GOD WITH US : ADORE

Father, we confess before you that unless your Holy Spirit moves in our minds and hearts and wills,

the very depths of our soul, unless you, Father, move in us, we cannot understand your word correctly.

So we ask, Father, that your Holy Spirit would gently but deeply fall upon us,

fall upon our bodies, fall upon our minds, fall upon our hearts and our wills.

Father, may your Holy Spirit fall upon us and fan into flame within us

that we might use the best of our mind and the best of our heart and the best of our will

to seek to understand your word, but we know that that is never sufficient.

So we ask, Father, that you would lead us ever more deeply into your word,

that your word might go ever more deeply into us,

and that we may bear much fruit for your glory in our day-to-day lives.

And this we ask in the name of Jesus, your Son and our Savior. Amen.

Please be seated.

Last week I didn't have a stopwatch.

I have no idea how long I preach for, so that can be a bit of a dangerous thing.

I'm going to do a couple of very un-Canadian things this morning.

I'm going to maybe cause a little bit of stress in the room,

and I'm sort of, I think, compelled to cause a little bit of stress in the room

because of the nature of the biblical text that we're going to look at,

and because, like, I'm going to mention creation and evolution and Christmas.

And that, as soon as I mention creation and evolution and Christmas,

in many Canadian contexts, it causes a little bit of stress.

And you might wonder why on earth I'm going to do that.

Andrew, could you put up the first slide, please?

Could you, we don't have to say the verse thing.

Could you read this with me, please?

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

He was in the beginning with God.

All things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made.

So we're going to look at today.

And the thing about this text is that it draws a...

Actually, when I...

You know, at first, when I was wanting to talk about this text,

I wanted to say that it sort of drew a line in the sand,

and then I realized after I'd been actually, you know, talking about it for a while,

so in my own head, I talk about it in my head,

that when I say drawing a line in the sand,

drawing a line in the sand is a very, very arbitrary thing.

You know, it's as if you have all this sand,

you're just not going to retreat anymore,

you're not going to give up anymore,

you're going to draw this arbitrary line right here,

and on the other side, but you're going to take your stand.

And the fact of the matter is,

is that this isn't drawing a line in the sand.

This text is pointing out a grand canyon

between what the Bible teaches and what a lot of...

and basically everything else.

And that causes a bit of stress for people

when we realize that it's sort of pointing out a big grand canyon

between what this text is claiming

and to which is generally believed in our country

and throughout the world.

Because this text is making a very, very bold claim

that, you know, look at the last sort of two and a half lines.

All things were made through him,

and without him was not anything made that was made.

And the word made is a perfectly good word,

but in the original language,

it just says something...

It goes sort of beyond the English word.

It'd be awkward to translate the original language into English,

but it actually...

The word that we use here is made,

actually in the original language,

says cause to exist.

Causes to exist.

And so this text is making a very, very, very big claim

that all things were caused to exist through him,

and without him was not anything that was caused to exist

that came into existence.

That's what the text is saying.

And it sort of flies in the face of what we learn

or students learn.

If you go to university, if you go to high school,

go to elementary school in this country,

where we're taught something very, very different.

And I'm not going to solve all of that.

I'm just trying to draw it out.

But I want to say a couple of things about that.

The first thing is that...

I'm going to be very un-Canadian.

Remember I mentioned at the beginning

I was going to be very un-Canadian.

Hopefully you'll extend me a little bit of grace.

Here's the first thing about what this statement is

and our culture.

You're cutting me some slack, okay?

Just for a moment.

I'm actually a nice guy,

even though I'm going to say something

which is a very rude thing to say in Canada.

And if you're here and you believe

what I'm about to sort of make a comment about,

I hope, you know, rather than being offended,

like I'll buy you coffee sometime this week.

I'll buy you lunch, okay?

Like I'm actually a nice guy.

But there's many people in our country

who are, you know, who are Buddhists and Hindus

and who believe in things like native spirituality.

But who here really honestly for a second

actually believes that any of the accounts

of these things is actually a real account of anything?

Like it's very un-Canadian to say

that native spirituality can't be possibly true,

but nobody believes that the world came to be

because ravens dropping seeds

or things are carried on the back of turtles

or like nobody believes that.

Nobody believes that that's the way things came to be, right?

Like nobody does.

Like if a person had a PhD in biochemistry

and said that he'd like to teach a class in biochemistry

and said that he was going to teach these things

as part of his lecture at the university,

he or she would be fired, right?

I mean, it would be beyond mockery.

In fact, if that was to happen at the Ottawa U or Carleton,

it would be on everything.

It would be on Letterman.

It would be on the late night.

It would be on all the comics

and everybody would be making fun.

And in fact, actually, in our culture,

there's a dominant story

about how all things have come into existence.

But practically speaking, in our culture,

there's not, you know, the, in a sense,

I'll call it the atheistic option

because that's actually what it is,

the atheistic option and the Christian option

and the Buddhist option and the Hindu option

and the Cree option and the Algonquin option

and the Navajo option.

And that's, in fact, not the case, right?

There's really only three options

that people think about.

And one of them, actually,

scientists basically always will tell you

that it's completely and utterly misleading.

The misleading one is this idea

that evolution is somehow making things

better and better and better

and that evolution causes things

and that we're moving in this particular type of direction.

And that's actually all it is

is just a romantic type of pious,

unfounded hope that science would have to say

it's actually not scientifically true,

that everything that happens

is just a result of time and chance,

that that's what evolution is.

It's purely and utterly chance.

There's no purpose.

There's no such thing as better.

There's really only next.

And, obviously, it's a very, very uncomfortable belief

and that's why people tend to quickly try to bring in

other types of things of purpose.

But it's actually, from a scientific level,

all you can say is before,

now, next.

And what governs these changes

is always just complete and utter chance,

really.

and then the only other option

I mean and it's usually just mocked

is the Christian option

because I mean that would also get you fired

maybe at Ottawa or Carleton

but at least our culture makes fun of it

like it's recognized that there is

at least some type of a credibility

or threat from it

and I want to say that

actually let's say this text again

could you say it with me

in the beginning was the word

and the word was with God

and the word was God

he was in the beginning with God

all things were made through him

and without him was not anything made

that was made

that's a serious philosophical and scientific claim

and it's that serious philosophical and scientific

claim

that

that actually helped to cause the birth of all science

and is the partially historically

the basis by which scientists seek order

in the world

because there's a sense that there's a knowable God

a creator and a plan and design

and that you can seek after the outline of the plan

and the outline of the design

and it's a serious option

be a whole other topic

a little bit about how it is

that we can reconcile this with science

I think it's easily done

I know that Christians can have

on one side of the Grand Canyon

the biblical side

that Christians can differ over the age of the earth

and a couple of other things

but those are arguments on one side of the Grand Canyon

it's different on the other side of the Grand Canyon

and it's a serious claim

I don't know how many of you have heard of the name of Thomas Nagel

he's a serious atheistic philosopher

often the more popular people who write books

aren't necessarily considered to be serious philosophers

but he is beyond any doubt

a very serious philosopher

and a long time atheist

and he just I think about a year and a half ago

caused a minor storm

because he wrote a book

showing why it is that evolution is not true

and he's an atheist

by the way at the beginning of the book

and the end of the book

he's still an atheist

he just basically wanted to point out

that while God obviously doesn't exist

and therefore everything that came to be

has to come to be by some means

that in fact evolution can't account for it

and that the sooner

that scholars recognize that it can't account for it

the proper account

that will continue to show that there is no God

will be found

and that's a

I mean he's one of a small group

of serious atheist thinkers

over the last five to ten years

who've started to express doubts

in academic journals and in books

as to whether in fact Darwinistic evolution

in fact can actually account

for the existence of all things

and every one of them who've written these books

still continue to believe that God does not exist

but they're merely pointing out

the fact that the theory doesn't work

that it can't account for important things

I believe that if you study it

we can't go into it right now in the sermon

but it's very very interesting

that John who's going to talk

and this is one of the two classic texts

as we go on to verse 14

that John that gives one of the most classic accounts

of the birth of Jesus

begins it with where we as Canadian Christians

are afraid to go

which is to publicly claim

that there is a God that does exist

who is the one who's created all things

and sustains all things

that in fact

if we were to watch a science fiction movie

and in the science fiction movie

going to unexplored places

they come across

an obviously very very ancient

and spaceship with no creatures there

and it's maybe the power source

is no longer functioning

and this ship of ours comes and discovers it

and if that happened in a movie

the very very obvious thing

especially if it happened early on in the movie

obviously it'd be the case

that for the rest of the movie

the movie is going to be consumed

with trying to figure out

who it was that used that ship at one time

who is this ancient race

and we would all know

that if one of the people

on the ship

our spaceship

if they were to say

no that ship did not

that just happened by an explosion

it purely happened by chance

there's nothing to seek

but that wouldn't be treated seriously

in the movie

because it would be very obvious

that if you saw something as intricate

as a spaceship

even with no people

that it was something built and designed

and that's at the heart

the simple Christian claim

that what we see around us

and that the universe

I mean just a cell

a human cell

just DNA is more complex

than that spaceship

and on one hand

that's why I was just talking

to a barista just a couple of weeks ago

and who's definitely not a Christian

and she said on one hand

okay I know that there has to be something

that created all things

because that can only account for it

but you're wrong

which was very refreshing to hear

it didn't bother me

or threaten me at all

and there are many people

in our culture

who are caught between this idea

that the order

and the complexity

and the beauty

that we see

has to be accounted for some way

and when science

and atheists

you know

when they push

to the idea

that in fact

everything just came to be

as completely

and utterly

as well as a chance

that there's this

conflict

in the soul

and the mind

and the heart

of many people

in our culture

which is why

in our culture

it's far more common

to slip in

ideas of purpose

and destiny

and design

in the theory of evolution

that

it's easy

to slip it in

it's easy

you know

evolutionary psychology

slips in

this idea

of things

being in us

because of some type

of design

and moral imperatives

and it gets slipped

into it

but it doesn't actually

the theory of evolution

cannot support that

it all crumples

if you think

if you think about it

very deeply

but let's read this

again together

in the beginning

was the word

and the word

was with God

and the word

was God

he was in the beginning

with God

all things were made

through him

and without him

was not anything

made

that was made

you know

not only

does this text

I'm going to do another

very un-Canadian thing

for a moment

and once again

I hope you're going to

give me some grace

if you're deeply offended

I'll

about this

I'll try to deal

with it

later on

because

I don't mean to be mean

but

there's a lot of fear

in Canada

right now

I think it's

you know

been made worse

by what happened

just a few blocks

from here

just a few weeks ago

and

I think it's made worse

by

ISIS

or ISIL

or whatever

however

we're supposed

to refer to them

and

you know

it just

these beheadings

and the terrible

terrible

terrible

terrible

things that are

being done

it causes

people to wonder

about their

safety

and people

wonder about

why

why

like

why

can't

these

people

and that's

the type

of language

that we use

okay I'm not

pardoning it

I'm just

I'm trying to

echo it

like why

don't these

people just

have this

sense of

our common

humanity

like why

are they

so

inhumane

like why

are they

so cruel

like why

why don't

they understand

that on one

level we're

sort of all

the same

and that we

should need

to get

together

just as I

think that

the sort of

the governing

story of our

elite institutions

of media

and culture

and academia

I don't think

they can really

account for the

complexity of the

world and the

beauty of the

world

I also don't

think they can

really account

for this whole

problem of

inhumanity

because you

see the idea

that there's

like one

human race

and that we're

to treat each

other humanely

is not a

scientific truth

it's not a

biological truth

it's a

theological

truth

that comes

from the

understanding

that there is

one creator

of one

humanity

and while

obviously it

is biologically

true

that human

beings by

definition are

human beings

and scientists

can prove

whether or not

something is

human

the fact

of science

doesn't create

within human

beings

any sense

of being

one united

humanity

that flows

from the idea

of there being

but one

God

who has

created

all things

it's a

theological

truth

it's not a

scientific and

biological truth

say this text

again with me

notice the

beginning of the

text

in the beginning

was the

word

and the

word

was with

God

and the

word

was

God

he was

in the

beginning

with

God

all things

were made

through him

and without

him was not

anything made

that was made

you know here

it says in the

beginning

it's obviously

echoing those

of you who

know your

bible a little

bit

it's echoing

genesis

Genesis 1 · chapter mention

chapter 1

it's saying

that before

there was

anything

there was

the word

before there

was anything

it's in a

sense before

there was

time

before the

big bang

before there

was anything

there was

the word

and in the

original language

next phrase

and the word

was with

God

in the

original

language

in English

there's only

one word

for was

but in the

original

language

there's three

words

for was

so that

in

sorry not

was

with

in the

original

language

there's

three

different

words

for with

and so

if I was

to say

that I'm

with my

dog

or I'm with my car and I'm with my wife,

the first two withs might or might not be one of the two different words,

but there'd be no mistaking that in the third case,

there's a word for with that's only used when a person is with a person

in the original language.

And in the original language, when it says,

in the beginning was the word,

talking about the word and that before all time,

before there's anything, there is the word.

And then the second phrase when it says,

and the word was with God,

that with is the word that's only used of a person with a person.

And so it's saying the word's a person

and this person is with God who's also a person.

And the word who's before all things

and is a person who's with God is also God.

And the word was God.

And it's saying here that there's two persons,

but it's also saying very clearly that there's only one God.

It's a deep mystery.

He was in the beginning with God.

It emphasizes it.

Augustine, who lived about 1,700 years ago,

when he was commenting about this,

he said that those words should be written in gold

in the most beautiful script in every church that exists.

That's what he said.

It should be there in gold because it's so central.

In the beginning was the word,

and the word was with God,

and the word was God.

He was in the beginning with God.

And there's this very, very clear teaching

that there is one God in two persons.

The deity of the Holy Spirit will be developed later on

in the Gospel of John and in other parts of the New Testament.

But here is the introduction of the book.

It's trying to communicate to us that there's only one God,

and this one God has made all things,

brought into existence all things.

And we human beings are things.

And human beings are made as a body and as a soul,

in fleshed souls or embodied spirits.

There are different ways to put it.

We're both soul and body, but we're just one thing.

We're not two things.

And God made both of those parts that make us us.

And because there is but one God,

and that one God has not only created all things,

this is also the basis whereby you should not rape the environment.

And it's going to be the basis.

If you read the Old Testament in Genesis 1,

it talks about how God has made all things.

And later on, there will be laws about the proper treatment of animals

and the proper treatment of people.

And it's all because of this understanding

that God is not part of his creation.

He's made all things.

All things are properly, fully his.

And because of that, all things are to be cared for.

And in particular, human beings that are made in the image and likeness of God.

Every human being is not just biologically a human being,

but what makes a human being a human being is not just biology,

but that every human being is made in the image and likeness of God.

And there is one humanity and one God.

That one humanity and one God is proven by biology and proven by science.

And philosophers like Thomas Nagel, who are serious philosophers and serious atheists,

said that the atheistic account of origins does not, in fact, hold intellectual water

and can't, in fact, account for all of the things that we see,

nor all of the experiences that we experience.

That the idea that all things come about as a result of time and chance

does not account for the fact that we see order.

And the fact that we have things like love and that we sense things like beauty

and we sense things like music as being glorious.

And that we can watch dance and think that there's something majestic

about a well-choreographed human being's dancing in beautiful choreography,

that there's something glorious and uplifting about that.

That the dance accounts for things better than chance accounts for things.

Dance accounts for things better than chance accounts for things.

And so, you know, our culture, on one hand, we have this sense that being human matters.

That in cultures where the human person has absolutely no value,

if you have a caste system, if you have a slave system,

if you have a totalitarian system, that being a person matters.

And that there should be this common sense of personhood

whether or not it is recognized.

That is, in fact, a theological truth that goes back to the book of Genesis

and the book of John and the entire scriptures.

And in fact, I would ultimately say that no other system of thought

properly grounds that fundamental experience and insight we have as human beings.

That Hinduism and Buddhism and science and atheistic science

cannot account for these things and ground them in a way which is both intellectually respectable

and scientifically examinable.

And it's just compellingly true.

Join with me in saying this again.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

He was in the beginning with God.

All things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made.

Those of you who come to the church are probably wondering,

why doesn't George have any points?

I kept struggling to have points.

And God said, George, how are you going to improve on John 1, 1 to 3?

Like, how am I going to improve on that?

And I was thinking, well, I guess I can't.

So that's why we're going to keep saying it over and over again.

You get nothing else out of this, but you've started to memorize John 1, 1 to 3,

then angels are happy, God is happy, and I'm happy.

In fact, let's say it again.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

He was in the beginning with God.

All things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made.

So some of you might say, here's my last very un-Canadian moment, okay?

So some of you might say, George, okay, that's very, very interesting that you say that it's a theological truth

that if you have one God and one humanity, that there's this common, there's this sense of the dignity of persons,

and that there's a, you know, when you talk about treating human beings in a certain type of way,

that it, because human beings are all human beings, that that's a theological, that's a very interesting thing.

But ISIS believes all that too, don't they?

So that's the last un-Canadian moment.

I'm coming to a conclusion with it.

And so, George, what do you say about that?

It can't obviously be true.

And I would say, you're right, it's not sufficient.

It's not enough.

Because, you see, you could come to the conclusion that there's one God and one humanity,

but God is, in fact, very, very distant, doesn't care anything about humanity at all.

You could believe there's one God who's created all things, and therefore all human beings are sort of the same.

But actually, fundamentally, God views all human beings as slaves, as fodder, as being completely and utterly irrelevant,

and one doesn't want to really deal with them.

And, in fact, actually, when God is going to try to deal with these pesky little human beings that he has no particular regard for,

he'll pick a few that he likes, and the rest he doesn't really care about.

And when he even deals with them, he deals with them through intermediaries.

He doesn't actually deal with them directly, but through intermediaries.

You see, and I don't mean to cast dispersions, in the Koran, even the Koran is not God dealing with human beings directly,

but through intermediaries.

And, in fact, it's not clear from the Koran of the dignity and value of human beings.

It's not clear, in fact, whether human beings are but slaves that can justify slavery and all sorts of things.

Not directly.

I'm not saying that that's what the Koran does, but there's a missing piece.

Let's say this again, and then, Andrew, after we've said this again, if you could put up the next slide.

Join with me in saying this again.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

He was in the beginning with God.

All things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made.

11 verses later.

And say it with me.

The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.

And the Word became flesh.

John wants us to understand that every word we are going to go, if you go back and decide that between now and the next couple of weeks, you're going to read all of the Gospel of John.

You want to hear about Jesus as John bears witness to Jesus.

And John wants us to know at the very beginning that Jesus is not a great man.

And I am not insulting him when I say that.

Jesus is not a great man.

Jesus is God.

Jesus is God who has taken, set aside his glory, and brought into himself our human nature in its completion, and walks amongst us.

And that is who we are reading about.

And this brings us to the final thing, which I can only touch on very briefly.

It brings on an unbelievable coherence.

You see, one of the things which is so challenging and embracing, if you try to read a philosopher like Thomas Nagel,

is that he doesn't believe you go to a better place when you die.

Die, you die.

Fertilizer.

Fertilizer.

And God didn't create us.

It's probably going to have to be by chance in some way.

We just have to figure out a better scientific mechanism and description than evolution has given us.

And we live our lives, and, you know, we live our lives according to whatever things about how to try to get along,

and, you know, basically utilitarian type of ethics, and you sort of get along,

and it's sort of best if you do certain types of things,

and there's a great consistency and coherence in it.

But notice here, the Bible is telling us that the same one who brought all things into existence

is the same one who comes and takes into himself our human nature and walks amongst us,

is the same one when you read John's Gospel who is going to teach us how to live,

is the same one who is going to die upon the cross to be the power of God for salvation for all who believes in him,

is the same one who will rise and defeat sin and death and all hostile spiritual powers.

He's the same one who will ascend into heaven,

and he is the same one who will return and will bring in the new heaven and the new earth.

And it's not that you have one type of account of creation,

another account of how to live,

another account of what is going to fix things,

and another account of what happens after you die.

It's not like the average Canadian, and I don't mean to insult anybody who's here,

who on one hand believes that, yes, everything that came to be came about as a result of time and chance.

That's evolution.

And yes, when I die, I'm going to go to a better place.

And yes, when I live my life, I'm going to live my life according to these types of moral rules.

And they never ask themselves,

one moment, if I'm going to go to a better place,

maybe that should affect the way that I live.

In one moment, if I'm just a complete result of time and chance,

how on earth am I going to go to a better place?

How on earth is that going to happen?

And it's only not viewed as incoherent,

because that's what everybody believes.

But it's not, I do not mean to offend,

it's not coherent.

Brave souls like Thomas Nagel recognizes that it's not incoherent,

incoherent, and lives his life in an attempt to be intellectually consistent.

But we see here that not only does the Christian faith,

not only does the Bible offer us this profound account

that everything, that the thing which is the most basic,

the beginning of all things is God,

that he's the one who brings all things into existence.

And that because he brings all things into existence,

we can have this sense that there's,

that's why there's order,

that's why there's beauty,

that's why there's joy,

that's why there's love,

that's why there's truth.

And that's why there's these things.

That's why we can recognize,

that's why we can discover,

that's why we can figure out how things work,

that's how we can dig and learn and dig and learn,

and we can be engineers and physicists and chemists and biologists

and moms and dads and dancers and poets

and artists and carpenters

and have families,

and we can do all these things,

and there's this coherence there.

And the same one who's created all things

and we recognize that there is this fundamental problem

and it's not a problem with Islam.

It's not a problem with atheism.

It's not a problem with totalitarianism.

It's not a problem with Buddhism or Hinduism or Christianity.

That the fact of the matter is that every day in the newspaper

it convinces us that there's something fundamentally wrong with human beings

that human beings cannot fix for themselves.

I just watched on DVD The Giver.

And as soon as you see a perfect society in any Hollywood movie,

what do we all know?

There's evil.

It's evil masquerading is good.

Everybody knows that.

Except when we take psychology and spirituality and then we forget it.

But the Bible never forgets it and it goes after the heart

and it's saying that the same God who creates all things

is the God who comes and is amongst us in lowliness

and he comes to die.

And by telling us that, the Bible is telling us

that the problem of human beings is vastly worse

than we can possibly imagine and believe.

But the worth of human beings is vastly greater.

that God, the Son of God, would die upon a cross

so that we could be reconciled to him.

One of the most famous verses in the Bible,

John 3.16,

For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son

that whoever believes in him should not perish

but have eternal life.

Spoken by God, the Creator, who walks amongst us,

who died upon the cross to redeem us,

to reconcile us to him.

Andrew, if you could put up the final slide.

I'm going to invite,

this will be up on the webpage later,

I'm going to invite you that this is a great prayer.

It's a prayer to begin the Christian walk.

It's a prayer to live the Christian walk.

Dear God, please grow in me

a humble, trusting, walking knowledge

of the greatness, glory, and grace

of Jesus, the crucified Messiah.

At whose birth we celebrate,

Jesus the Messiah.

And it's to be a humble,

to grow in us a humble trusting

of the greatness, glory, and grace

of Jesus, the crucified Messiah.

Humble trust.

Walking means that it makes a difference

about how we live.

You know, the mission statement of this church

is making disciples gripped by the gospel,

living for his glory.

That as the gospel grips us,

it will change how we live our 24-7 lives.

And I try to capture that in the word walking.

If the Holy Spirit has it all pressed upon you,

would you join me in praying that?

Could you stand?

Please?

And we'll just allow a moment of silence.

And you don't have to pray it out loud,

but if the Holy Spirit is pressed upon your heart at all,

the glory and the greatness of Jesus,

God, the Son of God,

the Word,

who was with the Father before all eternity,

who became flesh,

to die upon the cross,

so that all who believe and trust in him

will not perish,

will not perish,

but have eternal life

with the Father who has created all things

and will make the new heaven

and the new earth for us to dwell in.

And not just to know and trust Jesus,

but to know and trust Jesus

is to enter into a relationship

where we walk with him.

He guides us.

He'll change how we live our lives.

The prayer to enter the Christian walk

is the prayer to continue and grow

and deepen in the Christian walk.

So those for whom the Holy Spirit is pressed upon you,

please join with me in praying.

Dear God,

please grow in me

a humble, trusting, walking knowledge

of the greatness, glory, and grace

of Jesus, the crucified Messiah.

Father, pour out your Holy Spirit upon us.

Bring us to Jesus.

Help us to trust, Father,

that all truth is your truth.

Help us, Father,

to press in to know more of Jesus

and to know more of the truth

and to know more of you

and to know more of your word

and have your word play a deeper role in us.

And all this we ask in the name of Jesus,

your Son and our Savior.

Amen.