Prayers of Paul 01

Philippians 1:9-11
9And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, 10so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ, 11filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ—to the glory and praise of God. (NIV)

Paul prays for the Philippian church “so that [they] may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ—to the glory and praise of God.” Sounds good! I don’t think there are any of us that wouldn’t value that result. We expend lots of mental and emotional energy trying to decide what is best and trying to do the right thing.

But for what does Paul ask the Father that will produce these results in the lives of the Philippians? He prays that their love will overflow!

This suggests that maybe our approach may need some adjustment. Usually, if I’m honest, my motivation is to do the ‘right’ thing. But why am I so driven to do the ‘right’ thing? The answer, again if I’m honest, is one of two reasons…

1. I want to be seen to be doing the right thing by other people who will then be impressed with the fact that I’ve done the right thing. This selfishness and pride is fairly obvious and straightforward to repent of.

2. I want to be seen to be doing the right thing by God because I believe that God expects me to do the right thing. This sounds good at first, but beneath the surface lies the trap of trying to earn God’s favour through good (right) works.

Yes, God does want us to do the right thing, but for the right reason. And that reason is what Paul prays that the Philippian believers will have in abundance: Love. When their love abounds “more and more in knowledge and depth of insight,” then they will know what is the right thing to do, and they will do it motivated by love alone.

It begins and ends with love, not my feeble attempts to be good.