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My message and my preaching were not marked by persuasive words of human wisdom, but by a demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith would not rest on human wisdom, but on God’s power.

1 Corinthians 2:4–5, EHV

If a person’s coming to faith were dependent upon how eloquently a person explains the faith and the clear exposition of Scripture, then the people of God would not have needed Jesus’ death on the Cross. The power of God is not merely in words. It is in the movement of His Spirit into the hearts of mankind. We are fully reliant on God to help lead another to Him and to be brought to Him. Faith comes through hearing, but it is God who opens the ears and the hearts of the hearer, as well as our Lord, placing the Words on the lips of the preacher. Neither is done through the power of the person, but the supernatural power of our Lord. Just as Baptism isn’t the power of the water or the promises made by the person being baptized, but the power of the Holy Spirit that brings the person to the waters of Baptism and the Word of God attached to those waters. We may be the vessel that our Lord uses in His work, but we are chosen and are called by our faithfulness to Him who has created the faith in us in the first place. In this, we may find our peace.

Let us pray. I thank you, my heavenly Father, through Jesus Christ, your dear Son, that you have kept me this night from all harm and danger, and I ask you to protect me this day also from sin and every evil, that in all I do today, I may please you. For into your hands, I commend myself, my body and soul, and all that is mine. Let your holy angel watch over me, that the wicked foe have no power over me. Amen.