your mercy and compassion for us. Father, increase our own compassion for those who are lost today; give us words of prayer, and a heart for the souls, of sinners everywhere as we pray for their awakening, redemption, and transformation. Lord, each and every one of us has been lost, and then saved. So it is that we mourn the state of those who remain fallen, and pray for the work of your Holy Spirit in their lives. Jesus said “blessed are those who mourn”, and we ask that you bless us today. Lord have mercy and help us to lead the lost to Jesus from the decrepit condition in which they find themselves... in this, your will, we praise your name, and in their salvation we give you all the glory. Holy, Holy, Holy, are you our God who gives us eyes to see the invisible souls in the world, and Holy are you who has restored our sight and sent us into the world where we are meant to reach out to every soul in every nation. Open our hearts and eyes to the world’s lost and dying Father, just as yours have always been open to us.
“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.”
John 3:16-17 ESV
Amen, Amen, Amen
Rich Forbes