PrayerBits for Saturday

PrayerBits

A bite sized devotional program
produced by the West Side Presbyterian Church

Saturday

Scripture lesson: Romans 8:22-27 Hope

Time to reflect: The ancient word translated as “hope” is not a weak word like our word “hope.” It was not a vague synonym for “wish,” as we tend to use it. I would define it as “an absolute confidence in something that hasn't yet happened.” When we “hope” for the Resurrection we are not wishing or “hoping, maybe, that it is true.” Instead we know, without question that it is going to happen. Read this passage with this understanding of the word “hope.”

Moving through the day: Meditate on how it changes your thinking to speak of hope in this fashion.

Scripture:

We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he already has? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.

 In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express.And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints in accordance with God's will.