Pray Network Forum

Every congregation needs three essential gatherings – one for worship, one for teaching and training (discipleship), and one in which the congregation meets God in corporate prayer. These are not exclusive one of the other. As the church gathers for prayer, there should be at the heart of the meeting, a worshipful disposition. The corporate worship experience should be structured to include significant congregational prayer moments. Yet neither, the church gathered to worship and hear the Word nor the church gathered to pray the Word, can replace the other. The act of praying together is itself a form of discipleship. We learn to pray by praying.

The discipleship-training-teaching effort of the church should include a prayer training component, in which, a deeper

understating of prayer is cultivated, and again, neither can replace the other. The central spiritual discipline that enlightens us is prayer – over an open Bible. Without prayer, discipleship fails. Since, without the discipline of daily time with God, as well as regular moments in which the congregation pauses to meet with God corporately, we testify to independence and self-sufficiency, the opposite of the spirit of one under discipline.

A fundamental characteristic of healthy worship is its vertical orientation. It is not the singing or preaching that inspires us, not the horizontal. Rather, it is edification (horizontal), insistently, in the context of glorifying God (vertical). Our chorus and syrupy brotherly love moments, our best inspiration praise music and positive preaching, will not sustain us. What is demanded is an encounter with the Presence, with God. That necessitates corporate interaction with God, our talking to God, doing it together, and that is corporate prayer.

Sadly, too little prayer occurs in our corporate worship. Even when we sing prayer songs, we recite the lyrics, but do not pray them. We are in church, unconscious of God’s Presence. Essentially ignoring Him – with Him in the room. Talking to one another about Him – but not to Him.

The element of prayer in worship has almost been lost – prayer is a quick opening to say to the people, “We are beginning the service!” And it is a closing exercise, a moment in which many race for the door to be the first out of the parking lot, and in which the pastor positions himself at the door for congratulatory handshakes about the morning message. The benediction, which should be the high point in worship, that moment in which God’s blessing is pronounced on the people, is disappearing.

In smaller congregations, where prayer request times have survived, a collage of needs are cast heavenward with such casualness that the experience testifies to our waning faith in prayer. That too, is the time when staging shifts occur. Prayer is ancillary to worship, almost irrelevant, certainly the stepchild of corporate worship. If prayer is not practiced when the people of God gather for worship, by that omission, we declare its value as insignificant. We assume God’s grace. We transform worship into clubs of sincere people gathered to inspire one another – and that is less than true worship. The congregation needs to hear the pastor, not only talking to them, but also talking to God in their behalf,

modeling Biblical prayer, functioning in his primary role as shepherd-watchman-intercessor. And the congregation needs to be led in corporate prayer.

It is estimated that 90 percent of the people attending some religious events, even church services, are passive observers.^[1] The church has been a spectator event. We are sung to, prayed for, and preached

at. The church is thought to exist for the inspiration it offers, the services it provides, the bang for the buck – not so. The church does not exist for itself, for its members, but for the Lord, and because of His loving nature, for the world around us. Contrary to popular thought, worship is not ‘for what we receive from the experience’ but for what God receives. Narcissistic self-interested worship is a form of idolatry; it is self-worship, thinly disguised. And it is self-deception. The new reformation, someone has said, is ‘do whatever works.’ Pragmatism. In our attempt to be contemporary, and to reach a post-Christian culture, we are in danger of becoming ourselves post-Christian. Of losing the faith. To make it all about the person, the sinner, whose major problem is self-centered life, only reinforces the sin. It is the radical opposite that is needed – repentance, a cross, humility, the death of sin and self.

• This blog is part of The Praying Church Handbook – Volume III – Pastor and the Congregation which can be purchased at alivepublications.org>

^[1]       Mike Erre, Death by Church (Eugene, OR: Harvest House, 2009), 39.

...in response to his frustration in asking for prayer to be more active in the ministries and activities of congregational life.

Most leaders/pastors do not value highly either the critical need to invite the congregation to the place of prayer (a prayer meeting or meetings throughout the week where prayer is the primary purpose; praying for the holy huddle but also for the culture and community) ... and to take prayer to the places the members are already gathered (small groups, studies/classes, planning team/committees, families, etc).

We pray "up" (asking for all our needs) but fail to pray "out" by asking the Lord to empower us to live prayer-care-share lifestyles that deliver the tangible love of God through Christ to neighbors, neighborhood and nations.

Comments anyone?

Frustrated?

Blessed by your experience?

There are four prayer streams in the life of the people of God that are critical.

1. The congregation gathered in and for prayer. Not preaching. Not teaching or training, but in prayer.
2. Smaller prayer groups. Not the entire congregation gathered, but slices of church life gathered for prayer. For example, at the heart of every ministry and group in the congregation, there should be a developing prayer culture. To isolate prayer by framing it as ‘prayer ministry’ and placing it there; having youth and children, men and women, singles and seniors, a dozen other ministries here, all undergirded by the prayer ministry there – is fatal error. To assign prayer to a few, even a significant but detached team is to attempt to use prayer as a kind of engine for church ministries, and yet, separate from them. That makes prayer pragmatic, utilitarian, and that is a flawed equation. Every ministry, to be New Testament, is to be humbly dependent on God in prayer. At their heart, must be a culture of God’s Presence, of holiness and humility and that necessitates prayer. The goal is to press prayer into the seams of congregational life. If church activities and ministries are to be animated by the breath of God, they must be praying ministries – the Spirit is breath and prayer is breathing.
3. The family altar. Currently, only 5 to 8 percent of Christian homes have anything resembling a family altar. That must change. If prayer is foreign to daily life, we declare to ourselves and our children, that we have learned to live without family gatherings in which God is at the center of our lives and activities, our daily relationships, in a formal and openly affirming manner. God must not be ignored. Our children, having learned from us to live without engaging God in an intentional manner six days a week, soon forego the seventh – not continuing church attendance as adults. Tozer bluntly declared, “If you will not worship God seven days a week, you do not worship Him on one day a week.”^[1]
4. Personal prayer. Daily prayer. Relentless praying. John and Charles Wesley, when traveling together, had the habit of rising early to spend time with God, and then meeting together, often for an hour or more, before they began their day. Spurgeon would rise early for personal prayer, and then gather his family for prayer before they met the day.

Without personal prayer, without family altars, without small groups in which we are all active in prayer, the corporate prayer gathering lacks the roots that cause it to flourish. Yet, without the corporate prayer meeting, that models prayer, that offers teaching prayer experiences that become templates for personal, family and small group praying, the other corollary elements don’t develop. Each feeds the other, and none can replace another. They are interdependent. The most conspicuous of the four is the corporate prayer meeting, the congregation gathered for prayer. Without these, church is a ceremony, not a celebration of lives lived out God’s Presence.

Welsh pastor, Geoffrey Thomas, asserted, “There is no way that those who neglect secret worship can know communion with God in the public services of the Lord’s Day!”^[2] D. A. Carson notes, “The person who prays more in public reveals that he is less interested in God’s approval than in human praise. Not piety but a reputation for piety is his concern.”^[3]

We are not to go to church to worship, but to go worshipping – out of a life of worship. The form of corporate worship feeds the informal – confession, praise, offering, preaching, prayer, the reading of the Scriptures, repenting, professing, singing, sharing, the bread and the cup, baptism, the blessing. All these feed the personal, informal daily prayer times; and they in turn, feed the public.

• This blog is part of The Praying Church Handbook – Volume III – Pastor and the Congregation which can be purchased at alivepublications.org>

^[1]       Tozer.

^[2]       Geoffrey Thomas, “Worship in Spirit,” The Banner of Truth, August-September, 1987, p. 8.

^[3]       D. A. Carson, Matthew, Expositor’s Bible Commentary, 12 volumes (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1984), 8:165.

 Do you think God's timetable is too slow for you in answering your prayers? We read in John chapter 11, where Mary and Martha sent word to their dear beloved friend Jesus to let him know their brother Lazarus was sick. Mary and Martha became impatient when Jesus didn’t come when they thought He should come to heal Lazarus. However, Jesus had different plans, He told the disciples, and “This sickness will not end in death, No, it is for God’s glory so that God’s Son may be glorified through it”.  Jesus loved Mary, Martha, and Lazarus very much but stayed in Galilee teaching and healing the sick until the time was right to go for God to be glorified.   

Two days later Jesus told his disciples that it was time to go to Judea to see Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. However, when they arrived, they learned that Lazarus had been dead for four days. Martha told Jesus, “If You had come sooner my brother would not have died.” Jesus was deeply moved as he went to the grave, asking to have the stone removed from the tomb but Martha said, “But Lord, he’s been dead four days and stinketh.” Jesus told her “Didn’t I tell you that if you believed you would see the glory of God”. Then Jesus called in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out” and Lazarus came out of the tomb.   

 We can learn several lessons from this story. When we pray asking God for something, we get discouraged as Mary and Martha did because our prayer isn’t answered on our timetable. However, think of all the people Jesus had the opportunity to heal and teach during those two days. Jesus, God’s Son knew the Father’s plan was to glorify his Son by raising Lazarus from the dead, not to heal Lazarus. Isn't it great that when we think God is four days late by our timetable He is still on time?    

Our finite minds simply cannot grasp God’s infinite ways for answering our prayers. We have no idea how many times we have prayed and He is waiting for the proper time to answer. God often needs to work in our hearts, our character or the person we are praying for before he can answer our prayers. God’s way and timing is always perfect, he knows best, even when we think he is too late, He is still on time.    

• Is God's timetable too slow for you at times?
• Are you getting tired of waiting on God to answer your prayers?
• Are you disappointed and frustrated because God is not answering on your timetable?
• Does God want to develop character in your life or in the lives of your loved ones before He is ready to answer?
• How do you respond when God does not answer your prayers according to your plans? 

Prayer:

Dear Father, I want to thank you for the privilege to bring my concerns to you.

Give me patience as I wait for you to work out your plan and your timing

to answer my prayers.

Help me to trust you and your Word as I wait for your answers to my prayers.

In Jesus Name, Amen

Lillian Penner

_________________________________________________________

The first guy who got away with decision making without the impact of a woman was Adam, when he still had a full set of ribs (Genesis 1:18-23). Why does God so often communicate with women first? On our first date, my then future wife told me what God had called her to be, and what that meant in terms of the husband she needed to fulfill that revelation. Prior to that my mother had been a bit more subtle, in telling me what she and God had determined would be my future. In both cases, the women were correct in their interpretation of my future. I have talked with countless men who share similar versions of my story. If there is an answer to my question, as to why God so often communicates with women first, it may be the same answer as to why God’s first communication following the resurrection of Jesus, was through an angel, but to women (Matthew 28:5-7; Mark 16:5-7; Luke 24:4-8; John 11-14), and the first appearance of Jesus following His resurrection was to Mary Magdalene (John 20:15-17), and therefore, the first verbal witness of God’s resurrection power was shared by Mary to the male disciples (20:18). My intent is not to make more of this than is necessary, although I’m sure some who respond will be prone to do so, but my desire is to share that God reveals His will to whomever He chooses, and we had best listen when the communication comes from God, whomever might be the messenger.

How do we look at radical Muslims? Shortly after 9/11 a child in our church said, "We need to pray for the terrorists!"

Without thinking, I answered, "Pray that they will be caught and killed." Because of that 4 or 5 year-old boy, I had to examine my heart and my thinking in this matter. I have come to some thoughts that I would like to share with you.

Is it wrong to pray for judgment to come on our enemies? God is a God of judgment. He could not be good, holy or even loving, if He did not judge the wickedness of men.

Many skeptics point at the command of God for the people to destroy the city of Jericho killing men, women, children and livestock, saying the Bible endorses genocide. However, this incident did not take place in a vacuum. First, God had told Abraham in Genesis 15 that He was going to bring judgment on the Amorites. But he said they had not filled up their iniquity. Who knows how long God had already shown His patience toward this wicked people, calling them again and again to repent. And yet, another four hundred years passed before the Children of Israel came through the wilderness to encircle the city of Jericho. Many have argued that the Atomic Bomb that killed all living creatures in the Japanese cities, ended World War II and prevented many more deaths for many years. So the destruction of Jericho caused many of the Amorites to flee rather than being killed in the ensuing war.

But you may ask why the Lord employed Israel in this judgment. I certainly don't know all of God’s reasons. I do know the people of Israel knew not to do such a thing without God's direct command. This is a crucial point that I want get back to.

Interestingly enough, this is not the only time God put His judgment into the hands of men. King Saul wickedly brought the judgment that had been foretold upon the house of Eli. God used the ungodly Assyrians to carry His people into captivity for rejecting Him. And most strikingly, God used the imperfect judgment of a Roman tribunal to sentence and crucify Jesus. That judgment of God was upon my sins and yours. God took my sin upon Himself as Jesus died for us. Nothing shows the measure of God's love for us as powerfully as Jesus taking our judgment on Himself at the cross.

I have prayed for God to bring judgment on wickedness in our world. But the Bible, Old and New Testament, clearly teaches that God prefers repentance and forgiveness to judgment and destruction. One of the most apropos stories of this is the book of Jonah. Jonah was sent to preach to Nineveh. Nineveh was the enemy of Israel. Jonah tried to flee from God's call. But he only proved you can't run from God. When he finally went to preach to the city he made no reference to repentance as he proclaimed judgment would come in forty days. However, the people did repent in sackcloth and ashes. The point of that book is God's compassion for people and our New Testament mission to love even our enemies with the gospel. The final day of judgment is coming. But until God tells us it is time to pray for judgment temporary or ultimate, we need to pray for it not to be too late for His grace even for our enemies.

I am praying and rejoicing to see Muslim people turning to Christ by the thousands all across the Middle East, Central Asia and elsewhere. Some of them had indeed been radical Muslims. I pray for their sin and threat against us to be condemned and come under the terrible wrath of God as Jesus died in their place and mine.

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Many years ago I heard this illustration: Imagine a set of scales with a one-pound weight on one side and a pile of sugar cubes to be added to the other. The first few cubes added seem to make no difference in shifting the weight. Neither do the next ten cubes…or the next ten. However, by the time one hundred cubes have been added, a point is reached where the addition of one or two more sugar cube starts to tip the scales.

So the question is which sugar cubes played the most important part in shifting the weight? Was it the first ones placed on the scales or the ones that finally tipped the weight? The answer of course is that all were equally important. The ones that tipped the scales wouldn’t have done so had the first ones not played their part.

When we pray, doesn’t it seem sometimes as if our prayers make no difference at all while at other times we see immediate answers? Assuming we are praying in line with God’s will, the prayers that seem to make no difference are just as essential as those that bring immediate answers. There seems to be a certain “weight” of intercession that God requires to answer each prayer, whether we are praying for a need or a friend’s salvation.

This illustration can also be applied to leading someone to Christ. Was it our witness that made the difference—or did reading a Bible or hearing a preacher lead to their decision? If our words didn’t seem to make much impact we should not be discouraged. We are sowing where someone else will reap. And those who reap and see results can be grateful for those who sowed without which there would be no reaping.

So let us ask God to make us faithful sugar cubes—willing to pray and witness even without seeing visible results.

And there is one more thing we can learn from the sugar cubes. It wouldn’t harm for us to be a little sweet either!

Colin Stott

Colin Stott is Global Prayer Coordinator for Global Recordings Network, a mission that provides audio Bible stories in over six thousand languages and dialects. For more information about reprinting this article and others in this series on prayer, contact Colin at colinstott@globalrecordings.net

As we move through life, we flow with predictable patterns of interaction with others. Sadly, so often the emotions, the cognitive content exchanged, the decisions and the delights of the world with which we interact are not in unity with God. On the contrary, they are adverse to Him. Consciously, sometimes unconsciously, we are pressured to compromise ideals, exposed to language and lines of thought contradictory to God’s principles. The drive, the things that delight those around us, is diametrically opposed to heaven’s will for healthy and godly people, not to mention our families. Yet, we are forced to swim in this stream called the world! A world at enmity with God. We cannot escape it. We cannot leave it and flee to the desert. We must be in it, but not of it.

The way we differentiate ourselves, break from its mad rhythms and noises, recalibrate our values, is solitude. Prayer is a protest against the world as it is. It is a declaration to God that we do not want to be a part of this world, that we want the power to live above its grip, and yet to influence it in some profound way. The inability to pray, to tolerate the stillness and silence, is an indication of the degree to which we have become addicted to the world.

“Nothing but solitude can allow the development of a freedom from the ingrained behaviors that hinder our integration into God’s order.”^[1] Jesus urged, “When you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father” (Mt. 6:6). The word for room in Greek is tameion, referring to a small inner closet. It was probably a storeroom, a kind of pantry, typically the only room in a first century home with a door.^[2]

John Paton (1824-1907) was a legendary Scottish missionary to the New Hebrides in the 1800s, that great missionary century. Paton’s father was common laborer. The small cottage in which John grew as a boy was ordinary. Nonetheless, in it was an extraordinary place – a small private space consecrated by his father for private prayer. Paton remembered it well.

The closet was a very small apartment…having room only for a bed, a little table, and a chair, with a diminutive window shedding diminutive light on the scene. This was the sanctuary of that cottage home. There daily, and many times a day, generally after each meal, we saw our father retire, and shut the door; and we children got to understand, by a sort of spiritual instinct (for the thing too sacred to be talked about), the prayers that were being poured out there for us, as of old by the High Priest within the veil in the Most Holy Place. We occasionally heard the pathetic echoes of a trembling voice, pleading as for life, and we learned to slip out and in past that door on tip-toe, not to disturb the holy charge. The outside world might not know, but we knew, whence came that happy light, as of a new-born smile, that always was dawning on my father’s face: it was a reflection from the Divine Presence, in the consciousness of which he lived.^[3]

Cyprian, the bishop of Carthage in the third century noted,

In his teaching the Lord has bidden us to pray in secret – in hidden and remote places, in our very bedchambers – which is best suited to faith, that we may know that God is everywhere present, and hears and sees all, and in the plentitude of His majesty penetrates even into hidden and secret places.^[4]

Andrew Murray reminds us,

The Father is in secret…He is waiting for us, where He is always to be found. Christians often complain that private prayer is not what it should be. They feel weak and sinful, the heart is cold and dark; it is as if they have so little to pray, and in that little no faith or joy. They are discouraged and kept from prayer by the thought that they cannot come to the Father as they ought or as they wish. Child of God!…when you go to private prayer your first thought must be: The father is in secret, the Father waits for me there…^[5]

Quiet. Solitude. Time alone with God – it is irreplaceable.

• Learn more about Creating Your Own Personal Prayer Closet with Doug’s new book The Prayer Closet>

• This blog is part of The Praying Church Handbook – Volume III – Pastor and the Congregation which can be purchased at alivepublications.org>

^[1]       Thomas à Kempis, The Imitation of Christ; quoted by Calvin Miller, The Vanishing Evangelical, 160.

^[2]       Philip Graham Ryken, When You Pray: Making the Lord’s Prayer Your Own (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, a division of Good News Publishers, 2000), 17.

^[3]       John Paton, ed. John G. Paton, DD, Missionary to the New Hebrides: An Autobiography, 2 volumes (London, 1889), 1:10-11.

^[4]       Cyprian, “Treatise on the Lord’s Prayer,” Hippolytus, Cyprian, Caius, Novatian, Appendix, Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson, ed., Ante-Nicene Fathers, 10 Volumes (Christian Literature, 1886; Reprinted: Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1994), 5:447-457, 448.

^[5]       Andrew Murray, With Christ in the School of Prayer (Westwood, NJ: Fleming Revell, 1953), 30.

Much is being written here and elsewhere these days about praying for our country.  Good thoughts, wisdom shared, encouragement and hope given.  Hopefully, we're praying even more than we're writing about prayer.

I wanted to take a minute to contrast two approaches that I've personally experienced to praying for our country. 

• Pride brings God the answers and asks him to act on them; humility brings God questions and asks for his wisdom.
• Pride tells God who needs to be elected or which party should be in or out of power; humility seeks God's intervention to raise up righteous leaders of his choosing.
• Pride calls down God's judgment on people who believe or act in ways we consider immoral (and that even ARE immoral); humility seeks God's grace, forgiveness and cleansing for those who live far from his will, recognizing that we also once lived outside his will and saving grace.
• Pride makes the assumption of the Pharisee - that we are in the right and that God should recognize that; humility recognizes with the tax collector that we are wrong and in need of God's grace.
• Pride shouts; humility pleads.
• Pride calls us to tell God the way things are going in our nation and in our world; humility causes us to seek his wisdom and strength to change them.
• Pride focuses our thoughts on the changes other people need to make; humility confesses the changes we need to make.

I have prayed both ways.  By God's grace - and in his infinite patience - I'm slowly learning to pray less from pride and more from humility. 

In the Northwest, where we have four seasons the beautiful tulips are in full bloom reminding us of the new life that spring brings, the cherry trees are loaded with blossoms. It is a beautiful time of the year with the trees and plants that have lied dormant during the cold winter months are getting new life almost over night.   

During the winter months, many of our areas experience harsh cold snowy weather. However, as spring approaches it gives us the hope of warmth, beautiful gardens, and landscapes. As it warms our spirit, we become alive and more energetic.    

We often go through seasons in our prayer lives where we do not take the time to read and meditate on God’s Word or pray intentionally for our families or ourselves. We pray but our prayers may become humdrum, repetitive, or seem pointless.   

That was my experience a number of years ago, I felt the prayers for my children, and grandchildren were very general, superficial, and powerless. I prayed they would be safe, have a good day and I would be go on through my day since I didn’t live near them, and didn’t know their immediate need.    

However, that all changed after I asked God to give me wisdom and insight about how I could pray for them intentionally. Praying intentionally means a determination to pray in a certain way, done by intention or design. Asking God for direction and reading several books about prayer, I was encouraged. I gained some tools to help me to pray intentionally and regularly for my children and grandchildren.    

The Bible, God’s Word was the greatest resource I discovered to help me with my praying, not only for my family but also for myself. We read in Hebrews 4:12 (in the Amplified version), “The Word of God is alive and full of power, making it active, operative, energizing, and effective.” it was alive and full of power, bringing energy into my prayers. Personalizing God’s Word in our prayers releases His supernatural power and His presence in my life.    

 In praying scripture, I not only find myself in intimate communication with God, but my mind is being renewed to think His thoughts, about the situation I am praying for, instead of mine. Ultimately, God shrinks what I thought as impossible to a possibility and gives me peace as I wait for His answer.   

As we start claiming God’s promises and personalizing the scriptures, we will experience more confidence and boldness in our praying. Nothing threatens the ENEMY more than when we are intentionally praying God’s Word for children, grandchildren, and ourselves. 

 As you experience the spring, season approaching in your area I hope your thoughts will turn to accessing your prayer life for your children, grandchildren, and yourself. If you are in a WINTER season in your prayer life and you have not been spending time with the Lord regularly or in prayer, allow the spring season to bring new life to your prayers.    

Prayer:

Dear Father, as I am reading your Word, show me the scriptures I can pray for my family and myself. Help me to set an appointment with you each day and show me how you would like me to be an intentional prayer warrior for my family. In Jesus’ name.

I have developed thirty-one “Scriptures to Pray for Grandchildren” that I have found very helpful to pray for my grandchildren. Join our mailing list for updated blogs and grandparenting suggestions and I will send you a free downloadable copy of “Thirty-one Scriptures to Pray for your Grandchildren”.   

By Lillian Penner

National Prayer Coordinator

Christian Grandparenting Network

lpenner@christiangrandparetning.net

Samuel Lee, the great Puritan writer, argued,

Prayer is the soul’s colloquy with God, and secret prayer is a conference with God upon admission into the private chamber of heaven. When you have shut your own closet, when God and your soul are alone, with this key you open the chambers of paradise and enter the closet of divine love.^[1]

As the medieval philosophers noted, every choice is a renunciation – a thousand renunciations. To choose one thing is to abandon another. You cannot, as the age-old saying goes, have your cake and eat it too. As in Genesis, choose the one tree and lose privileges at the other. To choose God is to differentiate yourself from the world. To want intimacy with Him is to abandon all other gods.

John Guest offered a balanced perspective:

Prayer is first and foremost an expression of an intimate relationship with God.

Prayer includes discipline, but it is not merely a discipline. It involves setting aside a regular time and place, but it is not merely an item on our schedule. It includes asking for things we need, but it is not merely a shopping list of requests and rejoicings. It involves speaking to God and God speaking to us, but it is not merely an exchange of memoranda.

More than anything else, prayer is a relationship. When we reduce it to a regimen, we deprive ourselves of what all who knew God throughout the Scriptures expressed in their prayers: that God is alive, and the He knows us and lets Himself be known by us, that we can enjoy a deep and intimate personal relationship with Him in prayer.^[2]

Prayer itself, the act, is an expression of your need to live out of God’s life, and not merely invite Him into yours. It is more than a fleeting feeling. If you attempt to sustain your prayer life merely out of emotional highs, positive moods, even good intentions, you will fail. A healthy prayer life is found in the balance of both a private and corporate ritual, one as simple as the commitment to pray daily and attend church weekly; to be a part of a small prayer group and also to pray with one’s spouse on a regular basis. Commitment. Ritual – and by that we mean the rigor of a predictable routine. Despite one’s feelings, one’s sense of whether the experience is profitable or not, we should pray. The daily meeting with God is habitual. The ancient John of the Cross noted that in prayer we fight:

…boredom, tiredness, lack of energy. It’s hard, very hard, existentially impossible, to crank up the energy, day in and day out, to pray with real affectivity, real feeling, and real heart. We simply cannot sustain that kind of energy and enthusiasm. We’re human beings, limited in our energies, and chronically too tired, too dissipated, and torn in various directions to sustain prayer on the basis of feelings. We need something else to help us. What?^[3]

The answer is ‘ritual – a rhythm, a routine.’ Ritual in a noble sense. Once you embrace a daily/weekly rhythm, the personal and the corporate, you begin to live by that cadence. It is no longer about the immediate euphoria of any given morning of prayer or weekly worship service. It is about obedience and consistency of life. The discipline itself does not change us: God changes us, but the ritual and routine that galvanizes discipline becomes the context into which God’s transforming power is infused.

We sometimes have romantic ideas about prayer and encounters in our attempts to develop a life of prayer that actually distort our perception of prayer and serve to discourage regular daily times of prayer with God. In truth, bright lights and a booming voice is rare. On some mornings, there may be no new, life-changing insight. Good relationships are long-term, and at the same time daily. As Rolheiser reminds us,

Nobody can…sustain high energy all the time, or fully invest himself or herself all the time…Real life doesn’t work that way. Neither does prayer. What sustains a relationship over the long term is ritual, routine, a regular rhythm that incarnates the commitment.^[4]

Those who have aging parents visit them, not for the take-way – particularly those with afflictions such as Alzheimer’s – they visit not for the joy, but out of dutiful love! They go despite the feelings with which they wrestle, the disappointments that may exist about how the life of their parent has ended. This is the greater love – not self-serving love, not love looking for a pay-off, but genuine agape. Those who are raising teens ask them the hard questions even if it means processing through a grand hassle, and they do so out of love! You pray because you love God, and He loves you! Your daily time is a declaration of that love, and it opens the cosmic door on your side and intentionally invites Him into your life.

Dawson Trotman, founder of the Navigators, observed that discipline without must be matched by the desire within. We sometimes intensify activity, crank up the will, and see prayer as a kind of power plant, the boiler room of the church. In the distance, God is calling, “Come away!” He is wooing us back to the place we once were when He asks us, “Do you love me? Feed my sheep!” In the flurry of a growing flock, in the feeding of the sheep, it is possible to lose the relationship with Him. Like a couple, busy raising their children, the fruit of their love, running from the supermarket to soccer games, somehow they lose one another in the middle of what the relationship itself created.

A study of mice revealed the deadly impact of amphetamine, both in groups and alone. Researchers determined that it takes twenty times as much amphetamine to kill an individual mouse than to kill a mouse in a group. In a group of mice given a deadly dose, a mouse not administered the drug will still be overcome by the mere impact of the deadly effect of the drug on his peers. Within ten minutes of being in a group of dying mice on the drug, the drug-free mouse will succumb. Dallas Willard charges, “Western men and women, especially, talk a great deal about being individuals. But our conformity to social pattern is hardly less remarkable than that of mice – and just as deadly.”^[5] Prayer is the great differentiator. It sets us apart from the group. It takes us out of the rat race. It is the moment when we make our daily declaration, “God is enough!” In solitude, we find what Dallas Willard calls ‘the psychic distance’ necessary to be free from the crowd.^[6]

Stop for a minute and evaluate your own prayer life. Is it duty or delight? Is it regular or fleeting? Are you cultivating a relationship or loosing sight of our ultimate purpose here on earth? Declare your love for God. Stay the course. Each day is a new day to commit to Him.

• This blog is part of The Praying Church Handbook – Volume III – Pastor and the Congregation which can be purchased at alivepublications.org>

^[1]       Samuel Lee, “Secret Prayer Successfully Managed,” The Puritans on Prayer. Ed: Don Kistler (Morgan, PA; Soli Deo Gloria, 1995), 239-293, 245.

^[2]       John Guest, Only a Prayer Away: Finding Deeper Intimacy with God (Ann Arbor, MI: Vine, 1985), 75.

^[3]       Ronald Rolheiser, Our One Great Act of Fidelity (New York: Doubleday Religion, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, 2011), 78.

^[4]       Ibid 80.

^[5]       Dallas Willard, The Spirit of the Disciplines (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1988), 160-161.

^[6]       Ibid, 161.

As we slow down after the celebration (and busyness) of Easter week, what do we do now?

The last sayings of Jesus that world-changing day give us a path to tread. Watch this progression:

• “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” (Luke 23:32-38)
• “Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise.” (Luke 23:39-43)
• “Woman, behold your son! . . . Behold, your mother!” (John 19:26-27)
• “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:45-50)
• “I thirst.” (John 19:28)
• “It is finished.” (John 19:30)
• “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit!” (Luke 23:46)
  
  

The first thing he does on the cross? He prays for others. Even on the cross, praying for others leads to loving them, in this case with his dying gasps for air. Seeing to them by talking to them from the cross, he is loving them. From words of truth and comfort to the criminal, to loving his mother and seeing to her livelihood, Jesus is helping them while being the ultimate intercessor.

But then, note, Jesus' intercessory prayer gives birth to worship. Intercessory prayer loves people; that’s why we have prayer cards on it. With prayer cards to help us, we slow down and look at people in our mind's eye. We think about what their world is like, and what they are going through. The prayer card helps us capture that. So our prayers for them become truly meaningful, not trite.

In Jesus, this was the final path on the cross. The last six hours on the cross began with intercessory prayer for others, and his life ended with the ultimate prayer of surrender. That is worship. In Jesus’ pattern, intercessory prayer becomes the door to complete surrender.

Bob Allums
Director of seeJesus Seminars: A Praying Life

Twitter: @_APrayingLife

P.S. Visit us at seeJesus.net.

There are many ways to pray for the United States.  Some take a very politicized approach to prayer, seamlessly blending politics with spiritual truth in ways that are sometimes inspired and at other times, well, pretty agenda-based.  Others take a more generic approach, simply trusting God to bring about the right results without really concerning themselves too much with specific issues.  Still others take an approach founded not in politics but in Scripture and less issue-based than Word-based.  In this last camp falls a 40-day prayer devotional entitled Desperate for Change, by Dave Butts.

Desperate for Change focuses its prayer topics on scriptural themes such as peace, hope, courage, and wisdom.  Each day's devotion features a couple of paragraphs on that day's theme, then two or three bullet points to guide prayer and finally a written prayer from Dave.  The tone is heartfelt, worshipful - and yes, a bit desperate.  Desperate to see God glorified in our country; desperate to see our country return to His ways.  Desperate, in the words of Day 1's devotion, to see the United States reverse the trend of placing man's wisdom above the truth of God's word.

This 40-day devotional is great for individual or small group use; but perhaps its greatest potential lies in using it as a guide for a churchwide prayer campaign.  If it's true (and it is) that the greatest difference Christians can make on the direction and shape of our country is through prayer, then Desperate for Change is an investment in our country that the Church cannot afford to pass up.

Desperate for Change is available through Harvest Prayer Ministries at www.prayershop.org (click the picture for a link directly to this resource).  It's also the basis for the "As One" prayer campaign featured in the Praying for the United States group (http://www.pray.network/group/praying-for-the-united-states) here on Pray.Network.

Last week I started a new blog, Thinking in The Spirit, http://thinkinginthespirit.blogspot.com/. I began writing about the relief and refuge of repentance. Next week I will continue that theme. But this week, and every other week in the future, I want to return to Watching in Prayer.

This being an election year in America, I want to talk to you about praying your politics. What does this mean? How do you apply this dictum?

If you get serious about doing this, you will of course pray your thinking. Nearly all of us feel like what we believe our country needs is being threatened. And I believe you need to do that even if I do not agree with your politics.

But let me ask you if you are praying for your morals. How important are your morals to you? Are you tempted to focus more on the economy or your comfort, your own benefit above what God declares to be right or wrong?

Do your morals include compassion? Compassion is the most critical thing Jesus spoke of concerning judgment of the nations.

“When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his throne in heavenly glory. ³² All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. ³³ He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.

³⁴ “Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. ³⁵ For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, ³⁶ I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

³⁷ “Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? ³⁸ When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? ³⁹ When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’

⁴⁰ “The King will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’

⁴¹ “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. ⁴² For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, ⁴³ I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’

⁴⁴ “They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’

⁴⁵ “He will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’

⁴⁶ “Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.” 

Matthew 25:31-46

http://thinkinginthespirit.blogspot.com/

http://daveswatch.com/

http://watchinginprayer.blogspot.com/

Connect, Communicate, Collaborate, Celebrate

Acts 2:46-47 “Day by day continuing with one mind in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, they were taking their meals together with gladness and sincerity of heart, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord was adding to their number day by day those who were being saved.” NAS

I am often motivated by the word, “Together,” especially in Scripture. Jesus called His disciples together in order to teach, fellowship, give instruction, equip, and rejoice with them. He never sent His disciples out alone; He taught them the importance of scattering in groups of two or more to minister and gathering back together to share and celebrate what God had done in and through them.

The Great Commission was meant to be accomplished together; with each person praying, caring for others and sharing the Good News of Jesus with every person on earth until Christ’s return. It would be impossible for one person or even one ministry to connect with every person, and so we MUST work together. We join together neighborhood by neighborhood, city by city, reaching out to and through every cultural sphere of influence – education, arts, healthcare, military, government, church, sports, people with disabilities, workplace, etc., … so that every generation, every race, every person, is being prayed for, cared for and having the gospel shared with them with the authentic love of Jesus Christ.

It is with all of this in mind that I encourage you to Connect, Communicate, Collaborate and Celebrate with one another. The Mission America Coalition and its initiatives such as
LOVE2020, have challenged us as Christ-followers, to live a “Prayer, Care, Share” lifestyle in a deliberate way that touches every person in America with the love of Jesus. This can only be accomplished with TOGETHERNESS; by connecting with other Christ-followers and ministries; secondly, by communicating with one another often and clearly to share ideas, needs and burdens, and to strategize on how to accomplish all that needs to be done. Thirdly we all need to collaborate on the strategies so that there is ACTION and progress that takes place.

Collaboration accelerates the advancement of praying for people, caring for people and sharing the message of salvation. Finally, we cannot miss an opportunity to celebrate every victory; every person who is fed, educated, given healthcare, and opportunities to live out their God- given gifts and purpose. We need to celebrate communities coming together in crisis and in strengthening the connectedness of their neighborhood. Share the stories of people who reach out to families suffering in times of loss, illness, military deployment, or unexpected events that life can bring. Modeling love motivates others to follow these great examples of living beyond ourselves, and celebrating these moments assures us that we are making progress and spurs us on to do more. It lifts hearts and gives hope to a hurting world when they see communities being transformed; as multiple areas of need are met, and people are loved as Jesus demonstrated and commanded.

Who can you connect with? How have you communicated with the ministries and churches in your area? How can you collaborate with multiple ministries to reach the needs of your city? When was the last time you shared a great story of “Prayer, Care, Share,” in action so others could celebrate with you? There are so many ministries, churches and Christ-followers in America and around the world and we MUST practice connecting, communicating, collaborating, and celebrating more and more each day in order to reach America and the world with the love of Jesus.

The Million Praying Grandparents Movement is for grandparents worldwide who recognize the desperate moral and spiritual climate our grandchildren navigate in a world hostile to truth.

Imagine the impact on our world today when a Millions Plus Grandparents are intentionally praying for their grandchildren and their parents throughout the world.

In an attempt by secular humanists to develop a secular society, they have very strategically and very intentionally whittled away at our Godly heritage. Today there is an urgency for grandparents to unite in mass numbers to be prayer warriors for the next generation.

If you are a grandparent grasping the urgency I urge you to signup for the Million Praying Grandparents. When grandparents sign up they are declaring their commitment to pray regularly for their grandchildren, their parents and outside influences.

 As a way of saying thanks for that commitment, grandparents will receive a free printable copy of a Million Praying Grandparents Prayer Resource to help them pray intentionally for their grandchildren using God’s Word.

For the sake of the hearts, minds and souls of your grandchildren, will you say, “YES, I will join the Million Praying Grandparents movement?”

Go to the Million Praying Grandparents website

http://www.millionprayinggrandparents.com and follow the instructions to sign up to be a part of the Million Praying Grandparents movement?

I would like to have a Million Praying Grandparents joining together to pray for the next generation on September 11, 2016, Grandparents’ Day of Prayer.

Will you encourage your friends to become a part of the Million Praying Grandparents movement to impact the next generation to know and follow Christ wholeheartedly?

Lillian Penner

National Prayer Director, Christian Grandparenting Network

lpenner@christiangrandparenting.net

A Prayer Guide For Churches Hungry for Revival and Ready for Renewal 

Sundays

• Ask the Lord to bring a fresh wind of his Spirit that revives our devotion to Christ and our dedication to his calling on our Church – no matter what cost or changes we must face

Mondays

• Ask the Spirit to reveal your sins and spiritual weaknesses, then confess them, receiving his cleansing and renewing your commitment to ongoing discipleship

Tuesdays

• Ask the Spirit to reveal the sins and spiritual weaknesses of our congregation, then confess them, welcoming his cleansing and restoration and leading

Wednesdays

• Seek the Lord, declaring our desperation for renewal that purifies our worship and enlivens our fellowship

Thursdays

• Seek the Lord, declaring our desperation for renewal that focuses our leadership and increases the generosity of our stewardship

Fridays

• Seek the Lord, declaring our desperation for renewal that empowers each of us to love our neighbors and impact our neighborhoods

Saturdays

• Pray the “Prayer Adventure” will be attended by many with a heart for revival and a mind open to Spirit led renewal ...will equip prayer champions in every family and ministry ... will result in children and youth incorporated into the Holy Spirit’s ministry of prayer in our church

"What Are You Going to do for your Grandkids at Easter"

 Are you going to share the real meaning of why we celebrate Easter with your grandkids this year? Let’s make Easter a special celebration of the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ for our grandkids.

 Here are a few suggestions:

• Send your grandchildren an Easter greeting card with a Bible verse and/or a note that you are praying for them. Grandkids always enjoy getting mail from their grandparents.

• Send a CARE package: Easter egg coloring kit, Easter craft, Easter paper plates, napkins, and cups for a family dinner or a storybook with the true meaning of Easter. Of course, Easter would not be complete without some traditional candy.
• Email an electronic Easter card.
• Send them Resurrection eggs which you can purchase at your local Christian bookstore or online at http://www.christianbook.com.
• Make Resurrection Rolls with the grandkids. Look for the recipe I will post soon.

Would you please share some of the things you have done with your grandkids to teach them the real meaning of Easter in the comments below the blog?

Lillian Penner

The Syrian refugee crisis is the worst refugee crisis of since World War II. More than 13.5 million Syrians are in need of humanitarian assistance. More than 4 million have fled the country and are living as refugees in Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey, Iraq, European countries and around the world.

This is how the PrayForRefugees website summarizes the huge crisis currently facing Syria and neighboring countries.  The realities faced by these refugees include child labor and exploitation, lack of education, squalid and unsafe living conditions, and lack of hope for a brighter future.  The crisis is now 5 years old; tens of thousands of Syrian children have  never known a real home.

PrayForRefugees encourages us as believers to hear the cries of these refugees and to respond in prayer.  From their website:

We can affirm some shared beliefs:

• Each human being is created by God, is loved unconditionally, and is of eternal value to the Lord
• We are all commanded to serve the poor, the suffering and the oppressed, regardless of where they live
• We are to find Christ in the hungry, the thirsty, the stranger, the naked, the sick and the imprisoned
• The Syrian refugee crisis breaks the heart of God

And as Christians, we can pray:

• For protection of civilians – innocent individuals, families and children – caught in the crossfire of this conflict
• For relief for the suffering – for food, clean water, shelter, clothing, health care and protection from the winter cold
• For a future for children – for education, for safety and security, for stability and emotional health in the face of their traumatic experiences
• For the work of groups responding tangibly to the needs of Syrian refugees
• For peace in Syria and an end to the conflict

During the period of Lent, PrayForRefugees is sponsoring a prayer campaign on behalf of Syrian Refugees.  Visit their website (click the image above) for daily prayer topics, or follow along and participate here on Pray.Network through the Prayer For Syrian Refugees discussion.

Everything you need to live an abundant life comes from the Lord. At least that’s what Jesus said – “I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly” (John 10:10).  So how then, can you have an abundant life without continual communication with the Lord?  The answer is, “You can’t.”  Have you ever thought, how many things we think have to be modified by the adjective, ““abundant” in order to be meaningful, and successful?  Abundant money.  Abundant time.  Abundant health. Abundant friendships. Abundant resources. Abundant information. What about this for a formula: Abundant prayer leads to an abundant life!