Where and in whom is your faith

 270926:61

Where and in whom is your faith

   What I’m about to say, some of you are going to say ‘ouch’, and some are going to say ‘who does he think he is?’ so please bear with me . . . It’s not the you ‘can’t believe. It’s more that you choose NOT to believe’.

[GW*] James 5:7-11 “Brothers and sisters, be patient until the Lord comes again. See how farmers wait for their precious crops to grow. They wait patiently for fall and spring rains. 8 You, too, must be patient. Don’t give up hope. The Lord will soon be here. 9 Brothers and sisters, stop complaining about each other, or you will be condemned. Realize that the judge is standing at the door. 10 Brothers and sisters, follow the example of the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord. They were patient when they suffered unjustly. We consider those who endure to be blessed. You have heard about Job’s endurance. You saw that the Lord ended Job’s suffering because the Lord is compassionate and merciful”

   It seems that all I do on behalf of God is to make statements that, as we say here .. “to get their backs up” .. in other words ‘to wind others up’. If it gets us asking about God and what He can do, well, it’s a good thing. Now before I loose where I was, God is faithful; God is honest; God keeps promises. All we need to do in the tough barren times is not to loose Faith in Him, who is!

Here is 4 points that the Lord wants to share with you . . .

1. You don’t ask you don’t get. . .John 14:13 “And whatever you ask in My name, that I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.”
2. If you don’t ask God, He won’t supply all you needs. . . Philippians 4:19 “And my God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus”
3. Never make light of what others ask God for. . . Romans 14:12-13 “So then each of us shall give account of himself to God. 13 Therefore let us not judge one another anymore, but rather resolve this, not to put a stumbling block or a cause to fall in our brother’s way”
4. Ask in faith, not wavering. . . Hebrews 10:23 “Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful”

   Lets say it’s Friday afternoon, today your going on holiday, but like so many others your hoping to get away early. But, you have to stay later and so you get caught in traffic, and to top that you hit every red light from work to home. Do sit there with steam coming out of your ears, with your blood pressure going through the roof? OR, are you going to curse and become more and more angry. OR, are you going to sit back take time to ‘decompress from the week, saying “Thank you Jesus for the chance to switch off, so I’ll be relaxed and ready for my holiday.” You tell me which sounds the better one to you?

I want you to open your bible and read the next couple of verses, this is where Jesus walks on water … [NKJ] Matthew 14:22-33

   As Peter told Jesus .. “Lord, if it is You, command me to come    to You on the water.” .. As Peter believed as Jesus told him to come, he did not hesitate in his faith to walk also on water, and he did. Then unlike the waves his faith vanished, thus his faith vanished, he panicked and so began to sink. What is very clear, is that we must NOT let fear into our thinking about anything, when God says ‘anything’ God means anything, or else the seed of fear will take root.

   Think of fear as a ‘dandelion’. As soon as one of it’s seeds is allowed to take root it will be hard to clear your garden of them. So is the seed of ‘Fear’, unless you keep constantly on top of it will infect every part of your life/thinking. At all times and through everything we need to praise out Lord.

[NIV] 1 Kings 18:21 “Elijah went before the people and said, “How long will you waver between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal is God, follow him.”

   Some call through, this decisioning, flip-flopping, so mmuch so that you would be like a wave at sea with no control, your direction is at the mercy of the wind ...

[NIV] James 1:6 “But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt, because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind”

...This is why you truly can’t serve 2 masters at any one time. God has told different Kings/Leaders/Prophets, all have found this out down the ages. There it is , the hard hitting truth, what needs to sink in is this .. ‘You only need to, look at God, and only hear from God, nothing and no-one else’ .. Don’t you see that when your in tune Gods for your life you will overcome, ride above oppressors; have a clear understanding of gods will; of your future in His will.

Here are 2 reasons for being in and having Gods will for us . . .

1. Honestly, from experience that when you have heard from God, that you seriously have heard, then nothing else will ever matter again.

2. Nothing will over come you when your gaze (i.e. looking) is only on the face of Christ Jesus-presence

… Always remember the devil is like a hungry lion looking for pray .. [NIV] 1 peter 5:8 “Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour” .. he also is a very sly and cunning, so he uses stealth tactics like …

• Offers alternatives to Gods will

• Will try to fool you with negative options

• Will try to convince you, that Gods ways are boring & stuffy

• Will try to convince you, you can repent later for all your bad ways.

   When we pray for Wisdom – Health – Love – Protection. We have to be careful that we don’t assume to know what Jesus wants from us, so we need to ask humbly daily, and do not be presumptuous. A great way of finding out ‘all the above’ is, found in Matthew 6: 6-15, please read as if you have never heard this before and read slowly, above all think to whom your saying this .. [NIV] Matthew 6: 6-15 “But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. 7 And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. 8 Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.

9 “This, then, is how you should pray:

“‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name,

10 your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.

11 Give us today our daily bread.

12 And forgive us our debts, as we also

have forgiven our debtors.

13 And lead us not into temptation,

but deliver us from the evil one.

14 For if you forgive other people when they sin against

you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.

15 But if you do not forgive others their sins,

your Father will not forgive your sins.

My closing thought is .. if it matters to God, then it should matter to us. So I ask again …

Where and in whom is You Faith ??

Pray - Prayed – Prayers

 

180626:61

Pray - Prayed – Prayers

• The Word Pray is used upwards of 313 times in Old testament alone.

• The exact noun "prayer" appears about 36 to 87 times in the New Testament depending on the specific translation and whether you include plural forms like "prayers"

• In the New International Version (NIV) of the New Testament, the exact noun "prayer" appears 77 times (found in 71 individual verses).

If you include other direct grammatical forms of the word family (such as pray, prayed, praying, and prays), the total count across the New Testament rises significantly:

• Prayer (singular): 77 times

• Prayers (plural): ~31 times

• Pray / Prayed / Praying / Prays (verb forms): Over 250 times combined

• The exact numbers rely’s heavily on the version/translation you are reading. Some versions would see/translate “I pray thee” as to meaning: please.

• The Word Pray in all it’s forms are mentioned some 650 times throughout the whole bible dependent on the version your reading.

   OK, this may not be the most conventional way of starting my blog, but, God wanted to highlight just some of the numbers surrounding these simple words. Don’t trust my words, do a word search for yourself. When ever reading anyone’s blog or listening to a sermon, check out what the word in your bible tells you.

   For instance did you realise that there are 25 prayers that are attributed to Jesus Christ Himself. As mentioned before every word in the bible is truth, never let anyone persuade you other wise. Your prayer life should cover every aspect of life. Here are some of these types of prayers ..

• Prayer of Faith : This reaffirms your faith in God

• Prayer of agreement : Entails several people praying together.

• Prayer of Petition : Is one of the ways we bring our request to God [Philippians 4:6]

• Payer of Thanks Giving : Shows our gratitude to God for what He has done for us [Ps100:4]

• Prayer of Worship : Helps us recognise Gods power and greatness simply by saying .. “God is good”

• Prayer of Consecration : Is done to make something Holy, like your home or a new Church.

• Prayer of Intercession : We pray for somebody else’s well being, for God to intervene

• Prayer of the Holy Spirit: We ask for the help of the holy Spirit when not sure how else to pray.

• Pray for Healing : There is no one pray that heals all. [Luke 5:13/14] He healed by the measure of their faith, or, the disciples would say “in Jesus name be healed.”

   So when in a previous message I asked .. “Prayer what is it good for?” I hope to have further answered the question. I know it has been said before, but, it is worth saying again, that .. If it mention more than once, we should not only sit up and take note, but to also look into this more and apply what is being told to us.

   I feel God never said say this and all will be well. Whilst stepping out in faith believing. He did not want for us to say something over and over and over to the point of becoming robotic to the point (prayer) has no meaning. Which leads to no heart in what is being said. . . [NKJ] Matthew 6:7 “when you pray, do not use vain repetitions as the heathen do” . . . Every Christian denomination, believes theirs is the best doctrine. My first hearing the voice of God, although I did not know it as such at the time, took me to an ‘Anglican Church’. From there I went to an ‘Alpha course’. Sadly for this Church it made me question what was in this book, from which you repeated sayings. After a while I found this beautiful building void of the voice of God I was being taught about.

Each and every denomination has a different way of how to behave …

• Some don’t like you speaking in tongues
• lifting your hands in worship
• Some even cherry pick only parts of the Bible, ignoring the rest

   I surly didn't want to bamboozle you with a ton of facts and figures. All I want to do is show you some figures, that were to make you think, and inspire you to do some searches for yourself.

   I will leave you with the golden ticket of prayers, as it shows us the best and most effective of prayers. I can, all but guarantee you will know of or have heard in part or in full, 'The Lords Prayer'. It is of cause from John 6:7-15 … “And when you pray, do not use vain repetitions as the heathen do. For they think that they will be heard for their many words.

8 “Therefore do not be like them. For your Father knows the things you have need of before you ask Him.

9 In this manner, therefore, pray: Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be Your name.
10 Your kingdom come. Your will be done On earth as it is in heaven.
11 Give us this day our daily bread.
12 And forgive us our debts, As we forgive our debtors.

13 And do not lead us into temptation, But deliver us from the evil one. For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen.

14 “For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. 15 But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.”