21 Days of Fasting and Prayer
As we enter 2025, many are eager for a new beginning. Amid the chaos, there is a longing for answers and tranquility. This serves as a powerful reminder that true peace is found in God. Let’s make 2025 a year of deepening our relationship with Him like never before. This year, as we embark on a collective fasting journey, let’s come together with others to form a community that rejuvenates our hearts and minds. We invite you to participate in this year's Fast. Together, as we seek God, we can conquer any challenge.
Today's Devotion
A Spiritual Church
Saturday January 18, 2025
What is a church? Not a building, location or even a meeting, but a “spiritual house” made of “living stones,” Scripture says.
What is a church? Not a building, location or even a meeting, but a “spiritual house” made of “living stones,” Scripture says.
Today's Scripture
- 1 Peter 2:5 (NIV)
- “You also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.”
- Zechariah 4:6 (NIV)
- ‘Not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit,’ says the Lord Almighty.”
- Revelation 2:4-5 (NIV)
- “Yet I hold this against you: You have forsaken the love you had at first. Consider how far you have fallen! Repent and do the things you did at first. If you do not repent, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place.”
Devotion
What makes our places of worship sacred? What’s so special about gathering in a sanctuary or living room or coffee shop or school cafeteria? Where’s the value? Is it the place? Is it the people? The value of our worship gatherings is found in the One whom we gather to worship.
The church is the very presence of Jesus in a people. This means we, the church, are not just a group of people with common beliefs. We don’t just meet once a week because we enjoy the same style of preaching or the same worship songs. We are spiritually united by the presence of Jesus in our lives and in our midst when two or three of us gather in His name.
Together, we are “living stones” being built into a spiritual house—a house that is not a sanctuary, coffee shop, living room or cafeteria. In this spiritual house Immanuel, God with us, dwells.
What makes our places of worship sacred? What’s so special about gathering in a sanctuary or living room or coffee shop or school cafeteria? Where’s the value? Is it the place? Is it the people? The value of our worship gatherings is found in the One whom we gather to worship.
The church is the very presence of Jesus in a people. This means we, the church, are not just a group of people with common beliefs. We don’t just meet once a week because we enjoy the same style of preaching or the same worship songs. We are spiritually united by the presence of Jesus in our lives and in our midst when two or three of us gather in His name.
Together, we are “living stones” being built into a spiritual house—a house that is not a sanctuary, coffee shop, living room or cafeteria. In this spiritual house Immanuel, God with us, dwells.
Prayer Points
- In 1 Peter 2:5 we are called a holy priesthood offering spiritual sacrifices to God. What spiritual sacrifices do you make to God? Take a moment to consider the gift it is to know and love our Savior. Let’s give thanks to Him for being Immanuel, God with us. Pray for the universal church, that it will continue to grow across the globe and that we, its living stones, will continue to be built up.