Pray the word with David Platt is a resource from radical. net.

Philippians chapter 4 verse 1.

Therefore my brothers whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, stand firm thus in the Lord, my beloved.

What a picture of affection and love and desire for other people to stand firm in Jesus.

Like Paul writes this to these brothers and sisters in Christ

and he says, you are people I love and I long for like my joy and crown like to say to people you're my

joy you're my crown and to call them after saying I love and long for you my beloved

Like do you feel that for other followers of Christ?

Like a love for them, a longing for them such that you would say they're your joy and

they're your crown.

Like I think in my own life,

when I think of this kind of love and longing,

I immediately think of my family.

I think of my wife and my kids, like I love them so much. I just long to be with them. They are my joy. Like I look at my wife and my kids and I find such joy in them and I long to see them standing firm in Jesus.

Like I pray for that more than anything else. want to live for that I want to live to see

them standing firm in Jesus like that is that is life to me if I see them standing firm in Jesus

like that is joy to me and yet here's the picture and

that's entirely right for me to feel as a dad for his children as a husband for his

wife yes but God has also created me to feel that way

for my brothers and sisters in Christ in the church. So not just for my physical family but for those who are of his household, my brothers and

sisters, children of God, to love and long for them to stand firm in Christ like that, to want to see them,

standing firm in Him in such a way that it brings me joy like a crown they're my beloved so this is the way God is designed

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