Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Praying the Psalms - Worlds Of Wonder


Psalm 8 (part 2)

3-4 I look up at your macro-skies, dark and enormous, your handmade sky-jewelry, Moon and stars mounted in their settings. Then I look at my micro-self and wonder, Why do you bother with us? Why take a second look our way?

Father God--I think I get what David was talking about. The night sky is so vast. The creation is vast that you have made and sustain. In contrast to the moon and the stars my concerns seem so small. Any yet you sent your only Son to this place. Amazing.

5-8 Yet we've so narrowly missed being gods, bright with Eden's dawn light. You put us in charge of your handcrafted world, repeated to us your Genesis-charge, Made us lords of sheep and cattle, even animals out in the wild, Birds flying and fish swimming, whales singing in the ocean deeps. 9 God, brilliant Lord, your name echoes around the world.

Father God--You created the world that surrounds me. The universe that you created is amazing and astounding. In the middle of it all you placed man. So often we mess it up. We overlook our mandate to care for and superintend your created order. Or, we want to somehow equate ourselves with the animals that we are supposed to watch over.

Father God--You call me to your work, your mission and your grace lived out in a world that is amazing and hauntingly beautiful. In it’s best moments creation echos to me of your grace.

Saturday, August 27, 2011

Praying the Psalms:Answering Machines and Seperation Anxiety


Psalm 8 1 God, brilliant Lord, yours is a household name.

Father God--Household name...reminds me of the recording on our answering machine. “Hello, You have reached the Brown’s house leave a message.” We are a part of your household...but no answering machine at your house. When we call home you are always there.

Remind me today that I am a part of your household. It really should change everything. Let that simple fact of grace infuse everything today that I come into contact with.


Nursing infants gurgle choruses about you;
toddlers shout the songs
That drown out enemy talk,
and silence atheist babble.

Father God--I have been around babies being fed and taken care of a lot lately. What a blessing! I reminds me of what the writer is talking about...the sense of safety, of priority and focus that babies bring with them. The songs and the laughter over silly and yet somehow sacred things of raising little ones remind me of you.

Maybe atheist’s and the like could be daycare owner’s. Little ones teach me so much about my own stuff. The elemental things like laughter, joy and hope. It can be summed up but somehow left wanting by the term “separation anxiety.”

Father God--Do I ever get separation anxiety from you? I haven’t thought of it that way before. Is that something I can pray for? I have a feeling it is was what Wesley and the others meant by conviction.

Father--Can you give separation anxiety to those who are far from you in our community? Can you help your people let people know that there is a place that can meet that deep need? Your church should be all that can be summed up in the term "household" of God.

Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Praying the Psalms: Even when Evil Men Rule


Psalm 7 (Part Two)

9-11 Close the book on Evil, God,
but publish your mandate for us.
You get us ready for life:
you probe for our soft spots,
you knock off our rough edges.
And I'm feeling so fit, so safe:
made right, kept right.
God in solemn honor does things right,
but his nerves are sandpapered raw.

Father God--David was aware of your work in his heart...molding, shaping, and sustaining. He has it exactly right. Your work continues in this heart of mine, not easy work... but making fit what once was useless. Remind me in those times when I am "thick as a brick" that you are working in this heart of mine. There is no wasted material. You want to use everything that comes into my life to mold and shape this heart of mine.

11-13 Nobody gets by with anything.
God is already in action—
Sword honed on his whetstone,
bow strung, arrow on the string,
Lethal weapons in hand,
each arrow a flaming missile.

Father God--There will come a time when you close the book on evil. There will come a time when tyrants will fall and playing the angles will end. You are at war with evil even when I am unaware of it the battle rages around me. I can trust in the fact that evil men are in a fight they can not win.

14 Look at that guy!
He had sex with sin,
he's pregnant with evil.
Oh, look! He's having
the baby—a Lie-Baby!

15-16 See that man shoveling day after day,
digging, then concealing, his man-trap
down that lonely stretch of road?
Go back and look again—you'll see him in it headfirst,
legs waving in the breeze.
That's what happens:
mischief backfires;
violence boomerangs.

Father God--You know the days that I live in...a time when the values which held things together are in transition. It is a time of opportunity and danger on all sides. It is a time that is not sustainable...a violent, and unjust age. I have a feeling that David felt the same way...at odds with the people that surrounded him.

17 I'm thanking God, who makes things right.
I'm singing the fame of heaven-high God.

Father God--In the end, there is praise. Praise is a faith statement. Praise flows out of trusting you to work even when I am in between the cracks in the sidewalk of active intervention. I may not see the end of the chain of events that result in the judgement of those who trap the righteous. or the judgement of the current despots who are in power. I can in the mean time, back at the ranch, praise you who makes things right.

In this day that will begin in a couple of hours let me rest in your grace...and goodness trusting you to keep me safe in this coming day even as the battle rages around me.

Praying the Psalms--Innocents?


Psalm 7

A David Psalm


1-2 God! God! I am running to you for dear life; the chase is wild.
If they catch me, I'm finished:
ripped to shreds by foes fierce as lions,
dragged into the forest and left
unlooked for, unremembered.

3-5 God, if I've done what they say—
betrayed my friends,
ripped off my enemies—
If my hands are really that dirty,
let them get me, walk all over me,
leave me flat on my face in the dirt.

Father God--Truth and honesty are what stand in the end. Looks and perception look good on the outside, but there must be reality that stands behind them. Accusations are one thing, but reality is another. I wonder if we will be surprised in the end by what the truth is? Power does not make right. It is just power. You are the one that vindicates and who's judgement will stand the test of time. David here is calling for you to vindicate him.

Father--I wonder if David thought of this psalm when he was told of Uriah’s death? In the end David and I both stand in need of your grace. Here in the heat of being pursued David appeals to you for vindication of the present that he was experiencing.

6-8 Stand up, God; pit your holy fury
against my furious enemies.
Wake up, God. My accusers have packed
the courtroom; it's judgment time.
Take your place on the bench, reach for your gavel,
throw out the false charges against me.
I'm ready, confident in your verdict:
"Innocent."

Father--You know the end from the beginning and right now I ask for your forgiveness for those places where I will miss the mark, absolutely make a mess of it. Prepare me now for the changes that will need to take place to avoid the future pitfalls and footfalls that might lead me away from your grace.

The enemy surrounds and the powers that are arrayed against your people are mighty...but you are the Ancient of Days, Mighty and Holy with no shadow of turning. You know me Lord, so much better than I know myself. Whenever I walk toward the light shadow casts away from me.

Father--David appeals to you as being an innocent. He was a young man here. Age, experience and raw life brings me to the place where I can only claim grace but never innocence. Grace at the foot of the cross of your only begotten Son is the only thing that I claim.

Tonight this is as far as I will go. I know that David ends with praise to you...and I know that evil needs to be confronted. As I write this the Arab Spring results are bearing fruit in early autumn. Kadafi's reign in Libya is coming to an end.

Tyrants rise and fall with propaganda making what they do appear right. I am not the one to judge...I am just the one tonight to pray for your people in Libya who are not safe because evil is being corner on their door step. Keep your children safe. Are my brother’s dieing tonight as a tyrant's rule comes to an end?

Thank you for the relative safety that I experience right now. Thank you for the chance to serve you in this place. Make this place a place of grace and hope because of Your mercy received.

Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Praying the Psalms - Honest to God

Psalm 6

A David Psalm

1-2 Please, God, no more yelling, no more trips to the woodshed.Treat me nice for a change; I'm so starved for affection.2-3 Can't you see I'm black-and-blue, beat up badly in bones and soul? God, how long will it take for you to let up?

Father God- I think I get how David felt. Sometimes it feels like the discipline with never end. It reminds me of the times when I would be asked if I wanted my spanking now or later. A bit of a no win answer if you ask me.

Why did this psalm come up now Lord? Is there a message in the timing? These last few weeks have been a roller coaster of thoughts, feelings and circumstances for this journeyman.

David felt black and blue when he wrote this.What I know from the past is there are seasons of growth and change. Is correction a part of the process of grace? Absolutely! Do I like it? No. Doesn’t sound like David did either. Honesty was David’s default position...the place where given time and the work of your Holy Spirit he always returned to.

4-5 Break in, God, and break up this fight; if you love me at all, get me out of here. I'm no good to you dead, am I? I can't sing in your choir if I'm buried in some tomb! 6-7 I'm tired of all this—so tired. My bed has been floating forty days and nights on the flood of my tears. My mattress is soaked, soggy with tears. The sockets of my eyes are black holes; nearly blind, I squint and grope.

Father God--There he goes again...honesty and bruised in the soul is all right there. Ok, so he used poetic license a bit here, he was saying how it felt to him as he went through the process. When you are growing me, Lord, it feels as if the hurt will never end. The enemies that surrounded David were both an instrument of God’s using and at the same time out for their own ends.

When am I going to get that part Lord? That no matter what happens you are working at making the lemons into lemonade? The very people who while out for their own ends are being used by you to hone and polish your work in my life. All I need to do is co-operate, open my soul to the direction of the Spirit’s work. So often that is not my response.

8-9 Get out of here, you Devil's crew: at last God has heard my sobs. My requests have all been granted, my prayers are answered. 10 Cowards, my enemies disappear. Disgraced, they turn tail and run.

Father God--There will come an end to those who are the present cast of characters that surround, confront and confound me. There will be an ongoing process of change as to who the “enemies” are. David prayed that they would go away and be disgraced...that is a great start, but you call for more from your people don’t you?

Matthew 5:43-45

"You're familiar with the old written law, 'Love your friend,' and its unwritten companion, 'Hate your enemy.' I'm challenging that. I'm telling you to love your enemies. Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst. When someone gives you a hard time, respond with the energies of prayer, for then you are working out of your true selves, your God-created selves.

In this day, let my default position be honesty tinged with grace to those I encounter.


Saturday, August 20, 2011

Praying the Psalms: Time to Party



A DAVID PSALM

Psalm 5
005 [5.1-3] Listen, GOD! Please, pay attention! Can you make sense of these ramblings, my groans and cries? King-God, I need your help. Every morning you’ll hear me at it again. Every morning I lay out the pieces of my life on your altar and watch for fire to descend.

Father God--David was beginning his day much like I am. He was laying out the hurt and the praise right on the alter. He laid them in his mind and heart on the place where they were offered to you...a place where they would be consumed and gone. I like that picture. There are too many things that I bring to the alter, only to pick them back up. I worry about them and they end up consuming too much of me David had it exactly right. He let go of them right where they could be consumed.

[5.4-6] You don’t socialize with Wicked, or invite Evil over as your houseguest. Hot-Air-Boaster collapses in front of you; you shake your head over Mischief-Maker. GOD destroys Lie-Speaker; Blood-Thirsty and Truth-Bender disgust you.

Not everyone has the luxury of letting things go into your hands...Remind me, Father, of the load that some are carrying with no relief in sight. I can go on a rant about the people that are filled with hot air and are blood thirsty, truth benders. But bringing them before you in prayer provides me with a way to let go and let you work. It looks like David was a master at that process.

[5.7-8] And here I am, your invited guest— it’s incredible! I enter your house; here I am, prostrate in your inner sanctum, Waiting for directions to get me safely through enemy lines.

Father--Thank you for this time and this day that I can start with you. The sun calls me to the possibilities for this day with you with me. I wait here in the silence knowing you will lead, speak and guide through the maze of responsibilities that await me.

[5.9-10] Every word they speak is a land mine; their lungs breathe out poison gas. Their throats are gaping graves, their tongues slick as mudslides. Pile on the guilt, God! Let their so-called wisdom wreck them. Kick them out! They’ve had their chance.

Father God-- Keep me safe in an environment that many times I only have the slightest glimpe of the dangers that surround. I can relate to David’s feelings...

[5.11-12]But you’ll welcome us with open arms when we run for cover to you. Let the party last all night! Stand guard over our celebration. You are famous, GOD, for welcoming God-seekers, for decking us out in delight.

Father God--You are the one I run to. There is protection, provision and partying in your plans for your people. Celebration surrounds you...welcomes are your speciality. Why party when enemies are surrounding? You are my protector.

Peterson, Eugene H. (2006-06-15). The Message Remix 2.0: The Bible In contemporary Language

Monday, August 15, 2011

Notes to the Lord:Father is Listening


Psalm 4

004 [4.1] When I call, give me answers. God, take my side! Once, in a tight place, you gave me room; Now I’m in trouble again: grace me! hear me!

Father--David came to you in the middle of his need. Almost like a child, in a play ground fight...asking you to take up his cause. I can relate to the need for grace. I need it all the time. I can relate to the need for answers. The reality is I want you to take my side much like a spoiled child demanding my way.

There is and element of fox hole praying here, Lord. I know the feeling I have been there often. It is a slice of life prayer...David could have been writing this on his ipad as he sat in the park on Broadway.

[4.2] You rabble—how long do I put up with your scorn? How long will you lust after lies? How long will you live crazed by illusion? [4.3] Look at this: look Who got picked by GOD! He listens the split second I call to him.

Father God--David knew about those who wanted him to fall. There is protection in your grace. You listen and intervene in the way that you think is best.

[4.4-5] Complain if you must, but don’t lash out. Keep your mouth shut, and let your heart do the talking. Build your case before God and wait for his verdict. [4.6-7] Why is everyone hungry for more? “More, more,” they say. “More, more.”I have God’s more-than-enough, More joy in one ordinary day [4.7-8] Than they get in all their shopping sprees. At day’s end I’m ready for sound sleep, For you, GOD, have put my life back together.

Father God--There is a ongoing process of depending on you for the next step. You are seeking to deepen me. You want me to include you in my day and to send you just these kind of prayers in the middle of my everyday. It is true that in you I find peace and grace that can not be brought with more material things in my life. Sound sleep at the end of the day come from following after and and depending on you to put my life back together.

“Flash Prayers” is an excellent idea developed by Frank Laubach in his many books on prayer. He purposed to learn how to live so that “to see anybody will be to pray! To hear anybody, as these children talking, that boy crying, may be to pray!”11 Flashing hard and straight prayers at people is a great thrill and can bring interesting results. I have tried it, inwardly asking the joy of the Lord and a deeper awareness of his presence to rise up within every person I meet. Sometimes people reveal no response, but other times they turn and smile as if addressed. In a bus or plane we can invite Jesus to walk down the aisles, touching people on the shoulder and saying, “I love you. My greatest delight would be to forgive you and give you good things. You have beautiful qualities still in the bud that I would unfold if only you will say yes. I’d love to rule your life if you’ll let me.” Frank Laubach has suggested that if thousands of us would experiment with “swishing prayers” at everyone we meet and would share the results, we could learn a great deal about how to pray for others. We could change the whole atmosphere of a nation if thousands of us would constantly throw a cloak of prayer around everyone in our circle of nearness. “Units of prayer combined, like drops of water, make an ocean which defies resistance.”
Foster, Richard J. (2004-05-11). Celebration Of Discipline - 25th Anniversary (pp. 44-45).

As the
se feet take me through the coming day...let me pray flash prayers for those I encounter in this day...

Saturday, August 13, 2011

Growing Edges Quotes


Heaven and earth, it seems, are not after all poles apart, needing to be separated forever when all the children of heaven have been rescued from this wicked earth. Nor are they simply different ways of looking at the same thing, as would be implied by some kinds of pantheism. No, they are different, radically different, but they are made for each other in the same way (Revelation is suggesting) as male and female. And when they finally come together, that will be cause for rejoicing in the same way that a wedding is: a creational sign that God’s project is going forward; that opposite poles within creation are made for union, not competition; that love and not hate have the last word in the universe; that fruitfulness and not sterility is God’s will for creation.

Wright, N. T. (2009-04-24). Surprised by Hope (p. 105). Harper Collins e-books. Kindle Edition.

Thursday, August 11, 2011

Praying the Psalms -Help!


003 [3.1-2] A DAVID PSALM, WHEN HE ESCAPED FOR HIS LIFE FROM ABSALOM, HIS SON

GOD! Look! Enemies past counting! Enemies sprouting like mushrooms, Mobs of them all around me, roaring their mockery: “Hah! No help for him from God!”

Father God--It isn’t all pretty. There are times when your people, blessed people, the people of God are overwhelmed. It looks as if they are under resourced, and without hope. David felt on many scores as if he were down for the count. Civil war and insurrection surrounded him fomented by his favored son.

[3.3-4] But you, GOD, shield me on all sides; You ground my feet, you lift my head high; With all my might I shout up to GOD, His answers thunder from the holy mountain.

Father God--Even when I am experiencing my worse fears in real time, you are with me. I am not alone and you will answer. David in the middle of great personal loss and even when his life was in danger found reason for praise. He found a firm place to stand and hold his ground.

[3.5-6] I stretch myself out. I sleep.Then I’m up again—rested, tall and steady, Fearless before the enemy mobs Coming at me from all sides. [3.7] Up, GOD! My God, help me! Slap their faces, First this cheek, then the other, Your fist hard in their teeth! [3.8] Real help comes from GOD. Your blessing clothes your people!

Father God--In the middle of this day that will start all around me in just a few moments remind me that you are the one who fights the battles. I need only rest in your grace. Real help comes from you in ways and means that are beyond, above and around me even when I am not aware of it.

Wednesday, August 10, 2011

Praying the Psalms - Thoughts on Power


Psalm 2

[2.1-6] Why the big noise, nations? Why the mean plots, peoples? Earth-leaders push for position, Demagogues and delegates meet for summit talks, The God-deniers, the Messiah-defiers: “Let’s get free of God! Cast loose from Messiah!”

Father God--Your people have been engaged and outraged by the political situations that face them for centuries. There have been demagogues and God deniers all along the way. The plot is thickening in my country right now.

I grieve for where we are...this is a time of being between the cracks in the sidewalk. We are not what we have been and not yet what we are going to be. There are those that would have us trusting in ourselves and not in you. Intervene in the political landscape, Father. This is a prayer that is as old as your people.

Heaven-throned God breaks out laughing. At first he’s amused at their presumption; Then he gets good and angry. Furiously, he shuts them up: “Don’t you know there’s a King in Zion? A coronation banquet Is spread for him on the holy summit.”

Father God--There is a sense of the ironic and the pathetic whenever humans forget who really is in charge. Speak and all of the talking heads will find there is something really important to talk about in the daily news cycle. What would you say to us? “America is a republic not and empire?” “Live simply so other can simply live?”

Somalia comes to mind as I write this the scenes of need, famine, and heart ache haunts me. There is no qualitative difference between those hungry faces and my well feed face. Lines from Your son's words to Peter float in my head...:”Feed my lambs.”

[2.7-9] Let me tell you what GOD said next. He said, “You’re my son, And today is your birthday. What do you want? Name it: Nations as a present? continents as a prize? You can command them all to dance for you, Or throw them out with tomorrow’s trash.”

Father God--You are in control. Nations dance when you demand it. Messiah one day will move in power against those who would defy his rule. The kingdom of God is alive and well in the twenty-first century.

[2.10-12] So, rebel-kings, use your heads; Upstart-judges, learn your lesson: Worship GOD in adoring embrace, Celebrate in trembling awe. Kiss Messiah! Your very lives are in danger, you know; His anger is about to explode, if you make a run for God—you won’t regret it!

Father God--Your righteous anger is kindled when you see your children in need and at the mercy of ruthless political sharks. Even political sharks who have forgotten how to lead will find that there is reason for repentance. Your mercy reaches even the powerful.

In this day that will dawn in a few moments, Father, lead those who are find themselves in power in this nation. Work in their hearts to see leadership as a trust and nothing less. Remind them that they are ultimately responsible to you. Give wisdom to our leaders, help them to know when to hold their ground and when to compromise.

Tuesday, August 9, 2011

Praying the Psalms: Wanting to Be Real




Bold Psalm 1

[1.1] How well God must like you— you don’t hang out at Sin Saloon, you don’t slink along Dead-End Road, you don’t go to Smart-Mouth College.

Father God--As I start to pray this psalm, I realize that I have been blessed. You have lead me away from places that I have been in the past...out of “SIn Saloon.” I remember some of the those days...other’s are a bit hazy. I remember being at “Dead-End road. The emotions flood in if I let them...fear, loneliness, frustrated depression. Those feelings form their expression in “smart-mouth” sarcastic humor that really was just laughing at the hollowness of my soul.

You lead me from that place...thank you.

[1.2-3] Instead you thrill to GOD’s Word, you chew on Scripture day and night. You’re a tree replanted in Eden, bearing fresh fruit every month, Never dropping a leaf, always in blossom.

Father--I have to be honest. I haven’t thought of this place I am at as Eden, but I have this growing desire to read your word. It rattles around in my brain and comes out at times when I don’t expect it and in ways that are frankly suprising to me. The promise here is of a fruitfulness that is not seasonal but continuous. I never noticed that before. Thank you for that promise given from your hand.


[1.4-5] You’re not at all like the wicked, who are mere windblown dust— Without defense in court, unfit company for innocent people.

Father--The description of the wicked, I can understand emotionally. I have been there...windbown, rootless dust...dry hot air...without an advocate...unfit to be around regular people. Somehow thinking that my spiritual condition was written on my forehead somewhere for everyone to read.

[1.6] GOD charts the road you take. The road they take is Skid Row.

Father--Thank you that my road is one that you know. You are charting the way that at times seems meandering to my feet. As I walk this road of faith you are with me. It is only through your grace and unmerited favor expressed in your Son that I am on this road in the first place. Thank you for the process of becoming that you have set me on. It really is a process of becoming real.

On Becoming Real

"Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse. "It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real."

"Does it hurt?"asked the Rabbit. "Sometimes," said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. "When you are Real you don't mind being hurt." "Does it happen all at once, like being wound up," he asked, "or bit by bit?"

"It doesn't happen all at once," said the Skin Horse. "You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally,by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand." "I suppose you are real?" said the Rabbit. And then he wished he had not said it, for he for he thought the Skin Horse might be sensitive. But the Skin Horse only smiled.

Bianco, Margery Williams (2004-03-01). The Velveteen Rabbit (Kindle Location 30). Public Domain Books. Kindle Edition.


Wednesday, August 3, 2011

Notes to the Lord:The Days Ahead


2 Timothy 3

[3.1-5] Don’t be naive. There are difficult times ahead. As the end approaches, people are going to be self-absorbed, money-hungry, self-promoting, stuck-up, profane, contemptuous of parents, crude, coarse, dog-eat-dog, unbending, slanderers, impulsively wild, savage, cynical, treacherous, ruthless, bloated windbags, addicted to lust, and allergic to God. They’ll make a show of religion, but behind the scenes they’re animals. Stay clear of these people.

Lord Jesus--This the passage that everyone preaches from when they are unhappy with the current state of events. Lord Jesus, give me wisdom to view the world not from a perspective of gathering darkness because of my own myopic self focus, but let me see the world around me through your eyes of grace.

I know that, regardless of my view of end-times events, we are closer to your return than when Paul wrote these words. Truth be told some of these same character traits have been evident all along during the life of the church. Are they more evident now? That is something that is very hard to evaluate.

What I can be sure of without a doubt is I do not want to be defined by any of these descriptors. Ruthless, bloated wind bags...kind of sums up most of politics right now, but then that might just be my slightly jaded perspective.

[3.6-9] These are the kind of people who smooth-talk themselves into the homes of unstable and needy women and take advantage of them; women who, depressed by their sinfulness, take up with every new religious fad that calls itself “truth.” They get exploited every time and never really learn. These men are like those old Egyptian frauds Jannes and Jambres, who challenged Moses. They were rejects from the faith, twisted in their thinking, defying truth itself. But nothing will come of these latest impostors. Everyone will see through them, just as people saw through that Egyptian hoax.

Lord Jesus-It is almost like Paul is on a rant and once he gets started one thing leads to another and then the thoughts just flow. I wonder if he had specific individuals in mind as he wrote to Timothy? Did Paul the veteran of a thousand church fights have individuals in mind that Timothy had to work with? Lord Jesus--Paul is saying that those who are in this church thing for their own ends will be found out in the end. The results will not stand up to the test of time.

Lord Jesus--Work in this heart, create in me an authenticity that rests not on show but on the reality of your grace. Let that grace shape and mold my life and heart in ways that the test of time only brings into clearer focus and sharper resolution.

Monday, August 1, 2011

Notes to the Lord:More Thoughts About Light


2 Timothy 2

25Opponents must be gently instructed, in the hope that God will grant them repentance leading them to a knowledge of the truth,

Lord Jesus--Here Paul focuses his thoughts on those who just plain are opponents to the gospel. There are those who listen and just disagree with the call of the gospel, it is not productive to argue. The call is never to argue, but to instruct. The call is to tell the story in as many ways as I can think of to say it. Say it in actions and thoughts, in words that are eloquent of your light, and your call toward change.

2
6 and that they will come to their senses and escape from the trap of the devil, who has taken them captive to do his will.

"We do not draw people to Christ by loudly discrediting what they believe, by telling them how wrong they are and how right we are, but my showing them a light that is so lovely that they want with all their hearts to know the source of it." -- Madeleine L'Engle

Lord Jesus--Madeleine L'Engle got it much better than I can say it. The call is to show everyone a light that is so lovely that they want to know the source of it...in so doing they find themselves truly free for the first time.