EXPAND TO READ: EPHESIANS 1 (HCSB)
PERSONAL JOURNAL:
SIN (verse 18): This has been a big struggle of mine my entire life, but especially since coming to faith. You tell us that You want the perception of our mind to be enlightened—the PERCEPTION of our mind. This doesn’t mean that automatically when coming to faith that we are fully enlightened with all Your knowledge, blessings, and such and that our way of living and our mind is automatically shifted. It requires some work from us to change our way of thinking so that our thoughts and perceptions will slowly but surely align with Yours. Please forgive me for my resistance to this, Father, as I have been quite stubborn in my faith for a long time. I have not allowed my mindset to change since coming to faith, which has produced a lot of hurt and brokenness in my life. Forgive me for my resistance, rebellion, stubbornness, and immaturity in allowing the perceptions of my mind to begin to change. Continue to work in me, Father, and show me what Your ways of thinking are so that I will begin to align my mindset to Yours in this life.
PROMISE (verse 5): You keep revealing this promise to me in scripture, yet for some reason I still struggle at times to truly embrace the full blessing of this promise. You promise us that we are predestined to be adopted through Jesus Christ to You; that You are now our Father and we are Your sons through Jesus according to Your favor and will. Why do I struggle so much with fully embracing and accepting this promise in my life? Is it because of all the pain and hurt I’ve experienced from my earthly father? Is it because of the world’s examples of fatherhood that is so broken that I cannot fathom what a perfect father even looks like? Is it because of my own shortfalls as a father in this life? There are so many questions and issues I have in relation to this topic that I struggle with all the time. I need to remember that nothing in this life compares to the Father You are to me. I need to stop trying to measure Your perfect Fatherhood to the broken fatherhood of this world, so that I can begin to truly embrace what it means to be Your son.
ATTITUDE (verse 18): Yes, I am coming back to this verse because not only do I feel it’s a sin confession for me, but I also feel that it’s an attitude change I need to apply in my life. You tell us that You want the perception of our minds to be enlightened. To me, this is saying that all the knowledge I need to live out a righteous life is already embedded in my mind through Jesus, the Spirit, and Your word. My problem, however, is changing my perception of my mind to the point that I no longer walk my spiritual journey in my old habits or the worldly/fleshly way of living; rather I shift the perception of my mind to always see Your grace, Your glory, Your truth, and Your will in all that I am and all that I do. Help me to embrace this attitude of a newly redeemed and righteous mindset in this life, Father, so that when I do walk in the world You are shown through me and not myself.
COMMAND (verses 20-23): Although these verses are not necessarily a command, I do see it as a clarification of the authority given to Jesus through You, Father. You tell us that You have given Jesus authority and dominion over ALL things in this world. You tell us that You demonstrated Your power by raising Him from the dead and that He is now seated at Your right hand in Heaven. You tell us that everything is under his feet and that You appointed Him as head over everything for the church, which is His body. Help me to be better at embracing this truth towards Jesus’ authority in my life, Father. Help me to embrace that Jesus is a part of everything and I am a part of Him. Help me to embrace that all things from Him and through Him are by Your authority and that nothing in this life can diminish or change that, even though at times I do struggle with the deceptions, temptations, and falsehoods of this world.
EXAMPLE (verses 3-8): These verses give us such a great example of how deep and true Your love is for us. Not only did You sacrifice Your perfect Son for us, but You also showed us Your love by predestining us for adoption as Your children! I am not a child of this world anymore but am now a child of God thanks to Jesus providing the perfect sacrifice for my atonement as well as through His resurrection providing me a clear path into eternal salvation. I have redemption through His blood and that was only possible through the power and never-ceasing grace that You have shown me. Thank You for this love You have shown to me, an undeserving sinner who has made a lot of mistakes in this life even since coming to faith. Thank You for showing me so much grace in my life and adopting me as Your son even when I felt I was completely undeserving of a perfect Father.
*DAILY NOTE: I remember when I first learned how to do a quiet time almost a year ago, Ephesians was the first book I tried to do my quiet time in and journal through. I chose Ephesians at the time because I thought that’d be the best for me since it deals heavily with relationships, and I was struggling with my relationship pretty massively at the time. Fortunately, through my struggles I opted to stop because I did not feel You were speaking to me like I needed to speak to likely because I was not ready for Ephesians. Now that I have been building up my relationship with You in the right ways for almost a year, You have brought me back to Ephesians and I am so grateful for this quiet time! I guess I am ready to truly receive the teachings, counsel, and convictions You are communicating to me through Ephesians, now, because today’s quiet time on day 1 of this book has been absolutely amazing to me personally! Thank You for knowing better than I do when I am ready for certain scriptures, Father. The way You illuminate things to me in Your timing versus my own still amazes me every day.
EXPAND TO READ: GENERAL NOTE FOR MY QUIET TIMES
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