A prayer of hope (from Hope for Hull ’08)

(based on Psalm 69 v.13 Living Bible translation)
Lord God, as we look out across this area we see so much that needs to be done, so many who need to be helped in body, mind and spirit.
Our time and resources are limited and often inadequate; sometimes we just don’t know what to do.
But we will keep on praying to you, O Lord.
For now is the time!
You are bending down to listen.
You are ready with a bountiful supply of love and kindness.
Now answer our prayers for this place and its people, as you have promised.
Strengthen and encourage us to stand together for you as we seek to bring fresh hope to these communities where you have placed us.
We ask this in the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ – Saviour, Healer and Restorer of Hope.
Amen
visit http://www.hope08.com/Group/Group.aspx?id=59485

Prayer is the key to revival

I'm off to the national Methodist Lay Workers' Conference, so I'm blogging ahead this week!

Prayer is the key to revival:

In September 1857, a man of prayer, Jeremiah Lanphier, started a businessmen’s prayer meeting in the upper room of the Dutch Reformed Church Consistory Building in Manhattan. In response to his advertisement, only six people out of a population of a million showed up. But the following week there were fourteen, and then twenty-three when it was decided to meet everyday for prayer. By late winter they were filling the Dutch Reformed Church, then the Methodist Church on John Street, then Trinity Episcopal Church on Broadway at Wall Street. In February and March of 1858, every church and public hall in down town New York was filled.Horace Greeley, the famous editor, sent a reporter with horse and buggy racing round the prayer meetings to see how many men were praying. In one hour he could get to only twelve meetings, but he counted 6,100 men attending. Then a landslide of prayer began, which overflowed to the churches in the evenings. People began to be converted, ten thousand a week in New York City alone. The movement spread throughout New England, the church bells bringing people to prayer at eight in the morning, twelve noon, and six in the evening. The revival raced up the Hudson and down the Mohawk, where the Baptists, for example, had so many people to baptize that they went down to the river, cut a big hole in the ice, and baptized them in the cold water. When Baptists do that they are really on fire!*

There are no charismatic preachers or leaders in this story. Just a man called to pray.

Will you pray?

2 Chronicles 7v14 is a tremendous promise:

....if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.

Let's get serious about prayer!

*thanks to http://www.40-days.com/revivalstories.php

'PRAY WITHOUT CEASING' vigils

Last year I drew up some guidelines for 24/7 prayer. Let me share them with you:

Here I am…
How do I pray?
What do I say?

First….remember God longs to speak to us far more than we long to speak to Him!

Second….you’re here to hold vigil. Jesus and the New Testament writers often use the instructions; ‘Watch and Pray’. When your ‘watch’ ends pass the baton (a wooden cross or something appropriate) to the next person and say to them, ‘Watch and pray’

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Third….light a candle. Jesus is ‘the Light of the World’. In a desperate world we proclaim victory over dark powers and affirm our Christian Hope. And we ourselves are ‘lights’……as having been in His presence we go out to reflect His glory. (2 Cor 4v6)

Fourth….. pray (briefly is fine) with others present. Maybe you want them to pray for you or for a problem you have. Just ask. And vice versa….be ready to pray for them.

Fifth…..as you are quiet before God, pray for each person or situation that comes into your mind. You may admit to God that you don’t know what to pray….just say ‘Lord, here is N……you know their needs. Please touch them.’

Sixth…..If, like most of us, your mind wanders….offer to God those thoughts, especially the things you are most concerned about, leave them with Him, and experience His peace. (Phil 4 v6-7)

Seventh…. Don’t be surprised if God speaks to you. It probably will not be audible, but as you are quiet before God a thought may be implanted in your mind. Test it (because there are ‘voices’ other than God’s). A particular sin may be highlighted to enable you to repent of it before God. (again…test it…. If it’s from God, it will be specific). A particular course of action may be revealed to you in answer to a dilemma you have prayed for.
Share these with others if you feel you can, and don’t be afraid to ask if you’re uncertain.

Eighth*…..


*this isn’t a complete list ! You can add to it !!

Unanswered prayer

Even if you feel your prayers aren't being answered, God is still right by your side. When we ask God for something (whether it’s healing for a loved one, world peace or a parking space), it’s because it’s important to us. So why might God give us something as trivial as a parking space, when a loved one’s cancer isn’t healed?

We don’t always get what we ask for, no matter how ‘good’ we believe our cause to be. This is hard to accept—but beware of the term ‘unanswered prayer’. Just because we don’t get what we want, how or when we want, doesn’t mean God doesn’t hear and isn’t responding in some way.

Accepting that there is a God is a huge leap of faith in itself. Once there, we can accept that God is massive, made of love and purity, all-powerful, and far beyond our human understanding. Therefore, we must also accept that we can’t really understand what God’s up to. Like the butterfly that beats its wings in Brazil and causes a tornado in Texas, we can’t know what part we play in God’s great big universal plan.

As painful as it is, sometimes God doesn’t seem to answer our prayre because the answer we really need is ‘No’, or because God is teaching us something. Wouldn’t life be weird (and chaotic) if everyone got everything they asked for? Watch the movie Bruce Almighty!

Sometimes we can look back and see how God drew us closer through ‘unanswered prayer’—that what we ended up with was more valuable, and was, in fact, the answer to prayer of a different sort.

Unanswered prayers will include things that aren’t God’s will (that your enemies will die, for example!) or things we think we want, but which won’t be good for us (like winning the lottery). Remember that God’s will comes before our own needs and wants; that’s why the Lords Prayer says, ‘Your will be done’.

What about people who persevere in heartfelt prayer for a sick child, only to watch that precious child die? It’s hard to explain that away as a lesson. Why didn’t God step in? What did the child—or the parents—do to deserve it? How could God be so cruel? The answer, of course, is that he isn’t. And this ‘unanswered prayer’ is almost impossible to explain. All we can do is remember that when Jesus asked God to spare him before he was crucified that prayer wasn’t answered (it was answered in a different way: he was resurrected three days later.)

We can’t always understand what God is doing—if we could, would we really want him to be our god? No matter what difficulties or even tragedies you may face, turning your back on God because of ‘unanswered’ prayer isn’t the right response. Usually, we are closest to God when we turn and sob onto his shoulder, and let him comfort us in our pain.

Nothing will be perfect until we’re united with him after this life is over. Until then, let’s not stop talking to God in prayer.

This article is found at http://www.church-on-the-net.com/reference/unansweredprayer.aspx.

Reproduced with thanks. Do visit this excellent new website.

Try praying TRIPRAYING !

Continuing with our series on prayer:

I encouraged a group of Ministry Students to try this last year. It proved of immense value. I hope they are still doing it (do let me know.. if you're reading this, EMMTC students! ).
Tripraying is about joining with two others to pray as a three. It’s also about your group of three connecting with the wider church through the tri praying network as part of the wider church. As members of the body of Christ we need each other. When we share our faith journey together, we grow in our relationship with God and with others.

Jesus says: ‘When two of you get together on anything at all on earth and make a prayer of it, my Father in heaven goes into action. And when two or three of you are together because of me, you can be sure that I'll be there’ (Matthew 18:19-20).
So tri praying - or praying in threes is biblical and we can expect God to act in us and through us as we spend time with him and pray for people and situations around us.

Our prayers are more effective as we pray as a team and we can ask for his kingdom to come as we ‘think of ways to motivate one another to acts of love and good works’ (Hebrews 10: 24,).

We all struggle at times and prayer can be hard work. Having the support and encouragement of two others is invaluable. ‘By yourself you're unprotected. With a friend you can face the worst. Can you round up a third? A three-stranded rope isn't easily snapped’ (Ecclesiastes 14:12). Committing to pray with two others helps us to be disciplined, accountable and to keep going.

How to get going:
Ask two other people if they would like to commit to praying together as a three.
Agree to meet - on a regular basis for prayer (at least once and preferably twice a month). You could keep in touch more regularly by phone or email as well.

When you meet:
1. Let your friends know how your faith journey is going and pray for each other.
2. Pray for three friends who aren’t yet Christians.
3. Identify a ‘Big issue’ – a situation that really needs God’s touch, his intervention or his solution. Pray for these together

thanks to 40 days http://www.40-days.com/trypraying.php

Get this Prayer Classic

Whatever book you may choose to read on the subject of PRAYER, you will find in it somewhere reference to a book which came out way back in 1931; 'Prayer' by O.Hallesby*. This is a wonderful Christian Classic. I have a 1951 hardback copy given to me in my teens (no I wasn't in my teens in 1951 !) by my old Sunday School teacher. I have included various quotes below. The book appears to be in print again. Do get a copy. Your prayer life will never be the same.

Hallesby quotes:
Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me. Revelation 3:20
I doubt I know of a passage in the whole Bible which throws greater light upon prayer than this one does. It is, it seems to me, the key which opens the door into the holy and blessed realm of prayer. To pray is to let Jesus into our hearts. This teaches us, in the first place, that it is not our prayer which moves the Lord Jesus. It is Jesus who moves us to pray. He knocks. Thereby He makes known His desire to come in to us. Our prayers are always a result of Jesus' knocking at our hearts' doors.
Prayer is an attitude of our hearts, an attitude of mind....

What is this spiritual condition?

What is that attitude of heart which God recognizes as prayer? I would mention two things.

In the first place, helplessness. As far as I can see, prayer has been ordained only for the helpless. It is the last resort of the helpless. Indeed, the very last way out. We try everything before we finally resort to prayer.
Secondly, faith.
It is written, 'But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.' Hebrews 11:6.

Without faith there can be no prayer, no matter how great our helplessness may be. Helplessness united with faith produces prayer....

You have more faith than you think you have. You have enough faith to pray; you have enough faith to believe that you will be heard. Faith is a strange thing; it often conceals itself in such a way that we can neither see nor find it....
Prayer consists simply in telling God day by day in what ways we are helpless.... Only he who is helpless can truly pray.... Helplessness united with faith produces prayer.
To pray is nothing more involved than to let Jesus into our needs. To pray is to give Jesus permission to employ His powers in the alleviation of our distress. To pray is to let Jesus glorify His name in the midst of our needs.

There come times when I have nothing more to tell God. If I were to continue to pray in words, I would have to repeat what I have already said. At such times it is wonderful to say to God, "May I be in Thy presence, Lord? I have nothing more to say to Thee, but I do love to be in Thy presence.

The secret prayer chamber is a bloody battle ground. Here violent and decisive battles are fought out. Here the fate of souls for time and eternity is determined, in quietude and solitude, without another soul as spectator or listener.

See to it, night and day, that you pray for your children. Then you will leave them a great legacy of answers to prayer, which will follow them all the days of their life. Then you may calmly and with a good conscience depart from them, even though you may not leave them a great deal of material wealth.

*for info on this little known writer: http://www.prayerfoundation.com/books/book_review_prayer_o_hallesby.htm

PRAISE HIM !

High up on the Wolds, we looked across the Ancholme Valley towards Winterton. It's usually a good view, but at 8 o'clock this morning the mist completely obscured our town. We prayed as we looked into the mist, knowing that the people we were praying for were right there, even though we could not see them, or their houses.

How important it is that we pray

EVEN WHEN WE CANNOT SEE.

The Psalmist prayed to God in HOPE and his prayer became a song of praise:

But I will hope continually, and will praise you yet more and more.
My mouth will tell of your righteous acts, of your deeds of salvation all day long, though their number is past my knowledge.
I will come praising the mighty deeds of the Lord God, I will praise your righteousness, yours alone.
O God, from my youth you have taught me, and I still proclaim your wondrous deeds.
So even to old age and grey hairs, O God, do not forsake me, until I proclaim your might to all the generations to come.
Your power and your righteousness, O God, reach the high heavens. You who have done great things, O God, who is like you? Psalm 71:14-19NRSV

Verse 18 in the AMPLIFIED Bible speaks to me !! (in more ways than one) …

Yes, even when I am old and grey-headed, O God, forsake me not, [but keep me alive] until I have declared Your mighty strength to [this] generation, and Your might and power to all that are to come.

Waiting on God

How long have you been waiting for God to answer your prayers? How long will it be before His promises are fulfilled? I for one easily get impatient.

Here's a lesson for us in waiting on God, praying continually, and trusting He will act in His time:

After three years, I went up to Jerusalem. Later I went to Syria and Cilicia. Gal.1: 18, 21

Paul was a man of action, who didn't let the grass grow under his feet. Immediately after the stoning of Stephen, he went to the high priest, asking for letters of authority to the synagogue leaders in Damascus so that he could arrest any there 'who belonged to the Way'. Confronted by Christ on the Damascus road, however, and called to proclaim the gospel, Paul 'at once began to preach in the synagogues that Jesus is the Son of God'. Same man, same urgency.
The book of Acts compresses the time that Paul spent in Damascus. But in his letter to the Galatians, Paul says that it was not until the third year after his conversion that he went to Jerusalem (Gal.1:17-18). The urgency of the Acts narrative dissolves into an indeterminate time spent in 'Arabia'. When the Jerusalem visit finally happened, Paul no doubt felt that his time had come, and he recalls in Acts 22 (v.17-18) his dismay when, as he was praying in the temple, the Lord told him to leave immediately because his life was in danger. Accompanied to Caesarea, Paul was then sent up north to Tarsus, in the province of Syria and Cilicia, where he spent the next ten years.
Whether in the desert east of Damascus, or in Syria and Cilicia, this passionate, driven man spent up to fourteen years in obscurity, before his primary ministry opened up before him. Bear in mind that by this time - in an age when life expectancy was low - Paul must have been well into his 40s.
Why did God allow - or ordain - these long delays? Reading between the lines, we can deduce that Paul needed teaching - first, to understand the gospel in all its richness, and second to learn to submit his will and his temperament to the lordship of Christ.
God's sovereign purposes may well conflict with human reason, with our passion for plans and programmes. In our driven age, let us not fight against delays, but use times of unemployment, sickness or disappointment creatively, with gratitude, to learn more of God and of what it means to be conformed to the image of his Son.
thanks to Helen Parry (LICC)

PRAYER

I want to encourage you through these blogs to get serious about prayer (and fasting...it's Lent on Feb 6th !)

My experience of prayer is like that of Jacob (Genesis 32 v24-30), a varied mixture of struggle and blessing! Though long in the tooth as a believer, I still find it hard to tune-in to the 'still small voice', and really listen to God....

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'His Isles' was a national prayer conference held at Swanwick organised by the Prayer Association for the British Isles.

Here's a few of the highlights:

From Kenya came a word from the Lord that 2007 would be a year of preparation for the nation and that 2008 would be a year of harvest. But there are three things that God hates and that we need to urgently pray about as a nation - our deception, our bloody hands and our idolatry.

Later another prophecy came that God is putting in place a net across our nation but that at the moment the net isn’t strong enough to hold his power. What are we doing to build ‘networks’ with police, teachers, local authorities as well as other churches?

How many of us have ‘planted seeds’ into people’s lives which we are still waiting to see the fruit of? God says that the seed is still to come forth…keep praying!

In 1966 when the Evangelical Alliance acknowledged the Charismatic Movement, one prophecy given paralleled this to Jesus going into the wilderness for 40 days after receiving the Holy Spirit at his baptism. Jesus came out of the wilderness in the power of the Spirit. The Church is coming out of a 40 year wilderness in that same power. Keep praying!
with thanks to Lou Ashford (September 2007)

We MUST get serious about prayer NOW.
What better time to recover our prayer life than this Lent.

William Arthur, a leading Methodist of the 1850s argued that the primary need of the ministry is the power of the Holy Spirit; he believed that it’s absence is our corporate responsibility. 'Prayer is the condition of obtaining this power. Prayer, prayer, all prayer – mighty, importunate, repeated united prayer'. He goes on to insist that a Church’s members must be ‘mighty in prayer’.

So we need to pray, to cry out to God, to wrestle in prayer, to pray all night if necessary. To refuse to ‘let go’ until the blessing is ours.

What if, together, we say this through the 40 days of Lent:

Lord Jesus Christ,
driven into the wilderness by the Holy Spirit,
I come to you aware of my frailty
and reluctance to fight temptation.
Make me, by the same Spirit,
determined to discover you
in stillness and activity,
in order and chaos,
when alone and when in fellowship,
in weakness and in strength,
when uncertain and when certain,
when needing help and when giving it.
Wherever I am and whatever I am doing,
I pray that the Holy Spirit will help my unbelief,
and grow faith in me....
such faith as will release in me
prayer without ceasing. Amen

Seeking faith and speaking words I never thought I'd say

As it's that time of year when Methodists join with other local churches in an Annual Covenant Service, let's explore what it's about.

First an interesting observation:
‘We observe that in some places significant numbers of members absent themselves from the Covenant Service believing it to set a higher standard for discipleship than that which permitted them to become members.'
Philip Drake

The Introduction
‘Christ has many services to be done:
some are easy, others are difficult;
some bring honour, others bring reproach;
some are suitable to our natural inclinations and material interests,
others are contrary to both.’

The Covenant Prayer
I am no longer my own but yours.

Put me to what you will, rank me with whom you will;

put me to doing, put me to suffering;

let me be employed for you, or laid aside for you,

exalted for you, or brought low for you;

let me be full, let me be empty,

let me have all things, let me have nothing:

I freely and wholeheartedly yield all things to your pleasure and disposal.

And now, glorious and blessed God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, you are mine and I am yours.

The Covenant Service is acknowledged to be one of the jewels in the Methodist liturgical crown. The enthronement service for the present Archbishop of Canterbury used it at a solemn moment of the liturgy. It was adapted from earlier traditions and introduced into Methodist worship by John Wesley as a means of regularly reaffirming our commitment as disciples and followers of Jesus. Yet it is now felt by many to be too difficult and too intense.

It's clear that this affirmation is a serious one that embraces the whole of our life, in all its parts. Most people find it quite tough to say, and really mean it. In our culture we tend to prize our ability to make decisions and choose our own path in life. It can feel very hard to give that up. But this prayer is like a love poem. It is about surrendering to God in love and joy.

The service, which is full of the assurance of God’s love for us, in whose power alone we are able to undertake such promises, includes a profound meditation on how we can discern what is being asked of us. It is clear that the ‘many services’ Christ may ask of us could involve social reproach or financial hardship. But there is a beautiful balance, which suggests the possibility that our calling will include undertaking activities that we enjoy and that will bring us prosperity and honour. It is impossible to rule out hardship. It is about genuinely offering ourselves – ‘no longer our own but yours’. It is the giving up of our own powerbase and right to choose which is so hard.

People have resisted the phrase ‘put me to suffering’, as if God deliberately willed us to experience pain. However, the word simply means the opposite of ‘doing’; it is the state of waiting or passivity, of ‘being done to’ in some way, and parallels the next phrase, being ‘employed’ or ‘laid aside’. The desire for control, power and choice is a very strongly encouraged stance in our society, and it is not surprising that we resist truly offering God our willingness to let both activity and passivity be ‘for you’. However, to believe that God cannot be served except in active ‘doing’ will lead us to marginalise those whose calling is now to lay things down, or who do indeed have to endure suffering in the modern sense. The revised version of the prayer clarifies the point by referring to ‘all that I do, and in all that I may endure.’ *

The Covenant Prayer (revised)
I am no longer my own but yours.
Your will, not mine, be done in all things,

wherever you may place me,

in all that I do, and in all that I may endure;

when there is work for me and when there is none;

when I am troubled and when I am at peace.

Your will be donewhen I am valued and when I am disregarded;

when I find fulfilment and when it is lacking;

when I have all things, and when I have nothing.

I willingly offer all I have and am to serve you,as and where you choose.
Glorious and blessèd God,Father, Son and Holy Spirit,

you are mine and I am yours.

May it be so for ever.

Title of this blog is ‘Seeking faith and speaking words I never thought I'd say’...

Song lyrics from Prince of Egypt featuring the original version of 'When you believe'..... Leon Jackson's recent number one.

Try this link:

http://www.thelyricarchive.com/lyrics/whenyoubelieve.shtml

* edited version of extract from Methodist Conference Report 'Time to Talk of God'