GOD’S WORD FOR JULY 13 ~ ~ 2 Corinthians 2:14 ~ ~ “Now thanks be to God who always leads us in triumph in Christ, and through us diffuses the fragrance of His knowledge in every place.”

Continuing with excerpts from John Piper’s “The Pleasures of God”

Why then does God delight in the prayers of the upright (saved)? He delights in their prayers for the same reason that he hates the sacrifices of the wicked—because the prayers of the upright are the extension and outworking of the heart;

but, unlike the heart of the wicked, the heart of the upright magnifies the power and grace of God. The prayer of the saved is a delight to God because it expresses those affections of the heart which call attention to the all-sufficiency of God

We saw from Psalm 147:11 that “the Lord takes pleasure in those who HOPE in his love.” here we see that the Lord takes pleasure in prayers that give expression to that hope. The reason our hope is a pleasure to God is because it shows that all our joy comes from the bounty of his grace. The reason our prayers are a pleasure to God is because they express this God-exalting hope.

It is a precious thing beyond all words—especially in the hour of death—that we have a God whose nature is such that what pleases him is not our WORK for him but our NEED for him.

The intensity of God’s pleasure in prayer becomes more and more obvious as we look at the connection between prayer and the other things that God is committed to with all his heart.

Fr example, God loves to magnify his glory in the lives of his people. So he designed prayer as a way for this to happen. Jesus says, “Whatever you ask in my name, I will do it, THAT THE FATHER MAY BE GLORIFIED IN THE SON” (John 14:14)

So God has designed prayer as an occasion when he and the Son will be glorified as the source and agent in doing good to his people. This is one of the reasons Revelation describes the prayers of the saints as golden bowls of incense before the throne of God (Revelation 5:8). God delights in the aroma of his own glory as he smells it in the prayers of his people.

2 Corinthians 2:15

For we are to God the fragrance of Christ among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing.

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