April 10, 2018

God Is Waiting

They all joined together constantly in prayer, along with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brothers. – Acts 1:14

How important is prayer on your daily “to do” list? Is it an afterthought or is it something you dedicate specific time to? Is prayer something you do out of obligation or is something you look forward to doing? And is prayer a once-and-done kind of thing or is it something that carries you through the day?

Several years ago I lead a study titled The Battle Plan for Prayer. I always knew God would call me to do it again and He has. It’s been a wonderful refresher course in being specific in my prayer life.

This study, by Stephen and Alex Kendrick and based on the movie War Room, leads us into a more strategic prayer life. How many times do we pray in generalities so that we never really know if our prayers are answered? How many times do we hold back because we’re afraid God will let us down, that He’ll say no, or, worse, that He’ll ignore us and our request?

What shallow faith we have. We’re so intent on doing it ourselves, on counting on ourselves, that we leave God out of the equation until all of our options are done. We have no where else to turn. We have nothing left to lose. Then we turn to God, who was waiting there all along, eager to help us and longing for a relationship with us.

That’s what God wants. He wants our hearts. He wants our devotion. He wants us to turn to Him, to run to Him, with all our joys and sorrows, our needs and our celebrations. He wants that relationship. We’re a bit leery. He is God, after all. He is Almighty. Powerful. Our Judge. The Creator of our world and the One in charge of it all.

What if He says no? What if He doesn’t heal or provide for us? What if He sends us on a journey we’d rather not take to a place we’d rather not go?

God has good plans for us. God provides for us. God loves and sustains us. These are His promises. He wrote them down for everyone to see. He is a God of truth. We can count on Him when we can’t count on anything or anyone else.

What would happen if you were as devoted to prayer as you are to your cell phone or to your kids’ ball schedule or your job? What would happen in your if you made prayer a priority rather than an obligation or something that was an option?

Schedule your prayer time and keep it. Then learn to pray spontaneously throughout the day. Is it a beautiful day? Thank God for it. Did your meeting god well? Thank God for that too. Are you stressed over finances? Turn it over to God and thank Him for handling it – before He does. Whatever it is, learn to include God in the moments of your day. He cares and He wants to be included.

March 10, 2016

Resist The Devil

7 Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. 8 Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. 9 Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. 10 Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up. -- James 4:7-10

Who controls your life? You? God? Satan? Whoa! Wait a minute, you’re saying about now. Satan isn’t in control. I am. Or at least God is. Not Satan. I’m a Christian!

Okay. But that doesn’t mean you aren’t allowing Satan to push your buttons, disrupt your mind and your thoughts, and cause disruptions in your life. Satan causes havoc and ruins so many things.

I just watched the movie War Room -- again. I’m not sure how many times I’ve seen it. I love its message because the power of prayer is something we so often overlook. We pray when we are desperate rather than praying before we reach that point.

In one scene, she is praying and repeating “resist the devil and he will flee from you.” Then she gets up and basically calls the devil out and tells him to leave her house because Jesus is in charge now. How powerful! Why don’t we all do that?

Because we don’t recognize what Satan is doing. We blame others. In this same move, she blames her husband for everything but wise Mrs. Clara tells her to pray for her husband and blame the devil. Amazing things start to happen when she truly does pray for her husband. She stops trying to fix him and turns him over to God. Truly.

Ah, there we are back to that control issue. We really don’t want to give that up. How much grief do we cause ourselves and others by trying to control what we can’t control? We can’t control the actions of others. We can’t control events around us. We can’t control much of anything beyond ourselves.

The good part is that we’re not supposed to control those things anyway. We aren’t called to fix anyone or anything beyond ourselves. We’re to pray for people, resist the devil, and focus on God.

So stand up and fight -- with prayer. True, heartfelt prayer. That’s where you fight for those you love. That’s where you fight when you’ve been wronged. In prayer. Trust God to handle it all and He will. Always. He will.

January 27, 2016

Sow Kindness

Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. -- Galatians 6:9

There’s a scene in the movie War Room where one man stops and changes the tire on another car. Simple enough. Except, not really. Earlier in the movie the man with the flat tire and had hatefully argued that the other man should be prosecuted for his wrongs. And the other man, well, he had turned his life around and recommitted himself to God.

So he did the right thing.

It shocked the man with the flat tire. Maybe it even touched his hard heart. He wasn’t used to somebody doing something good, somebody he’d condemned, somebody who wasn’t going to benefit from the good deed.

We’re a little like that, aren’t we? We always look for the ulterior motive. We justify our own lack of kindness with the excuse that nobody would do it for us. Somehow we think that makes it alright. It doesn’t.

As God’s people, we’re to do good where we can, anyway that we can. Not because we expect to get anything out of it. Not because we think the other person deserves it. Not because it’s convenient or we’ll look good or we feel like it. We’re to do good because it is what He has called us to do.

We grow weary sometimes. We are condemned. Criticized. Judged. And yet we are to do good anyway.

The man in the movie did something wrong. He did. He admitted it -- belatedly I might add. But he admitted what he had done even though he knew that jail was a possibility. He did what was right. Fortunately, another man offered him grace that could only come from God.

Do good. Treat others as you want to be treated. Sow kindness. Lend a helping hand. Live your life so that others see Jesus in you.