for God is my witness, whom i serve with my spirit in the gospel of his son, that without ceasing i mention you always in my prayers, asking that somehow by God’s will i may now at last succeed in coming to you. [romans 1:9-10]
when paul says “for God is my witness,” he is inviting God to hold him accountable if anything he says is false. paul is communicating the weight with which he believes what he is writing.
this passage reminds me of matthew 5:37 in which Jesus, while teaching and advising against taking oaths, says “let what you say be simply ‘yes’ or ‘no’; anything more than this comes from evil.”
Jesus is speaking more to the character of his followers than he is about oaths themselves.
all of this leads me to ask this question of myself and of you:
are you a person of your word?
if you’re anything like me, you can probably quickly think of times when you’ve told that person you would pray for them, only to forget as soon as the conversation was over. or the person you told you would do something for them, knowing when you agreed to it that there was a pretty small chance that you would actually do it.
his mercies are new every morning. today, we can repent of these things and be washed clean all over again!
what must happen to make us serious about being people of our word?
today, i believe the answer is prayer. prayer for God to make us more like Jesus. prayer for our friends, family, neighbors, enemies, and people we don’t even know. prayer over people, in person, when the conversation happens. prayer when we see that note we wrote, or the alarm on our phone goes off reminding us to intercede on behalf of someone. intentional prayer.
prayer works in 2 ways:
1. we get to communicate with the creator of the universe who cares deeply about us.
2. it heightens our awareness of people and happenings around us.
today, through the power of Jesus, may we be people of character and people of prayer.
amen.
~ john sandman
