“Therefore this joy of mine is now complete. He must increase, but I must decrease.” (John 3:30)
If the prayer below captures in some way the deep longings of your heart, I invite you to join me in making it a prayer for 2014.
O God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
When John the Baptist made the beautiful declaration in the text above about your Son’s public prominence eclipsing his, it completed his joy! His joy was full! And we know that this was only possible because in the secret place, where no one else saw, your Spirit disciplined him until he no longer trusted or acted on any selfishly ambitious impulse and the desires of his heart were aligned with yours.
This is our desire too. Jesus must increase and we must decrease. To that end, we make this prayer to you as we begin this new year:
Increase our love for you as the greatest treasure of our hearts and decrease any idolatrous love of lesser things.