TheUpDate Jan 21, 2012
Call To Prayer

Good Morning FCC!

                  We are-for our third week- back into the book of Acts, The Spirit Led Mission. This weekend we will be looking at the phrase used to describe Stephen and the other first deacons: ‘full of the Spirit’.

                  Because of this, I am changing up TheUpDate this week to ask you to do something.  Would you take this week (beginning as you finish reading this,  through next Friday, Feb 3, the day of our FCC Annual Dinner Date and Family Meeting [learn more and RSVP here]), and PRAY?  I know many of you are praying daily for all kinds of people and concerns. But in keeping with the emphasis of this week’s passage, I want to ask you to add to your prayers a specific prayer.  A wonderfully, dangerously, safe prayer! 

A prayer for the Holy Spirit to increase his work in us as a people and as individuals.

Though you could pray this in many different ways, may I make one more request?  Would you pray the words of the following 18th century hymn by Joseph Hart, entitled Come, Holy Spirit, Come. Would you pray it for our church, for your family, for yourself?  Here is the prayer:

Come, Holy Spirit, come;


Let Thy bright beams arise;


Dispel the darkness from our minds,


And open all our eyes.

Revive our drooping faith;


Our doubts and fears remove;


And kindle in our breasts

the flames of never dying love.

Convince us of our sin;


Then lead to Jesus’ blood,


And to our wond’ring view reveal


The secret love of God.

Show us that loving Man


That rules the courts of bliss,


The Lord of Hosts, the Mighty God,


The Eternal Prince of Peace.

’Tis Thine to cleanse the heart,


To sanctify the soul,


To pour fresh life in every part,


And new create the whole.

Dwell, therefore, in our hearts;


Our minds from bondage free;


Then we shall know and praise and love


The Father, Son, and Thee.

                 
In Jim Packer’s book, Keep in Step with The Spirit, he writes: “…Where the Spirit’s ministry is studied, it will also be sought after, and where it is sought after, spiritual vitality will result” (187). 
May we increasingly be a people of spiritual vitality, because we seek the Spirit of the Living God, and may he reward us with himself and his power.

I love you FCC!  See you this weekend! Get ready for a little banjo action!

Tim