Always Be In Prayer – 5

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Scripture References: Luke 18:1-8

Pray for Our Homes

Now turn your thoughts to your home and where you live, and who you live with. How we need to pray for our homes! The devil is doing everything he can to destroy, especially, the American home. If he does, he has destroyed the foundation of Christianity, the bulwark of American liberty and American civilization. He has already practically destroyed the Lord’s day, turning it into a fun day, a commercial day, not to mention days we set aside as holy. The three great institutions upon which American liberty, religion and civilization were founded are the church, the Lord’s day, and the old-fashioned Christian home. If the devil can destroy those three, then he will have destroyed the foundation. And God said, “If the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do?” (Psalm 11:3).

So how much more we ought to pray that the enemy will not be able to destroy the family devotional time. Most homes don’t have time for the family to have devotions together anymore, the place where they can freely talk and discuss the Word of God and where they can pray together. When the devil gets us too busy to have family devotions and prayer, he has gone a long way toward destroying the foundation of Christianity. The spirituality of your church or any other church cannot rise any higher than the spirituality of your homes and the individuals within it.

We pray for the spiritual church. We pray for the power of the Spirit upon our churches. But it must start in the homes where we live seven days a week, twelve months a year, every year.

Oh, how my heart goes out to young boys and girls who have a thousand times the temptations today whereas I only had a few! The times have changed but spirituality shouldn’t. Jesus Christ is the same day in and day out, unchanging, (Hebrews 13:8), and since He is the head of the family and thus the church, change shouldn’t happen in our devotion to Him or toward one another.

I was raised in the Catholic church until just before my seventeenth birthday when I gave my heart to Jesus, but I had a step-mother who was faithful to take myself and my siblings to church, so I was given a taste of church. I had a matriarchal grandmother who loved the Lord and told me of my mother whom I never knew but who loved the Lord. My background until my seventeenth birthday wasn’t spiritual, but it was religious and when I met my wife-to-be, in High School, I gained a family that taught me about the Lord Jesus Christ. Many do not have even the background I had; they have never set foot in a church, and never had questions about God and Jesus. I was fortunate to meet the love of my life who came from a family who was spiritually devoted to the Lord and willing to share the Word of God and their insights.

Today, it seems, mothers and fathers have gotten too busy after the things of the world and, in the rush and hurry of everyday modern life and all the programs deemed necessary to grow successful families, yet they have lost what makes the family truly successful, and that is the time spent together in familial devotions and prayer.

With divorce rates so astoundingly high, abuse and neglect in the home, so many single parent homes, children living in foster care, with little to no love, it appears that we need to not just pray for our homes, but we need to lift up the homes and families of our neighbors and those in our communities. Again, the key is to pray continually (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18).

To Be Continued

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Unless otherwise noted, Scripture taken from the New King James Version®, NKJV © 1982 by Thomas Nelson.
Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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Daily Prayer & Praise 10/30/2023

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Lord, hear our prayer:

Almighty God, Lord, we praise you for your goodness that will not be defeated and for your glory which cannot be diminished; for your majesty which shines out into the darkness of your world and for your authority which is the ultimate answer to all our concerns; for your sovereignty which is our reason for worship and for your love which holds us and heals us and makes us whole. In Christ’s name and for your glory.

Amen.

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Some minor adaptation on some prayers.
David Clowes, 500 Prayers For All Occasions © 2003 by David C Cook Publishing
Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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Reflecting With God 10/30/2023

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Thinking, praying, reading, studying the Bible – when we do these things, we are reflecting on the Word of God. To reflect is to contemplate and/or consider, and God wants us to deeply reflect on His Word so that we can better understand Him.

“He who is faithful in what is least is faithful also in much.” – Luke 16:10.

The least action of life can be as surely done from the loftiest motive as the highest and the noblest. Faithfulness measures acts as God measures them. True conscientiousness deals with our duties as God deals with them. Duty is duty, conscience is conscience, right is right, and wrong is wrong, whatever sized type they be printed in. “Large” or “small” are not words for the vocabulary of conscience. It only knows two words,—right, and wrong.
~ ALEXANDER MACLAREN

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Unless otherwise noted, Scripture taken from the New King James Version®, NKJV © 1982 by Thomas Nelson.
Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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Worship In Spirit and Truth

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Monday October 30, 2023

John 4:24
“God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”

Worship must be in spirit and in truth!

It must be the truth of God and the Spirit of God. When a person, yielding to God and believing the truth of God, is filled with the Spirit of God, even his faintest whisper will be worship.

The stark, tragic fact is that the efforts of many people to worship are unacceptable to God. Without an infusion of the Holy Spirit there can be no true worship. This is serious. It is hard for me to rest peacefully at night knowing that millions of cultured, religious people are merely carrying on church traditions and religious customs and they are not actually reaching God at all.

We must humbly worship God in spirit and in truth. Each one of us stands before the truth to be judged. Is it not now plain that the presence and the power of the Holy Spirit of God, far from being an optional luxury in our Christian lives, is a necessity?

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Tozer on the Almighty God : A 366-Day Devotional (WingSpread, 2004)
Unless otherwise noted, Scripture taken from the New King James Version®, NKJV © 1982 by Thomas Nelson.
Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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Food For Thought 10/30/2023

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“Go Easy!”

My six daughters sometimes gather around me, telling me how they need shoes, money for music lessons and for many other things. Sometimes I have been compelled to say, “Go easy! I am not made out of money. We will just have to get what we can afford and go without the rest.”

But I never read in God’s Word where He ever told anybody, “Go easy! I don’t have very much. I have already strained Myself giving to others. I cannot give as much as you ask.” No, no! One of our greatest sins about praying is that we do not ask for enough. We do not take what God is willing to give. . . . God forgive us our little, stingy, unbelieving prayers!
~ John R. Rice

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Spiritual Nuggets 10/30/2023

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Transformers

Some people are like spectators in their faith communities—they simply watch while others interact, serve, and reach out. But Paul’s instructions to Titus about overseers show us that communities need people who will do more than just show up.

“For it is necessary for the overseer to be blameless as God’s steward, not self-willed, not quick-tempered, not addicted to wine, not violent, not greedy for dishonest gain, but hospitable, loving what is good, prudent, just, devout, self-controlled, holding fast to the faithful message according to the teaching” (Titus 1:7–9).

Titus was counteracting the harm false teachers had caused in the Cretan community (Titus 1:11). He needed the leaders’ assistance to succeed. At first, Paul describes this type of leader as someone who doesn’t commit certain actions—anger, desire for personal gain, drunkenness, or violence. But Paul also realized that leaders did need to take certain positive actions—showing hospitality, loving what is good, and holding fast to the gospel. Only by avoiding some behaviors and embracing others could they transform the community by being instruments of change.

There will be periods in our lives when we’ll need to humbly accept the help of others. But there are also times for action, and our motives will be just as important as our conduct.

The believers on Crete needed to be molded and shaped for godliness. Likewise, we need God’s word and His Spirit to provide us with wisdom not only to respond, but to do so with the right action—showing hospitality, loving what is good, and being committed to the good news of Jesus Christ. Then, as transformed people, we can be used to advance His kingdom.

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Adapted and modified excerpts from Connect the Testaments
Unless otherwise noted, Scripture taken from the Lexham English Bible, LEB © 2012 by Logos Bible Software.
Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Links open in new window and are in the Lexham English Bible, LEB, unless otherwise noted.
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Always Be In Prayer – 4

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Scripture References: Luke 18:1-8

Pray for Ourselves – Continued

From last lesson: When the devil can shut our mouths and cause us to pass by on the other side with no testimony from our lips, no witnessing to a lost world, no demonstrations (actions) of love toward the lost and dying world.

More than that, if he can cause us to become compromising, worldly Christians, if the devil can lead us into compromise about the truth of God and close our lips of witness, if he can cause us to be stumbling blocks over which sinners stumble in their choices concerning God, he most assuredly won’t get us, but he will get many other souls through the means of our apathy when it comes to compromising with the world.

Practically every lost soul wherever it is you live, is stumbling over somebody this very day. How great a tragedy that is when you think of it! That presents to us so much more the reason to ask God to keep us true, keep our feet in the straight and narrow, and to keep our spiritual eyes focused forward. The Lord Jesus said it would be better for us to be cast into the sea rather than become a stumbling block (Mark 9:42).

Through the years, I have heard people say, “I would like to be a Christian, but where I work, I couldn’t live it all the time” (I hear this from law enforcement all the time, even now). People, prayer can make it so that you can live a Christ-like life anywhere! If God calls you to a job or position, even in the secular world, He can and will equip you to accomplish what He has called you too. But, you have to seek Him regularly. But think of this; if you were put in the Garden of Eden and if you were to quit praying, actually communing with God, even there, the enemy would get you because of your neglect of the greatest influence you would have.

Daniel was taken into captivity as a seventeen-year-old lad. A thousand miles or more away from home, he was put in the most wicked court on the face of the earth, Babylon; he was subjected to every natural and emotional temptation, and all the scorn and ridicule that could be heaped upon him. But Daniel lived even there for God. When he was about eighty-five years of age, even that many years in captivity, his bitterest enemy could find nothing of which to accuse him but his religion.

So how did Daniel do it? Simply, three times a day, on his knees, with his windows opened toward Jerusalem, he prayed to God Almighty in whom he trusted and believed.

When our prayer life is like that, there will be victory. I’m not saying we have to be on our knees all the time like Daniel, but with humility in our hearts with our minds focused and steadfast on the Lord. Remember, He knows the temper of our hearts better than we ourselves do! Wherever we are and whatever the surroundings, and especially in the workplace, we can have a testimony that can turn sinners to the Lord Jesus Christ, at the very least shine the Light and Love of Christ Jesus to them!

To Be Continued

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Unless otherwise noted, Scripture taken from the New King James Version®, NKJV © 1982 by Thomas Nelson.
Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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Saturday Prayer & Praise 10/28/2023

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David Clarkson: Piercing Heaven – Puritan’s Prayers

There was no sorrow like your sorrow, Lord—no love like your love. Was it not enough, dearest Savior, that you came down to pray, and sigh, and weep for us? Would you also bleed and die for us?

Was it not enough that you were hated, slandered, blasphemed, buffeted? But you would also be scourged, nailed, wounded, and crucified.

Was it not enough to feel the cruelty of man? Would you also experience the wrath of God?

And if your love was not enough, giving up your life and shedding that precious blood, was it not enough to die once, to suffer one death? Would you die twice by tasting the first, and something of the second death—suffering the pains of death in both soul and body?

Oh the far-surpassing love of Christ! Heaven and earth are astonished at it. What tongue can express it? What heart can conceive it? The tongues and the thoughts of people and angels are far below it.

Oh the height, and depth, and breadth, and length, of the love of Christ! All creation knows not how to react. Our thoughts are swallowed up.

And there they remain until glory elevates them, when our job will be to praise, admire, and adore this love of Christ.

Amen.

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Faith From The Beginning 10/28/2023

Presumptuous Sinning

SOME have corrupted this precious, blessed truth, and made it the occasion for license and carelessness and looseness of living. They say that if we sin the Lord is ready to forgive; we can just ask Him to forgive us and it will be all right again. They claim therefore, that they can sin again and again and just be forgiven over again and again. But the Bible teaches no such thing. While it is true that the Lord forgives and cleanses us as often as we confess, there is a penalty attached; for even though He forgives, we must still pay the price. “Whatever a man sows, that he will also reap” (Galatians 6:7) was written concerning believers. When a Christian disobeys God, he must pay the price. No Christian can disobey God without reaping the harvest of his disobedience, even though God freely forgives him.

Nowhere is this better illustrated than in the life of Abram, the father of the faithful. God had told him to go out from the land of his fathers, to another land. This was the call of faith. Abram believed it, left his country and went to the land of Canaan. But while he was a believer, he was a disobedient believer; for instead of leaving his father and his kindred, he took them along. You will recall the sorrow that this disobedience brought into Abram’s life. God stopped him half way to Canaan, at Haran, where he spent six barren, fruitless, miserable years, until he was compelled to bury his father, a type of the flesh. His disobedience ended in a funeral far from home. Abram reaped in the death of Terah the sowing of his disobedience of not leaving his father behind according to the word of God.

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Adapted and modified excerpts from Studies in the Life of Abraham by M. R. De Haan (1891-1964)
Unless otherwise noted, Scripture taken from the New King James Version®, NKJV Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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Life In Focus 10/28/2023

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Between Parents and Children

IF you come from a home background that left painful memories of childhood, you may find it hard to think kindly toward your parents. Yet Proverbs urges us as children to respect our parents, faulty though they may be. We need not like or approve of everything our parents did (and do), but only a fool despises his parents (Proverbs 15:20).

It is important to add that the Bible sees parenting as a partnership between both the father and the mother, in which both are committed to each other and to the child’s welfare. That is the ideal, and a child tends to thrive in that kind of home. But whether or not our parents have come even close to fulfilling their biblical responsibilities, they deserve a measure of respect and affirmation.

Proverbs includes a number of principles about how we and our parents ought to relate:

  • We have life through the union of father and mother (Proverbs 4:3; 23:25).
  • As children, we have a significant impact on how our parents view their lives and evaluate their significance (Proverbs 10:1; 15:20; 17:25; 23:24).
  • How we treat our parents displays our values and attitudes (Proverbs 19:26).
  • Disrespect for our parents can have terrible implications for our own life (Proverbs 20:20).
  • As our parents grow older, we should give them the gifts of listening and caring (Proverbs 23:22).
  • By pursuing wisdom, we not only benefit ourselves but can bring great joy to our parents (Proverbs 23:25; 29:3).
  • By pursuing evil and folly, we can be a destructive force in our parents’ lives (Proverbs 28:24; 29:15).
  • We will suffer greatly if we show no respect for our parents (Proverbs 30:11, 17).

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Courtesy of Nelson’s New Illustrated Bible Commentary
Unless otherwise noted, Scripture taken from the New King James Version®, NKJV © 1982 by Thomas Nelson.
Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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The World Is Your Neighborhood

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Saturday October 28, 2023

Galatians 5:14
For all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this:
“You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

If our English word neighbor had stuck to its etymological roots, determining who our neighbor is might have been a bit easier. Neighbor is derived from a German word that was a compound made up of “near” and “dweller, especially a farmer.” In other words, in centuries-ago Germany, a nahgabur was someone, likely another farmer, whom you knew because he lived near you.

But when Jesus told the story of the Good Samaritan, He established a definition that predated Europe’s Middle Ages. Your neighbor is not necessarily someone who lives near you, nor does it have to be someone with whom you are acquainted. According to Jesus in Luke 10:25–37, your neighbor is any person who has a need that you are able to meet. Jesus made the point in His parable that the man the Good Samaritan helped was a stranger—not a “near-dweller.” Yet the Samaritan assumed the responsibility for doing everything he could to help.

Today we think of neighbors as those who live on our street or in our neighborhood. Yet, using Jesus’ definition, we have many more neighbors than those. We need to broaden the boundaries of our neighborhood to include the whole world.

If my heart is right with God, every human being is my neighbor.
OSWALD CHAMBERS

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David Jeremiah, Turning Points with God: 365 Daily Devotions (Tyndale, 2014)
Unless otherwise noted, Scripture taken from the New King James Version®, NKJV © 1982 by Thomas Nelson.
Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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Essential Insights on Faith 10/28/2023

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Good news from a distant land is like cold water to a parched throat.
PROVERBS 25:25

Billy Graham

All of our work and frail human
attempts are nothing without GOD’S
BLESSING, brought about by PRAYER
and TRUST IN HIM. As we look at
the years ahead, I pray that God will
STRENGTHEN US and that we will
NOT LOSE HEART. For He “is able to do
immeasurably MORE than all we ASK or
IMAGINE, according to his POWER
that is at work within us”

(Ephesians 3:20 NIV).


Unless otherwise noted, Scripture taken from The Holy Bible, Holman Christian Standard Bible®, HCSB © 2009
by Holman Bible Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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Anecdotal Story 10/28/2023

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We Can Always Find An Excuse

“Do not run until your feet are bare and your throat is dry. But you said, ‘It’s no use! I love foreign gods, and I must go after them.’ ” – Jeremiah 2:25.

He said to them, “You are the ones who justify yourselves in the eyes of others, but God knows your hearts. What people value highly is detestable in God’s sight.” – Luke 16:15.

Peruvian farmers plant the coca shrub in the thin soils of the Andes, then nurture it to maturity. They harvest the leaves, chew them freely as a stimulant, and sell their bounty to drug syndicates who extract the white alkaloid from the leaves to smuggle for sale around the world, particularly the United States.

One writer asked some Peruvians if they didn’t feel badly for the harm done by the coca they produced. They didn’t use it or supply it to addicts, they replied. It was just a business to them. Yes, they admitted, perhaps it was wrong “but how else can we make a decent living?”

Like the Peruvians, we justify nearly any behavior, attitude, or sin that we feel offers us an advantage. If it isn’t economics, it’s social, or relational, or even religious. Enough careers exist that pose no intentional threat to human welfare to free us from working in those that do. If friends don’t let friends drive drunk, neither do friends impose illegal behaviors on friends just to prove their friendship.

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Courtesy of Speaker’s Sourcebook of New Illustrations by Virgil Hurley © 1995 by Word, Incorporated.
Unless otherwise noted, Scripture taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV © 2011 by Biblica, Inc.®
Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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Classic Devotional 10/28/2023

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Judgment and the Punishment of Sin – 2

From Part 1: You must, take care and repent of your sins now so that on the day of judgment you may rest secure with the blessed.

IN THAT day every trial borne in patience will be pleasing and the voice of iniquity will be stilled; the devout will be glad; the irreligious will mourn; and the mortified body will rejoice far more than if it had been pampered with every pleasure. Then the cheap garment will shine with splendor and the rich one become faded and worn; the poor cottage will be more praised than the gilded palace. In that day persevering patience will count more than all the power in this world; simple obedience will be exalted above all worldly cleverness; a good and clean conscience will gladden the heart of man far more than the philosophy of the learned; and contempt for riches will be of more weight than every treasure on earth.

Then you will find more consolation in having prayed devoutly than in having fared daintily; you will be happy that you preferred silence to prolonged gossip.

Then holy works will be of greater value than many fair words; strictness of life and hard penances will be more pleasing than all earthly delights.

Learn, then, to suffer little things now that you may not have to suffer greater ones in eternity. Prove here what you can bear hereafter. If you can suffer only a little now, how will you be able to endure eternal torment? If a little suffering makes you impatient now, what will hell fire do? In truth, you cannot have two joys: you cannot taste the pleasures of this world and afterward reign with Christ.

If your life to this moment had been full of honors and pleasures, what good would it do if at this instant you should die? All is vanity, therefore, except to love God and to serve Him alone.

He who loves God with all his heart does not fear death or punishment or judgment or hell, because perfect love assures access to God.

It is no wonder that he who still delights in sin fears death and judgment.

It is good, however, that even if love does not as yet restrain you from evil, at least the fear of hell does. The man who casts aside the fear of God cannot continue long in goodness but will quickly fall into the snares of the devil.


The Imitation of Christ, by Thomas à Kempis, is a Christian devotional book first composed in Medieval Latin as De Imitatione Christi (c. 1418–1427). The devotional text is divided into four books of detailed spiritual instructions. The devotional approach of The Imitation of Christ emphasizes the interior life and withdrawal from the mundanities of the world, as opposed to the active imitation of Christ practiced by other friars. The Imitation is perhaps the most widely read Christian devotional work after the Bible, and is regarded as a devotional and religious classic. The book was written anonymously in Latin in the Netherlands c. 1418–1427. Its popularity was immediate, and after the first printed edition in 1471-72, it was printed in 745 editions before 1650. Apart from the Bible, no book had been translated into more languages than the Imitation of Christ at the time.

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Thomas à Kempis, The Imitation of Christ. Public Domain
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Poetic Praise 10/28/2023

Thanks to Brother Mike for the use of his inspirational poetry!
Be blessed all who read!


THE GREAT EXCHANGE

When I feel inadequate
Or in a fit of despair
Feeling tired of going on
And saying I don’t care
I just need to look to Him
And know He’s on my side
For He has made me worthy
To receive what He’ll provide
So I will open up my hands
And lift them to His throne
Pouring out my love to Him
And all the stuff I’ve owned
Giving Him my emptiness
And all my worthless pride
For I have been made worthy
And in Him I’ll abide
Exchanging all my bitterness
And all that holds me down
For love that only He can give
Will free me when I’m bound

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Mike Manahan, © January 4th, 2023. Used with permission. Mike Manahan Facebook Page
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Always Be In Prayer – 3

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Scripture References: Luke 18:1-8

Pray for the Unsaved – Continued

Have you ever thought what would happen if the Holy Spirit ceased His intercession for you? Have you ever thought what is going to happen to a lost world when God’s appointed intercessors forget to pray for them and nobody else is left to stand in the breach, nobody else is left to stand between the living and the dead to intercede for a poor, lost, dying, Hell-bound world? The return of Christ Jesus is likely to be very, very soon. Have you thought about who will intercede for the world when He calls His Bride, His Church, away from this evil world?

The lack of intercession is why the world is plunging into Hell like it is now. That is why iniquity abounds. Far too many churches have grown cold and worldly because God’s people have been too busy about other things. People are starting to turn from the truth as the writer of Hebrews and others have predicted long ago. We see this truth in the news daily. It’s because so many have forgotten or neglected to pray. Oh, how prayer makes such a mighty difference in the salvation of souls!

How we should be continually praying for the unsaved! Think of this, it can make a mighty big difference if an unsaved soul knows somebody is praying for him. They may be as hard as nails, they may be unkind, they may say hard things to you, but those prayers touch the cords that nothing else will ever touch. I have experienced this first-hand as have so many others who believe so strongly in intercessory prayer! We experience this truth with family and acquaintances.

I remember quite a long time ago, soon after I was ordained, when a young man came up to me after a service where I preached on intercessory prayer, he said to me, “Pastor listen! I’m a saved man this evening because my wife as well as other family members wouldn’t quit praying for me. If others could know what it means to a hopelessly lost sinner and know that somebody won’t quit praying for that person, Christians would pray much more fervently and more continually for unsaved people.”

Oh, how we should be praying continually and fervently for lost souls!

Pray for Ourselves

Here is something that needs to be addressed concerning prayer for ourselves. Many believers think that it is selfish if we spend time with the Lord, asking Him for ourselves, and yet, Jesus Himself taught that the Father expects us to ask for our needs according to His will, to ask for forgiveness for ourselves as we forgive others (Matthew 6:8-15). We have the privilege and the right, in Christ Jesus, to approach the throne of grace, boldly, and pray in behalf of our own lives! When Christians live in a world that hates us because of our love of Christ, we are up against the devil in all of his subtlety, and the world with all its corruption. The devil is most assuredly going to do his utmost to paralyze us, to close our mouth of testimony, and do everything else he can to make us useless in the Kingdom of God. He knows that when we get saved, he can never get one of us as his own, but he has gone a long way to accomplish his purpose when he can shut our mouths and cause us to pass by on the other side with no testimony from our lips, no witnessing to a lost world, no demonstrations (actions) of love toward the lost and dying world.

To Be Continued

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Unless otherwise noted, Scripture taken from the New King James Version®, NKJV © 1982 by Thomas Nelson.
Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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Daily Prayer & Praise 10/27/2023

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Lord, hear our prayer:

Sovereign Lord and Father we praise you that on this day we have set aside for thanks, that your promise of the Holy Spirit is for us; that as we are united in thanksgiving we can know what it means to be filled with the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, love of God and the power and the presence of the Spirit. May he continue to empower us to live in you. In his most holy name, we give thanks.

Amen.

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Some minor adaptation on some prayers.
David Clowes, 500 Prayers For All Occasions © 2003 by David C Cook Publishing
Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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Reflecting With God 10/27/2023

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Thinking, praying, reading, studying the Bible – when we do these things, we are reflecting on the Word of God. To reflect is to contemplate and/or consider, and God wants us to deeply reflect on His Word so that we can better understand Him.

“How many of my father’s hired servants have bread enough and to spare.” – Luke 15:17.

The rabbis report, that, when Joseph gathered much corn in Egypt, he threw the chaff into the Nile, that, flowing to the neighboring cities and nations more remote, they might know what abundance was laid up for them. So God hath thrown some husks to us in this world, that, tasting the sweetness thereof, we might aspire to His bounty above. If there be such glory in God’s footstool, what will there be in His throne? If He give us so much in the land of our pilgrimage, what will He not give us in our own country? if so much to His enemies, what will He not give to His friends?
~ SPENCER

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Unless otherwise noted, Scripture taken from the New King James Version®, NKJV © 1982 by Thomas Nelson.
Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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John 6:6

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Friday October 27, 2023

John 6:6
He Himself knew what He would do.

Jesus did not always perform miracles.

He did not always feed the people miraculously.

He accepted money from His friends to purchase bread. And He permitted His disciples to go and buy bread, even though they had a long way to go.

However, if need was present, Jesus did perform miracles, and did so willingly and gladly.

But even in need and distress Jesus desires to show us how helpless we are before He will intervene.

It was for this reason that He asked the disciples to find a way to feed the five thousand.

Not until they were agreed that such a thing was impossible out there in the wilderness did Jesus interpose His miracle.

Misfortune came to you one day. And Jesus asked you, as He did His disciples, what you would do now.

You thought and thought, night and day. But one thing seemed as impossible as another. Perhaps you have not found a way out yet.

Listen now: Jesus Himself knew what He would do also for you. He knew it before you suffered your misfortune. As a matter of fact, it was He who sent it. But He did not do so before He had thought of what He would do to help and bless you.

He waits now only for you to tell Him that you do not know what to do. Then He will perform the miracle that is needed, now as before. He will open a way for you in your temporal affairs. In spiritual things He will bless you with enlightened eyes, that you may see His goodness and greatness.

Yes, look at Him, how He stands there, calm and confident in the midst of His bewildered disciples.

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O. Hallesby, God’s Word for Today: A Daily Devotional for the Whole Year, translator Clarence J. Carlsen (Augsburg, 1994)
Unless otherwise noted, Scripture taken from the New King James Version®, NKJV © 1982 by Thomas Nelson.
Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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Food For Thought 10/27/2023

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God’s Superlatives

Writers are supposed to avoid superlatives. The textbooks tell us that authors who use extreme adjectives like “fabulous,” “magnificent,” and “splendid” are usually overstating the case. These graphic superlatives are to be reserved only for occasions that actually merit their use, and then they are to appear very seldom.

But when the writers of the Bible spoke of the blessings of God upon His children, they used the strongest of terms. So marvelous are the riches of Christ enjoyed by His own that the Holy Spirit, the author of God’s Word, used the most extravagant language to describe them. Here are a few examples:

—God’s pardon is “abundant”                           —Isaiah 55:7
—His love “passes knowledge”                          —Ephesians 3:19
—His gift of salvation is “indescribable”         —2 Corinthians 9:15
—His life is “more abundant”                            —John 10:10

Paul, writing to the discouraged Corinthians, said that through God we are “enriched in everything for all liberality, which causes thanksgiving through us to God” (2 Corinthians 9:11).

Feeling poor of spirit?

Wishing you had more of the riches of this world?

Remember the superlatives of God!

~ David C. Egner

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