Reflections on Week of Prayer: DELIGHT

Our last night in the Week of Prayer had a lofty goal. We wanted to spend the hour simply finding our happiness in God. Is that a new concept to you? Our goal at Grace Fellowship Church is to delight in God, to the glory of God and the good of all people. We do this as we choose to treasure God above all else - an easy thing to do when we are in our right minds.
But spending time in prayer focusing on the goodness of God and expressing to Him in our words the delight we find in Him and His ways is something many find new. In one sense, this is surprising. So many of the Psalms, for instance, do this very thing. Yet, I wondered what it would be like to end our week this way.
Frankly, it was wonderful. What an encouragement to pray along with my friends as they expressed to God His great worth. It was a wonderful way to finish our week, taking us all the way back to God Himself as our chief end and pleasure.
This was my favorite Week of Prayer ever. I can't wait until the next!

Reflections on Week of Prayer: MINISTRIES

I suppose this might sound discouraging, but my experience of prayer last night was rather dry. Maybe “hard” is a better word. It was our fifth night in a row, our smallest turnout and I was tired. But the saints came and we prayed. How strange it is that an hour of prayer seems to go faster as the week goes on… even when you are weary.

We tried to pray for every “official and non-official” ministry carried on by the members of Grace Fellowship Church. It was a daunting task to pray for so many things and not to pray the same old thing over and over. God was gracious.

One of the things I learned last night was the joy of help. I felt like Aaron and Hur were holding my arms last night so that we would prevail. Brothers and sisters kept praying, kept grappling and kept on until we covered it all. How glad I am for the Body of Christ. This is one of the great blessings of corporate prayer… you are helped along as you pray along with others.

In my morning devotions today I read Paul’s description of the prayers of Epaphras: “… always struggling on your behalf in his prayers, that you may stand mature and fully assured in all the will of God” Colossians 4:12.  The only way Paul could know the content of Epahras’ prayers was to hear them. And Paul drew great encouragement from what his brother sought from the Lord. This Paul finds a similar boon when he hears the prayers of his fellow church members!

Reflections on Week of Prayer: LEADERS

Last night we devoted an hour to pray for our leaders. This may seem very self-serving (since the leaders set the agenda for the meetings!) but there was a theological rationale behind it. Strike the shepherd and the sheep are scattered. False shepherds lead the sheep astray. Like priest, like people. The Bible contains a robust and careful job description and qualification list for church leaders. We believe in it. Yet it is so precise and full of exacting standards that we know the only way we will get and keep leaders like this is by prayer.

I wondered if last night would be the shortest of meetings, yet the saints came ready to work hard on behalf of their elders and deacons. How humbling to hear such tender, Scripture-full, pleading prayers on our behalf.

After several years in the ministry I concluded, “The only reason you have gotten this far is people are praying for you.” I had a renewed sense of that last night.

I'm not making this up. I really get to serve the best saints in the world. I don't deserve it.

Reflections on Week of Prayer: CONVERSIONS

Having already confessed how few conversions we saw last year, and thanked God for the ones we did see, the pump was primed to set after praying for more. Believing our first mission field is in our own camp, we listed out all the names of the kids from High School and down. Some of these kids are already graciously converted, but we were happy to pray for all of them by name asking God to save.*

What a time of prayer. A wave of pleading swept over us. After an hour there was a palpable sense we needed to keep on, so we excused those who needed to leave, but pressed on for another 40 minutes beseeching the Lord of the harvest. I don’t write this to boast in anyone but the Lord. Who are we?

What most of us wanted was a renewed burden for friends who are not Christians yet. May God give it.

Pondering that Jesus came to “seek and save that which was lost” and that He “came into the world to save sinners” and that His Father “takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked” we were led to feel we were praying the will of God as we prayed for men and women to be saved from the guilt and penalty of their sins. Children, friends, family members, neighbours, co-workers, old friends were all prayed for.

Graciously, God was with us again.

*This is no offense to a godly parent. What mom or dad does not want their child prayed for? And if someone prays for one of my converted children to be converted, I hear that prayer in the spirit is given. If the Apostle could speak of “not having already attained” salvation in the fullest, realized sense, then I think we can pray for children – especially when we consider how feeble and tempted a child may be.

Reflections on Week of Prayer: THANKSGIVING

We met last night to thank God. I was reminded of Jesus’ delight in the one former leper out of ten who returned to thank Him for his healing.

            “Was no one found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?”  (Luke 17:18 ESV)

We are thankless far too much.

Last night created the same experience as our night of confession – as brothers and sisters thanked God for the specific blessings of the last year, my heart was caught up with them to the throne in gratitude to the Giver of all good things. Precious were the words of thanks from the children. Oh, for more of that simplicity in my own prayers.

Another effect of an hour of thanks was a further humbling. Yes, it was humbling to confess our sins, for which we alone are responsbilbe, but it was equally humbling to thank God for all the good in our lives. He gets all the credit for dealing with our sin and all the credit for “every good gift.”

God seems very evidently at work in our church. All the glory for that goes to Him.

Reflections on Week of Prayer: CONFESSION

Take us down and lay us low

Leave ashes in place of gold

Life-giver sustainer

Let nothing remain of our pride

From your mountain on high

Lay us low

These are the words to Christa Well’s new song, LayUs Low. The Image of God EP was released just the other day and I am thanking God for it – especially for the way it poetically captures what happened last night.

We met for one hour to confess our sins to God. How does one write about these things? I felt that God was with us in power and grace. He kept us from all the nearby dangers an exercise like this can fall in to and He came with forgiveness, holiness and love. It was a powerful time and I hated to draw it to a close. God was with us.

Another of Wells’ songs says:

We come in pieces

We come in fragments

We come discolored

To the foot of the cross

Our Maker sees us

All that we have been

Bonds us together

The Image of God

We left our meeting last night humbled, more in love with each and more thankful than ever for Jesus.

The surprising blessing to me was listening to my brothers and sisters confess. I had thought that might be an odd thing to do, but in reality it exposed my heart. As one brother wept for his sin, it made me see the same sin in me. As one sister compared her sin to other actions, I thought, “That’s me, too, Lord!” Every person who prayed led me to see more of my own sin and in turn more of the beauty of the Gospel.

I will never forget that night.

11 Reasons You Should Come to Every Meeting during the Week of Prayer

11. It will not kill you to do it, and it will bless you and your children to be there.

10. You need to learn how to prevail in prayer and this is an excellent way to teach you.

9. This is your church, you are her members, and your leaders want you here for they know it will be good for you.

8. You will model to the world that God is real when you give up 6 nights to pursue Him in prayer.

7. You will gain the joy of doing something for the Lord. How many times do we aspire to do great things for God or even complain that we want to serve more? Well, here is the way to do something for real.

6. You personal spiritual life will be blessed as you follow the logic of the week from confession, to thanksgiving, to conversions, to leaders, to ministries, to delight in God.

5. You will be speaking to God with God’s people every day this week! What is better than that?

4. You will be humbled.

3. You will be deeply reminded of how needy we are for God to work as we lay out our many requests before Him – needs that are easy to otherwise forget .

2. Other than having to work, or being in the hospital, or traveling, or providing childcare so your spouse can go, or health concerns or sickness – what good reason would there be to miss these meetings? Your entertainment? No. Your rest? No. Your privacy? No. I can’t think of one good reason.

1. Your praying in general will be revitalized from taking one week to pray with God’s people every night.

Help! I am being tempted toward sexual sin!

The real threat of sexual sin is not a disease. It is what will happen to you if you do not repent of it and seek God's forgiveness in Christ.

For you may be sure of this, that everyone who is sexually immoral or impure, or who is covetous (that is, an idolater), has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God. Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience.
(Ephesians 5:5-6 ESV)

For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality; that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor, not in the passion of lust like the Gentiles who do not know God; that no one transgress and wrong his brother in this matter, because the Lord is an avenger in all these things, as we told you beforehand and solemnly warned you. For God has not called us for impurity, but in holiness. Therefore whoever disregards this, disregards not man but God, who gives his Holy Spirit to you.
(1 Thessalonians 4:3-8 ESV)

And he said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give from the spring of the water of life without payment. The one who conquers will have this heritage, and I will be his God and he will be my son. But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.”
(Revelation 21:6-8 ESV)

Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.
(1 Corinthians 6:9-11 ESV)

Learning from the Old Men First: Driscoll, Keller, and Marriage Books

Having read parts of Tim Keller’s and Mark Driscoll’s new books on marriage, I have been struck by one thought.  A man ought usually to wait until he is older before he offers his wisdom to others.

When Solomon’s son, Rehoboam, began his reign, the Scriptures tell of how he consulted first with the old men, then with “the young men who had grown up with him” on how he ought to rule. This was a matter of wisdom – the application of truth to a certain situation. There were specific principles for the kings of Israel to follow, but Rehoboam’s question was more in the line of ethos or style. What would his reign feel and look like. 1 Kings 12 goes to rather extensive pains to show that Rehoboam’s folly was in listening to the young men, rather than the old men. And this notion holds true in general.

I recall an old pastor telling me once, “You may want to wait a few years before you preach on parenting.” That was good advice since my kids were 5 and 2 I pretty much thought I knew all there was to raising children – everybody’s children! I also tended to think the Bible had much more to say about parenting than it really does. Thankfully, I mostly kept my mouth shut other than to say specifically what the Bible said on the topic.  That has enabled a few less regrets at this stage of my ministry.

This has been one of my fears for Pastor Driscoll through the years. I think he has tended to write “too close to the lesson.” Even this latest book, if I read the chronology right, seems to say that all the good things he is directing us to do are things he has really only applied in his marriage in the last 3-4 years. I am glad where Biblical truth is changing any marriage, but I think it is not wise to speak of seeing huge long-term results so close to their application.

In comparison, Pastor Keller purposefully waited until he was older in years and experience to write a book on marriage. Frankly, I think he has a lot more to say not only because of the manner in which he approaches the subject, but because he has lived through 37 years of applying this Truth in marriage. His own and others.

In a fast-paced culture like ours, we do well to remember that God has created things in such a way that our older folks ought to be sought out for their opinions first. And if you are a young man, you do well to work out your salvation in fear and trembling and a certain level of quietness now. Your day to impart wisdom to others will come soon enough, and you may find that the humbling of years gives you far less to say.

Be Quick to Seek Forgiveness - Really Quick

“Let me be very personal and ask about your relationship with Christ. Has any cloud come between your soul and your Saviour? An incident is told of Spurgeon who suddenly stopped in the middle of the street he was crossing and prayed. [These were the days when streets were somewhat safer, populated with horses rather than automobiles.] When he reached the other side, his companion asked him, ‘Why did you stop to pray in the middle of the street?’ Spurgeon's reply was something like this, ‘A cloud came between my soul and Christ, and I could not let it remain there even long enough to reach the other side of the street.’” – J. Vernon McGee