Praying to do the Right thing in the Right Time!

Romans 1:8 – 13 First, I think my God through Jesus Christ for you all, that your faith is spoken of throughout the whole world. For God is my witness whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his son, that without ceasing I make mention of you always in my prayers, making request if, by some means, now at last I find a way in the will of God to come to you. For I long to see you, that I may impart you some spiritual gift, so that I may be established – that is, that I may be encouraged together with you by the mutual faith both of you and me. Now I do not want you to be unaware, brother and, that I often plan to come to you (but was hindered until now), that I might have some fruit among you also, just as among the other Gentiles.

As we returned the data Romans chapter 1, we are going to look further into Paul's request. Paul in his prayer to God was requesting the opportunity to visit the Romans. His statement in verse 10 and his statement in verse 13 make it clear that this had been his desire for some time. Yet he makes it all so clear in verse 10 that he does not want his desire to overrule God's will. Though he recognized the good that could come from his visit to the Romans he also understood that to be blessed and it it needed to be according to God's will. One writer put it this way," we must be concerned with doing things right (management), but we also must be concerned with doing the right things (leadership)." Paul's comments reveal that he was truly concerned with both of these areas.

One of the primary reasons for Paul's desire to visit was so that he might impart a spiritual gift to help strengthen our established the believers at Rome. Paul getting to spend time with the Romans would allow his spiritual gift of teaching and preaching to be used to build their faith and to strengthen them as a body of believers. But Paul also realized that by being there not only could he encouraged the Romans but they through their faith could also encourage him as well.

In this request we find Paul praying desiring God's will he and at the same time desiring to see the growth the Romans. How often do we become selfish and our prayers ignore the will of God and what his desire is and forget about the benefit of others and their need to grow spiritually? When we recognize the opportunity to minister are we patient enough to wait for God's timing?

 May our prayers like Paul's be concerned with the will of God and the growth of other believers that we might see fruit in their lives.

The Video version of this is available at www.youtube.com/user/churchoflittleton  FW # 63

Pray for One Another part # 1

2 Thessalonians 1:3–5, 11- 12 (NKJV) ³We are bound to thank God always for you, brethren, as it is fitting, because your faith grows exceedingly, and the love of every one of you all abounds toward each other, ⁴so that we ourselves boast of you among the churches of God for your patience and faith in all your persecutions and tribulations that you endure…¹¹Therefore we also pray always for you that our God would count you worthy of this calling, and fulfill all the good pleasure of His goodness and the work of faith with power, ¹²that the name of our Lord Jesus Christ may be glorified in you, and you in Him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ.

How often are our prayers focused on ourselves and on physical needs?  As we look at Paul’s prayer in II Thessalonians we see immediately that Paul’s concerns go well beyond the physical.

He begins by praising God that the Thessalonians faith was growing exceedingly.  Their trust in the Lord was greater day by day.  He continues his praise being thankful for the Thessalonians love for one another. The third area of Paul’s praise dealt with the fact that they were standing firm and faithful in spite of persecutions and tribulations.

As Paul gets to the end of this section he moves from praise to prayer.   His first request is “that God would count you worthy of this calling.”  DA Carson explains this by saying, “That means these believers must grow in all things that please God so that he is pleased with them, and finally judges them to be living up to the calling that they have received.  In short, they are to ‘live a life worthy of the calling [they] have received.’ (Eph. 4:1)”[1] For those of us that have trusted Christ as Savior we should be concerned with pleasing the God we claim to serve.  This is not immediately perfect but grows as we are sanctified and submit to the guidance of the Holy Spirit in our lives.  

The second request is that the Thessalonians would through the power of God and their faith grow to the point that they are fulfilling the good that God intended them to fulfill so that they are fully pleasing Him.   Carson clarified this saying, “What Paul presupposes is that God’s people have been so transformed through their conversion to Jesus Christ and His gospel that they now develop new sets of goals.  Prompted and shaped by goodness and faith they inevitably formulate new purposes, decidedly Christian plans, Christian goals.” [2]

Imagine how our churches might be different if this were the way we as individuals were praying for one another.

The video version of this is available at www.youtube.com/churchoflittleton   FW # 43 

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[1] Carson, DA., A Call to Spiritual Reformation, pg. 53

[2] Ibid, pg. 56

Confidence in the Lord Psalm 5:1-3In

In Psalm 5 verses 1-3   David says, ^“1Give ear to my words, O Lord, Consider my meditation. ²Give heed to the voice of my cry, My King and my God, For to You I will pray. ³My voice You shall hear in the morning, O Lord; In the morning I will direct it to You, And I will look up.”  

David put his confidence in the Lord.  What is your confidence in?  What do your actions reveal that your confidence is in?  Are you putting your confidence in men?  Your spouse?  Many put their confidence in themselves.  Others put their confidence in money and still more put their confidence in the government.

In this passage David reveals his confidence in three ways.  The first way is that His confidence is seen in his repetition.  Verse one says, “Give ear to my words”.  He was asking God to listen.   In verse one he repeated the idea saying, “Consider my meditation” .  The term here is sighing not the term we have previously looked at for meditation.  David’s troubles may have kept him from even being able to put words to his prayers.  The second verse begins by saying, “Give heed to the voice of my cry.”  In these three ways David was pleading with God.  John Calvin said this revealed his perseverance in prayer.  He didn’t just pray once and quit.  It was a day by day occurrence.

The second way that David’s confidence in the Lord is seen is through his statement, “My voice shall you hear”.   There are two sides to this statement.  The obvious is that David would be talking because it was his voice.  He was confident to take his request to God.  The other one is that God would here.  He was confident that God would listen to his prayer.

The third way that David’s confidence is seen is in his expectancy.  His statement, “I will look up” reveals that he was looking to God expecting Him to answer.  Do we expect God to answer us when we bring requests.  My mind goes to the early church when they were praying for Peter’s release from jail and when he showed up at the door they were too surprised to let him in.  We too should pray with confidence. 

I hope that today you are placing your confidence in the Lord as you take your requests to him on a daily basis.

The video format of this is available at www.youtube.com/churchoflittleton