My soul magnifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God, my Savior. My God has looked on my humble estate and chosen me and saved me from myself, and placed me in his eternal kingdom through Jesus Christ, my lord. Now all generations will call me blessed. For my God, who is mighty has done great things for me and holy is his name.

Jesus is my Lord. He is great and mighty, and he is the son of the most high. He reigns over his people, forever, and of his kingdom there is no end. Nothing is impossible with God.  In Christ, Almighty God has visited his people and redeemed them. He has given light to me, who was in darkness, to guide my feet into the way of peace.

Luke 1:26-80

Lord, make me, your creation, as far as I can possibly receive it, a partaker of your perfection. Let me be in perfect harmony with you. Today, I yield my heart to you as God; my heart rests upon you. I believe that you, as God, will do in me all that you have promised. Give me today, Lord, a perfect heart.  Fill me with knowledge and understanding of your will.

Fill me, holy spirit, with a hunger for your word and an awareness of your presence with me.  Thank you that today I follow you. The Lord is my shepherd. I am in a living fellowship with Almighty God, my heavenly father, through Jesus Christ, his son and my Lord and Savior.  Today, father, I am in your realized presence and in your favor. The gift is God, himself. Your realized presence, Father, is the great blessing.

Hallelujah, today I am diligent to follow you, Lord.  I am in Christ and at peace. On account of your suffering, Lord Jesus, I have salvation. Today I grow in grace and knowledge of you, my Savior.  To you, Lord Jesus, be glory, now and forever.

Lord, I know you keep your promises. I see in your word that you are longsuffering towards your people, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.  But your day will come. It will come as a thief in the night. The heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements will melt with a fervent heat, the earth also, and the works that are therein shall be burned up. Nevertheless, I, according to your promises, look for new heavens and a new earth,  wherein dwelleth righteousness.

I gird up the loins of my mind. I am sober and hope to the end for the grace that is brought to me by the revelation of Jesus Christ.  As an obedient child I do not fashion myself any longer according to my former lusts when I was ignorant. But now as you, father, have called me to be holy, by your grace I am holy.

I am redeemed by your grace and Jesus’ atonement. I am redeemed with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish or spot, who was ordained before the foundation of the world.  Through Jesus I believe in you, my heavenly father, who raised up Jesus from the dead and gave him glory so that my faith and hope would be in you, the true God. My soul is purified because I have believed your truth.  I am born again by the incorruptible seed, the word of God, which liveth and abideth forever.

Thank you, father, for electing me and sanctifying me through your spirit. Thank you that in your abundant mercy you have a begotten me into a lively hope by the resurrection of the Lord Jesus from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled that fades not away and is reserved in heaven for me.

Thank you, father, that I am kept by your power through faith into a salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last times.  I rejoice in that salvation even though now, for a season, if need be, there is unhappiness and manifold tests and trials. These try my faith as fire tries gold and my faith is found to the praise and honor and glory of my Lord Jesus, the Christ.

Thank you, father, for my Lord Jesus, who took part in flesh and blood that through his death he has destroyed him who had the power of death, that is the devil.  Through his death and resurrection Jesus has delivered me from the bondage of the fear of death.

Jesus took of the seed of Abraham, which included me, and in all things he became like me, his brother, so that he is my merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to you, my heavenly father, Almighty God.  In all this Jesus reconciled me to you, father.  Moses was faithful to you, father, as a servant, but Jesus, the Christ, is faithful as a son over his own, including me as his.  I hold fast to confidence in Jesus and I rejoice in the hope. Firm to the end.

I do not neglect this great salvation God has given me. It is spoken of by Jesus and confirmed by the words of his apostles. You, father, confirm it every day with signs and witness and gifts of the Holy Spirit.

I see Jesus made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death. I see him crowned with glory and honor. I see him taste death for me. With his life, death, and resurrection he brought many sons to glory.  He is the captain of my salvation.

Jesus was made perfect through suffering. He was sanctified and I am sanctified in him. He calls me, brother. He took part in flesh and blood that through death he would destroy him that had the power of death, that is the devil.

Ed’s thoughts (make them yours. If you agree with them, preach them out loud to yourself)

My response to Jesus becomes my main occupation. My work is to believe on him as the Messiah. To be effective that kind of belief must grow and become experiential.  I must grow in my understanding of how lost I am and how helpless I am to affect any reconciliation.  I am blessed when I realize how “poor in spirit” I am and how thoroughly I need a savior.

Also, I must study and receive exhortation about how completely and thoroughly Jesus fulfills the position of Savior, deliver, reconciler, and sustainer. He is the one; not me, and I must see that, believe that, and act on it. If it (i.e. my faith or belief) is real then I will progressively see how desperate my need and how completely, exceedingly, beyond all I could ask or think, Jesus has met each of my real (spiritual, emotional and physical) needs. The proper response then is to seek him actively.

When I realize what God in Christ has done for me, I can understand and find hope in the fact that no matter how bad this earthly situation, the real eternal situation is filled with hope and assured of joy. I need to understand, pray, and study to believe that I have all things that pertain to life and godliness through the knowledge of him who called me to his own glory and excellence.

I have been granted His precious and very great promises, so that, through them, I become a partaker of the divine nature and escape the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire.  I am told, “to make every effort to grow, to add to, to mature” in the character of Christ.

I concentrate on Jesus as the Messiah; not just a great man, but as Messiah, the one sent by God. The question is will I believe him and follow him as the only way; not bumbling along with some Jesus and some me, but will I reckon myself dead, crucified, no longer in the equation, just a sheep following my shepherd? And so confident and knowledgeable of my shepherd that I want for nothing.  Following along in the sure knowledge that all is well and is going to be well even if we are walking through the valley of the shadow of death; even if sin is all around me.  If I am in Christ I have escaped the world.

Thoughts

Biblical thankfulness is being thankful for what God has done, therefore, we need to know the word of God enough to know what God in Christ has done for us.

Colossians 1:9-14  Here Paul doesn’t pray for what they don’t have, he prays they will grow in their awareness and understanding of what they do have. I need to come to, daily and moment by moment, a greater understanding that by god’s grace and Christ’s courage, I have been qualified, delivered, transferred, redeemed, and forgiven.

When I realize what I have in Christ, if I really experientially realize, then I can be thankful in all situations; not thankful for all circumstances, but thankful in all circumstances. I can understand and find hope in the fact that no matter how bad this earthly situation, the real eternal situation is filled with hope and assured of joy.  I need to understand, pray, and believe that I have all things that pertain to life and godliness through the knowledge of him who called me to his own glory and excellence.