Church! As we’ve been talking about for the last few weeks, we set aside yesterday, March 27th as a Day of Prayer and Fasting…particularly for the Deep Roots initiative and the future-shaping Capital Campaign/Pledge Sunday this weekend.
Our staff had a great day off-site together praying for our church and learning more about prayer. At one point, i sent each of them off with a book on prayer from my library. Their job was to learn more about prayer and then come back and teach us. It was so incredibly rich! Here are just some of the concepts that they shared:
- When we hold on too tightly to the good, it means we can’t embrace the even-better that God has for us.
- Prayerless people cut themselves off from God’s prevailing power.
- Prayer is the key to unlocking God’s prevailing power.
- If we are living close to God, it is easy for us to hear the whisper of His voice. If we are living further away from God, it takes much louder and more drastic sensations to get our attention.
- Most of us pray ‘achievement oriented’ prayers and need to learn to just linger in His presence more.
- Many of us have created a life that doesn’t need miracles!
- May we be the kind of people that God can trust with a miracle.
- Rev. 1:18, 3:7 and Matt 16 speak of Jesus holding the keys. What we allow…He will allow. What we loose…He will loose. What we bind…He will bind. We have an incredible responsibility to pray and activate Heaven’s power!
- Matt 7:7 (ask/seek/knock)…but what about when it doesn’t work. Richard Foster provided a powerful illustration. He said, when our TV doesn’t work, we don’t assume there is no such thing as television ‘sound-picture’ transmission. We simply search, try, push buttons, wiggle wires, adjust and fix the TV. We know it’s supposed to work…and so we are determined to figure out why it’s not. However, when it comes to prayer, many people ask, seek and knock…and when it doesn’t work, they assume there is no validity to prayer or that God doesn’t exist. Foster challenges us to approach prayer like we would approach a TV that isn’t working. Assume it’s supposed to work and then figure out why it’s not. Search, try, push buttons, wiggle wires, adjust and fix the prayer transmission and reception.
It was amazing how quickly the day went as we knocked on Heaven’s door. We prayed for our church, our community and the future of Riverwood. We prayed for the Pledge Sunday this week…and for the 100’s and 100’s of personal decisions that will be made. We prayed for greater effectiveness and impact…and for a remarkable weekend of outreach and worship on Good Friday and Easter Sunday.
i hope you too had a great appointment with God yesterday. If you missed it or weren’t able to squeeze it in…hey, there’s always today!
Have an awesome rest of your week…
Pastor Todd
Between Sundays 