The JOY Letter

Philippians 1

Thanksgiving and Prayer

3 I thank my God every time I remember you. 4 In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy 5 because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, 6 being confident of this, that He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.
7 It is right for me to feel this way about all of you, since I have you in my heart; for whether I am in chains or defending and confirming the gospel, all of you share in God's grace with me. 8 God can testify how I long for all of you with the affection of Christ Jesus.
9 And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, 10 so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ, 11 filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ—to the glory and praise of God. [all emphasis added]

As Paul wrote this letter [of JOY] to the Philippian church I love how it applies to you and me [still] today. God's Word is TIMELESS!

When I first came to Christ 39 years ago - I was given my first Bible - a KJV Bible with no footnotes to cheat with [I'm laughing here]. I poured myself into the Epistles - all of them - the letters of love to the newly established churches - many of which Paul wrote. I was sharing with someone just the other day why I believe the LORD took me to these letters first. They are the very place for us to build up our faith and begin to learn to crawl - then walk - to drink [the milk] - then devour [the solid meat] the Word.

To me, these Letters - called Epistles - are the place of our personal FAITH WALK with Jesus Christ - the very place we learn to live out the abundant, victorious life that was promised to us when we received the gift of Christ IN US. Yes, there will be suffering and pain along that path - but that is all part of God's 'character building' in us - it's His instruction method - which proves effective if we are to be cast into His image.

My prayer today is for you [who are abiding in Christ] who may be reading this -

vs 9-10: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, 10 so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ, 11 filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ—to the glory and praise of God.

Looking Upward and Choosing JOY,

Stephanie

[Time to FLY]