Authentic Praying

“There was a man…whose name was Job; and that man was perfect and upright, and one that feared God, and shunned evil” (Job 1:1).

A little girl named Judy disobeyed her mother, she was sent to her room to think about her attitude and actions. Judy’s mother stood outside the door and listened to her child cry, then pout, and then began to pray. “Do you see, God, all the trouble you gotten me into? Last night I said my prayers and asked you make me a good girl, and you didn’t. So it’s really your fault, God, and it’s not my fault. You didn’t answer my prayer, so it’s up to you to make Mommy stop being mad at me.”

This is childish praying prayed with a childish attitude. Yet it’s not so far removed from much praying that takes place today. When the bad choices we make bring bad consequences upon our lives, we are quick to blame circumstances or other people or God himself. We pray, “God, if only my husband,” Or, “God, if only my wife,” Or, “God, if only you had brought me up in a more loving home,” Or, “God, if only you hadn’t made me to be so easily tempted.” We pray and play in the blame game too many times ourselves. When we come to God in prayer, by the way that is not coming to God, when we come to God with an attitude of shifting blame instead of abject humility and contrition, we are being as childish as little Judy.

God wants authentic mighty prayer, it begins in humility before our awesome and holy God. We are dependent upon God for our physical well-being, our emotional well-being, and our spiritual well-being. We are dependent for all. We have no power in prayer unless we learn to praise Him and recognize our complete dependence on Him.

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  • Truth Spoken In Love

    “And I have declared unto them thy name, and will declare it, that the love with which thou has loved me may be in them, and I in them”
    (John 17:26).

    People are looking for truth. They’re looking for reality. Deal with people in truth, and you will deal with reality.

    Speaking the truth isn’t even enough, though. Truth must be spoken in love.

    Many people think they are doing right by being very outspoken. Then, they put a veneer of respectability on what they say by commenting, “Well, I believe in telling the truth. You will always know what I think.” That is wrong, as well; for the child of God endeavors to balance that which “God says and what He says and how He says it”, in love.

    God’s people are to much like a see-saw. Unbalanced, too top-heavy, no real leverage, prideful, and liking it with a sneer. If the peace of God does not rule, He is not ruling in that person’s heart. God balances the see-saw with a fulcrum of truth and love.

    Truth balanced with love is Jesus on the cross praying, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do” (Luke 23:33). “Forgive them” is love; “for they know not what they do” is truth. Mercy and peace kiss at the cross.

  • Praying the Bible

    “When they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and continued to speak the word of God with boldness”  (Acts 4:31).

    On the cross the Lord Jesus only said out loud seven brief things. The Romans had flayed His back until it was ribboned and torn, and was seen by every eye that passed by. Severely dehydrated, His entire body weight hanging on three nails that held Him to the wood, the Lord of love had to push himself upward to be able to talk, and then only briefly before releasing and settling downward.

    Understandably, then, everything Jesus spoke from the cross was important. And as He lifted himself up each time I am convinced that He prayed through the verses of Psalm 22. As He weighed back downward, wrestling on those nails, He continued to pray silently through Psalms 22. Oh! How that pangs my heart. Yet, oh, how, it rejoices my soul! His first prayer from Psalm 22:1, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” The last prayer was from Psalm 31:5, “Father into thy hands I commit my spirit.”

    Jesus prayed the Psalms. The final act of His earthly life was to pray the words of a psalm, the Word of the Bible. Friends, if the Lord Jesus prayed the psalms and the Bible, and the early church prayed the psalms should we not do as well? There is power in praying the Bible.

  • You Can Not

    “This is the message we have heard from Him and declare to you, that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all” (I John 1:5).

    Mark Twain said these words, “You can’t pray a lie. I found that out.” Have we realized that God is looking for men and women who live a life that is pure and holy before Him? Do we not understand that the way the Lord communicates to us is a life that is filled with the aroma of Christ?

    Our salvation and prayer life is not dependent upon us. Our lives are not dependent upon our living it out. Our goals are not His nor are our ways. God began a new work in us when we were redeemed by the blood of Christ. He cleansed us and claimed us for His own. Now until we understand that we don’t know how to pray.
     
    Our fellowship with God and what we have in Him, and our lives being constantly cleansed, which is abiding in Him and our allowing the Spirit of God to work in us, how?–    through the Word of God, the church of God, the sufferings of life–all of which God will use to speak to us. This is how we pray. Not with a lie but with truth. Too many say they pray but their lives are no where ready to receive God’s prayer request.

  • As It Was In the Days of NOAH

    “There is no fear of God before their eyes” (Romans 3:18).

    In Noah’s day the creation of the Creator chose to choose against God. They lived as if He wasn’t there. They were devoid of God. They were detoxing themselves from all that reminded them of the true and living God. They unanimously voted God off the island, eliminating Him completely from earth’s equation. Humanity hung by a thread of a thin, godly line. Though outnumbered by millions, Noah’s little family is the “why” God held back His judgment for 120 years.

    We see a sneak preview of things to come, an advance viewing of humanity in the last days. That generation was a God-hating breed, and their kind has returned in this generation. Noah’s contemporary message was ignored by the masses and the messenger was maligned and hated. They ate, drank, and pursued relationships without the acknowledgment of God at all.

    God was not in their human hard drive, erasing Him from their collective conscience and culture. They produced after their own kind, making more degenerates, just like them. They flocked together, sinned together, and hated together. Rejecting the words of a man who gave them the Words of God, they chose to suppress the truth and avoid all witnesses.

    We as Christians are, by nature, salt and light, we’re also masters at hiding in the salt shaker and hitting the dimmer switch. We must allow God’s Spirit to lift us and load us for love. For it is God’s people who again are postponing inevitable judgment. Noah’s world did not begin without God, but it sure ended up that way.

    Look around. Which way do you think we’re headed?

    And what are going to do about it?

  • The Light of the World

    “You are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden”  (Matthew 5:14). 

     

    God has called us to make Him known to a dark world lost without direction and a dynamic. Without light there is darkness. We have been changed within so that we would light the world. This is God’s purpose that we would enjoy our God and share Him with others.
    You and I are here to be light, bringing out the God-colors in the world. As we know Him we will make Him known. God is not a secret to keep Him stowed away on the inside of us. He wants to be known to all.
    So why not become public about this? This is what the early disciples did. They came out of the upper room and out into the streets and began to shine into the hearts of those before them. As a matter of fact they turned their world upside down.
    God does not want us to hide our light under a bucket or a bed. He is not desirous of us hiding under our business or our bed. Business or laziness is not good when it comes to shining. While others are in darkness in their world of acquiring more we are to shine. While others are asleep in their sin we are to be awakened.
    Keep an open house; be generous with your lives. Open up to others, for you will prompt people to open up with God, this generous Father in heaven.

     

  • Self Entertainment

    “And shall deliver him to the Gentiles to mock, and to scourge, and to crucify him, and the third day he shall rise again” (Matthew 20:19).

    A disciple of Christ is not doing what we feel is right or what others think we should do. God said that He would reward each accordingly by how we relate to Him. We do not work or do for Christ because we get recognition but because He gives us His strength to do His will. We are all unprofitable servants. No matter the talents or gifts we have God has to use them for His purpose and His time.

    There are only two kinds of workers in the field today: those who want a contract and agree to work for such and such amount, and those who had no contract and agreed to take whatever the Lord thought was right. Sometimes we feel cornered or sequestered because we are not getting our gifts “out there in the world” which usually means the church world.

    God has called each of us to do our jobs well. When we watch others and measure ourself by them then we are measuring with the wrong measure. God’s people are to be walking with Him daily. When we direct the responsibilities entrusted to us for our own good then we are running amok on God. Until a child of God is settled in Christ they will run around trying to feel religious, smug and satisfied in doing good religious things.

    Jesus was delivered by Judas to the high court of Israel. He was mistreated and judged. The Gentiles scourged him, mocked him, and crucified him, but God raised Him up. Don’t go by feelings of what you think you should do but go by God’s power and do what He wants to do through you. The Lord Jesus was on His Father’s timetable and no one else’s. He walked accordingly to His Father’s will and not to His own dictates.

    It is a lesson well learned when we realize it is God who raises His people up from the dead of this world and the tantalizing flesh. It takes a very discerning person to take up his cross and deny himself and walk against the winds of entertaining the flesh. The flesh (the self life) must realize it is crucified and each day we must mortify the deeds of self life. Beware of making self happy instead of dying to self for it is God who determines the reward given. What seems to be first will be last in the kingdom of God.