Rev. 7:9 “After this I looked, and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands.”
God has such a heart for the global church – all peoples of the earth, all his children, gathered together praising Him as one. If worshipping God together in unity as one body of believers, regardless of denomination, language, ethnicity, background, etc. is the picture we have been given of the new heavens and new earth, then that is what we should be seeking right here and now.
We were able to get a taste of what that might look like this past Sunday as we gathered alongside our brothers and sisters of Iglesia Hispana to collectively worship the Lord and hear the Word spoken in multiple heart languages.
Matthew 5:6, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.” To seek righteousness, not just for ourselves but for those around us, is to seek both holiness and justice. As Shawn stated, to pray for an enemy, for someone who has nothing, for someone who doesn’t know Jesus, is an act of righteousness. We are called to lift one another up and bear one another’s burdens. What might this look like on a local and a global scale? Norma said it so simply in her prayer request: we pray for our church, for every member of our congregation and individual ministries, to have a passion for the Great Commission. It is God’s desire that all his children be saved and the Great Commission (Matt. 28:19-20 “Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.”) calls us as believers to seek God’s will for the nations right here at home and around the world.
To truly hunger for righteousness requires us to thirst for holiness and justice God’s way, not our own. Are you mostly concerned with looking out for, “me and mine”, or are you giving yourself to the things and people that matter to God? Let’s take time today to ask God to fill us with His spirit and His will, so the things that matter to God would become the true desires of our hearts and the focus of our actions.
-Lauren