Sunday Setup – Colossians 4:2-6

Hey Cross Church, welcome to the Sunday setup. This is our time where we digitally gather together every week Thursdays at 2:00 where we get to pray through the piece pray through the piece of scripture that will be preaching through this Sunday. And today we are continuing our series and we're really making a turn in this five-weeks um study of rooted and ready going through the book of Colossians. And we talked about being rooted in three different ways of being rooted in our worship, rooted in our community, and rooted in discipleship and getting closer to our God. Well, today we take the turn and we move from rooted to ready. And as we look at this Sunday of being ready for mission, um what we the passage that this just breeds out of is Colossians chapter 4 starting in verse two and we're going to read five verses here today. And it says this, he's starting in verse two, he says, "Devote yourselves to prayer. Stay alert in it with Thanksgiving. At the same time, pray also for us that God may open a door to us for the word to speak the mystery of Christ, for which I am in chains, so that I may make it known as I should. Act wisely towards outsiders, making the most of the time. Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you should answer each person." This is Paul just lays out an amazing couple verses here that's all about missions. It's all about sharing the gospel. It's all about praying for opportunities and acting on those opportunities. And I want us to start in verse two as we think about preparing our hearts for this time. Is he says a couple things here when he says devote yourselves to prayer and stay alert with Thanksgiving is you don't just get to tell people about Jesus when there's not preparation put into it. When there's not seeking God for opportunities and there's not being thankful for God that he has done stuff in your life and he wants you to do stuff in the lives of those around you. So, here's our first prayer prompt and starting with a prayer as appropriately here is a prayer of Thanksgiving. And here just taking these words straight out of the passage is Lord, help me be alert in my Thanksgiving by Lord, help me be alert in my Thanksgiving by appreciating what you have put in my life. By stewarding the resources you have given me and my family. Oh, Lord, help me appreciate be alert in my Thanksgiving by finish that prayer prompt and just take some time thanking God and being alert of why we should be thankful to him. >> Lord, help us stay alert in our prayer and our Thanksgiving. God, we have so much to be thankful for, the families you've given us, the churches you've given us, the jobs you've given us, our neighborhood. And Lord, let us be alert and and praying to you and and thanking you for all that you've done. But Lord, not not just letting the time pass by, not just taking the blessing without doing the work, but Lord, it position down your path and start putting into practice what you have called us to. And God, we see that's exactly where this passage leads is as Paul saying devote ourselves to prayer prayer is staying alert with Thanksgiving and and being thankful for all he's done. The rest of it is praying about opening doors and actually walking through those doors. And we're going to talk about how we walk through those doors. We're going to talk about how we share the gospel of how are is our speech seasoned with salt this week. But today, I want us to stop on this open door. And are we praying for doors to be open to share the gospel? Cuz if we're honest, sometimes we're not inviting people to church, we're not sharing Jesus with people cuz we're not praying for it and we don't know if we want it to come cuz we don't know if we're ready for it. But before we're even ready, we need to ask God to send the opportunities. He will make us ready. He will equip us with his word to make those happen. But I want this to be our prayer prompt here is God open doors and God open doors maybe at my dinner table with estranged family. God open doors maybe in your neighborhood with with the garages. God open the garage door a little bit more often so I actually get to see my neighbor. God, open doors in my workplace, open doors in my kids school, open door in my kids sports. Is God open doors in Pray that prayer for opportunities to share the mystery of Christ. God, open doors in the West Valley. God, in Surprise and Sun City Festival and Buckeye and Peoria God, in Waddell and Sun City West and Sun City Grand and Sun City proper. Lord, just open doors Open doors in Wickenburg and Wittmann and Morristown. Lord, just open doors that we can be faithful to walking through and to sharing the mystery of Christ. God, we are so thankful that you have entrusted us. We are thankful that you decide to work through us. And Lord, we just ask that you continue to open doors. And Lord, you lead us through them. God, we thank you for this time. We thank you for our church family. And Lord, we just bless all this in In name. Amen. Hey, thank you for joining us today. Come join us this weekend as we talk about what it looks like to be ready for mission. We'll see you soon.