The Central Moment

Creation reveals two things about God-- his eternal power and his divine nature. This
makes the created world like a book that can be read, calling us to thank and worship
an awesome God. And it is the book of Scripture that reveals his love and rescuing
power that has entered his creation in Jesus.

God is on the side of your marriage! To address Adam's aloneness as a human being on the earth, God created a woman -- from his side to be at his side. There is no inequality inferred here, but rather a mutuality that glorifies God, stabilizes societies and makes for human flourishing.

Human beings were created distinct from the animal kingdom, uniquely bearing God's image and partnering with God in his mission on earth. But this would mean that along with human responsibility there would be moral accountability. Here we find the first reference to evil in the Bible.

We were created by a powerful, intelligent, loving God who imprinted us with his own
image and breathed his own life into us. We therefore have value as human beings that
no prevailing philosophy or politically correct prejudice could ever take away from us.

The two characteristics of God that we first encounter in the Bible are his eternalness
and his creativity. We are not the products of random chance or some cosmic accident.
At the beginning of time our world was created by God -- on purpose and for purpose.

Today we conclude our four weeks of prayer—and production of The Central Moment—by remembering that there are still some 7000 people groups around the world who have no access to the gospel of Jesus Christ. Let us pray for missionaries to be sent and Jesus to be proclaimed!  ///  Beginning Monday, The Central Moment will no longer post on Facebook or YouTube. Instead, we will be replaying a 40 week series through the Bible that ran in 2021. You can listen at centralassembly.org/thecentralmoment, or subscribe to The Central Moment in your preferred podcast app. All previous episodes of The Central Moment will still be available at youtube.com/centralassembly.

Today, towards the end of our fourth week of prayer, we call out to God for the persecuted church around the world. May they have courage to witness faithfully to the testimony of Jesus and stay true to him.

Our nation is in desperate need of a Jesus-centered spiritual awakening. No matter our political convictions, we pray today for the healing of broken families, the breaking of addictions, a turning back of immorality and sin, help for the poor and disadvantaged and, above all, the salvation of people who are lost and without Christ.

We are grateful for the local leaders and public servants in our communities, even though they may not show up in the national news. They faithfully shepherd our counties, our cities, and our city services. Paul reminded the Ephesian church that they should regularly pray for those in civic authority, which we will do today.

God clearly mandates followers of Jesus to pray for those holding positions of civic authority. We influence the direction and welfare of our nation this way. In fact, Paul seems to infer a direct link between praying for kings and the ability to live peaceful and quiet lives.