Plan for Prayer

“If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples. . . . These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.” (John 15:7–8, 11) 

Prayer pursues joy in fruitful fellowship with Jesus, knowing that God is glorified when we bear fruit in answer to prayer. Why do God’s children so often fail to have consistent habits of happy, fruitful prayer?

Unless I’m badly mistaken, one of the reasons is not so much that we don’t want to, but that we don’t plan to.

If you want to take a four-week vacation, you don’t just get up one summer morning and say, “Hey, let’s go today!” You won’t have anything ready. You won’t know where to go. Nothing has been planned.

But that is how many of us treat prayer. We get up day after day and realize that significant times of prayer should be a part of our life, but nothing is ready.

We don’t know where to go. Nothing has been planned. No time. No place. No procedure. And we all know that the opposite of planning is not a wonderful flow of deep, spontaneous experiences in prayer. The opposite of planning is the same old rut.

If you don’t plan a vacation, you will probably stay home and watch TV. The natural, unplanned flow of spiritual life sinks to the lowest ebb of vitality. There is a race to be run and a fight to be fought. If you want renewal in your life of prayer, you must plan to see it.

Therefore, my simple exhortation is this: Let us take time this very day to rethink our priorities and how prayer fits in. Make some new resolve. Try some new venture with God. Set a time. Set a place. Choose a portion of Scripture to guide you.

Don’t be tyrannized by the press of busy days. We all need midcourse corrections. Make this a day of turning to prayer — for the glory of God and for the fullness of your joy.

IDEAL BINDING OF BELIEVERS WITH UNBELIEVERS!

 EVERYDAY IN THE WORD!

SUNDAY OCTOBER 15, 2023.

SUBJECT: IDEAL BINDING OF BELIEVERS WITH UNBELIEVERS!

Memory verse: "But go and learn what it means: ‘I desire mercy not sacrifice.’ For I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance.” (Matthew 9 vs 13.)

READ: Mark 2 vs 15 - 17: 

2:15: Now it happened, as He was dining in Levi’s house, that many tax collectors and sinners also sat together with Jesus and His disciples; for there were many, and they followed Him.

2:16: And when the scribes and the Pharisees saw Him eating with the tax collectors and sinners, they said to His disciples, “How is it that He eats and drinks with tax collectors and sinners?”

2:17: When Jesus heard it, He said to them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.”

INTIMATION:

Jesus came into the world to save sinners, and no sinner is beyond His saving power. He gladly associated Himself with sinners because He loved them, and because He knew that they needed to hear what He had to say. He spent time with all manner of people—poor, rich, bad, good, etc. Therefore, as ambassadors of Christ, our ideal witnessing for Him is reaching out to those who have need for His saving grace, no matter their kind. 

We too, must befriend those who need Christ, even if they do not seem to be ideal companions. Are there people you have been neglecting because of their reputation? They may be the ones who mostly need to meet and ensure they hear the message of Christ’s love from you. 

However, this fact of ideal witnessing has inadvertently been contrasted by many with the apostle Paul’s sayings in Second Corinthians 6 vs 14 - 16, “Do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers. For what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness? And what communion has light with darkness? And what accord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has a believer with an unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols....”

Here the apostle Paul advises that believers and unbelievers cannot be joined together effectively for a common purpose, such as; business partnership, marriage, etc. This is because of the difference in their beliefs. It would be a mismatch, and such can weaken the believer’s commitment, integrity or standards, especially for new converts, and those not yet deeply rooted in Christ. 

The apostle Paul had earlier explained that this does not mean isolating oneself from unbelievers which is against Christ’s leading; “I wrote to you in my epistle not to keep company with sexually immoral people. Yet I certainly did not mean with the sexually immoral people of this world, or with covetous, or extortioners, or idolaters, since then you need would need to go out of the world.” (First Corinthians 5 vs 9 - 10.)

Paul even urges believers to stay with their unbelieving spouses; “But to the rest, I, not the Lord, say: If any brother has a wife who does not believe, and she is willing to live with him, let him not divorce her. And a woman who has a husband who does not believe, if he is willing to live with her, let her not divorce him” (First Corinthians 7 vs 12 - 13). 

The apostle Paul made it clear that we should not disassociate ourselves from unbelievers—otherwise we could not carry our Christ’s command to tell them about salvation (Matthew 28 vs 18 - 20). Rather, we are to distance ourselves from the person who claims to be a believer, yet indulges in sins explicitly forbidden in Scripture by rationalizing his or her actions. By rationalizing sin, a person harms others for whom Christ died and dims the image of God in Himself or herself.

He wanted believers to be active in their witness for Christ to unbelievers, but they should not lock themselves into personal or business relationships that could cause them to compromise their faith. Believers should do everything in their power to avoid situations that could force them to divide their loyalties.

Also, the apostle Paul did not want single believers to enter into marriage with unbelievers. Such marriages cannot have unity in the most important issue in life—commitment and obedience to God. Because marriage involves two people becoming one, faith may become an issue, and one spouse may have to compromise beliefs for the sake of unity. Many people discount this problem only to regret it later. Don’t allow emotion or passion to blind you with someone who will not be your spiritual partner. 

One secret of effective witnessing for God is to recognize opportunities to relate God to person’s experience. When the opportunity arises, we must have the courage to speak out, using the situation to turn attention to God. 

PRAYER: Abba Father, my utmost heart desire is to be an effective witness for Christ, recognizing every opportunity, and utilizing the it to speak out and to turn attention of all around to You and Your Good News, in Jesus’ Name I have prayed, Amen.

PRAISE THE LORD!

God Heals by Humbling

 “I have seen his ways, but I will heal him; I will lead him and restore comfort to him and his mourners, creating the fruit of the lips. Peace, peace, to the far and to the near,” says the Lord, “and I will heal him.” (Isaiah 57:18–19)

In spite of the severity of man’s disease of rebellion and willfulness, God will heal. How will he heal? Isaiah 57:15 says that God dwells with the crushed and humble. Yet the people of Isaiah 57:17 are not humble. They are brazenly pursuing their own proud way. So, what will a healing be?

It can only be one thing. God will heal them by humbling them. He will cure the patient by crushing his pride. If only the crushed and humble enjoy God’s fellowship (Isaiah 57:15), and if Israel’s sickness is a proud and willful rebellion (Isaiah 57:17), and if God promises to heal them (Isaiah 57:18), then his healing must be humbling and his cure must be a crushed spirit.

Isn’t this Isaiah’s way of prophesying what Jeremiah called the new covenant and the gift of a new heart? He said, “Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel. . . . I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people” (Jeremiah 31:31, 33).

Isaiah and Jeremiah both see a time coming when a sick, disobedient, hard-hearted people will be supernaturally changed. Isaiah speaks of healing. Jeremiah speaks of writing the law on their hearts. And Ezekiel puts it like this: “I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh” (Ezekiel 36:26) 

So the healing of Isaiah 57:18 is a major heart transplant — the old hardened, proud, willful heart of stone is taken out, and a new soft, tender heart is put in, which is easily humbled and crushed by the memory of sin and the sin that remains. 

This is a heart that the lofty One whose name is Holy will dwell with forever.

THE DECEITFULNESS OF EARTHLY POSSESSIONS!

 EVERYDAY IN THE WORD!

SATURDAY OCTOBER 14, 2023.

SUBJECT: THE DECEITFULNESS OF EARTHLY POSSESSIONS!

Memory verse: "But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night, in which the heavens will pass away with a great noise, and the elements will melt with fervent heat; both the earth and the world that are in it will be burned up." (Second Peter 3 vs 10.)

READ: Luke 12 vs 16 - 21:

12:16: Then He spoke a parable to them, saying: “The ground of a certain rich man yielded plentifully.

12:17: And he thought within himself, saying, ‘What shall I do, since I have no room to store my crops?’ 

12:18: So he said, ‘I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build greater, and there I will store all my crops and my goods.

12:19: And I will say to my soul, “Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years; take your ease; eat, drink, and be merry.”

12:20: But God said to him, ‘Fool! This night your soul will be required of you, then whose will those things be which you have provided?’

12:21: “So is he who lays up treasures for himself, and is not rich toward God.”

INTIMATION:

Wealth, possessions, and money are all good, and the blessing of God to mankind, but we are deceived by the notion that they provide answers to every problem, hence we throw them at our problems. Though these material things are good in themselves because God has given them to mankind for our enjoyment (First Timothy 6 vs 17), but being obligated to them is sinful. The apostle Paul, in First Timothy 6 vs 10, says, "For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, for which some have strayed from the faith in their greediness, and pierced themselves through many sorrows."

These earthly possessions, are dangerous because they deceive us into thinking that they make life easy, and help us get everything we want. Consequently, we put our trust in them rather than God, who controls all circumstances. Those who pursue the empty promises of earthly possessions, rather than seeking God, will one day discover that they have nothing because they are spiritually bankrupt.

Guard against wrongful pursuit of these material things so as not to be a servant to them. They are created by God to serve you, and not you serve them. You are created to serve God, and if you loose your mark, you will serve them instead of God which is an error, and sinful. Jesus said in Matthew 6 vs 24, "No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon." Can you honestly say that God, not money, possessions, and wealth, is your master? One test is to ask which one occupies more of your thoughts, time, and efforts.

Your life is shaped mostly by what you are obligated to. They can develop you or mar you, but either way, they will define you. If you tell me what you are obligated to, I'll tell you what you will be in the years to come. We become whatever we are obligated to. Usually many people miss God's purpose for their lives at the point of committing themselves, or being obligated to their choice in life. 

Many are also afraid of getting committed or obligated to anything, and prefer to just drift through life. Many others make half-hearted commitments to competing values, which leads to frustration and mediocrity. And many more make a full commitment to worldly goals, such as becoming wealthy or famous, and end up disappointed and bitter. Your total obligation should be to God who owns and controls all circumstances.

Every choice you make has eternal consequences, so you better choose wisely. In our memory verse, the apostle Peter warns us about the futility of earthly possessions. Then he continued in the next verse (v 20), asking the pertinent question to us all, “Therefore, since all these things will be dissolved, what manner of persons ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness?" Realizing that the earth will be burned up, we should put our confidence in what is lasting and eternal and not be bound to earth and its treasures and pursuit of them. 

Earthly possessions are not bad or evil in themselves, but the manner of your pursuit of them is where the problem lies. The Bible, in Ecclesiastes 7 vs 12 says, "For wisdom is a defense, as money is a defense: but the excellency of knowledge is that wisdom gives life to those who have it." How wisely then do you pursue these earthly things? Do you pursue them with the excellent knowledge which comes from wisdom; knowing that at the end they are all vanity? 

Even life is a vapor, stripped of the life-giving spirit breathed into us by God, our bodies return to dust. Stripped of God’s purpose, our work is in vain. Stripped of God’s love, our service is futile. Therefore, we must put God first over all we do and in all we do because without Him we are nothing. Knowing that life is futile without God motivates the wise person to seek Him first.

What are you obligated to? Do you spend more of your time piling up possessions, or striving to develop Christlike character? Now that we have been warned about the impending end, the choice is yours to make. Be morally clean and spiritually alert because you don’t know the hour of His coming! 

Prayer: Abba Father, all things are Yours, and in You all things consist. Endue me with the excellent spirit to put You first in all things, and to understand the futility of earthly possessions and materialism in eternity, especially when they hinder me from serving You and others acceptably, in Jesus’ Name I have prayed, Amen. 

PRAISE THE LORD!

The Master Servant

 . . . so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. (Ephesians 2:7)

To me, the Bible’s most astonishing image of Christ’s second coming is in Luke 12:35–37, which pictures the return of a master from a marriage feast like this:

“Stay dressed for action and keep your lamps burning, and be like men who are waiting for their master to come home from the wedding feast, so that they may open the door to him at once when he comes and knocks. Blessed are those servants whom the master finds awake when he comes. Truly, I say to you, he will dress himself for service and have them recline at table, and he will come and serve them.”

To be sure, we are called servants — and that no doubt means we are to do exactly as we are told. But the wonder of this picture is that the “master” insists on serving. We may have expected this during Jesus’s ministry on earth, since he said, “The Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45). But Luke 12:35–37 is a picture of the second coming, when the Son of Man comes in the blinding glory of his Father “with his mighty angels in flaming fire” as 2 Thessalonians 1:7–8 says. Why would Jesus be portrayed as a table waiter at the second coming?

Because the very heart of his glory is the fullness of grace that overflows in kindness to needy people. This is why Ephesians 2:7 says he aims “in the coming ages [to] show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.”

What is the greatness of our God? What is his uniqueness in the world? Isaiah answers: “From of old no one has heard or perceived by the ear, no eye has seen a God besides thee, who works for those who wait for him” (Isaiah 64:4 RSV). There is no other god like this. He never relinquishes the role of inexhaustible benefactor of his ever-dependent, happy people.

LET GOD BE THE SOURCE OF YOUR PROSPERITY!

 EVERYDAY IN THE WORD!

FRIDAY OCTOBER 13, 2023.

SUBJECT: LET GOD BE THE SOURCE OF YOUR PROSPERITY! 

Memory verse: "That I will take nothing, from a thread to a sandal strap, and that I will not take anything that is yours lest you should say, ‘I have made Abram rich’." (Genesis 14 vs 23.)

READ: Genesis 13 vs 8 - 11: 

13:8: So Abram said to Lot, "Please let there be no strife, between you and me, and between my herdsmen and your herdsmen; for we are brethren. 

13:9: Is not the whole land before you? Please separate from me. If you take the left, then I will go to the right; or, if you go to the right, then I will go to the left." 

13:10: And lot lifted his eyes and saw all the plain of Jordan, that it was well watered everywhere (before the LORD destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah) like the garden of the LORD, like the land of Egypt as you go toward Zoar.

13:11: Then Lot chose for himself all the plain of Jordan, and Lot journeyed east. And they separated from each other. 

INTIMATION:

Abraham was not wealthy because he was a shrewd business man or because God rewarded his great integrity. Abraham was prosperous because God promised to bless him and make his name great. The blessing was independent of Abraham's performance or what he deserved. It is purely the favor of God that made him rich. In the same way, your efforts are not the source of prosperity in your life. 

The blessing of God made Abraham so rich that he and his nephew, Lot, couldn't dwell together because their flocks and herds were too big. They had so many animals that one location couldn't feed them all, so their servants began fighting with each other over the grazing land, and they were forced to separate. 

Abraham took Lot up to a hilltop so they could look out over the whole land. One part of the land was a well-watered plain lush with grass; the other part was dry. Keep in mind that the survival of the herds depended on there being plenty of natural grass to graze on. Fields of grass were the only source of food they had. So it isn't surprising that Lot chose the well-watered land for himself.

The story reveals how confident Abraham was in God as his source. Anyone who was relying on natural circumstances and his own efforts for prosperity would never give up a well-watered plain for his animals. Looking at the natural facts, the decision whether to choose a grassy plain or the desert was a no-brainer. But Abraham knew God was his source, no matter what things looked like to the naked eye. Abraham was saying, "It doesn't matter where I go, the Lord is going to bless me."

Right after Abraham allowed Lot to take the better land, God appeared to him and promised even more prosperity than Abraham had already experienced, "And the Lord said to Abram, after Lot had separated from him: "Lift your eyes now and look from the place where you are - northward, southward, eastward, and westward; for all the land which you see I give to you and your descendants forever. And I will make your descendants as the dust of the earth; so that if a man could number the dust of the earth, then your descendants also could be numbered. Arise, walk in the land through its length and its width, for I give it to you." (Genesis 13 vs 14 - 17.)

In the natural, it is impossible for a man who grazes his flocks and herds in the desert to prosper as much as a man whose cattle graze in lush pastures, but nothing is impossible with God. (Luke 1 vs 37.) The blessing of God made Abraham rich, and he prospered much more than Lot did.

Not long after Lot and Abraham separated, foreign kings raided the city of Sodom, where Lot lived, and took everyone captive. When Abraham heard that his nephew had been seized, he armed his servants that were trained for war and pursued the foreign kings. His private army consisted of 318 men, which gives you an idea of how rich he was and how many servants he had at that time in history. He was so rich that he had a private army. Abraham's men defeated the foreign kings and brought back all of the spoil and people who had been taken captive.

The king of Sodom was grateful, so he offered to let Abraham keep the spoil: "The king of Sodom said to Abram, Give me the persons, and take the good to yourself" (Genesis 14 vs 21). The king recognized that if it hadn't been Abraham, his entire kingdom would have been lost. We don't know how much spoil the king was offering Abraham, but it isn't unreasonable to think it would have been the equivalent of millions of dollars today. 

Abraham had recovered all the goods, food, valuables of five cities, so the spoil certainly worth a lot of money. But Abraham didn't accept the king's offer because he didn't want anyone to have a reason to claim they had made him rich. He knew he was rich because of the blessing of God. His confidence in God as the source of his wealth was so strong that he gave away millions of dollars worth of spoil, which he had rightfully earned by conquest. (Genesis 14 vs 22 - 24.)

We need to see God as our source and develop the attitude that the resources we have are a gift from God. Yes, you may have worked so hard at your job, but God is the source! God gave you life, health, and abilities, and God is the One who opens doors of opportunity. 

Until you recognize God as your source, nothing else the Bible says about finances is going to work. As long as you hold to your money with a clenched fist and hoarding possessions, God's method of prosperity won't work in your life. You have to see yourself as a steward managing the financial blessings that God has given you. Seeing God as your source doesn't mean you sit at home and do nothing. You are supposed to work, but you need to recognize that even though you work, it is God who gives the increase. (First Corinthians 3 vs 7.)

A farmer has to prepare the soil and plant seeds in order to get a crop, but God created the natural laws that govern sowing and reaping, God sends the rain and sun that makes the plant to grow, God gave the land to farm on, and God is the source of the farmer's health. Likewise, it is the blessing of God that makes it possible for you to prosper, and the foundation of prosperity is seeing yourself as a steward.

Prayer: Abba Father, You are the reason I live, and in You I move and have my being. All I have is Yours. Yours I am, and Yours I want to be. Give me the grace to manage Your resources appropriately, to earn my acceptance as a worthy servant by You, in Jesus’ Name I have prayed, Amen.

PRAISE THE LORD!

Beware of Serving God

 “The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything.” (Acts 17:24–25)

We do not glorify God by providing his needs, but by praying that he would provide ours — and trusting him to answer, and living in the joy of that all-providing care as we lay down our lives in love for other people.

Here we are at the heart of the good news of Christian Hedonism. God’s insistence that we ask him to give us help so that he gets glory. “Call upon me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you shall glorify me” (Psalm 50:15). This forces on us the startling fact that we must beware of thinking he needs us. We must beware of serving God, and we must take special care to let him serve us, lest we rob him of his glory. “God is not served by human hands, as though he needed anything” (Acts 17:25). 

This sounds very strange. Most of us think serving God is a totally positive thing. We have not considered that serving God may be an insult to him. But meditation on the very meaning of prayer makes this plain. 

In the novel, Robinson Crusoe, the hero, took Psalm 50:12–15 as his favorite text to hope in as he’s stranded on the island: God says, “If I were hungry, I would not tell you, for the world and its fullness are mine. . . . Call upon me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you shall glorify me.” 

Which means: there is a way to serve God that would belittle him as needy of our service. Oh, how careful we must be not to preempt the mighty grace of God in Christ. Jesus said, “The Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45). He aims to be the servant. He aims to get the glory as the Giver.