I’m a uniquely blessed, technological novice. However, between my wife and some very knowledgeable friends and colleagues, God has provided me with a wealth of tech support and encouragement. And yesterday, amongst technology professionals, God provided spiritual support and encouragement.

At the invitation of an EA supporter, I attended the High Tech Prayer Breakfast in Washington, D.C., and walked away both encouraged and challenged. I particularly appreciated, technology icon and outspoken follower of Christ, Pat Gelsinger’s challenge to have a clear sense of calling.

I’ve been reading the D.A. Carson’s Praying with Paul: A Call to Spiritual Reformation, which recently addressed 2 Thessalonians 1:11 – “We constantly pray for you, that our God may make you worthy of his calling, and that by his power he may bring to fruition your every desire for goodness and your every deed prompted by faith.”

This fabulous quote below from Carson coincides nicely with Gelsinger’s challenge:

God has graciously called us; now we must live up to that calling. That cannot mean less than that we should become increasingly holy, self-denying, loving, full of integrity, steeped in the knowledge of God and his Word, delighted to trust and obey our heavenly Father.

  We are not strong enough or disciplined enough to take these steps ourselves. That is why Paul prays as he does. If the holy God is to count us “worthy of his calling,” we must ask him for help. That is why Paul is praying: he is not simply asking the Thessalonians to try harder, but he is praying for them to the end that God will count them worthy of his calling. Such a prayer is tantamount to asking that God will so work in their lives, so make them worthy, that ultimately he will count them worthy.

And so this text asks us: When was the last time you prayed this sort of prayer for your family? For your church? For your children? Do we not spend far more energy praying that our children will pass their exams, or get a good job, or be happy, or not stray too far, than we do praying that they may live lives worthy of what it means to be a Christian?

My prayer for each of the 1,000 attendees is that we put the biblical principles, clearly outlined, into daily practice.

As noted in the book of James,

“It’s in the obeying of the Word that we experience the blessing, not in the reading or the hearing.” – Warren Wiersbe 

“But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing.” (James 1:25)