Colossians 4: 2-6 | Converted Conversations

Well, if you've got your Bibles this morning, if you would turn with me to Colossians chapter 4.

Colossians 4 · chapter mention

We continue in our study on Colossians, and we are finishing up this great, wonderful letter that Paul wrote to the church at Colossae.

There are still a few scripture journals out in the hallway.

If those are helpful to you, you're welcome to pick one of those up and use it.

We would love for you to have that.

It has Philemon as well, and we'll be doing a two-week study on Philemon when we finish Colossians in a few weeks here.

And so if you don't have one of those, feel free to pick one of those up and use that.

It was my delight this morning to get to teach our youth in Sunday school.

That was new.

They were kind.

Okay, I'm not cool at all.

Let's just be honest.

But they were really wonderful this morning.

And I asked them the question.

I asked them, what are some things that they would want to learn?

What would they ask Jesus?

What would they ask Jesus?

If Jesus walked into that room this morning, what are some questions that they might ask him?

And their answers were very interesting.

I think one of the questions that we would think about is how are we supposed to look?

How is the gospel supposed to change us when we are converted?

When we are made new men and women in Christ, how different are we supposed to look?

How different are we supposed to talk?

How different are we supposed to think?

How do we know whether we're looking and talking and thinking and acting different enough?

Right?

But there's no question that in our following Christ, that we are different people.

And that our relationship with Christ should change not only us, but change our families, as we studied two weeks ago, changes our work relationships, as we looked at last week.

And today we read this passage where we learn that knowing Christ changes our conversations.

In the way that we interact with others, the way that we talk with others, we should be profoundly changed if we know Christ.

Who we talk to, how we talk, and why we talk is all completely different than it was before.

Our motivations are completely different than they were before.

And just as we are converted, so are our conversations.

So let's look at this together in Colossians chapter 4, verses 2 through 6.

Colossians 4:2–6

That's where we are this morning.

Follow along in your Bibles, if you will.

Paul writes, continue steadfastly in prayer, being watchful in it, with thanksgiving.

At the same time, pray also for us that God may open to us a door for the Word, to declare the mystery of Christ, on account of which I am in prison, that I may make it clear which is how I ought to speak.

Walk in wisdom toward outsiders, making the best use of the time.

Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person.

So the first thing we see in this passage is that who we talk with changes.

Who is your primary conversation partner?

I'm interested to know.

Who's your primary conversation partner?

Maybe the person you're married to?

I hope you talk a lot, right?

You know, Caroline and I have some brilliant conversations in the morning before coffee.

It's usually like, morning, right?

That was me, by the way.

That's me.

And she says, Good morning, husband.

No, she doesn't, not exactly like that.

But we're both we're both kind of non-verbal until we get the coffee in us and maybe wake up a little bit.

And then we just talk all day long, all the time that we're around each other.

You probably talk with your spouse, your kids, maybe, your parents, maybe, the people you work with, perhaps.

Um, some of you talk to the radio in your car.

I've seen you.

You listen to talk radio and you talk back.

Yeah, you might not want to get some help for that, right?

If that's your primary conversation partner.

Some of you talk to your phones, right?

This is becoming a thing.

You talk to Siri or Gemini or whoever your phone robot is, right?

Yeah, hopefully that's not your primary conversation partner.

Who should our primary conversation partner be?

Well, we see in this passage, our primary conversation partner should be God.

But as followers of Christ, our primary conversation partner becomes God Himself.

In Acts chapter 6, when the early church appointed seven men to make sure widows were being cared for, why did the apostles do that?

Acts 6 · chapter mention

Well, the text in Acts 6 tells us this.

They said, it is not right that we should give up preaching the Word of God to serve tables.

Was there anything wrong with serving tables?

No, but it wasn't their primary calling to serve tables, not in the role that God had called them to.

So they appointed spirit-filled men for that duty, and they said this.

They said, but we will devote ourselves to prayer and to the ministry of the word.

So what were they devoted to?

Preaching and prayer, preaching and teaching and prayer.

Prayer is vital, and it seems strange to have to say that.

In our community group on Wednesday night, I shared that sometimes I feel guilty when I devote a lot of time to prayer because there's so much to do.

There's so much stuff on my desk to do.

And if you've seen my desk, you know that someone should do something with all of those things on my desk, right?

There's so much to do, so much practical stuff to do, and yet prayer is vital.

The most important thing that I do is pray.

The most important thing that you do is pray.

The most important conversation partner that you have is God Himself.

And prayer is not complicated.

It doesn't have to be complicated.

It's simply talking to and listening to God.

It feels funny saying this to you.

It's like me, if I was saying to a husband, having conversations with your wife is important.

Hopefully we know that.

Yet many still neglect it.

Sometimes you never move on past the nonverbal stuff before the coffee, right?

In your marriage, in your conversations together.

But if we would know God, we have to talk with him, we have to listen to him.

We have to share our needs, our desires, our frustrations, our joys, thank him, cry out to him when we are in trouble.

Relationships are built on this constant interaction.

It's no different with God.

And I wonder which part of that is the hardest for you.

If it's hardest for you to think of things to say in your prayers, or if it's hardest for you to sit still and listen.

To be still and know that God is God and to hear what He would say to you.

Look at verse 2.

Verse 2 says, continue steadfastly in prayer, being watchful in it with thanksgiving.

Continue steadfastly in prayer, being watchful in it with thanksgiving.

The New American Standard Version translates this as devote yourselves to prayer.

It means to be courageously persistent, to hold fast and to not let go.

Kind of like a dog clinging to a bone.

You can't take it away from them, you know.

We are persistent, we're holding fast, devoting ourselves to prayer, regardless of the distractions that may come.

And there are many, many distractions today.

We think of maybe Acts 1.14.

It said this all these were devoting themselves to prayer together with the women and Mary, the mother of Jesus, devoted in prayer in Acts 1.

That's the kind of devotion that you have when your Savior has just ascended into heaven and you're waiting on what comes next.

You remember that scene in the book of Acts, and Jesus ascends into heaven.

Disciples are kind of looking up, you know, right?

What comes next?

What happens next?

They needed to know.

They devoted themselves to prayer in order that they should know what to do.

This is the kind of devotion that we're called to.

Immediately following that devoted prayer, by the way, in the book of Acts, the assembly, it says, was filled with the Holy Spirit and empowered to preach the gospel to people in every language, in every corner, people from every corner of the Roman Empire.

Well, is that a coincidence?

I don't think it is.

I think that was born out of that devotion to prayer, that time in prayer as they were seeking the face of God.

Now, is that exact scenario going to happen every time that we pray?

No, of course not.

But we should expect God to do great things when his people ask him, when we devote ourselves to prayer.

Well, here Paul calls us to three specific postures in our prayer life, and I don't mean physically, though it can be helpful to adopt physical postures when you pray.

The first one is to be steadfast.

Steadfast means we are dogged in it, determined.

We don't quit.

We guard against distraction.

I get easily distracted by noise or devices or things around the house.

Amazon packages coming on the front porch.

If I'm here, then people coming into the building.

Sometimes I put headphones on or earbuds on with instrumental music.

Sometimes I walk outside.

I love to head to the woods to focus.

Because we are supposed to pray steadfastly, and sometimes that means physically moving away from distractions so that you can talk to God and listen to God.

Praying is supposed to become like breathing, that it's a persistent habit.

That if we're not in the mood to pray, we pray anyway, and we tell God that.

Not in the mood to pray.

If we're angry at God, we confess that.

And say, I don't really want to talk to you right now.

There's a great line in a song that I was listening to this week by a Christian songwriter.

And she said, I might need you to dig deep in me, and I might not want you to.

I might need you, God, to dig deep in me.

And by the way, when you do, I might not want you to.

Sometimes we go to God and we are not in the best frame of mind.

We just confess that and we still come to Him in prayer.

If we're confused, we confess it and we say, God, I'm confused.

I don't know what to pray for here.

Please give me words.

He already knows anyway.

He knows what we're we're dealing with.

Our confession of our sin or our struggle is just telling him something that he already knows.

We are joining him in that knowledge.

We are admitting it to ourself and coming to him anyway.

We're supposed to be watchful.

This second posture.

Paul says, be watchful.

This sounds just like Paul's words in Ephesians 6.18 when he said, keep alert.

Be aware of spiritual and physical needs in your family and your circle of friends and fellow believers and around the world.

We are supposed to be alert and watchful that we don't forget Christ's supremacy over all things and his sufficiency for every need.

We are to be watchful.

We're to be watchful and vigilant as well for attacks that may come that Satan would desire to pull us away from times of prayer.

Think of the disciples in the Garden of Gethsemane.

Jesus asked them to pray, and what did they do?

Yeah, they fell asleep, right?

We need to be watchful about not only distractions but attacks from the evil one that He would try to keep us from that relationship with God.

With endless distractions or endless fatigue, endless other needs that other people need to talk with us or need something from us, or they're texting us, or they're calling us, or they're knocking at our door, and yet we're no good to anybody if we're not spending that time together with God.

The third posture is the one of thankfulness.

Be thankful.

Here's an exercise for you.

Pray to God and don't ask him for anything.

What would your prayer look like if you prayed to God, didn't ask him for a thing?

I'm not saying every time.

We're supposed to ask him for things.

But sometime pray to God, don't ask him for anything.

For you or for anyone else.

Just thank him for who he is and what he's already done.

Just try that sometime.

Prayer should be many things.

It should be adoration and praise and confession of sin and need and thanksgiving and supplication and intercession for others, not just the last two.

Not just God, here's my laundry list for me, and here are all the things that others around me need.

Those are good.

Good to pray for other people.

Good to recognize that anything that we need comes from God, that God is the source of all help for us.

But it's also good for us to discipline ourselves to not ask for anything.

To have a relationship with God beyond transactional.

Right?

That we're not just asking God to meet this need or that, that we're recognizing the needs he's already met.

That we're recognizing the worth of who he is.

That we are, as the psalmist said, ascribing greatness to God.

God knows he's great.

You're not going to tell God he's great and he's gonna go, well, you're kidding me.

I am?

Could you say it again?

Just to bolster my ego?

God knows.

He knows he's great.

He knows he's good.

He knows he's gracious.

He knows he's kind and compassionate.

He knows all those things about himself.

He's glad to know that we know.

He's glad when we ascribe those qualities to God that we recognize who we're talking to.

Have you ever gotten a call on the phone?

Someone calls you on the phone and you pick up the phone and you think it's one person.

Maybe you were just talking to somebody on the phone, maybe a loved one or family member.

You ever done this?

And you've just been talking to them on the phone and your phone rings again, and you're pretty sure they just called you back about something, you start talking to them like it's them?

It's really bad when you think it's your wife and you go, hey baby.

And it's not your wife?

It's some dude that you know.

And he's like, hey man, I haven't talked to you in like a year.

Why are you calling me baby?

You know?

You ever done that?

God desires that we know who we're talking to, that we understand who he is, at least in our limited understanding.

That we acknowledge what he has done.

And when we review his track record, when we see his steadfastness, we will be thankful.

2 Chronicles 16, 9 tells us that the eyes of the Lord roam to and fro throughout the whole earth to give strong support to those whose heart is blameless toward him.

What does that teach us?

It says, God is watchful over us.

God is watchful over us.

He has supported you, sometimes without you even knowing it.

And he says, be watchful and thankful toward him for that.

Second of all, what we pray for changes.

So our primary conversation partner changes when we come to know Christ, but then what we pray for changes as well.

And this happens as we grow in our relationship to Christ.

Anyone can be religious.

We've got a lot of religious people around the world, a lot of people praying around the world.

Some people who are praying don't even know God and they pray anyway.

Some people pray as a matter of rote or it's part of religious ceremony.

Some people just pray occasionally for their wants.

We've got people who don't follow God, don't acknowledge God, but in their time of need, they might throw up a prayer for healing for a loved one or something like that.

But when we are truly converted, and as we grow in maturity in our walk with Christ, we begin praying for others to come to Christ, and we pray for open doors to share the gospel.

Look at verses three and four with me here.

Paul says, at the same time, pray also for us, that God may open to us a door for the word to declare the mystery of Christ, on account of which I am in prison, that I may make it clear, which is how I ought to speak.

So what's he praying for there?

He's praying that God would be with him to open a door for the word that people might get to hear the gospel.

And then when they do get to hear the gospel, that he would proclaim that clearly.

We prayed for this this morning in our prayer time.

Some of the guys praying with me in the back hallway there.

I prayed for clarity that in my sermon this morning that I would be able to speak the truth of the gospel clearly to you.

Well, Paul wrote this from a Roman prison cell, this whole letter.

He had endless physical needs.

He could have asked for better health, he could have asked for better food in prison.

I'm sure it wasn't great.

He could have asked for safety in prison.

That can be a dangerous place, or a quick release, that God would just let him out of there quickly.

But what does he prioritize here?

He asked them to pray that God would open a door for the word and that he would have favor and opportunity to declare the mystery of Christ.

And we know from reading Paul's letters, from reading the book of Acts, that Paul was given this, that many times he was able to share the gospel even with the palace guards, even with even with the people who are watching over him, that he was able to share the gospel with them.

When we look at our own community, we have thousands of year-round residents, we have neighbors, we have students, we have visitors who come into Mount Washington every day, who don't know Jesus Christ.

You've heard me say this statistic.

Mount Washington has grown by 400% in the last 30 years.

I don't know if you noticed, but uh they tore down that Christian school that looked like a castle.

You probably did notice.

I'm sure you did notice that.

Building apartments for a thousand people there this past week.

They just announced a new subdivision over on Broadrun Road.

It's going to be 700 homes.

700 homes.

It's like 2,000 people.

Between those two developments, that's 3,000 people moving to or close to our community.

How many of them will know Jesus?

Four out of five people in our community now don't have a relationship with Jesus Christ?

Four out of five?

And is their concern, eternity a concern for us?

Is their salvation a concern for us?

Are we concerned enough to have a conversation with God about them every day?

You have family members, extended family members, you have friends, you have neighbors, you have folks who don't know Christ.

And as we grow in our relationship with Christ, our conversations with him turn more to these things that we begin to pray for those who don't know him.

The more we value our relationship with God, the more we see the need for others to have that relationship with him as well.

The more we delight in our time with God, the more we want that for people that we care about as well, that they would have time with the God who created them.

Now you might say, I'm not an evangelist, I don't feel confident sharing my faith, and I understand that, and it's hard.

It's hard even if you're good at that, even if you talk to everybody, you know, even if you're one of the people in our conversation who is the last person in the building and just keeps talking, you know, and their spouse is going, can we go?

Because we miss lunch, but it's probably time for dinner.

Could we just leave now?

Because you're just talking to everybody?

Even that person, it's hard to talk about the gospel.

And we'll work on that.

But for now, are you confident in praying for those who do?

For praying for Joel and Mirabelle over in where they serve in Cambodia.

For praying for others in our congregation that are more confident in that, they're involved actively in an evangelistic ministry, for those who go to work every day and they're the only Christian on their team at work and they're surrounded.

By people who need to hear the gospel?

Are you confident in praying for those who do?

And are you confident in asking God to move?

Do you really believe that God works in the hearts of people to call them to Jesus Christ anymore?

Do you believe that he still does that?

I do.

I hope you do.

Declaring the mystery of Christ is a great privilege, but it is hard work.

And those who are on the front lines of evangelism need your prayers.

I need your prayers in this.

And so we pray that God would open doors of opportunity.

We pray that he would give courage to speak.

We pray that we would make the gospel clear, as we ought to speak.

All of the things that it tells us in those couple of verses.

And as who we talk with changes, as God becomes our primary conversation partner, our conversations with God naturally should turn toward the needs of others.

That is, we adore him and we praise him and we thank him for what he has done.

We thank him for his faithfulness to his people.

We thank him for giving Christ to die on the cross for us.

We move beyond our own need and we move to the needs of others.

And we and then we are ready, perhaps, to talk with others about their need for God.

And that's the last one this morning.

Look at this third part.

How we talk to outsiders changes.

How we talk to outsiders changes as we come to a deeper relationship with God.

This is verses five and six here in the text.

It says this walk in wisdom toward outsiders, making the best use of the time.

Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person.

How many of you love salt?

You love salt?

You ever look at a nutrition guide for a restaurant, your favorite restaurant?

You ever go online and look at their nutrition guide?

Don't do it.

Don't do it.

It'll ruin you.

You'll never want to go there again.

There's so much salt and restaurant food.

It's amazing.

I was looking at the nutrition guide for what I'm serving you on Wednesday nights and Thursday that we have a restaurant that's nice enough to donate some food for that.

Don't go look at it.

Okay?

Just eat good the rest of the week.

Okay?

Because it tastes so good and there's a reason for that.

It's because it has a lot of salt in it, okay?

Apparently.

Seasoned with salt, what does that mean?

We'll get to that here.

But we want to, first of all, make the best use of our time.

We have countless opportunities at work.

It's amazing to me.

Sometimes we can get together with other Christians and we say, we pray and we say, God, give me opportunities to talk with people about Jesus.

And then we'll go pump gas at the community store, which is staffed by people, which is full of people, and we're standing at the pump, and we've got a captive audience, the guy next door standing at the pump right next to us, and we're still going, God, give me opportunities to talk with people about Jesus, right?

We're surrounded by opportunities at work and at school in our neighborhoods, and as we go shopping to talk with people, we chat about the weather and we talk about sports and we talk about politics and we talk about food and we talk about our families.

We show pictures of all the cute babies in our lives.

And those are great topics, but what people ultimately need more than they need to know who we cheer for and what the score was last night, ultimately what they need is the gospel.

And so we're supposed to walk in wisdom toward outsiders, making the most of every interaction with people, because we don't know how much time we will get with them.

We don't know if we'll get a minute or two or ten or if it's someone that we know if we will ever see them again.

Jonathan Susi, who came and preached for us, my friend from Maine, who's a pastor.

Yeah, and he's looking to move down this way, go to get his PhD at the seminary.

He told me yesterday on the phone he's going back to Maine.

He's got to do a funeral for someone in their church.

There was no indication.

But but this man passed away this past week, and they asked him to come back and do the funeral.

He said there was no indication that he was sick, he wasn't ill, there was nothing wrong with him that we knew of, and suddenly he's not there anymore.

Thankfully, Dave is a believer, walks with Christ, knows Jesus.

His eternity is secure, and he's with him even now.

But we don't know if we're going to get that time with people in our lives who don't know Christ.

And so we want to make the most of our time.

Second of all, our speech, always gracious.

Be gracious in your speech, always.

Don't just gear up for it when you have to have a spiritual conversation with somebody or around your kids or you're around church people.

Always be gracious in your speech.

People see you, people watch you.

If you get cut off in traffic, they can read your lips, whatever you're staying in your car, right?

Some of you, you get cut off in traffic and you go, you know?

We can sort of clue into what you're saying there.

Be gracious in your speech always.

Repent of impatience in traffic.

That's a good thing to pray for.

Repent of impatience in long lines, or when dealing with difficult people, even that salesperson on the phone, Caroline has to remind me, those crank calls that you get, wherever, whatever place they're calling from, trying to loan you money that you don't want, and they've got your number somehow, and they're just calling endlessly and leaving you these automated messages, those are, when it is a real person, those are real people.

Right?

We have all kinds of opportunities to share the gospel, but not if we're not gracious in our speech.

And so when you're tired or you're anxious, that is not an excuse to drop gracious speech.

It's not good enough if we're always saying, Well, I'm sorry, I was just tired earlier.

People get tired of hearing that.

Listen, the people you're sitting with right now get tired of hearing that.

Much less people who don't know Jesus.

Much less people who don't love you, right?

They'll put up with that for a while.

But we've got to be gracious in our speech.

You can pray for that.

Pray that God will make you gracious in your speech.

We are indwelt by the Holy Spirit.

As followers of Christ, our speech should reflect his fruit.

Let's talk about salt.

Not the salt in the restaurants.

But let's talk about seasoned with salt.

What does this mean?

Salt brings out flavor.

God made you, God made you, an interesting person with unique background, hobbies, and personality.

You people are fascinating.

I've been learning more about you as we've been doing community groups the last two or three weeks.

Learning all kinds of stuff.

Learning where you grew up and learning about the early days of your courtship and marriage and learning what you do for fun.

You guys do some weird stuff for fun, you know?

And learning what games you like, and learning what you like to play, and learning what your favorite food is, and learning about things that you know about that you love to talk about that nobody else loves to listen about, but boy, you love talking about it, right?

And I do that too.

I've got things I'm fascinated with, and nobody really wants to listen to that stuff, but it still fascinates me.

You are interesting.

God made you that way.

Don't you think that part of the reason why God made you that way is so that you can make inroads for the gospel?

Right?

It's not just so you would be the most interesting person who ever lived.

It's because all of those connections help you to connect people to the good news about Jesus.

Don't become flat or boring the minute you start talking about spiritual things.

Some of you are so interesting in just everyday life, and you've always had something to talk about.

Don't become boring when you start to talk about Jesus.

We went through in a youth Bible study this morning, went through the Bible book by book, and we talked about what each book was about.

It's exciting.

You know, it's exciting.

I mean, the book of Joshua, it's nothing but battles and walls falling down and, you know, prayers around the city and all kinds of cool stuff, and Exodus, you know, and I mean, you know all those stories, right?

The Bible is exciting.

Don't make it boring.

Don't make spiritual things boring because you're not that way normally.

And so pray and ask God to help you see and look with wonder at the good news of the gospel so that when you articulate that to other people, that they are caught up in the wonder of it as well.

Use your interests, whether it's gardening or building or cooking or sports or literature or whatever, as natural bridges to gospel truths.

The gospel is the most exciting news in human history, and our speech should convey that vitality.

And then the last part of this here, knowing how to answer, Paul assumes that outsiders will be asking us questions, right?

Is that happening in your life?

Are people asking you about your faith?

This doesn't happen for me as often as it should, and that's a wake-up call to me.

It may be that our lives and our speech don't look any different than the rest of the world.

But if they did look different, people would ask us more about what we believe.

When our lives are distinct and our speech is gracious, it creates curiosity.

You're weird for Jesus, you're different for Jesus, you're interesting for Jesus.

You're undignified, perhaps, for Jesus.

And it creates curiosity among people and gives us opportunities to share the hope that we have in Him.

Well, the end of this, as we strive to align our speech with God's heart, we recognize where we fall short, we admit our hesitations, we recognize our need for his grace.

Our hope does not rest in our own perfect eloquence in saying the right thing to God or even saying the right thing to other people.

It rests in the unchanging power of God's word.

And just as an example, let me just share with you to close this promise in Isaiah chapter 40.

Isaiah 40 · chapter mention

We read this: a voice says, Cry, and I say, What shall I cry?

All flesh is grass, and all its beauty is like the flower of the field.

The grass withers, the flower fades.

When the breath of the Lord blows on it, surely the people are grass.

The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever.

He will tend his flock like a shepherd, he will gather the lambs in his arms, he will carry them in his bosom, and gently lead those that are with young.

There's a lot of words out there.

A lot of conversations out there.

Most of them no one will ever hear again.

Culture shifts, our time is short, but the word of our God stands forever.

And so let's be a people that are devoted to steadfast prayer, that are eager for open doors for the gospel, that are gracious in our speech to everyone at all times, pointing people around us to the shepherd who carries us.

Can we do that together?

Can you hold me accountable to that?

If you see me in traffic and I'm going like that, can you tap on the window, honk at me?

Hold me accountable to that.

Okay?

Can you ask me when you see me on a Sunday or Wednesday or whenever?

Can you ask me and say, How did it go this week, Pastor, talking with people who've never heard the gospel?

How'd that go?

Did you get a chance to do that this week?

Did you take an opportunity to do that?

Would you hold me accountable to that?

Some of you nod and just say, Yes.

Will you do that for me?

Okay?

Maybe not all of you.

That might be a little bit overwhelming.

You're all riding me in the lobby and you're like, shame on you.

Okay.

But would would you consider doing that for me?

Would you ask some people to do that for you?

Would you say to your spouse, I'm going to start spending more time in prayer talking to God?

And I think I'll be better for it.

I think we'll be better for it.

I think I'll be a better husband or better wife for it.

But could you help me to do that?

Could you help me make time to spend more time talking to God, listening to God?

Would you do that?

Consider doing those things this week.

Let's pray together.

Father God, I thank you for all the ways that you change us.

And I thank you for the way that you change our speech, our conversations.

Lord, it is a miracle.

It is amazing that you would even want to talk with us.

That you would even want to listen to us.

It's incredible to think that we could have a conversation with the God of the universe, that we could come to you as often as we want.

As often as we make time, you are there ready to listen, ready to talk with us.

God, it is an awesome privilege that you would allow us to be the primary instrument through which people come to hear the good news of the gospel.

We're the plan.

Your church, all of us flawed people who mumble over our words, sometimes struggle with doubt ourselves, who forget where scripture passages are found, perhaps can't remember the address or the wording of it.

Who are certainly sinners, but sinners saved by grace.

It's amazing that you would let us be your primary instrument through which people hear the good news of Jesus.

And yet you do.

So bless us in that.

Give us fruitfulness in that.

Help us to make the most of those times.

Help us to look forward to those times.

What a privilege that we get to talk about the gospel to the people in our lives.

In all of these things, God, we just pray that you would be glorified through our words, through our listening, through our conversations.

Because you deserve all glory and honor and praise in our lives and the lives of those around us.

And so we acknowledge that, even as we pray to you now.

In Jesus' name.

Amen.