I'm doing a series on prayer at The Plant. This past week I talked about getting on our knees and realizing who this God really is that we pray to. He is Father, Son and Holy Spirit. He is the One who created this world and formed you with His very own hands. And He cares so much for you that He came into this world in the flesh of Jesus and died and rose to give you eternal life. And as He prepares a home in heaven for you He gives us His Spirit to lead and guide us through this life.
Why a series on prayer? Probably because I have so many questions about it myself. I would like you to think about some of these questions: why pray? How is your prayer life? What do you expect from prayer? What is your view of God? Your view of God will affect how you approach Him.
Prayer for me has to be more than just asking God for things because you know I don't always get what I pray for. But I am learning that if He is the true God that He says He is and if He really is my Heavenly Father who has my best interest at heart then pray is simply me coming to Him and saying, "hey Dad, can we talk, I need You"
Someone once said prayer is getting a hold of God not the answers. We always want answers. What we need is Jesus who is already holding on to us. Next week I am going to be talking about getting on His lap for He is our Father who loves us.
It's amazing, you can be 48 years old and still feel the need to crawl up on His lap just to feel safe from this crazy world. And even more amazing is that He will hold you- that's grace and that's His love.
May you feel His arms around you today and always!
In Christ,
Pastor John
6 comments:
Pastor John - Keep the messages about PRAYER coming! I struggle with Satan diverting my mind away from my talks with God... not to evil thoughts, but OFF TRACK.
Hey Pastor,
How is my prayer life? Never where I feel it should be. I know I need to talk with God for greater lengths of time. I do pray throughout the day. I praise God. I thank Him. I talk to Him about the day. I pray for my family and friends and the things they are going thru and for God to stay close to them. I pray for strength and wisdom for me. For about two weeks now I have been praying: God please don’t let me go. I feel it is easy right now to just forget about church and not go at all, I am struggling and I don’t want God to let me go. Sometimes I feel alone and I just don’t want Him to leave me too. Deep down I know He won’t leave me. I don’t know why, but I am still praying with Him not to leave me. Is this a crazy prayer?
You know what I expect from prayer? It depends. Sometimes when I’m talking with Him I just expect Him to listen. I don’t need anything else but someone to listen to me. Other times I expect God to answer me. And most of the time I expect Him to answer me right away. A lot of times He does. It is so cool when I pray for someone and they tell me something that I had been praying for them about that God answered. Praise God! I know that some of our prayers God will answer when He wants to answer it and it might take a long time. Don’t give up, keep praying! He is listening.
Wow, my view of God. My view has changed over the years the more I learn about God. I never knew about His grace growing up. I think of Matt Redman’s song Face Down. One of the verses goes like this: Lord, I stand on Your merciful ground yet with every step tread with reverence. My step-dad is someone I really never talked to about anything so I can’t really relate to God being my dad. I can relate to Him being my friend. My friend, who I can talk to and say anything and everything that is on my heart. I can tell Him how much I love Him, I can tell Him when I am angry and I don’t understand why things are happening. I can tell Him how my day is going. I can ask him crazy questions. I can tell Him things and know He won’t hold them against me. He is my comforter and He looks out for me.
Your prayer series sounds great!
Colleen - I know what your talking about. Satan gets me OFF TRACK too.
Pastor John, it is so good to be able to hear Gods words through you once again. I agree with you totally on prayer. I struggle daily with it and most of the time I pray for a good prayer life.
One of the many tough things I deal with is how many times to pray about something before the enemy makes me feel like a whiner. Then I worry about did I stop to soon? The other tough one for me is at work my supervisor and I have started morning prayer with our department of about 30 men. We alternate weeks and I pray for God to give me his Holy Spirit to give me the words to pray. Problem is I'm so nervous that in a matter of seconds I'm praying my words instead. Talk about strong faith right?
On a good note I have seen answered prayer that would blow anybodies socks off. We worship an amazing God and in his timing and in his will he will move mountains in the blink of an eye.
I thank and praise God for technology to be able to express my thoughts and feelings with other Christians especially ones who have ment so much to me throughout my journey. Thank you and God Bless.
Very well written and reviewed, I in the past had heard some of your sermons online and found them fulfilling and informative. When I look at how my prayer life is....well, its non-existent. And like so many others, when I do talk to God, its to ask a favor...I am envious, envious of so many that have a relationship with God and can talk to him wthout feeling guilty or embarassed. Why do we as a people have to need something to pray? Thats sad.
Expecting anything from God...well the last time I can remember expecting God to be with me and help me...its always when I once again need help, it would be nice to have that relationship with HIM that allowed me to stop in some days and just say "hey, how ya doing, wantta grab a cup of coffee and let me tell you about how good my day was."
My thoughts on prayer are open for improvement, and anything that is posted on this blog could only help. As I stated before, your talented and God has blessed you with the skill to reach others, I hope to read the word of God, through your words in the near future. Thank you so much
Thanks to you other Children of our amazing God for sharing the weakness of our human natures. Even though I've been a long-time Christian, I am daily disappointed that I fail our Lord so many, many times. Thankfully, He understands and does not give up on me. EVERYONE, keep talking with God even though it comes in little snippets. The Holy Spirit gives me the confidence that ALL words reach our Father and He makes sense of what we are saying.
AMEN Colleen!!
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