Week 4 January 2026, Devotion Part 2

For though you have countless guides in Christ, you do not have many fathers. For I became your father in Christ Jesus…I urge you, then, be imitators of me.       1 Corinthians 4:15-16

Having yanked out the pedestal from under his own feet, Paul continued warmly, “I do not write this to make you ashamed, but to admonish you as my beloved children…I became your father in Christ Jesus through the gospel.” The gospel, mind you, not through professional training, ecclesiastical ladder-climbing, or – heaven forbid – by peer and popular consent. Paul’s kind of “fatherhood” begets loving discipline in the household of God. Rank it high along with mutual respect and genuine affection. Rank it supremely with “Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant…” (Philippians 2:5-7).

Each member of God’s family is called to serve the high purpose of glorifying Christ by imitating Him. Our “church fathers” are best served by followers of Christ, not fans of their personal strengths or charisma. Fans are driven by the winds of shifting opinion. Followers in the pew and pulpit are made dynamic by the breath of the Holy Spirit.   Part 2 of 2

Comment: If you were to browse my book shelves, you’d catch on quickly that Charles H. Spurgeon, Oswald Chambers, and J.I. Packer were the mainstay of my favorite mentors.  Sadly, my most valued volume of Dr. Martyn Lloyd Jones writings on REVIVAL is missing.  The person who had borrowed it, ghosted me for strongly backing COVID-19 vaccinations.  Dr. Packer wrote the foreword to “JOY UNSPEAKABLE: Power and Renewal in the Holy Spirit.”  He and Martyn were friends as ministers in the UK. 1 Peter 1:8 inspired the title, “Whom having not seen, ye love; in whom, though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory.”  Having married in 1959, I loved that the author commemorated the Welsh Revival of 1859.  “It was part of a broader religious awakening that started in New York in 1857 and spread to the British Isles, including Ireland, Scotland, and Wales.  It was primarily a revival of united prayer that gained momentum…leading to powerful preaching, widespread conversions and a dramatic increase in prayer meetings and spiritual activity.”  Forgetting some “fringe pastor’s” push for political activity, why not check on Jonathan Edwards during the three days and nights before he preached on “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God”?  He neither ate nor slept, saying to God over and over again, “Give me New England!”  When he arose from his knees to head for the pulpit, some said “that he looked as if he had been gazing straight into the face of God.  Before he opened his lips to speak, conviction fell on his audience.”  When political rhetoric leads to revenge killings, should not the church resolutely unite to pray for the Holy Spirit’s “Joy Unspeakable”?  1 Cor. 4