To the city, the one that God created and the one He loves, I want to take more of an interest in you and love you with a new found passion. I don’t want to continually take from you as I please but rather give back to you. I want to help your inhabitants and bring healing where there is hurt, bring joy where there is sorrow and love where there is hate. I want to devote my life to healing it by spreading the love of God so He can heal it from the inside out. Oh God have mercy on us – your sinful children - who have denied what you have called us to do and have strayed from you! Jesus, give us your passion, your heart and help us to bare your name wherever we go without shame. Lord, give us courage to come out of hiding and to take a stand for what is right and hate all that is wicked. Help us to grab a hold of all that pleases you and forsake our own selfish / sinful desires. With your help we can turn this city around. Forgive us Lord, for the times we prostitute the city for our own good, where we continually take from it and treat it as if it owed us something. It owes us nothing but we owe it our lives. So here it is to the city I commit my life to rebuilding its walls and its people. I knowingly make this vow to you oh city that I can’t do it alone but only with the help of Him who created you. Just as Jesus laid down His life for us to have a way to heaven so must we lay down our lives for the city. In doing so, it is our hope that “greater things are yet to come and greater things are still be done in this city” that she may be directed to Christ our savior in order that He might redeem us – a fallen and miserable people. It is my hope and prayer that we as a community of faith can bring others to an understanding of what God longs for us to do in our cities – it is after all, the great commission!
Monday, July 21, 2008
Archive: Letter to the City
To the city, the one that God created and the one He loves, I want to take more of an interest in you and love you with a new found passion. I don’t want to continually take from you as I please but rather give back to you. I want to help your inhabitants and bring healing where there is hurt, bring joy where there is sorrow and love where there is hate. I want to devote my life to healing it by spreading the love of God so He can heal it from the inside out. Oh God have mercy on us – your sinful children - who have denied what you have called us to do and have strayed from you! Jesus, give us your passion, your heart and help us to bare your name wherever we go without shame. Lord, give us courage to come out of hiding and to take a stand for what is right and hate all that is wicked. Help us to grab a hold of all that pleases you and forsake our own selfish / sinful desires. With your help we can turn this city around. Forgive us Lord, for the times we prostitute the city for our own good, where we continually take from it and treat it as if it owed us something. It owes us nothing but we owe it our lives. So here it is to the city I commit my life to rebuilding its walls and its people. I knowingly make this vow to you oh city that I can’t do it alone but only with the help of Him who created you. Just as Jesus laid down His life for us to have a way to heaven so must we lay down our lives for the city. In doing so, it is our hope that “greater things are yet to come and greater things are still be done in this city” that she may be directed to Christ our savior in order that He might redeem us – a fallen and miserable people. It is my hope and prayer that we as a community of faith can bring others to an understanding of what God longs for us to do in our cities – it is after all, the great commission!
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