Kenneth D. Boa - Face to Face: Praying the Scriptures for Spiritual Growth

Face
To Face

Praying
the Scriptures
for
Spiritual
Growth

Scripture translation and adaptation by

KENNETH BOA

Karen and I dedicate this collection
of Biblical affirmations
with love to our children Heather and Matthew.

For years I have been frustrated by a hit and (usually) miss approach to catching a few thoughts from the Bible before going to sleep. My morning devotional times have been greatly enhanced by a previous volume, Face to Face: Praying the Scriptures for Intimate Worship. This little prayer book is based on the eight forms of prayer modeled in the Lords Prayer: adoration, confession, renewal, petition, intercession, affirmation, thanksgiving and closing prayer. One of these formsaffirmationis illustrated in the phrase, Your kingdom come; Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven Matthew 6:10). The principle of affirmation involves agreeing with Gods will for us and submitting to it. It occurred to me, then, that hundreds of affirmations could be derived from Scripture and compiled into a format that would act as a tool to enable people to renew their minds with Biblical truth on a daily basis. And if we pray these affirmations back to God, we are actively and verbally agreeing with His will for us, resulting in our spiritual growth as we become more and more conformed to His image in Christ Jesus.

The germ of truth in the growing body of self-talk literature is that people often need to be reminded of their identity and goals so that they have a clear sense of purpose and direction. The problem with this literature is that it often promotes an unbiblical value system and world view. Biblical affirmations are founded in truth; they are not like the self-talk that says, Every day and in every way, I am getting better and better. The affirmations of Scripture encourage us to walk by faith, not by feelings; when we pray affirmations, we are agreeing with God on the way things really are regardless of our emotional, cultural and theological filters. Though our circumstances may threaten our commitment to the truththat God is in control of our affairs and has our best interests at heartScripture affirms these foundational principles and tells us to cling to them even in the midst of lifes pain.

These Biblical affirmations are not merely wishful thinking; they are true of every person who places his or her hope in Jesus Christ. They stress our identity in Him as well as our intimacy with God our Father. They challenge us to value relationships more than objectives. They teach us that what we do does not determine who we are; rather, our being should shape our doing. They reinforce the realistic perspective that we are strangers and pilgrims, not citizens of this world, and tell us to walk in grace and live in the power of the Spirit of God instead of walking in obedience to a set of external rules and living in the power of the flesh. As we pray these spiritual truths, they counsel us to take the risks of applying Biblical precepts and principles, to place our hope in the character and promises of God, and not in the people, possessions or prestige of this world.

Many of the prayer affirmations in Face to Face: Praying the Scriptures for Spiritual Growth are expressed as desires; you will be dialoging with God, agreeing with Him that these are the things you want to be true of your life. Using this book on a regular basis will be a faith-building exercise that will make these affirmations increasingly real in your life, resulting in a change in perspective, without which no genuine spiritual growth can take place. When we renew our minds through praying the affirmations of Scripture, we grow in the knowledge of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ (Ephesians 4:13).

And what better time to use such a tool than just before going to sleep? The thoughts we entertain after we turn out the light have a profound effect on the rest of the night, but few of us make good use of these strategic minutes. Instead, most people carry anxieties and other fleshly thought patterns to bed with them. Throughout the course of the day we are being bombarded by the temporal value system of the world through the things we see, hear and read. Because of this, it is important that we renew our minds with the eternal value system of Scripture so that we regain a sense of focus on the crucial issues of who we are, where we came from, why we are here and where we are going.

Face to Face: Praying the Scriptures for Spiritual Growth is designed to assist you in this process of renewing your mind. It can be most effective when used just before going to sleep so that you set, or program, your conscious and subconscious mind for the rest of the night. This is consistent with Davids practice: When I remember You on my bed, I meditate on You in the night watches (Psalm 63:6). Rather than being conformed to this world, you will be transformed by the renewing of your mind (Romans 12:2). This will assist you in taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ (2 Corinthians 10:5). Face to Face: Praying the Scriptures for Spiritual Growth will help you to set your mind on the things above, not on the things on the earth (Colossians 3:2), and to let your mind dwell on whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good reportif anything is excellent or praiseworthy (Philippians 4:8).

To create this collection of Biblical affirmations, I consulted several translations as well as the original language of every passage. The result is essentially my own translation, though it shares much in common with existing translations. My intention in doing this was to remain as close to the Biblical text as possible while still retaining clarity and readability. I then adapted the bulk of the passages into an affirmation format.

Within the Praying the Scriptures format, these affirmations are directed to God; as we pray we reflect back to Him and agree with Him about 1) the truths He teaches us about Himself and 2) statements of what we want to be true of our lives. A number of these affirmations were derived from negative statements and evaluations in the Bible and turned into positive statements. In other cases, principles have been derived from the lives of Biblical characters.

To assist you in personalizing these affirmations, I decided to put them in the singular and/or first person whenever possible. However, some (e.g., 1 Corinthians 1:45, 7) could not be adapted into the singular without excessive distortion. When you use Face to Face: Praying the Scriptures for Spiritual Growth with another person or with a group, turn the singulars into plurals.

Clearly, a large measure of subjectivity is unavoidable in the creation of a book like this. This relates to several issues, like the decision of selecting some passages and not using others; translation decisions; editorial choices involved in adapting passages into the form of affirmations; assignment of passages into categories; and arrangement of these categories. Inevitably, people will wonder why I overlooked some passages or categorized others in the way I did. These are all matters of judgment and interpretation, and I freely admit that there are many other ways in which these affirmations could have been expressed and arranged. In many cases they overlapped my tidy categories, and I had to make choices on the basis of emphasis. Because of all this, I encourage you to make insertions and deletions whenever it will help make this a more effective tool for spiritual growth.