Sunday, October 25, 2015
From Victim to Victor!
Your attitude determines your altitude. – Unknown
Scripture:
Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died—more than that, who was raised to life is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? Romans 8:34-36 (New International Version)
For more than the better part of last year, I was paralyzed by a number of unexpected changes in my life. My inability to adequately effect positive change to counter all of the negative forces coming against me rendered me practically useless. I was dazed and confused; punch drunk by all the blows life seemed to be sending my way. I was content to sleep my life away and do nothing to fight back against the forces that threatened to destroy me. It’s a brand new year and you ask, “What’s changed?” And my answer is nothing except my attitude.
At the beginning of a new year, many of us make resolutions to change some things in our lives. Those resolutions might be to lose weight, exercise more or quit smoking. Some make resolutions to go back to school or find a better job. For the most part, many will fail at these supposedly life changing resolutions. However, there are those who will in fact succeed. And do you want to know the secret to their success? It’s their attitude. They simply made up their minds to achieve their goals.
Somewhere along the way, I had forgotten all the life lessons I had been taught as a Christian. You know the ones; “I am more than I conqueror”, “I can do all things”, “I have not because I ask not” and the list goes on and on. Someway somehow I had started believing the lies that the enemy had started whispering in my ear; you know those too; “you aren’t worthy”, you can’t do anything right and that list goes on and on as well.
Far too often when things are going wrong in our lives, we tend to forget that we already have everything we need. It’s called the word of God. We just have to learn not to look down but to look up instead.
We must focus our attention to the heavens from which cometh our help, keep our eyes on the prize and remember that we already have the Victory!
Be blessed and be a blessing
Prayer:
Lord, sometimes I try to pray and the words won't come. I toss and turn and feel nothing. My mind is dry, my heart is dull, my soul longs for life. Hear my silent cry, my God, hear me. Breathe on us Lord renewing a right spirit within us. Even in our times of sorrow, we praise Your holy name. Lord, open our eyes and give us a discerning spirit, so that we may recognize the tricks of the evil one. Lord, we come before the throne of grace once again asking that You would forgive us for not depending on You. We come asking that You who are our rock and our salvation, would help us to starve our fears and doubts and feed our faith. Lord, I personally ask for forgiveness and direction for myself. I know that sometimes, we take You for granted and in doing so, leave ourselves open to attack. Lord, we stand before You again, putting on the whole armor of God. The belt of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, the shoes of the gospel of peace, wielding our shield of faith and the sword of the spirit, and placing upon our heads, the helmet of salvation. Lord, let us always be diligent against attack from he who seeks to destroy us. Lord I ask a special blessing for the family of James and Angela Johnson and the family of Zack Finnley. Each family has suffered a great loss and need Your loving arms of comfort to surround them. Continue to bless our brothers and sisters in Christ. Continue to anoint our leaders. Help us always to be able to call upon the name of the Lord in our times of distress. Thank You Lord, for Your faithfulness. Thank You Lord, for Your covering. Thank You Lord, that You pick us up, when we have been knocked down. We will the name of the Lord at all times, and His praises shall continuously be in our mouths. Praise his name saints of God. Glory Hallelujah, thank You Jesus, in His name we pray, Amen.
Scripture:
Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died—more than that, who was raised to life is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? Romans 8:34-36 (New International Version)
For more than the better part of last year, I was paralyzed by a number of unexpected changes in my life. My inability to adequately effect positive change to counter all of the negative forces coming against me rendered me practically useless. I was dazed and confused; punch drunk by all the blows life seemed to be sending my way. I was content to sleep my life away and do nothing to fight back against the forces that threatened to destroy me. It’s a brand new year and you ask, “What’s changed?” And my answer is nothing except my attitude.
At the beginning of a new year, many of us make resolutions to change some things in our lives. Those resolutions might be to lose weight, exercise more or quit smoking. Some make resolutions to go back to school or find a better job. For the most part, many will fail at these supposedly life changing resolutions. However, there are those who will in fact succeed. And do you want to know the secret to their success? It’s their attitude. They simply made up their minds to achieve their goals.
Somewhere along the way, I had forgotten all the life lessons I had been taught as a Christian. You know the ones; “I am more than I conqueror”, “I can do all things”, “I have not because I ask not” and the list goes on and on. Someway somehow I had started believing the lies that the enemy had started whispering in my ear; you know those too; “you aren’t worthy”, you can’t do anything right and that list goes on and on as well.
Far too often when things are going wrong in our lives, we tend to forget that we already have everything we need. It’s called the word of God. We just have to learn not to look down but to look up instead.
We must focus our attention to the heavens from which cometh our help, keep our eyes on the prize and remember that we already have the Victory!
Be blessed and be a blessing
Prayer:
Lord, sometimes I try to pray and the words won't come. I toss and turn and feel nothing. My mind is dry, my heart is dull, my soul longs for life. Hear my silent cry, my God, hear me. Breathe on us Lord renewing a right spirit within us. Even in our times of sorrow, we praise Your holy name. Lord, open our eyes and give us a discerning spirit, so that we may recognize the tricks of the evil one. Lord, we come before the throne of grace once again asking that You would forgive us for not depending on You. We come asking that You who are our rock and our salvation, would help us to starve our fears and doubts and feed our faith. Lord, I personally ask for forgiveness and direction for myself. I know that sometimes, we take You for granted and in doing so, leave ourselves open to attack. Lord, we stand before You again, putting on the whole armor of God. The belt of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, the shoes of the gospel of peace, wielding our shield of faith and the sword of the spirit, and placing upon our heads, the helmet of salvation. Lord, let us always be diligent against attack from he who seeks to destroy us. Lord I ask a special blessing for the family of James and Angela Johnson and the family of Zack Finnley. Each family has suffered a great loss and need Your loving arms of comfort to surround them. Continue to bless our brothers and sisters in Christ. Continue to anoint our leaders. Help us always to be able to call upon the name of the Lord in our times of distress. Thank You Lord, for Your faithfulness. Thank You Lord, for Your covering. Thank You Lord, that You pick us up, when we have been knocked down. We will the name of the Lord at all times, and His praises shall continuously be in our mouths. Praise his name saints of God. Glory Hallelujah, thank You Jesus, in His name we pray, Amen.
Sunday, October 18, 2015
Passing Through Darkeness
That which causes us trials shall yield us triumph: and that which make our hearts ache shall fill us with gladness. The only true happiness is to learn, to advance, and to improve: which could not happen unless we had commence with error, ignorance, and imperfection. We must pass through the darkness, to reach the light.
Scripture:
But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. 1 Peter 2:9 (New International Version)
Darkness is described as a condition that is void of light. When darkness is all around you, it is hard to see where you came from and even harder to see in what direction you may be headed. Have you ever been out at night and there was no light anywhere around you; or, in a room that was void of light? But then, you saw a ray of light and started heading in the direction from which the light emanated? That’s how our Christian walk is sometimes.
We find ourselves lost in the night, surrounded by darkness. We can’t see where we came from or where we are headed. We may even begin to panic and start doing irrational things in our quest to find our way home and out of the darkness that threatens to envelop us.
We search for a ray of light in anything, everything and everywhere. Our search may even lead us to the wrong things. We make seek solace in all the wrong places; in sex, drugs or alcohol. Some people get so lost in these places that they may never find their way home. You may know or seen some of these people. I know I have. My youngest sister got lost one day in the world of drugs and never made it home. However, my prayer is that she found the light she so desperately needed. Jesus; the light of the world.
Jesus can lead you out of darkness and into the wonderful light.
Be blessed and be a blessing
Prayer:
Grant unto us, Almighty God, in all time of sore distress, the comfort of the forgiveness of our sins. In time of darkness give us blessed hope, in time of sickness of body give us quiet courage; and when the heart is bowed down, and the soul is very heavy, and life is a burden, and pleasure a weariness, and the sun is too bright, and life too overwhelming, then may that Spirit, the Spirit of the Comforter, come upon us, and after our darkness may there be the clear shining of the heavenly light; that so, being uplifted again by Thy mercy, we may pass on through this our mortal life with quiet courage, patient hope, and unshaken trust, hoping through Thy loving-kindness and tender mercy to be delivered from death into the large life of the eternal years. Continue to touch Your saints who have asked for our prayers. Grant us everlasting mercy, through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen.
Scripture:
But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. 1 Peter 2:9 (New International Version)
Darkness is described as a condition that is void of light. When darkness is all around you, it is hard to see where you came from and even harder to see in what direction you may be headed. Have you ever been out at night and there was no light anywhere around you; or, in a room that was void of light? But then, you saw a ray of light and started heading in the direction from which the light emanated? That’s how our Christian walk is sometimes.
We find ourselves lost in the night, surrounded by darkness. We can’t see where we came from or where we are headed. We may even begin to panic and start doing irrational things in our quest to find our way home and out of the darkness that threatens to envelop us.
We search for a ray of light in anything, everything and everywhere. Our search may even lead us to the wrong things. We make seek solace in all the wrong places; in sex, drugs or alcohol. Some people get so lost in these places that they may never find their way home. You may know or seen some of these people. I know I have. My youngest sister got lost one day in the world of drugs and never made it home. However, my prayer is that she found the light she so desperately needed. Jesus; the light of the world.
Jesus can lead you out of darkness and into the wonderful light.
Be blessed and be a blessing
Prayer:
Grant unto us, Almighty God, in all time of sore distress, the comfort of the forgiveness of our sins. In time of darkness give us blessed hope, in time of sickness of body give us quiet courage; and when the heart is bowed down, and the soul is very heavy, and life is a burden, and pleasure a weariness, and the sun is too bright, and life too overwhelming, then may that Spirit, the Spirit of the Comforter, come upon us, and after our darkness may there be the clear shining of the heavenly light; that so, being uplifted again by Thy mercy, we may pass on through this our mortal life with quiet courage, patient hope, and unshaken trust, hoping through Thy loving-kindness and tender mercy to be delivered from death into the large life of the eternal years. Continue to touch Your saints who have asked for our prayers. Grant us everlasting mercy, through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen.
Sunday, October 11, 2015
Pray for Me!
Remember, Intercessory prayer might be defined as loving our neighbor on our knees. ~ Charles Bent
Scripture:
Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.
Saints of God, how often have your burdens been so heavy that you couldn't even put them into words? How often has life become so overwhelming that you couldn't even tell anyone what was going on or how you felt? How often have you gotten down on your knees to pray and could only cry tears of sorrow and plead for mercy?
I know that I have. You see, so often things in our lives become overwhelming to us. It seems that so much in our lives is going wrong. So often we feel that there is no one we can turn to. Not even God. At least not for ourselves. So we do the next best thing.
We go to our brothers and sisters in Christ and ask them to intercede on our behalf. You see, sometimes we become so distracted with our problems we can't see our way out. We become blinded by our circumstances and can't see our way to the alter. We are so bombarded by our afflictions that we don't know what to do. But even when we can't pray for ourselves, we can call on one another for prayer.
So today, pray for one another. Stand in the gap for your loved ones. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.
Be blessed and be a blessing
Prayer:Lord, we come before the throne of grace to intercede for one another. We come asking for blessings and breakthroughs, not for ourselves but for our family members, friends, co-workers, on-line family members and brothers and sisters in Christ. Lord, we don't know the needs of Your children, but You do Lord. We ask that You would lift and bind the spirits of depression, despair, loneliness, anger, resentment, hurt, poverty and all others that are not of You. Lord, we ask that You would bless us and deliver us as only You can. Place Your hedge of protection securely around every person and all families that are represented here today. Allow this season of Your son to be filled with blessings and joy that have been given with the birth of Your son, Jesus Christ, in whose name we pray. Amen.
Scripture:
Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.
James 5:16New International Version (NIV)
Not long ago, I received an urgent message from one of my Christian brothers. The message simply said, "Pray for me". There was no specific prayer request, no explanation, and no reason given. Just these three words. "Pray for Me."Saints of God, how often have your burdens been so heavy that you couldn't even put them into words? How often has life become so overwhelming that you couldn't even tell anyone what was going on or how you felt? How often have you gotten down on your knees to pray and could only cry tears of sorrow and plead for mercy?
I know that I have. You see, so often things in our lives become overwhelming to us. It seems that so much in our lives is going wrong. So often we feel that there is no one we can turn to. Not even God. At least not for ourselves. So we do the next best thing.
We go to our brothers and sisters in Christ and ask them to intercede on our behalf. You see, sometimes we become so distracted with our problems we can't see our way out. We become blinded by our circumstances and can't see our way to the alter. We are so bombarded by our afflictions that we don't know what to do. But even when we can't pray for ourselves, we can call on one another for prayer.
So today, pray for one another. Stand in the gap for your loved ones. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.
Be blessed and be a blessing
Prayer:Lord, we come before the throne of grace to intercede for one another. We come asking for blessings and breakthroughs, not for ourselves but for our family members, friends, co-workers, on-line family members and brothers and sisters in Christ. Lord, we don't know the needs of Your children, but You do Lord. We ask that You would lift and bind the spirits of depression, despair, loneliness, anger, resentment, hurt, poverty and all others that are not of You. Lord, we ask that You would bless us and deliver us as only You can. Place Your hedge of protection securely around every person and all families that are represented here today. Allow this season of Your son to be filled with blessings and joy that have been given with the birth of Your son, Jesus Christ, in whose name we pray. Amen.
Sunday, October 04, 2015
Fight Back!
Don’t
focus on what you’re going through; focus on where you’re going
to! ~ Unknown
Scripture:
For the Lord your God is the one who goes with you to fight for you against your enemies to give you victory. Deuteronomy 20:4 New International Version (NIV)
Scripture:
For the Lord your God is the one who goes with you to fight for you against your enemies to give you victory. Deuteronomy 20:4 New International Version (NIV)
Recently as I sat church listening to my Pastor speak a word, I was moved by what he had to say. He told the story of how King David had returned from battle and found that his home had been conquered, burnt to the ground and his wives and children taken into captivity. Those who had gone into battle with him were angry with King David because they felt that if they had not been away in battle with him, they would have been at home to protect their own families. David began to experience a spirit of defeat.
At first he got angry and just wanted to give up. But then he went to God and asked if he should go after what had been taken from him and get it back. God’s answer was yes; he would overtake them and get back all that was his.
Just like King David many of us will return home and find that the enemy has taken or destroyed all that we have. It could be in the form of a devastating financial lost, the breakup of our marriages, or even the loss of our relationship with God himself. It is at these times that the devil will move in for the kill. Remember, his job is to kill, steal, and destroy.
It is at these times that we may experience division with our loved ones, a spirit of defeat, discouragement and distraction from what our God given purpose is. It is at these times when it’s okay to get mad and say “I’m mad and I’m not going to take it anymore.” In other words, there comes a time when it’s necessary to fight back.
There will be times in your live when you feel as though you have no control over your lives and that’s okay because it is at times like these when God can show up and show out. So often we will not be the one who has the last word regarding our situations. However, there is one who does and his name is Jehovah Jirah, my provider. Elohim, God of total power, and finally Jehovah Nissi my banner who goes before me. The key is being able to know when you are weak. It is at those times when God will be your strength.
When we learn to put God at the forefront, He will fight on our behalf and the victory shall be ours!
Be blessed and be a blessing
Prayer:
Father God, I come kneeling at the throne of grace humbly asking that You would hear my prayer. Lord, I realize that there are times in my life when I wanted to do things my way and because of my stiff neck, I failed to surrender my will to Yours and I stumbled and faltered. Lord, I come before the altar of sacrificing admitting that I have not always done things Your way and because of that, I have lost my way and all that You have given to me. Lord, I ask that You would be my strength and my banner, leading me into battle to take back all that the devil has tried to steal from me. You are my strength and my stronghold. I surrender my will to Yours as I let go all of my problems and surrender them to you. For I am weak and I need Your strength to regain my rightful place in the kingdom. Lord, I thank You for my blessings and my breakthroughs. I thank You for not only what You have done but also what You are about to do in my life. I bless Your name Father as I give thanks for the one who intercedes on my behalf, Christ Jesus. It is in His name that I submit this prayer. Amen.
