Tag Archives: encouragement

When You’ve Prayed All You KnowTo Pray

01 Thursday Dec 2016

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I wrote this almost six years ago on what to do when we have prayed everything we know to pray. I post it again today for a friend who is feeling that way.

JESUS

Jesus.  Jesus.  Jesus.
Sometimes that is the only prayer I have – and it is enough.
When I’m waiting for an answer that doesn’t come and I know no more prayers to pray, I utter His name — Jesus.
When the night is long and I can’t sleep, I whisper — Jesus.
When I’ve lost my way, I cry out to the One who has not lost me.  I pray — Jesus.
When I’m tired and I can’t see rest ahead, when all strength is gone, I breathe His name — Jesus.
When I am in pain, I remember the One who can heal, and I plead — Jesus.
If I’m afraid, I bear in mind that I have a Shield whose name is — Jesus.
He is my Savior and my Lord, my Shelter and my Comforter.
He gives me sanctuary under His wing and supplies me with restoration and peace.
He is the Holy Lamb of God, the One who comes with compassion and new hope.
He is my Faithful Friend and the Radiant Light on this earth’s journey.
He is the Way of all righteous, the ever-abiding Truth, and the Life of love and joy.
He is the Mighty and Eternal God

A Nation Under God

21 Monday Nov 2016

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This past Election Day, many evangelicals believed that God’s man for this hour in our nation was elected. The numbers keepers tell us 81% of the evangelical vote went for Donald Trump. I am one of those evangelicals.

Conservatives believe that a school day opened with prayer and the pledge to allegiance is a good thing. We see it as putting God first, where He deserves to be. We believe our flag is to be honored and lifted high in respect and gratitude for those who have bravely fought for our freedom. We believe that our nation must come first as we work cooperatively with other nations.

george-washington-kneeling-in-prayer2President George Washington said “It is impossible to rightly govern a nation without God and the Bible.” That belief was still held when Abraham Lincoln said “Unless the great God who assisted (Washington) shall be with me and aid me, I must fail; but if the same Omniscient Mind and Mighty Arm that directed and protected him shall guide and support me, I shall not fail . . . Let us all pray that the God of our fathers may not forsake us now.” No one said it more clearly than President Ronald Reagan when he said “If we ever forget that we are One Nation Under God, then we will be a nation gone under.”

A friend called the day after the election and said she imagined I was very happy at the election’s outcome. I replied that what I felt most was relieved; relieved that God was giving us another chance to come back to Him. This mission of many to put God completely out of every public venue is misguided. Every faith is honored and given room today but the faith of Christianity. This is wrong and God will not be mocked. Want some proof of that? Read the stories in the Old Testament of those who did it their way rather than God’s way and see what they went through.

Why would God pick Donald Trump to use? Someone who sometimes speaks crudely and bombastically? I can’t answer that any more than I can explain why God used a drunk (Noah) to build an ark to save humanity. Nor why He used a murderer (Moses) to lead the people of Israel out of bondage. God turned Saul of Tarsus from a man who strongly supported the execution of Christians into Paul, a great missionary and builder of New Testament churches. Maybe God chooses the unlikely to show His great power over all, to demonstrate that the impossible with man is opportunity with God. I can’t explain God’s choices but I can line up and respect them. If I cast my vote incorrectly, time will soon tell. And if I made the right choice, it will be an exciting time for America as we watch God shape and use President-Elect Donald Trump.

“The counsel of the Lord stands forever, the plans of His heart from generation to generation. Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD, the people whom He has chosen for His own inheritance.” Psalm 33:11-12 (NAS).

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Praying God’s Steadfast Love

07 Monday Nov 2016

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Many of us are familiar with the comfort received when we personalize Psalm 91. In verses like 3, we replace “He will deliver you” with “He will deliver me” and we go on in that manner of making the scripture our own. As we face our own trials and fears, we pray back to God the inspired scripture of Psalm 91.

I learned about praying Psalm 91 over myself from a woman long devoted to constant prayer. I was quite ill at the time. Then when my daughter became gravely ill, I taught her to use it in the same way. Sometimes I would read it over her, entering her name throughout, and she found strength and calm in God’s care for her.

There is another psalm that I use even more as a prayer and that is verse 4 of Psalm 6: “Turn, O Lord, and deliver my life; save me for the sake of Your steadfast love” (ESV). Everything we need is in that one sentence. We call on God’s mercy and grace for whatever is our need; we ask Him for deliverance because of who He is and not because we in any way deserve such Love.

There are times when a scripture seems to jump into our vision. The words will magnify as if bolded. I consider these times as God reaching out in a personal way, giving us a scripture to claim in a time of need, and I encourage you to do the same. Thank Him for it. Write it down and pray it frequently. In so doing, He will inscribe it on your heart.

I especially love Psalm 6:4 because it is easy to remember and because it fully encompasses everything. I pray it over friends. For example, I will say: “Turn, O Lord, and deliver Christy’s life; save her for the sake of Your steadfast love.” I use it for our nation: “Turn, O Lord, and deliver our nation, save us for the sake of Your steadfast love.” It is a prayer we desperately need to pray in these days.

The word “steadfast” is an English translation from the Hebrew word “hesed.” Depending on the translation of your Bible, it may also read everlasting, kindness, or mercy. I have read different counts as to the number of times it is used, but all accounts have given it 200 times or greater, with the most use in any single book of the Bible found in Psalms, the scriptures used as the temple hymnal and devotional guide for the Jewish people.

There is great wisdom in praying the scriptures. We engage ourselves with God’s Word, we commit scripture to memory, and we pull power into our lives from the breathed words of God. Can we not imagine the delight of our Father when He hears us speak to Him in His language? He has declared a covenant with us and when we communicate with Him in this manner, we are claiming and agreeing with what He has said.

All scriptures of God’s love are for for us, yet I believe that if you search the scriptures that tell of His steadfast or everlasting love, you will find something that God will lift from the pages and personally give to you. I hope you will give it a try.

Here is a beautiful song about God’s everlasting love from Terry MacAlmon.

Favorite Quotes on Prayer

17 Monday Oct 2016

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I have long been a collector of quotes. A few words can speak so much. An avid reader, I have journals with nothing but quotes from favorite authors that have taught, comforted, and encouraged me through the years. Unfortunately, I did not keep a record of what book I found each quote, as my intention was to record them only for personal review. All  are about prayer and it is my hope that you will find some blessing for yourself in the quotes I am sharing.

ingrid-bergman-2016“When a man is born from above, the life of the Son of God is born in him, and he can either starve that life or nourish it. Prayer is the way the life of God is nourished.”  –Oswald Chambers

“Our strength is renewed in only one way: spending time with God in prayer, waiting on Him, immersed in scripture reading, time with God’s people, cultivating Christ’s presence—so that the Holy Spirit may take over.”  –St. Francis de Sales

“Do not have your concert first and then tune your instrument afterwards. Begin your day with the Word of God and prayer, and get first of all into harmony with Him.” –Hudson Taylor

“What is essential in prayer is not that we learn to express ourselves, but that we learn to answer God. The Psalms show us how to answer.”  –Eugene Peterson

“It is the prayer that God the Holy Spirit inspires that God the Father answers. . . . The Holy Spirit works His prayers in us through the Word, and neglect of the Word makes praying in the Holy Spirit an impossibility.”  – R. A. Torrey

“Praise and thanksgiving are an essential part of persevering prayer. The more we focus on praising God, the more devoted and faithful we become. “ –Cynthia Heald

“In prayer we cease leaning on the staff of self-will and put all our confidence in God.” –Maxie Dunnam lady-of-guadelupebest

“When we fail to make prayer a priority—essentially forfeiting our time alone with God—we will begin to feel an emptiness in our lives, accompanied by a strange sense of unrest and uneasiness.”  –Charles Stanley

“It is well said that neglected prayer is the birthplace of all evil.”  –Charles Spurgeon

“Praying for the sick is reaching out with one hand to touch the risen Christ while holding on to the sick with the other hand.”  –Robert L. Wise

“Prayer is the rope that pulls God and man together. But it doesn’t pull God down to us, it pulls us up to Him.” –Billy Graham

“The one concern of the devil is to keep Christians from praying. He fear nothing from prayerless studies, prayerless work, and prayerless religion. He laughs at our toil, mocks at our wisdom, but trembles when we pray.”  –Samuel Chadwick

“He must set his heart to conquer by prayer, and that will mean that he must first conquer his own flesh, for it is the flesh that hinders prayer always.” –A. W. Tozer

“I think that the dying pray at the last not ‘please’ but ‘thank you,’ as a guest thanks his host at the door.” –Annie Dillard

“If the only prayer you say throughout your life is ‘Thank you,’ then that will be enough.” –Meister Eckhartbucket-of-roses-jul-29-2016

Mama’s Bible

23 Saturday Apr 2016

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. . . take root downward and bear fruit upward. (Isaiah 37:31 ESV)

My grandmother’s Bible was a treasure beyond any price. I had hoped as her oldest grandchild that I might inherit it, however I never discussed that with my grandmother or my mother and so in the end it didn’t come to be.

What made Mama’s Bible so revered? She poured and prayed over its words daily. Her gentle, but sure hands caressed the pages. She wept and rejoiced, she trusted and she practiced. She did what Isaiah said: took root downward and bore fruit upward.

I’ve never known anyone that Jesus was as real to as He was to Dulcie Spencer. She sang songs to Him throughout the day and talked to Him as if He were right at her elbow. I’ve walked into her home and overheard her talking and thought she had company, only to find out it was no visitor but her best friend and permanent resident: Jesus. Mama relied on Him completely for every matter and that reliance gave her a radiance that cannot be duplicated by anything of this world. Mama had a heavenly glow. THE_SPENCER_FAMILY_001 - Copy

My grandmother had no earthly riches. She lived a simple life, but a life marked with beauty because of how she lived it. Mama’s standard was to do exactly as God’s Word said for her to do: she loved God with all her heart, soul, strength and mind; she loved her neighbors as herself; and she believed God’s word that when we trust Him completely, He will never forsake us. Mama’s family saw and respected that trust. I believe we were all, in fact, hugely affected by her rock-solid trust in God. My earliest memory of Mama is of her kneeling by her bed for prayer at end-of-day, long dark braids falling down her back and over her homemade gown. Mama always prayed aloud and just as I have visual remembrances of Mama, I have auditory ones, too.

wedding pic - CopyWhen I married in 1989, Mama wasn’t physically able to be with us so she sent her Bible to me for the ceremony. I can’t think of better representation of this woman that I loved more than ever I could express.

Though I didn’t get to keep the book she loved above all others, she did give me her faith and for that I am eternally grateful. Mine isn’t as beautiful as hers, but it is as confident. And what she passed on to me, I passed on to my daughter Kristi. I know because I have witnessed it.

I truly cannot imagine my life without this great woman’s influence. I have often said if I could choose to be like anyone in the world, it would be my grandmother. I wish I could say I had lived a life like hers, but I can’t. My journey has been one of much stumbling, failing, and starting over, however no one’s persuasion of faith has had a greater hold on me than that of Dulcie Spencer. I thank her for showing me a Jesus she never doubted and pointing the way to heaven’s door. You are my crown jewel, Mama.Copy of spencer family about 1951

Here are a few lines from a letter Mama wrote to her children not long before she died in 1991 at 91 years of age: The dear Lord has been so good to our family. I can’t thank him enough and that he lives in me all the time.  I’ve prayed to him all my life and He answers my prayers day and night. Please don’t grieve after me when I’m gone for I’ll be safe with our dear Lord and all my loved ones in heaven. 

 

A Job’s Value

01 Monday Feb 2016

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A recent Guideposts story on job perspective really gave me pause. A man who had lost his job and had been unemployed for seven years was offered the job of janitor at his church. While he was grateful, his wife was not. It would require both of them and she felt it wasn’t important and fell beneath their potential. But as she received new vision on the job’s importance, and in some part the hidden roles it played, she reexamined her attitude and her life. She had an attitude shift—a new perspective.

I began thinking of those who clean our church and church school and wondered how they saw their jobs. Our buildings are immaculate: floors shiny clean, walls free of marks, bathrooms fresh and in order. It must take incredible attention and skill to keep them that way. Do our janitors see their work as important? Do they feel appreciated? Have I ever told them they are appreciated?

Courtesy morgueFile DSC05581.JPG

Courtesy morgueFile DSC05581.JPG

At a very large church next door to us, the cleaning duties are staffed by volunteers and headed up by a company executive. Keeping the church clean is a job he asked for, a way he desires to serve, and that service has provided $1.6 million in local and global missions. It’s pretty easy to see the value of their jobs, but it doesn’t have to be this dramatic to make a difference. Any building kept clean says a lot about what happens there, and probably nowhere is such a statement more important than in a church. The basics done with excellence indicate how other things are managed.

There is a quote I’ve always loved: “Every job is a self-portrait of the person who does it. Autograph your work with excellence.” While some jobs may take a while to reveal an individual, the profession of cleaning is a work that paints a self-portrait quickly.

Sometimes you have to reach bottom to understand the importance of basic work. That’s what happened to the man who for seven years had sought work like he had—that of a software developer. He came to a place where having a paying job was more important than what he did and he received the position offered him with gratefulness. He embraced it determined to do his best and six years later is still signing that work with excellence. The executive who cleans our neighboring church is a recovering alcoholic. That dealt with his ego in a powerful way and his way of serving others still goes strong after twenty years. Another self-portrait signed with excellence.

I began to think of other work that wasn’t so glamorous but ranked as valuable to most of us. What about the people who bag our groceries and take care to separate delicate items from heavier ones? Who limit the weight put in a bag? What about someone in a store who walks us to what we are looking for rather than pointing the way? The service people who come to our houses and put on shoe protectors at the door rather than tramping through with whatever they’ve brought with them from outside?

Every job is important and I’m going to be better at letting those with jobs that daily affect my life know I appreciate them. I hope you will join me in the doing the same.

The Loaves & the Fish, the Storm-tossed Sea

14 Wednesday Oct 2015

Posted by in God's faithfulness

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Scriptures in Matthew 14:13-21 and Mark 6:30-44 tell the story of how Jesus fed 5,000 people with five loaves of bread and two fish. Only men were counted in that day, so we know significantly more than 5,000 people were fed. We can be sure that Jesus didn’t leave the women and children hungry. And after each person was filled, there was enough bread and fish left to fill twelve baskets.

Let’s think in the fullest sense of this miracle and not hurry over a story we have known since childhood. The truths of God need to settle into our minds and hearts and form a solid foundation of faith for the trials that come to all of us. There is less sting in our trials when we can immediately reflect on who God is and what He can do.

Scripture tells us after feeding of the thousands, Jesus immediately sent the disciples on ahead by boat while He went alone to a mountainside be in prayer. We know He was there for hours because scripture talks of “when evening came” (John 14:23 and Mark 6:47). Then we see another reference to time when it says Jesus went to the disciples “during the fourth watch of the night” (John 14:24 and Mark 6:48). The fourth watch of the night was between 3 and 6 a.m.

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The disciples were far out on the sea when it became storm-tossed. The Greek word used for measuring distance was stadia–an eighth of a mile or 660 feet. Some Bible translations say “many stadia” or “over a mile.”  My intention here is to have us see how physically far away Jesus was from the disciples when they found themselves in trouble  and how they probably thought Jesus was unaware of their plight. Surely, they must have felt alone and without hope—just as we sometimes feel today. Yet . . . Jesus knew! There is never a distance so great that we are separated from the Lord when we are His children.

These stories reveal to us quite a few things:

  • God has great compassion for every child of His.
  • There is nothing He cannot do.
  • We need quantities of time alone with God: to ponder what He has done for us, to give Him more than a nod of thank you, and to be strengthened for future trials.
  • Time alone with God should be a priority, as it was with Jesus.
  • We should not rush our alone time with God, but rather, linger as long as we can.
  • God is never skimpy with His love. When His answers come, we can count on added blessing.
  • No one is overlooked with God. He has no partiality with stations in life as man does.
  • We are not to waste what God has given. Our leftover fish and bread may be in sharing the struggles of our life and how God saw us through. Never fail to share how God provides.
  • We are never alone; He always knows where we are and will come to us at just the right time.

Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.  — Hebrews 13:8 (NIV)

Buffet Decision-Making

24 Monday Aug 2015

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I had a friend who said to me once “Treat it like a buffet. Take what you like and leave the rest.” I was trying to make a decision about going forth with something I wasn’t altogether sure I needed. This friend, Joanne, saw something in me I had not seen: that I was holding on to anger over a failed marriage. She wanted me to see her chaplain friend to get help letting go. The rest of the story is I did see him and he was a great assist in helping me identify unhealthy attitudes and behaviors and correct them. He helped me move on.

It was Joanne’s great example of how to treat counseling that made me act on her advice.  It was such visual direction. 20150109_181557I have never forgotten how effective it was and how it can be used in many scenarios.

I’ve been thinking about it lately as I’ve watched a friend do this with a tough situation in her life. There are many things that don’t work for her, but she is able to rise above and choose from the situation the things she likes—and leave the rest. She is cautious, but upbeat. She moves on with anticipation of good in every day and I admire her tremendously for handling her difficulty with a buffet approach.

I see the ability to “take what you want and leave the rest” as many things: wisdom, focus, staying positive, and going forward when you might otherwise stay stuck in emotional mire. By using the buffet method, one can build on the good and not allow the bad to control.

I’m still applying the buffet method in my life. I’ve used it in work situations. I’ve used it in matters with my house. I’ve use it with social affiliations and friendships. I’ve use it with memories—what to keep and what to discard—but I admit that’s the hardest of all for me. The thing the buffet method effectively does is release one from pain and regret that haunt. It releases one from indecision and disappointments—great and small. It can even bring levity to a piece of life that could otherwise be a burden too heavy to bear.

So to Joanne, my dear friend of long ago and at a time of grief and transition, I say thank you. Thank you for being brave enough to call my hand on something I couldn’t see and was tripping me up. Thank you for explaining how to take advice. How to sort through and keep only the parts that helps you grow.

We never know when something we say will become a building block in someone’s life, do we? It pays to be cautious with words, but it can also pay to be bold. file561270689520

 

Photos courtesy of morgueFile

Prayer Time in Room 144

27 Saturday Jun 2015

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At 10:30 each Tuesday morning, women gather in Room 144 of our church. We come happy, grateful, and expectant. We arrive for one purpose and one purpose only: for intercessory prayer.

For the most part, we are members of First Assembly Memphis. But there is a sprinkling of ladies from other churches who are just as faithful to Tuesday morning prayer time. We are a diverse group, yet beautifully united in our commitment to intercessory prayer each week. We love the Lord and believe He is a miracle-working God, eager to hear our prayers.

Always before we pray, we worship through music our leader, Kathy Cobb, has prayerfully selected for the morning. It is a drawing music, one that ushers us into the presence of the Holy Spirit. We still our minds and let the music wash over us, preparing us for prayer. We sit, stand, or kneel; it happens however each one is personally led to embrace these preparation moments for spending time with our King. We have checked our pride and reserve at the door. We have come to worship, to pray, and to believe.

Up until a year or so ago, we prayed for an hour. Then, as our group grew, so did our prayer time. Now it is 90 minutes or longer. We leave when we feel we have covered every need brought to us.  Always, we pray for our nation and its leaders. We pray for Israel. We pray for schools, both our church school and others in the area. We pray for family needs, financial needs, job concerns, and for those who need healing. Many times, people come to us especially to be prayed over for healing. Whatever the need, we are there to pray. We have a basket where some write their requests rather than speak them and at the close of our gathering, we pray over the basket.

So much happens in our church’s designated room for prayer:  Scripture is read. We sing to the Lord. We share praise reports. Every attempt is made to control lengthy talks and keep the focus solely on worship and prayer.

Gail, Kathy, me

Kathy Cobb, our prayer leader, center. Gail Spiller, original member of the prayer group on right. I am on the left. What a privilege to be a part of this group of believing women.

The Hour of Power prayer group welcomes all who need prayer or wishes to join us as an intercessor. We realize some are not comfortable praying aloud and that is not a prerequisite. Just come and agree with us by your presence and your love for the Lord. Being in a disposition of prayer is the only requirement we have for anyone’s presence. We invite you to enter in.

The Interceding of the Great Physician

30 Monday Mar 2015

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Yesterday our pastor told about a man in our church family who went in to have an upper body x-ray, and for whatever reason, the x-ray camera was positioned lower than it should have been. Because of the error, an abdominal mass was found. There had been no symptoms of cancer in his body and except for the misalignment of the x-ray machine, the malignancy would have gone undetected.

The daughter of a close friend wasn’t even a year out from her first breast cancer surgery when she felt a lump under her arm while showering.  She had been closely monitored by several specialists yet she was the one who discovered a cancerous node. One physician told her he was amazed she could feel it.

The husband of another friend repeatedly had high PSA’s indicating the likelihood of prostate cancer.  There were several biopsies and none disclosed malignancy. Even so, he couldn’t let go of concern and decided to go to a cancer center for a more extensive biopsy. An aggressive form of cancer was found and had, in fact, escaped the walls of the prostate.

Two years ago I had surgery to remove a cancer from my face.  For more than a year I had been anxious about two tiny black spots below my eye. I had the area checked three times by two different dermatologists and told the spots were nothing to worry about.  Then a cosmetologist saw them and strongly urged me to get another opinion. I went to yet a third dermatologist who biopsied and diagnosed a melanoma, the worst of all skin cancers.

As I thought about these four different scenarios, it didn’t cause me to lose faith in physicians. Rather, I saw it as the sure evidence of God’s hand in the lives of His children. He took over where man was limited: He acted through an ill-positioned x-ray, guided a young woman’s hand, prompted a cosmetologist to speak out assertively, and kept concern gnawing until the right tests were completed.

The healing miracles of Jesus’ day were dramatic. The lame were made to walk, the blind to see, a woman bent over for 18 years made to stand erect, the dead were raised. There was no subtlety about any of those healings. Yet I would say to you the situations I’ve described are no less miracles.  Where highly skilled physicians missed disease, The Great Physician, Jesus, stepped in and called disease out.

Does this interceding happen every time? No, not as far as we can see. However, I do believe it happens far more times than we realize and certainly more times than we ever give God credit. It is never wrong to pray for the sudden miracle occurrences of Jesus’ day, but we should not fail to see His healings of today that only need a closer look.

Each person in this story had a good outcome and good prognosis. Jesus is never late.  To God be all glory!