A Vision for Prayer in 2013

Yesterday, I cast North Church's vision for making 2013 a year that is focused around prayer. I am blogging some of my notes for those who were not in attendance yesterday and for those who read this who do not attend North Church.

Some of the items in the notes were not touched on yesterday.

A Vision for Prayer in 2013

There may be no greater tool for God to use to change us than consistent, fervent prayer.

“The man- God’s man- is made in the closet. His life and his most profound convictions are born in his communion with God.”

EM Bounds

The vision for prayer in 2013-

1.     Consistent- (Luke 22:39-41) Pray on the same days at the same times each week. This will develop habits and habits begin to make patterns. This will change you.

2.     Alone- (Luke 22:41)

a.     Pray by yourself, this develops intimacy and you can have freedom to sing, argue, make mistakes, read, be repetitive like to Psalm, meditate.

b.     Find your prayer closet.

                                               i.     In your car on your way to work. This is a quiet and consistent routine based opportunity.

                                              ii.     Shower. This is what I do. God uses the idea of cleansing to teach me daily and remind me. It is also a quiet and restful place.

                                            iii.     Actual closet.

                                            iv.     Next to your bed. Many married couples require different amounts of sleep or have different schedules. Many times Jen will be finishing up a project and I am just looking for something to do. Kneel next to the bed and pray.

3.     Sacrificially-

a.     Fasting. There will be more to come in the next few weeks sermons about fasting. But, at the heart of fasting is to connect with the heart of God and at the heart of fasting is sacrifice with the express understanding that God can provide.

b.     Wake up early. God will bless this. I love sleep and I hate to wake up before I have to. God will bless this. Sacrifice.

c.      Skip a lunch. Not necessarily fasting, but giving up of time that is “yours” in the middle of the day to seek God.

4.     Model- Your leaders have been doing this for a couple of months now. We do not want to call you to something that we have not been pursing for a while.

a.     Elders have been praying since for this and in this since November.

b.     Deacons have been praying since December.

c.      We are calling the church body to it today.

5.     What to pray/How to Pray-

a.     Allow God to direct this. Foremost, spend sometime with God and allow him to direct this, allow these words to serve as a guide.

b.     Some direction:

                                               i.     Books to help/guide/shepherd your praying mindset:

1.     Everyday Prayers by Scotty Smith.

2.     A Praying Life by Paul Miller.

3.     Humility by Andrew Murray.

4.     Abide in Christ by Andrew Murray.

                                              ii.     Read the Psalms. Read them by day. On the first of the month read Psalm 1 etc. on the first of the second month read Psalm 32 etc. Do not feel obligated to read the entire Psalm. If a phrase in a Psalm connects with your heart, stop, meditate on it, think on it, pray it, memorize it, repeat it to yourself throughout the day, remember this is the WORD OF GOD he is using it to penetrate your spirit and remind you of a part of himself.

Psalm 32 in Practice::

When you see the word Selah, that is an instruction to stop and think deeply on what you just read.

Memorize, meditate, repeat phrases, think on concepts, pray them verbally.

Psalm 32:1 Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered.

For me with this Psalm, this simple verse launched me for a full week to guide my prayers. It directs the rest of the Psalm and leads me to actively ask forgiveness for specific sin.

Closing::

God will shape you and will continue to shape you as you develop this communion, the devotion and as you sacrifice, learn, and hunger for his presence in prayer and in meditation. Come and spend 2013 in prayer and communion with God.

We have been working through Ecclesiastes at North Church. It has been really hard because the book is very dark and depressing. Solomon is terribly redundant by saying that everything is meaningless. As I am honest with the text and with myself it leaves me in a dark place as I study to prepare to preach it.

Many times when studying or when I lay down to sleep or when I prepare to go to work or when I speak to my wife and children, I find myself asking why? I ask why on deep and on surface levels. When I lay down to sleep, I ask, "Why did I do what I did today?" When I correct or speak to my kids I ask, "Why am I doing what I am doing as a parent? What am I teaching my kids and how is this going to impact them?"

I stress over my kids, my family, the election, my church, the people who go to my church, the things that the people that go to my church stress over, my weekly sermon, stuff at the office that is left undone, what people at the office think of me and the job that I am doing, the future of North Church. Ecclesiastes leads me to think dark thoughts about these things and the stress that they bring to me.

As I prepare to preach the verses that I will preach this week, I note that they are especially dark and they remind me of my situation. Each of the things that I listed above that bring stress to me are pressing in presently. My mind reals and so I try to pray, but my disheveled mind goes back to carrying that stress like a super heavy backpack, even as I pray.

Then I am reminded of Psalm 131. Three short verses. These three verses are nourishment to my soul. Just as I am being nourished by it, "Great Is Thy Faithfulness" pops up on my study playlist.

We serve a faithful God. I would like to invite you to come and explore these ideas with us at 10:00 am this week at North Church (660 Charbonier in Florissant). 

Take Courage

32 "Behold, an hour is coming, and has already come, for you to be scattered, each to his own home, and to leave Me alone ; and yet I am not alone, because the Father is with Me. 33 "These things I have spoken to you, so that in Me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world."

Jesus spoke these words prior to going into the Garden of Gethsemane to pray the night before he died.  

You will have tribulation, but in Jesus you HAVE peace. Take courage! The Greek word that is translated here as courage here is the marriage of joy and courage. Imagine a boy finished with his homework finished flying out of his front door and bounding down the porch out to play with his best friends on  perfect day. Imagine Todd Beamer's state of mind aboard flight 93 and overtaking hijackers.

This is the state of mind that is ours because Jesus has overcome the world.

When hardness of life and uncertainty presses in, remember these words of our Savior.

Take courage, I have overcome the world. 

The Gospel and a New Home

 Our home was hit by the Good Friday tornado of 2011. We have been back in our home since January of this year. If you have asked me if we are back in yet or how we like the "new" house, chances are I have told you something like, "it is so much more than we deserve."

I say that intentionally. I say it because we could never afford a new house. When I say new, I mean that everything in it is new. Only the exterior walls and the sub floor remains from the Thursday before Good Friday. The interior walls, the lighting, the electric, the plumbing, the HVAC, the furniture...all of it is brand new and we could never afford it on our own.

All of that reminds me of grace.

I sit in my dining room as I type this. My dining room used to be a garage with a door that rarely worked and cob webs everywhere. There was a big plastic bin with my kids sports equipment, yard work tools and other junk . There was an old tire to a van I no longer own. Now that space is filled with a huge table and 10 chairs and friends and family. I don't deserve it.

Earlier today I sat on my porch. My porch used to be a small concrete surface with steps that were falling apart. Today, the porch is bigger and is covered. It is more than I deserve.

Sometimes I sit in my living room and look at the walls and look down the hallway. The lines that the walls create are crisp and clean. The arches going into the dining room and kitchen remind us of the old charm of the former home. The colors that I can see from the living room invoke warmth and smiles.

The walls used to be made of plaster that would fall apart if you ever tried to hang something on them. I always had a fresh jar of plaster patch on a shelf in that worn out garage. But I was never any good at using the plaster patch. I was also never any good at sealing the jar, so I had four or five jars of dried out plaster patch. That really sounds like grace to me. The broken walls that fall apart are gone, the need for me to try to patch the brokenness is gone, the jars of dried out plaster patch found their way into the dumpster.

That dumpster sat in our driveway for 9 months and was filled with yesterday's ruined stuff that was torn down and thrown into the dumpster and hauled off to some land fill. That dumpster reminds me of the cross.

Then there is the kitchen. My bride has always wanted a new kitchen. Our cabinets and drawers used to be part metal and part wood. The wooden parts did not quite shut right and splinters would drop into our silverware drawer all the time. The metal cabinet doors had hinges that were slightly off and the wooden doors never seated properly. The sink leaked and the space below the sink was too small and when I would try to get in there to fix the leaks, my back would hurt for a few days after. Jen got her cabinets and all new appliances too. It is more than we deserve.

All of this reminds me of grace. Many times I just stop and think about all of this and exhale and my mind goes to grace. Traces of grace are all around us. Come by sometime and pop in and ask for the Grace Tour.

Thanks for reading.

Tuesday Link of the Week

This week's Link of the Week is to a .pdf of A.W. Tozer's classic The Pursuit of God.

There are two books that I go back to several times a year. Sometimes I read them all the way through some times I read a few chapters. This is one of those books. It is a classic book that drives the heart to worship and the mind to deep thoughts about God.

Bookmark this link on your computer and on your phone. The chapters are short and can be read in just a few minutes. Visit this link often and enjoy this classic work.

Tuesday Link of the Week

This week's link of the week is one of my favorites. It is an interlinear bible. With this link you can type in any Bible verse or series of verses or even entire chapters and it will pull up the Greek or Hebrew version of the verses. Many of the words will have clickable links to the Greek words as well as links to verse that word appears elsewhere in scripture.

This is an extremely valuable tool and it is free.

I want to walk you through a practice of using the link. Romans 5:8 is my favorite verse. As you click on the reference, you will be linked to the page for Romans 5:8. When you are there, click on the word "demonstrates". It will pull up the Greek word Sunistao.

Along the left column you will see the transliterated word and phonetic spelling (you can click on the speaker there and it will pronounce the word for you) and the definition of the word.

Through middle is the Word Origin, you will see that Sunistao comes from two root words. You can click on each to examine definitions and uses of the the root words.

Along the right column is a list of the times in scripture where this word is used. You can see that Sunistao is used a total of 15 times throughout scripture. If you click on the particular book of the Bible, it will bring up each verse in that book where Sunistao appears.

This is a great tool, spend sometime with some of your favorite verses and key words.

Thanks for reading!

Be Transformed

A few times each year, my mind will center around a word or a phrase in scripture. Currently, I my mind is camping on the notion of being transformed.

Romans 12:2 calls us to be transformed. Transformed is the Greek word Metamorphoo. It is the same word that is used when scripture recounts the transfiguration in Matthew 17 when Jesus literally took on a different physical presence.

The definition of the word is to change into a different form. So to be transformed, as we are called to be, is to take on a different form. If we give more than a cursory look at this idea, we realize that it is not something that we are capable of on our own. It is a supernatural act.

To be transformed is the foremost prayer that I am praying for North Church people.

So what does this mean and how does it happen? Romans 12:2 is a natural response to the grace and mercy of God that appears in Romans 11. But to be changed is not something that starts in us, it is a response to the grace and mercy of God. In order to be transformed, we must press into grace, we must long to be transformed, we must engage God through prayer and scripture, we must think and meditate on grace and mercy.

On the other side of transformation lies the joy that motivated Jesus to endure the intensity of the pain of the cross and to condescend the shame of being alone, broken, naked, bleeding and on display for the world to mock.

I am praying for transformation in our husbands as they lead wives. Men, read scripture to your bride and pray with her. Be the catalyst for the transformation in you and in her.

I am praying this sort of transformation for the single population of North Church. "When Jesus was here on the earth, the crowds would follow Him because they saw He gave good things. But that’s not what He wanted. He wanted their hearts for Himself. So He would turn to them and say things like, “If you don’t love Me so much that every other relationship in your life looks like hate by comparison, you can’t follow Me.”(from gracefortheroad.com)

I am praying for transformation in our wives as they submit and fill the role of "Azur" in their marriages. Women, nurture and pray for your husbands and gently ask them to lead you.

I am praying for us all that God would give us a thirst that only He can satisfy. I am praying for that to be a tangible thirst that we feel deep in the back of our throats that makes us noticeably uncomfortable.

Will you join me in these prayers?