The Gospel Of Prayer
The Gospel Of Prayer
There's nothing more transfiguring than prayer. People often ask, "Why do you insist on prayer so much?" The answer is very simple - because Jesus did. You could change the title of the Gospel according to St. Luke to the Gospel of Prayer. It's the prayer life of Jesus. The other evangelists say that Jesus was in the Jordan and the Spirit descended on Him as a dove - Luke says it was while He was praying that the Spirit descended on Him. The other evangelists say that Jesus chose 12 disciples - Luke says it was after He spent a night in prayer that He chose 12 disciples. The other evangelists say that Jesus died on a cross - Luke says that even when He was dying Jesus was praying for those who persecuted Him. The other evangelists say Jesus went on a mount and He was transfigured - Luke says it was while He was praying that He was transfigured. There's nothing more transfiguring than prayer.
The Scriptures say that the disciples went to bed, but Jesus went to pray - as was His custom. It was His custom to pray. Now Jesus was the Son of God - He was definitely anointed for His ministry. If Jesus needed all that time in prayer, don't you and I need time in prayer? If Jesus needed it in every crisis, don't you and I need it in every crisis?
The story goes that a group of tourists visiting a picturesque village saw an old man sitting by a fence. In a rather patronizing way, one of the visitors asked, "Were any great men born in this village?" Without looking up the old man replied, "No, only babies." The greatest men were once babies. The greatest saints were once toddlers in the things of the Spirit.
C. H. Spurgeon was converted at the age of 16 and began preaching in London at the age of 19. When he was 27, they built him a tabernacle seating 6,000 which he packed twice on Sundays - that's 12,000 - and once on Thursday nights. How? He waited on God. He got alone with God. He studied...and he prayed.
Desperate Prayer
God makes all His best people in loneliness. Do you know what the secret of praying is? Praying in secret. "But you, when you pray, go into your inner room, and when you have shut your door..." (Matt. 6:6). You can't show off when the door's shut and nobody's there. You can't display your gifts. You can impress others, but you can't impress God.
I Samuel 1:1-15 gives an account of the yearly trip Elkanah and his wife, Hannah, made to Shiloh to worship and sacrifice to the Lord. During this time, Hannah had been distressed that she was not able to bear a son for her husband. This passage of Scripture gives quite a descriptive account of her time in prayer concerning the barrenness of her womb. It says that Hannah wept. More than this, she wept until she was sore. She poured out her soul before the Lord. Her heart was grieving; she was bitter of soul, provoked, and of a sorrowful spirit.
Now that's a pretty good list of afflictions - sorrow, hardship, and everything else that came upon this woman. But the key to the whole situation is that she was a praying woman. In verse 20 it says that she reaped her reward. "And it came about in due time, after Hannah had conceived, that she gave birth to a son; and she named him Samuel, saying, 'Because I have asked him of the Lord.'"
Now I say very often - and people don't like it - that God doesn't answer prayer. He answers desperate prayer! Your prayer life denotes how much you depend on your own ability, and how much you really believe in your heart when you sing, "Nothing in my hands I bring, simply to Thy cross I cling...." The more self- confidence you have, the less you pray. The less self-confidence you have, the more you have to pray.
What does the Scripture say? It says that God takes the lowly, the things that are not. Paul says in I Corinthians 1:28 that God takes the things that are not to bring to nothing the things that are, so that no flesh should glory in His presence. We need a bunch of "are nots" today.
The Language of the Poor
Prayer is the language of the poor. Over and over again David, the King of Israel, says, "Incline Thine ear, O Lord, and answer me; for I am afflicted and needy" (Psalm 86:1). And do you remember that one of the greatest psalms he wrote says, "This poor man cried and the Lord heard him..." (Psalm 34:6).
The apostle Paul overwhelms me with his spirituality, his pedigree, his colossal intellect. Yet he says that he's very conscious that when he's weak, he is strong. He was always trying to prove to himself and to others that he was a nobody.
True prayer is a two-way communication. I speak to God and God speaks to me. I don't know how the Spirit makes communication - or why God needs me to pray - but that's how God works.
"Get Up And Pray!"
One day I was at a conference with Dr. V. Raymond Edman of Wheaton College, one of the greatest Christian educators in this country. He told us of an experience he had while he was in Ecuador as a missionary. He hadn't been there long before he was sick and dying. He was so near death that they had already dug his grave. He had great beads of sweat on his brow and there was a death rattle in his throat. But suddenly he sat straight up in bed and said to his wife, "Bring me my clothes!" Nobody knew what had happened.
Many years later he was retelling the story in Boston. Afterward, a little old lady with a small, dog-eared, beaten-up book, approached him and asked, "What day did you say you were dying? What time was it in Ecuador? What time would it be in Boston?" When he answered her, her wrinkled face lit up. Pointing to her book, she said. "There it is, you see? At 2 a.m. God said to get up and pray - the devil's trying to kill Raymond Edman in Ecuador." And she'd gotten up and prayed.
Duncan Campbell told the story of hearing a farmer in his field who was praying. He was praying about Greece. Afterward, he asked him why he was praying. The man said, "I don't know. I had a burden in the spirit and God said, 'You pray; there's someone in Greece that is in a bad situation.' I prayed until I got a release." Two or three years later the farmer was in a meeting listening to a missionary. The man described a time when he was working in Greece. He had been in serious trouble. The time? Two or three years ago. The men compared notes and discovered that it was the very same day that God had burdened a farmer, on a little island off the coast of Scotland, to pray for a man in Greece whose name he didn't even know.
It may seem the Lord gives you strange things. I don't care. If the Lord tells you something, carry on with what the Lord tells you.
Who Shall Ascend to the Hill of the Lord?"
There's another experience Duncan Campbell told about when he was working in Scotland.
"I couldn't preach," he said. "I couldn't get through to God. The heavens were solid. It was as though there was a 10 ft. ceiling of steel." So he quit trying to preach. He asked a young man named John Cameron to pray. The boy stood up and said, "What's the use of praying if we're not right with God?" He quoted the 24th Psalm, "Who may ascend into the hill of the Lord?"
You can't approach God unless your hands are clean, which means your relationships with others are clean and your heart is clean. "Who may ascend into the hill of the Lord? He who has clean hands and a pure heart..." (Psalm 24.3-4).
After the boy recited Psalm 24 he began to pray. He prayed 10, 15, 20 minutes. Then he suddenly said, "Excuse me, Lord, while I resist the devil." He turned around and began to tell the devil where to go and how to get there. He fought for all he was worth. You talk about having on the armor of God and resisting the devil! When he finished resisting the devil, he finished his prayer. He prayed for 45 minutes! When he finished praying it was just as though God had pulled a little switch in heaven. The Spirit of God came down on that church, that community, on the dance hall at the other end of town, and the tavern on this end of town. Revival was born in that prayer!
At the end of Malachi it says, "And the Lord, whom you seek, will suddenly (that's the word I like, suddenly) come to his temple" (Malachi 3:1). Remember what it says about the shepherds? They were watching their flocks by night when suddenly there was the sound of the heavenly host. Do you remember a bunch of men that had been waiting in the upper room? Suddenly the Holy Spirit came on them in that room.
There's a date in history that I love very much. It was Wednesday, August 13, 1737. A little group of people in Moravia were waiting in a prayer meeting. At 11:00 suddenly the Holy Spirit came. Do you know what happened? The prayer meeting that began at 11:00 lasted 100 years! That's right. That prayer room was not empty for a century! It's the longest prayer among men and women that I know of. Even children six and seven years old travailed in prayer for countries the names of which they couldn't even spell.
Why We Don't Have Revival
In an old town in Ireland they'll show you with reverence a place where four young men met night after night after night praying for revival. In Wales, there's a place in the hills where three or four young men only 18 or 19 years old met and prayed night after night. They wouldn't let God go; they would not take no for an answer. As far as humanly possible they prayed a revival into birth. If you're thinking of revival at your church without any inconvenience, forget it. Revival costs a lot.
I can give you one simple reason why we don't have revival in America. Because we're content to live without it. We're not seeking God - we're seeking miracles, we're seeking big crusades, we're seeking blessings. In Numbers 11, Moses said to God, "You're asking me to carry a burden I can't handle. Do something or kill me!" Do you love America enough to say, "God, send revival or kill me"? Do you think it's time we changed Patrick Henry's prayer from, "Give me liberty or give me death," to "Give me revival or let me die"?
In the 30th chapter of Genesis, Rachael goes to Jacob and throws herself down in despair. She says, "Give me children or else I die." Are you willing to throw yourself down before God to seek the spiritual birth of spiritual children in our country?
People say, "I'm filled with the Holy Spirit." If the coming of the Spirit didn't revolutionize your prayer life, you'd better check on it. I'm not so sure you got what God wanted you to get.
We've said that prayer changes things. No! Prayer doesn't change things. Prayer changes people and they change things. We all want Gabriel to do the job. God says do it yourself - with My sufficiency and My strength.
We need to get like this woman, Hannah. What did she do? She wept, she was grieved, she said she had a complaint, she fasted - and she prayed.
Jesus, the anointed of God, made prayer His custom. Paul, with his background and intellect, depended on prayer because he said he was weak. David, the king, called himself a poor man and cried to the Lord. Hannah prayed for a son and gave birth to a prophet. The prayers of a handful of young men sparked revival.
There's nothing more transfiguring than prayer.
There's nothing more transfiguring than prayer. People often ask, "Why do you insist on prayer so much?" The answer is very simple - because Jesus did. You could change the title of the Gospel according to St. Luke to the Gospel of Prayer. It's the prayer life of Jesus. The other evangelists say that Jesus was in the Jordan and the Spirit descended on Him as a dove - Luke says it was while He was praying that the Spirit descended on Him. The other evangelists say that Jesus chose 12 disciples - Luke says it was after He spent a night in prayer that He chose 12 disciples. The other evangelists say that Jesus died on a cross - Luke says that even when He was dying Jesus was praying for those who persecuted Him. The other evangelists say Jesus went on a mount and He was transfigured - Luke says it was while He was praying that He was transfigured. There's nothing more transfiguring than prayer.
The Scriptures say that the disciples went to bed, but Jesus went to pray - as was His custom. It was His custom to pray. Now Jesus was the Son of God - He was definitely anointed for His ministry. If Jesus needed all that time in prayer, don't you and I need time in prayer? If Jesus needed it in every crisis, don't you and I need it in every crisis?
The story goes that a group of tourists visiting a picturesque village saw an old man sitting by a fence. In a rather patronizing way, one of the visitors asked, "Were any great men born in this village?" Without looking up the old man replied, "No, only babies." The greatest men were once babies. The greatest saints were once toddlers in the things of the Spirit.
C. H. Spurgeon was converted at the age of 16 and began preaching in London at the age of 19. When he was 27, they built him a tabernacle seating 6,000 which he packed twice on Sundays - that's 12,000 - and once on Thursday nights. How? He waited on God. He got alone with God. He studied...and he prayed.
Desperate Prayer
God makes all His best people in loneliness. Do you know what the secret of praying is? Praying in secret. "But you, when you pray, go into your inner room, and when you have shut your door..." (Matt. 6:6). You can't show off when the door's shut and nobody's there. You can't display your gifts. You can impress others, but you can't impress God.
I Samuel 1:1-15 gives an account of the yearly trip Elkanah and his wife, Hannah, made to Shiloh to worship and sacrifice to the Lord. During this time, Hannah had been distressed that she was not able to bear a son for her husband. This passage of Scripture gives quite a descriptive account of her time in prayer concerning the barrenness of her womb. It says that Hannah wept. More than this, she wept until she was sore. She poured out her soul before the Lord. Her heart was grieving; she was bitter of soul, provoked, and of a sorrowful spirit.
Now that's a pretty good list of afflictions - sorrow, hardship, and everything else that came upon this woman. But the key to the whole situation is that she was a praying woman. In verse 20 it says that she reaped her reward. "And it came about in due time, after Hannah had conceived, that she gave birth to a son; and she named him Samuel, saying, 'Because I have asked him of the Lord.'"
Now I say very often - and people don't like it - that God doesn't answer prayer. He answers desperate prayer! Your prayer life denotes how much you depend on your own ability, and how much you really believe in your heart when you sing, "Nothing in my hands I bring, simply to Thy cross I cling...." The more self- confidence you have, the less you pray. The less self-confidence you have, the more you have to pray.
What does the Scripture say? It says that God takes the lowly, the things that are not. Paul says in I Corinthians 1:28 that God takes the things that are not to bring to nothing the things that are, so that no flesh should glory in His presence. We need a bunch of "are nots" today.
The Language of the Poor
Prayer is the language of the poor. Over and over again David, the King of Israel, says, "Incline Thine ear, O Lord, and answer me; for I am afflicted and needy" (Psalm 86:1). And do you remember that one of the greatest psalms he wrote says, "This poor man cried and the Lord heard him..." (Psalm 34:6).
The apostle Paul overwhelms me with his spirituality, his pedigree, his colossal intellect. Yet he says that he's very conscious that when he's weak, he is strong. He was always trying to prove to himself and to others that he was a nobody.
True prayer is a two-way communication. I speak to God and God speaks to me. I don't know how the Spirit makes communication - or why God needs me to pray - but that's how God works.
"Get Up And Pray!"
One day I was at a conference with Dr. V. Raymond Edman of Wheaton College, one of the greatest Christian educators in this country. He told us of an experience he had while he was in Ecuador as a missionary. He hadn't been there long before he was sick and dying. He was so near death that they had already dug his grave. He had great beads of sweat on his brow and there was a death rattle in his throat. But suddenly he sat straight up in bed and said to his wife, "Bring me my clothes!" Nobody knew what had happened.
Many years later he was retelling the story in Boston. Afterward, a little old lady with a small, dog-eared, beaten-up book, approached him and asked, "What day did you say you were dying? What time was it in Ecuador? What time would it be in Boston?" When he answered her, her wrinkled face lit up. Pointing to her book, she said. "There it is, you see? At 2 a.m. God said to get up and pray - the devil's trying to kill Raymond Edman in Ecuador." And she'd gotten up and prayed.
Duncan Campbell told the story of hearing a farmer in his field who was praying. He was praying about Greece. Afterward, he asked him why he was praying. The man said, "I don't know. I had a burden in the spirit and God said, 'You pray; there's someone in Greece that is in a bad situation.' I prayed until I got a release." Two or three years later the farmer was in a meeting listening to a missionary. The man described a time when he was working in Greece. He had been in serious trouble. The time? Two or three years ago. The men compared notes and discovered that it was the very same day that God had burdened a farmer, on a little island off the coast of Scotland, to pray for a man in Greece whose name he didn't even know.
It may seem the Lord gives you strange things. I don't care. If the Lord tells you something, carry on with what the Lord tells you.
Who Shall Ascend to the Hill of the Lord?"
There's another experience Duncan Campbell told about when he was working in Scotland.
"I couldn't preach," he said. "I couldn't get through to God. The heavens were solid. It was as though there was a 10 ft. ceiling of steel." So he quit trying to preach. He asked a young man named John Cameron to pray. The boy stood up and said, "What's the use of praying if we're not right with God?" He quoted the 24th Psalm, "Who may ascend into the hill of the Lord?"
You can't approach God unless your hands are clean, which means your relationships with others are clean and your heart is clean. "Who may ascend into the hill of the Lord? He who has clean hands and a pure heart..." (Psalm 24.3-4).
After the boy recited Psalm 24 he began to pray. He prayed 10, 15, 20 minutes. Then he suddenly said, "Excuse me, Lord, while I resist the devil." He turned around and began to tell the devil where to go and how to get there. He fought for all he was worth. You talk about having on the armor of God and resisting the devil! When he finished resisting the devil, he finished his prayer. He prayed for 45 minutes! When he finished praying it was just as though God had pulled a little switch in heaven. The Spirit of God came down on that church, that community, on the dance hall at the other end of town, and the tavern on this end of town. Revival was born in that prayer!
At the end of Malachi it says, "And the Lord, whom you seek, will suddenly (that's the word I like, suddenly) come to his temple" (Malachi 3:1). Remember what it says about the shepherds? They were watching their flocks by night when suddenly there was the sound of the heavenly host. Do you remember a bunch of men that had been waiting in the upper room? Suddenly the Holy Spirit came on them in that room.
There's a date in history that I love very much. It was Wednesday, August 13, 1737. A little group of people in Moravia were waiting in a prayer meeting. At 11:00 suddenly the Holy Spirit came. Do you know what happened? The prayer meeting that began at 11:00 lasted 100 years! That's right. That prayer room was not empty for a century! It's the longest prayer among men and women that I know of. Even children six and seven years old travailed in prayer for countries the names of which they couldn't even spell.
Why We Don't Have Revival
In an old town in Ireland they'll show you with reverence a place where four young men met night after night after night praying for revival. In Wales, there's a place in the hills where three or four young men only 18 or 19 years old met and prayed night after night. They wouldn't let God go; they would not take no for an answer. As far as humanly possible they prayed a revival into birth. If you're thinking of revival at your church without any inconvenience, forget it. Revival costs a lot.
I can give you one simple reason why we don't have revival in America. Because we're content to live without it. We're not seeking God - we're seeking miracles, we're seeking big crusades, we're seeking blessings. In Numbers 11, Moses said to God, "You're asking me to carry a burden I can't handle. Do something or kill me!" Do you love America enough to say, "God, send revival or kill me"? Do you think it's time we changed Patrick Henry's prayer from, "Give me liberty or give me death," to "Give me revival or let me die"?
In the 30th chapter of Genesis, Rachael goes to Jacob and throws herself down in despair. She says, "Give me children or else I die." Are you willing to throw yourself down before God to seek the spiritual birth of spiritual children in our country?
People say, "I'm filled with the Holy Spirit." If the coming of the Spirit didn't revolutionize your prayer life, you'd better check on it. I'm not so sure you got what God wanted you to get.
We've said that prayer changes things. No! Prayer doesn't change things. Prayer changes people and they change things. We all want Gabriel to do the job. God says do it yourself - with My sufficiency and My strength.
We need to get like this woman, Hannah. What did she do? She wept, she was grieved, she said she had a complaint, she fasted - and she prayed.
Jesus, the anointed of God, made prayer His custom. Paul, with his background and intellect, depended on prayer because he said he was weak. David, the king, called himself a poor man and cried to the Lord. Hannah prayed for a son and gave birth to a prophet. The prayers of a handful of young men sparked revival.
There's nothing more transfiguring than prayer.
cell sin
Cell Sin
Author: Mark Driscoll
This past summer I enjoyed some great vacation time with my wife of fifteen years, Grace, and our five children. We went to the high desert and spent most of our time enjoying the sunshine by playing catch, swimming in pools, inner tubing down rivers, going for walks and the like. For the first time in my life, I actually did not turn on my cell phone and did not take any calls or emails while on vacation. I made it a full three weeks of fasting from digital demons such as my BlackBerry, iPod, and second cell phone. Within a few days I also stopped wearing a watch and stopped really caring about time and instead enjoyed my wife, kids, and vacation. In short, it was wonderful. Unplugging my technology and simply having nothing on my body that required a battery seemed like a new kind of spiritual discipline for our age that refreshed and renewed me more than I could have imagined.
Being unplugged from my technology also made me more aware of how much lords over us as a beeping, ringing, and vibrating merciless sovereign god. I was grieved when I went to the pool every day with my kids to swim and play catch in the water and looked around the pool only to see other parents not connecting with their children at all but rather talking on their cell phones and dinking around on their handheld mobile devices while sitting in lounge chairs. When we went out for meals we saw the same thing. Parents with children were commonly interrupted throughout the meal by their technology and spent more time talking on the phone than to their family. To make matters worse, these people were actually quite loud and were incredibly annoying to the rest of us who do not want to hear whether or not their friend Hank’s nasty inner thigh rash had cleared up.
Sadly, the trend continued even late into the evenings. At night my kids like to go for bike rides and walks before heading off to bed so we spent our nights doing just that. At the resort where we stayed, it was amazing how many other families were doing the same, but the parents were not speaking to their children but rather chatting on the phone via their wireless headset (which I keep expecting to include an option to be surgically implanted into one’s head between their ears since there is apparently a lot of extra space there).
A recent article confirmed this is actually a tragic national trend and a cell sin to be repented of. An AP-Ipsos poll found that one in five people toted laptop computers on their most recent vacations, while 80 percent brought along their cell phones. One in five did some work while vacationing, and about the same number checked office messages or called in to see how things were going. Twice as many checked their email, while 50 percent kept up with other personal messages and voice mail. Reasons vacationers performed work-related tasks included an expectation that they be available, a worry about missing important information, or in some cases the enjoyment of staying involved (Source: Associated Press, June 1, 2007, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18983920/).
I know in years past I too have been guilty of these same digital sins against God, my family, and my own well-being. Now that I see it as a sin that destroys silence, solitude, fellowship, prayerful listening, and meaningfully and attentive friendship, I am deeply convicted that there is a new spiritual discipline of fasting from technology to be mastered. In this way, we can enjoy the life and people that God puts in front of us rather than ignoring them while we peck away with our thumbs and chat about nothing, which in the end is rarely as important as the people we are ignoring all around us.
Author: Mark Driscoll
This past summer I enjoyed some great vacation time with my wife of fifteen years, Grace, and our five children. We went to the high desert and spent most of our time enjoying the sunshine by playing catch, swimming in pools, inner tubing down rivers, going for walks and the like. For the first time in my life, I actually did not turn on my cell phone and did not take any calls or emails while on vacation. I made it a full three weeks of fasting from digital demons such as my BlackBerry, iPod, and second cell phone. Within a few days I also stopped wearing a watch and stopped really caring about time and instead enjoyed my wife, kids, and vacation. In short, it was wonderful. Unplugging my technology and simply having nothing on my body that required a battery seemed like a new kind of spiritual discipline for our age that refreshed and renewed me more than I could have imagined.
Being unplugged from my technology also made me more aware of how much lords over us as a beeping, ringing, and vibrating merciless sovereign god. I was grieved when I went to the pool every day with my kids to swim and play catch in the water and looked around the pool only to see other parents not connecting with their children at all but rather talking on their cell phones and dinking around on their handheld mobile devices while sitting in lounge chairs. When we went out for meals we saw the same thing. Parents with children were commonly interrupted throughout the meal by their technology and spent more time talking on the phone than to their family. To make matters worse, these people were actually quite loud and were incredibly annoying to the rest of us who do not want to hear whether or not their friend Hank’s nasty inner thigh rash had cleared up.
Sadly, the trend continued even late into the evenings. At night my kids like to go for bike rides and walks before heading off to bed so we spent our nights doing just that. At the resort where we stayed, it was amazing how many other families were doing the same, but the parents were not speaking to their children but rather chatting on the phone via their wireless headset (which I keep expecting to include an option to be surgically implanted into one’s head between their ears since there is apparently a lot of extra space there).
A recent article confirmed this is actually a tragic national trend and a cell sin to be repented of. An AP-Ipsos poll found that one in five people toted laptop computers on their most recent vacations, while 80 percent brought along their cell phones. One in five did some work while vacationing, and about the same number checked office messages or called in to see how things were going. Twice as many checked their email, while 50 percent kept up with other personal messages and voice mail. Reasons vacationers performed work-related tasks included an expectation that they be available, a worry about missing important information, or in some cases the enjoyment of staying involved (Source: Associated Press, June 1, 2007, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18983920/).
I know in years past I too have been guilty of these same digital sins against God, my family, and my own well-being. Now that I see it as a sin that destroys silence, solitude, fellowship, prayerful listening, and meaningfully and attentive friendship, I am deeply convicted that there is a new spiritual discipline of fasting from technology to be mastered. In this way, we can enjoy the life and people that God puts in front of us rather than ignoring them while we peck away with our thumbs and chat about nothing, which in the end is rarely as important as the people we are ignoring all around us.
You might be a pharisee if ...
You Might Be a Pharisee If...
by Harold Vaughn
You are glad you are better than others.
Your prayers are more like “self-talk” than speaking with God.
Your sins seem so small when placed beside the really BIG sins of others.
You rationalize that Christians who don’t agree with you are all “compromisers.”
You routinely dismiss anyone who would dare to point out a “blind spot.”
You verbally rip apart the people who disagree with you.
You rehearse your virtues when you should be confessing your sin.
You take delight in checking off your religious “to do” list.
The standard you use to judge others is “you.”
Prayer is more about you and your perception than about God and His praise.
You assume your discipline and “preciseness” indicates true spirituality.
Your memory is excellent when it comes to remembering your good works.
You glory more in appearance than in heart.
You are obsessed with externals, but blind to the internal reality of your own soul.
Outward righteousness is more important than heart holiness.
You find it difficult to fellowship with those different from yourself.
You believe you are superior to others.
You keep a list of your religious activities on the tip of your tongue.
You justify yourself by condemning others.
You build up yourself and your group by tearing others down.
You despise people who do not hold your convictions.
Your conscience is silent when you accuse and verbally abuse God’s people.
You excuse your arrogant behavior because you hold to “the correct position.”
You call your uncanny ability to catalog the faults of others “discernment.”
You thank God you are not as other men.
You really like to hear yourself pray.
Your sense of self-importance blinds you to the fact of how repulsive you are to
others.
You always come out in a favorable light when you compare yourself with other
men.
You feel your anger is justified because you are right and those you are angry
with are wrong.
You cling to “emotional infallibility” – the belief that whatever you feel in your
heart must be correct.
You believe a person really pleases God by keeping all the rules.
Your theological “rigidity” is more important than all other factors.
You feel the trail of broken relationships in your past is due to some fault in the
other parties.
You visually and intellectually comply in order to gain acceptance and approval.
You are so caught up in your own circle that you will do anything to maintain
your reputation.
You are dominated by the fear of man.
You are insulted by the notion you may be a Pharisee.
by Harold Vaughn
You are glad you are better than others.
Your prayers are more like “self-talk” than speaking with God.
Your sins seem so small when placed beside the really BIG sins of others.
You rationalize that Christians who don’t agree with you are all “compromisers.”
You routinely dismiss anyone who would dare to point out a “blind spot.”
You verbally rip apart the people who disagree with you.
You rehearse your virtues when you should be confessing your sin.
You take delight in checking off your religious “to do” list.
The standard you use to judge others is “you.”
Prayer is more about you and your perception than about God and His praise.
You assume your discipline and “preciseness” indicates true spirituality.
Your memory is excellent when it comes to remembering your good works.
You glory more in appearance than in heart.
You are obsessed with externals, but blind to the internal reality of your own soul.
Outward righteousness is more important than heart holiness.
You find it difficult to fellowship with those different from yourself.
You believe you are superior to others.
You keep a list of your religious activities on the tip of your tongue.
You justify yourself by condemning others.
You build up yourself and your group by tearing others down.
You despise people who do not hold your convictions.
Your conscience is silent when you accuse and verbally abuse God’s people.
You excuse your arrogant behavior because you hold to “the correct position.”
You call your uncanny ability to catalog the faults of others “discernment.”
You thank God you are not as other men.
You really like to hear yourself pray.
Your sense of self-importance blinds you to the fact of how repulsive you are to
others.
You always come out in a favorable light when you compare yourself with other
men.
You feel your anger is justified because you are right and those you are angry
with are wrong.
You cling to “emotional infallibility” – the belief that whatever you feel in your
heart must be correct.
You believe a person really pleases God by keeping all the rules.
Your theological “rigidity” is more important than all other factors.
You feel the trail of broken relationships in your past is due to some fault in the
other parties.
You visually and intellectually comply in order to gain acceptance and approval.
You are so caught up in your own circle that you will do anything to maintain
your reputation.
You are dominated by the fear of man.
You are insulted by the notion you may be a Pharisee.
The Saint Must Walk Alone
MOST OF THE WORLD'S GREAT SOULS have been lonely. Loneliness seems to be one price the saint must pay for his saintliness.
In the morning of the world (or should we say, in that strange darkness that came soon after the dawn of man's creation) that pious soul, Enoch, walked with God and was not, for God took him; and while it is not stated in so many words, a fair inference is that Enoch walked a path quite apart from his contemporaries.
Another lonely man was Noah who, of all the antediluvians, found grace in the sight of God; and every shred of evidence points to the aloneness of his life even while surrounded by his people.
Again, Abraham had Sarah and Lot, as well as many servants and herdmen, but who can read his story and the apostolic comment upon it without sensing instantly that he was a man "whose soul was alike a star and dwelt apart"? As far as we know not one word did God ever speak to him in the company of men. Face down he communed with his God, and the innate dignity of the man forbade that he assume this posture in the presence of others. How sweet and solemn was the scene that night of the sacrifice when he saw the lamps of fire moving between the pieces of offering. There alone with a horror of great darkness upon him he heard the voice of God and knew that he was a man marked for divine favor.
Moses also was a man apart. While yet attached to the court of Pharaoh he took long walks alone, and during one of these walks while far removed from the crowds he saw an Egyptian and a Hebrew fighting and came to the rescue of his countryman. After the resultant break with Egypt he dwelt in almost complete seclusion in the desert. There while he watched his sheep alone the wonder of the burning bush appeared to him, and later on the peak of Sinai he crouched alone to gaze in fascinated awe at the Presence, partly hidden, partly disclosed, within the cloud and fire.
The prophets of pre-Christian times differed widely from each other, but one mark they bore in common was their enforced loneliness. They loved their people and gloried in the religion of the fathers, but their loyalty to the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and their zeal for the welfare of the nation of Israel drove them away from the crowd and into long periods of heaviness. "I am become a stranger unto my brethren, and an alien unto my mother's children," cried one and unwittingly spoke for all the rest.
Most revealing of all is the sight of that One of whom Moses and all the prophets did write treading His lonely way to the cross, His deep loneliness unrelieved by the presence of the multitudes.
'Tis midnight, and on Olive's brow
The star is dimmed that lately shone;
'Tis midnight; in the garden now,
The suffering Saviour prays alone.
'Tis midnight, and from all removed
The Saviour wrestles lone with fears,
E'en the disciple whom He loved
Heeds not his Master's grief and tears.
-WILLIAM B. TAPPAN
He died alone in the darkness hidden from the sight of mortal man and no one saw Him when He arose triumphant and walked out of the tomb, though many saw Him afterward and bore witness to what they saw.
There are some things too sacred for any eye but God's to look upon. The curiosity, the clamor, the well-meant but blundering effort to help can only hinder the waiting soul and make unlikely if not impossible the communication of the secret message of God to the worshiping heart.
Sometimes we react by a kind of religious reflex and repeat dutifully the proper words and phrases even though they fail to express our real feelings and lack the authenticity of personal experience. Right now is such a time. A certain conventional loyalty may lead some who hear this unfamiliar truth expressed for the first time to say brightly, "Oh, I am never lonely. Christ said, `I will never leave you nor forsake you,' and, `Lo, I am with you alway.' How can I be lonely when Jesus is with me?"
Now I do not want to reflect on the sincerity of any Christian soul, but this stock testimony is too neat to be real. It is obviously what the speaker thinks should be true rather than what he has proved to be true by the test of experience. This cheerful denial of loneliness proves only that the speaker has never walked with God without the support and encouragement afforded him by society. The sense of companionship which he mistakenly attributes to the presence of Christ may and probably does arise from the presence of friendly people. Always remember: you cannot carry a cross in company. Though a man were surrounded by a vast crowd, his cross is his alone and his carrying of it marks him as a man apart. Society has turned against him; otherwise he would have no cross. No one is a friend to the man with a cross. "They all forsook him, and fled."
The pain of loneliness arises from the constitution of our nature. God made us for each other. The desire for human companionship is completely natural and right. The loneliness of the Christian results from his walk with God in an ungodly world, a walk that must often take him away from the fellowship of good Christians as well as from that of the unregenerate world. His Godgiven instincts cry out for companionship with others of his kind, others who can understand his longings, his aspirations, his absorption in the love of Christ; and because within his circle of friends there are so few who share his inner experiences he is forced to walk alone. The unsatisfied longings of the prophets for human understanding caused them to cry out in their complaint, and even our Lord Himself suffered in the same way.
The man who has passed on into the divine Presence in actual inner experience will not find many who understand him. A certain amount of social fellowship will of course be his as he mingles with religious persons in the regular activities of the church, but true spiritual fellowship will be hard to find. But he should not expect things to be otherwise. After all, he is a stranger and a pilgrim, and the journey he takes is not on his feet but in his heart. He walks with God in the garden of his own souland who but God can walk there with him? He is of another spirit from the multitudes that tread the courts of the Lord's house. He has seen that of which they have only heard, and he walks among them somewhat as Zacharias walked after his return from the altar when the people whispered, "He has seen a vision."
The truly spiritual man is indeed something of an oddity. He lives not for himself but to promote the interests of Another. He seeks to persuade people to give all to his Lord and asks no portion or share for himself. He delights not to be honored but to see his Saviour glorified in the eyes of men. His joy is to see his Lord promoted and himself neglected. He finds few who care to talk about that which is the supreme object of his interest, so he is often silent and preoccupied in the midst of noisy religious shoptalk. For this he earns the reputation of being dull and overserious, so he is avoided and the gulf between him and society widens. He searches for friends upon whose garments he can detect the smell of myrrh and aloes and cassia out of the ivory palaces, and finding few or none he, like Mary of old, keeps these things in his heart.
It is this very loneliness that throws him back upon God. "When my father and my mother forsake me, then the Lord will take me up." His inability to find human companionship drives him to seek in God what he can find nowhere else. He learns in inner solitude what he could not have learned in the crowd that Christ is All in All, that He is made unto us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification and redemption, that in Him we have and possess life's summum bonum.
Two things remain to be said. One, that the lonely man of whom we speak is not a haughty man, nor is he the holier-than-thou, austere saint so bitterly satirized in popular literature. He is likely to feel that he is the least of all men and is sure to blame himself for his very loneliness. He wants to share his feelings with others and to open his heart to some like-minded soul who will understand him, but the spiritual climate around him does not encourage it, so he remains silent and tells his griefs to God alone.
The second thing is that the lonely saint is not the withdrawn man who hardens himself against human suffering and spends his days contemplating the heavens. Just the opposite is true. His loneliness makes him sympathetic to the approach of the broken-hearted and the fallen and the sin-bruised. Because he is detached from the world he is all the more able to help it. Meister Eckhart taught his followers that if they should find themselves in prayer as it were caught up to the third heavens and happen to remember that a poor widow needed food, they should break off the prayer instantly and go care for the widow. "God will not suffer you to lose anything by it," he told them. "You can take up again in prayer where you left off and the Lord will make it up to you." This is typical of the great mystics and masters of the interior life from Paul to the present day.
The weakness of so many modern Christians is that they feel too much at home in the world. In their effort to achieve restful "adjustment" to unregenerate society they have lost their pilgrim character and become an essential part of the very moral order against which they are sent to protest. The world recognizes them and accepts them for what they are. And this is the saddest thing that can be said about them. They are not lonely, but neither are they saints.
In the morning of the world (or should we say, in that strange darkness that came soon after the dawn of man's creation) that pious soul, Enoch, walked with God and was not, for God took him; and while it is not stated in so many words, a fair inference is that Enoch walked a path quite apart from his contemporaries.
Another lonely man was Noah who, of all the antediluvians, found grace in the sight of God; and every shred of evidence points to the aloneness of his life even while surrounded by his people.
Again, Abraham had Sarah and Lot, as well as many servants and herdmen, but who can read his story and the apostolic comment upon it without sensing instantly that he was a man "whose soul was alike a star and dwelt apart"? As far as we know not one word did God ever speak to him in the company of men. Face down he communed with his God, and the innate dignity of the man forbade that he assume this posture in the presence of others. How sweet and solemn was the scene that night of the sacrifice when he saw the lamps of fire moving between the pieces of offering. There alone with a horror of great darkness upon him he heard the voice of God and knew that he was a man marked for divine favor.
Moses also was a man apart. While yet attached to the court of Pharaoh he took long walks alone, and during one of these walks while far removed from the crowds he saw an Egyptian and a Hebrew fighting and came to the rescue of his countryman. After the resultant break with Egypt he dwelt in almost complete seclusion in the desert. There while he watched his sheep alone the wonder of the burning bush appeared to him, and later on the peak of Sinai he crouched alone to gaze in fascinated awe at the Presence, partly hidden, partly disclosed, within the cloud and fire.
The prophets of pre-Christian times differed widely from each other, but one mark they bore in common was their enforced loneliness. They loved their people and gloried in the religion of the fathers, but their loyalty to the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and their zeal for the welfare of the nation of Israel drove them away from the crowd and into long periods of heaviness. "I am become a stranger unto my brethren, and an alien unto my mother's children," cried one and unwittingly spoke for all the rest.
Most revealing of all is the sight of that One of whom Moses and all the prophets did write treading His lonely way to the cross, His deep loneliness unrelieved by the presence of the multitudes.
'Tis midnight, and on Olive's brow
The star is dimmed that lately shone;
'Tis midnight; in the garden now,
The suffering Saviour prays alone.
'Tis midnight, and from all removed
The Saviour wrestles lone with fears,
E'en the disciple whom He loved
Heeds not his Master's grief and tears.
-WILLIAM B. TAPPAN
He died alone in the darkness hidden from the sight of mortal man and no one saw Him when He arose triumphant and walked out of the tomb, though many saw Him afterward and bore witness to what they saw.
There are some things too sacred for any eye but God's to look upon. The curiosity, the clamor, the well-meant but blundering effort to help can only hinder the waiting soul and make unlikely if not impossible the communication of the secret message of God to the worshiping heart.
Sometimes we react by a kind of religious reflex and repeat dutifully the proper words and phrases even though they fail to express our real feelings and lack the authenticity of personal experience. Right now is such a time. A certain conventional loyalty may lead some who hear this unfamiliar truth expressed for the first time to say brightly, "Oh, I am never lonely. Christ said, `I will never leave you nor forsake you,' and, `Lo, I am with you alway.' How can I be lonely when Jesus is with me?"
Now I do not want to reflect on the sincerity of any Christian soul, but this stock testimony is too neat to be real. It is obviously what the speaker thinks should be true rather than what he has proved to be true by the test of experience. This cheerful denial of loneliness proves only that the speaker has never walked with God without the support and encouragement afforded him by society. The sense of companionship which he mistakenly attributes to the presence of Christ may and probably does arise from the presence of friendly people. Always remember: you cannot carry a cross in company. Though a man were surrounded by a vast crowd, his cross is his alone and his carrying of it marks him as a man apart. Society has turned against him; otherwise he would have no cross. No one is a friend to the man with a cross. "They all forsook him, and fled."
The pain of loneliness arises from the constitution of our nature. God made us for each other. The desire for human companionship is completely natural and right. The loneliness of the Christian results from his walk with God in an ungodly world, a walk that must often take him away from the fellowship of good Christians as well as from that of the unregenerate world. His Godgiven instincts cry out for companionship with others of his kind, others who can understand his longings, his aspirations, his absorption in the love of Christ; and because within his circle of friends there are so few who share his inner experiences he is forced to walk alone. The unsatisfied longings of the prophets for human understanding caused them to cry out in their complaint, and even our Lord Himself suffered in the same way.
The man who has passed on into the divine Presence in actual inner experience will not find many who understand him. A certain amount of social fellowship will of course be his as he mingles with religious persons in the regular activities of the church, but true spiritual fellowship will be hard to find. But he should not expect things to be otherwise. After all, he is a stranger and a pilgrim, and the journey he takes is not on his feet but in his heart. He walks with God in the garden of his own souland who but God can walk there with him? He is of another spirit from the multitudes that tread the courts of the Lord's house. He has seen that of which they have only heard, and he walks among them somewhat as Zacharias walked after his return from the altar when the people whispered, "He has seen a vision."
The truly spiritual man is indeed something of an oddity. He lives not for himself but to promote the interests of Another. He seeks to persuade people to give all to his Lord and asks no portion or share for himself. He delights not to be honored but to see his Saviour glorified in the eyes of men. His joy is to see his Lord promoted and himself neglected. He finds few who care to talk about that which is the supreme object of his interest, so he is often silent and preoccupied in the midst of noisy religious shoptalk. For this he earns the reputation of being dull and overserious, so he is avoided and the gulf between him and society widens. He searches for friends upon whose garments he can detect the smell of myrrh and aloes and cassia out of the ivory palaces, and finding few or none he, like Mary of old, keeps these things in his heart.
It is this very loneliness that throws him back upon God. "When my father and my mother forsake me, then the Lord will take me up." His inability to find human companionship drives him to seek in God what he can find nowhere else. He learns in inner solitude what he could not have learned in the crowd that Christ is All in All, that He is made unto us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification and redemption, that in Him we have and possess life's summum bonum.
Two things remain to be said. One, that the lonely man of whom we speak is not a haughty man, nor is he the holier-than-thou, austere saint so bitterly satirized in popular literature. He is likely to feel that he is the least of all men and is sure to blame himself for his very loneliness. He wants to share his feelings with others and to open his heart to some like-minded soul who will understand him, but the spiritual climate around him does not encourage it, so he remains silent and tells his griefs to God alone.
The second thing is that the lonely saint is not the withdrawn man who hardens himself against human suffering and spends his days contemplating the heavens. Just the opposite is true. His loneliness makes him sympathetic to the approach of the broken-hearted and the fallen and the sin-bruised. Because he is detached from the world he is all the more able to help it. Meister Eckhart taught his followers that if they should find themselves in prayer as it were caught up to the third heavens and happen to remember that a poor widow needed food, they should break off the prayer instantly and go care for the widow. "God will not suffer you to lose anything by it," he told them. "You can take up again in prayer where you left off and the Lord will make it up to you." This is typical of the great mystics and masters of the interior life from Paul to the present day.
The weakness of so many modern Christians is that they feel too much at home in the world. In their effort to achieve restful "adjustment" to unregenerate society they have lost their pilgrim character and become an essential part of the very moral order against which they are sent to protest. The world recognizes them and accepts them for what they are. And this is the saddest thing that can be said about them. They are not lonely, but neither are they saints.
Prayer that kills corporate unity
Is it really possible for just one prayer to kill an entire prayer meeting? As strange as it may sound there is a certain kind of so called, “praying” that has the potential to greatly hinder or even kill our corporate prayer meetings. I’m sad to say I have witnessed this happen many, many times. If you are currently responsible for a corporate prayer meeting or feel called to lead one, you will want to pay careful attention to the following exhortations.
The type of prayer that too often kills our prayer meetings is that religious oratory which pretends to address God but is really intended to teach or correct men. Some believers are compelled to showcase their spiritual gifts and biblical insights under the pretense of interceding during a corporate prayer meeting. Regardless if this is a conscious or unconscious action, such so called praying will only quench the Spirit of prayer and discourage other believers. Prayer meetings are first and foremost a place for vertical dialogue between God and man and not the appropriate place to sermonize and teach. A corporate prayer meeting will always provides some opportunity to learn more about God and the scriptures, but this is usually just the natural byproduct of an honest and humble interaction with God and not the primary focus for coming together to pray. If we allow our prayer meetings to function in such a pretentious and prideful way they will inevitably become tedious and uncomfortable events that cause people to spurn corporate prayer rather than seek it out as a biblical source of greater unity and power. Many fine Christian authors have come to the same conclusion as the following excerpts make very clear.
C.H. Mackintosh: Are our Prayers More like Statements of Doctrine than Utterances of Need?
"Often our prayers are more like orations than petitions-more like statements of doctrine than utterances of need! It seems, at times, as though we meant to explain principles to God, and give Him a large amount of information. These are the things which cast a withering influence over our prayer meetings, robbing them of their freshness, their interest, and their value. Those who really know what prayer is-who feel its value, and are conscious of their need of it, attend the prayer meeting in order to pray, not to hear lectures and expositions from men on their knees. If they want lectures, they can attend at the lecture hall or the preaching room; but when they go to the prayer meeting, it is to pray. To them, the prayer meeting is the place of expressed need and expected blessing- the place of expressed weakness and expected power…Not infrequently it happens that what we call prayer is not prayer at all, but the fluent utterance of certain known and acknowledged truths and principles, to which one has heard so often that the reiteration becomes tiresome in the extreme. What can be more painful than to hear a man on his knees explaining principles and unfolding doctrines? The question forces itself upon us, “Is the man speaking to God, or to us?” If to God, surely nothing can be more irreverent or profane than to attempt to explain things to Him; but if to us, then it is not prayer at all and the sooner we rise from the posture of prayer the better, inasmuch as the speaker will do better on his legs and we in our seats... Some of us seem to think it necessary to make one long prayer about all sorts of things-many of them very right and very good, no doubt-but the mind gets bewildered by the multiplicity of subjects. How much better to bring one object before the throne, earnestly urge it, and pause so that the Holy Spirit may lead out others, in like manner to pray, either for the same thing or something else equally definite. Long prayers are often very wearisome."
Charles H. Spurgeon: The Evil of Mistaking Preaching for Prayer!
"Beware of the evil of mistaking preaching for prayer. The friends who were reputed to be ‘gifted’ indulged themselves in public prayer with a review of their own experience, a recalling of their creed, an occasional running commentary upon a chapter or Psalm, or even a criticism upon the Pastor and his sermons. It was too often quite forgotten that the brother was addressing the divine Majesty, before whose wisdom a display of our own knowledge is impertinence, and before whose glory an attempt at swelling words and pompous periods is little short of profanity; the lecture was evidently intended for man rather than God, and on some occasions did not contain a single petition from the beginning to end. We hope that good men are leaving this unhallowed practice, and are beginning to see that sermons and doctrinal dissertations are miserable substitutes for earnest wrestling prayers, when our place is before the mercy-seat, and our engagement is intercession with the Most High. If each person will offer the petition most pressing upon his heart by the Holy Spirit, and then make room for another, the evening will be far more profitable, and the prayers incomparably more fervent than if each brother ran round the whole circle of petition without dwelling on one point. Compare your topics of prayer to so many nails; it will be better for an intercessor to drive one nail home with repeated blows, than to deal one ineffectual tap to them one after another. Let as many as possible take part in the prayer of the church’s desires; the change of voice will prevent weariness, and the variety of subjects will excite attention. Better to have six pleading earnestly, than two drowsily; far better for the whole meeting that the many wants should be represented experimentally by many intercessors, than formally by two or three."
What Does A Good Prayer Meeting Look Like?
In closing lets consider some of the key aspects of a healthy and vibrant prayer meeting. There is not enough space here to rightly define all of the various expressions of a good corporate prayer meeting. Yet, it is safe to say that in a truly healthy corporate prayer gathering, each person has room to express his or her own heart to the Lord. Each believer is encouraged to listen and cooperate with the needs and prayers of the whole corporate assembly. Healthy corporate prayer meetings usually have some kind of defined leadership, but that does not mean that the meeting revolves around the prayers of one or two leaders while everyone else just listens. No, a healthy prayer meeting is designed by God to be a true concert or harmony of prayer, where each individual believer’s cry of need and worship contributes to the overall chorus of fervent intercession. There is no room for individualistic pride and ego to parade itself around and steal the time and space needed for the cries of the humble and needy! True corporate prayer is a united team effort and the prayers of pride, pretense and hypocrisy will strip it of its joy and blessing every time!
References:
“Prayer and the Prayer Meeting” by C. H. Mackintosh
“Only a Prayer Meeting” by Charles Spurgeon
The type of prayer that too often kills our prayer meetings is that religious oratory which pretends to address God but is really intended to teach or correct men. Some believers are compelled to showcase their spiritual gifts and biblical insights under the pretense of interceding during a corporate prayer meeting. Regardless if this is a conscious or unconscious action, such so called praying will only quench the Spirit of prayer and discourage other believers. Prayer meetings are first and foremost a place for vertical dialogue between God and man and not the appropriate place to sermonize and teach. A corporate prayer meeting will always provides some opportunity to learn more about God and the scriptures, but this is usually just the natural byproduct of an honest and humble interaction with God and not the primary focus for coming together to pray. If we allow our prayer meetings to function in such a pretentious and prideful way they will inevitably become tedious and uncomfortable events that cause people to spurn corporate prayer rather than seek it out as a biblical source of greater unity and power. Many fine Christian authors have come to the same conclusion as the following excerpts make very clear.
C.H. Mackintosh: Are our Prayers More like Statements of Doctrine than Utterances of Need?
"Often our prayers are more like orations than petitions-more like statements of doctrine than utterances of need! It seems, at times, as though we meant to explain principles to God, and give Him a large amount of information. These are the things which cast a withering influence over our prayer meetings, robbing them of their freshness, their interest, and their value. Those who really know what prayer is-who feel its value, and are conscious of their need of it, attend the prayer meeting in order to pray, not to hear lectures and expositions from men on their knees. If they want lectures, they can attend at the lecture hall or the preaching room; but when they go to the prayer meeting, it is to pray. To them, the prayer meeting is the place of expressed need and expected blessing- the place of expressed weakness and expected power…Not infrequently it happens that what we call prayer is not prayer at all, but the fluent utterance of certain known and acknowledged truths and principles, to which one has heard so often that the reiteration becomes tiresome in the extreme. What can be more painful than to hear a man on his knees explaining principles and unfolding doctrines? The question forces itself upon us, “Is the man speaking to God, or to us?” If to God, surely nothing can be more irreverent or profane than to attempt to explain things to Him; but if to us, then it is not prayer at all and the sooner we rise from the posture of prayer the better, inasmuch as the speaker will do better on his legs and we in our seats... Some of us seem to think it necessary to make one long prayer about all sorts of things-many of them very right and very good, no doubt-but the mind gets bewildered by the multiplicity of subjects. How much better to bring one object before the throne, earnestly urge it, and pause so that the Holy Spirit may lead out others, in like manner to pray, either for the same thing or something else equally definite. Long prayers are often very wearisome."
Charles H. Spurgeon: The Evil of Mistaking Preaching for Prayer!
"Beware of the evil of mistaking preaching for prayer. The friends who were reputed to be ‘gifted’ indulged themselves in public prayer with a review of their own experience, a recalling of their creed, an occasional running commentary upon a chapter or Psalm, or even a criticism upon the Pastor and his sermons. It was too often quite forgotten that the brother was addressing the divine Majesty, before whose wisdom a display of our own knowledge is impertinence, and before whose glory an attempt at swelling words and pompous periods is little short of profanity; the lecture was evidently intended for man rather than God, and on some occasions did not contain a single petition from the beginning to end. We hope that good men are leaving this unhallowed practice, and are beginning to see that sermons and doctrinal dissertations are miserable substitutes for earnest wrestling prayers, when our place is before the mercy-seat, and our engagement is intercession with the Most High. If each person will offer the petition most pressing upon his heart by the Holy Spirit, and then make room for another, the evening will be far more profitable, and the prayers incomparably more fervent than if each brother ran round the whole circle of petition without dwelling on one point. Compare your topics of prayer to so many nails; it will be better for an intercessor to drive one nail home with repeated blows, than to deal one ineffectual tap to them one after another. Let as many as possible take part in the prayer of the church’s desires; the change of voice will prevent weariness, and the variety of subjects will excite attention. Better to have six pleading earnestly, than two drowsily; far better for the whole meeting that the many wants should be represented experimentally by many intercessors, than formally by two or three."
What Does A Good Prayer Meeting Look Like?
In closing lets consider some of the key aspects of a healthy and vibrant prayer meeting. There is not enough space here to rightly define all of the various expressions of a good corporate prayer meeting. Yet, it is safe to say that in a truly healthy corporate prayer gathering, each person has room to express his or her own heart to the Lord. Each believer is encouraged to listen and cooperate with the needs and prayers of the whole corporate assembly. Healthy corporate prayer meetings usually have some kind of defined leadership, but that does not mean that the meeting revolves around the prayers of one or two leaders while everyone else just listens. No, a healthy prayer meeting is designed by God to be a true concert or harmony of prayer, where each individual believer’s cry of need and worship contributes to the overall chorus of fervent intercession. There is no room for individualistic pride and ego to parade itself around and steal the time and space needed for the cries of the humble and needy! True corporate prayer is a united team effort and the prayers of pride, pretense and hypocrisy will strip it of its joy and blessing every time!
References:
“Prayer and the Prayer Meeting” by C. H. Mackintosh
“Only a Prayer Meeting” by Charles Spurgeon
One Another
be at peace with one another (Mark 9:50)
wash one another's feet (John 13:14)
love one another (John 13:34)
love one another (John 13:35)
love one another (John 15:12)
love one another (John 15:17)
you are members of one another (Rom. 12:5)
be devoted to one another in love (Rom. 12:10)
honor one another above yourselves (Rom 12:10)
live in harmony with one another (Rom. 12:16)
love one another (Rom. 13:8)
stop passing judgment on one another (Rom. 14:13)
edify one another (Rom. 14:19)
be like minded one toward another (Rom. 15:5)
admonish one another (Rom. 15:14)
greet one another with a holy kiss (Rom. 16:16)
wait for one another (1Cor. 11:33)
have the same care for one another (1Cor. 12:25)
greet one another with a holy kiss (1Cor. 16:20)
greet one another with a holy kiss (2Cor. 13:12)
serve one another in love (Gal. 5:13)
bear with one another in love (Eph. 4:2)
speak truth for we are members of one another (Eph. 4:25)
be kind and compassionate to one another (Eph. 4:32)
submit to one another (Eph. 5:21)
do not lie to one another (Col. 3:9)
bear with one another (Col. 3:13)
forgive one another (Col. 3:13)
abound in love toward one another (1Th. 3:12)
love one another (1Th. 4:9)
comfort one another (1Th. 4:18)
incite one another to love and good deeds (Heb. 10:24)
encourage one another (Heb. 10:25)
do not speak evil of one another (Jas. 4:11)
do not make complaints against one another (Jas. 5:9)
confess your sins to one another (Jas. 5:16)
pray for one another (Jas. 5:16)
love one another deeply, from the heart (1Pet. 1:22)
offer hospitality to one another (1Pet. 4:9)
clothe yourselves with humility toward one another (1Pet. 5:5)
greet one another with a kiss of love (1Pet. 5:14)
have fellowship with one another (1Jn. 1:7)
love one another (1Jn. 3:11)
love one another (1Jn. 3:23)
love one another (1Jn. 4:7)
love one another (1Jn. 4:11)
love one another (1Jn. 4:12)
love one another (2Jn. 5)
wash one another's feet (John 13:14)
love one another (John 13:34)
love one another (John 13:35)
love one another (John 15:12)
love one another (John 15:17)
you are members of one another (Rom. 12:5)
be devoted to one another in love (Rom. 12:10)
honor one another above yourselves (Rom 12:10)
live in harmony with one another (Rom. 12:16)
love one another (Rom. 13:8)
stop passing judgment on one another (Rom. 14:13)
edify one another (Rom. 14:19)
be like minded one toward another (Rom. 15:5)
admonish one another (Rom. 15:14)
greet one another with a holy kiss (Rom. 16:16)
wait for one another (1Cor. 11:33)
have the same care for one another (1Cor. 12:25)
greet one another with a holy kiss (1Cor. 16:20)
greet one another with a holy kiss (2Cor. 13:12)
serve one another in love (Gal. 5:13)
bear with one another in love (Eph. 4:2)
speak truth for we are members of one another (Eph. 4:25)
be kind and compassionate to one another (Eph. 4:32)
submit to one another (Eph. 5:21)
do not lie to one another (Col. 3:9)
bear with one another (Col. 3:13)
forgive one another (Col. 3:13)
abound in love toward one another (1Th. 3:12)
love one another (1Th. 4:9)
comfort one another (1Th. 4:18)
incite one another to love and good deeds (Heb. 10:24)
encourage one another (Heb. 10:25)
do not speak evil of one another (Jas. 4:11)
do not make complaints against one another (Jas. 5:9)
confess your sins to one another (Jas. 5:16)
pray for one another (Jas. 5:16)
love one another deeply, from the heart (1Pet. 1:22)
offer hospitality to one another (1Pet. 4:9)
clothe yourselves with humility toward one another (1Pet. 5:5)
greet one another with a kiss of love (1Pet. 5:14)
have fellowship with one another (1Jn. 1:7)
love one another (1Jn. 3:11)
love one another (1Jn. 3:23)
love one another (1Jn. 4:7)
love one another (1Jn. 4:11)
love one another (1Jn. 4:12)
love one another (2Jn. 5)
A Bride for Isaac
"A Bride for Isaac"
The 24th chapter of Genesis begins with Abraham's realization that the time has come for Isaac to be married. Rather than let Isaac pick one of the local idolatrous ladies, Abraham calls for his servant and gives him a job.
"Travel a thousand miles to my family and find a bride for my son."
You might expect Isaac to go with the servant and pick the woman out for himself, but three times Abraham forbids Isaac to go with the servant to choose his bride. Instead the father sends his servant to find a bride. She must be selfless, brave, and willing to leave everything behind in order to please her God.
The servant tests her by asking for a sign: "Show me a servant who helps strangers." After he meets her he explains why he has come. She agrees to follow him across a dangerous desert to marry a man she hasn't even met. The servant leads the woman a thousand miles, giving her gifts along the way.
Now Isaac is in the field meditating when he sees something in the distance. Not the woman, but camels. Remember that. As they near, the woman asks the servant, is this the master? Yes, he says. She covers her face with a viel. The servant tells Isaac about the miracles God did to bring the woman there. Isaac accepts and loves her. She becomes his bride.
What does this show us? The son represents Christ and the bride represents those who are being saved, lead by the Spirit back to their saviour to be wedded forever with Him (Rev. 22.). Likewise, Paul writes that all men and women are supposed to symbolize this same relationship. Therefore, if we truly desire to be like Christ and the Church, then we must model this same example:
At the right time God will send His Spirit to find a suitable bride, not an idolatrous woman, but a woman from "our own family". This woman is a selfless servant. The Spirit meets her at the place where everyone draws water, i.e. the Word of God, and compels her to follow Him into a life of dedication and trust. He gives her gifts of the spirit. So I know that the woman the God wants is a woman who is in the word and freely shares the word with total strangers.
In turn, men are to be as Isaac, found "in the field" of evangelism which is so white with harvest. Men are to be meditating and praying that God sends more workers into the field. In fact, it says that Isaac was at a place called Beer Lahai Roi, which means "The well of God's vision for life." The man of God is to drink from God's vision for life. He water's the world with God's way of life, Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit.
When the woman has been lead far enough away from her attachments to the former life then the Spirit will lead her into view. What the man of God sees first is not the figure of the woman but the method of her travel: as Isaac saw camels, so the man of God will see the woman riding upon the gifts of the Spirit.
She asks the Spirit, is this the man? He says yes and she prepares herself by covering her outward beauty with godly humility. She steps off of her camel, which is a picture of the woman willingly lowering herself beneath the authority of her groom.
The Spirit brings her closer to the man of God and tells him, "look at this woman who has left everything behind to follow Me into the pursuit of God's will. Look at how she has crossed a desert of trials, riding upon the gifts of the Spirit. This woman is chosen by God to be the wife of whomever the Father desires and she has proven herself to be a servant of all, a traveler and a sojourner. Accept her and love her." And so the chapter ends with the words, "Isaac loved Rebekkah."
The Father will send His Spirit at the appropriate time to prepare wives for His sons. Until then men must be wholeheartedly in the fields of evangelism and prayer. When she does arrive, the man will know because of two things: he will see her riding upon the gifts of the Spirit instead of walking in her own strength. And the Spirit Himself will testify in the man's heart that God the Father has selected and prepared her, having first proven her worth as a helper by testing her willingness to serve strangers with the Word of Life.
Becoming Esther
This article is really good for all of you young ladies out there. It is also very applicable to us guys.
Becoming Esther
Becoming Esther
Others May - You Can Not
“Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. 38And whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. 39Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” (Matthew 10:37-39, ESV)
May the Lord bless you through these words from G.D. Watson:
If God has called you to be really like Christ in all your spirit, He will draw you into a life of crucifixion and humility and put on you such demands of obedience, that He will not allow you to follow other Christians, and in many ways He will seem to let other good people do things which He will not let you do.
Others can brag on themselves, and their work, on their success, on their writings, but the Holy Spirit will not allow you to do any such thing, and if you begin it, He will lead you into some deep mortification that will make you despise yourself and all you good works.
The Lord will let others be honored and put forward, and keep you hid away in obscurity because He wants to produce some choice fragrant fruit for His glory, which can be produced only in the shade.
Others will be allowed to succeed in making money, but it is likely God will keep you poor because he wants you to have something far better than gold and that is a helpless dependence on Him; that He may have the privilege of supplying your needs day by day - out of an unseen treasury.
God will let others be great, but He will keep you small. He will let others do a great work for Him and get credit for it, but He will make you work and toil on without knowing how much you are doing; and then to make your work still more precious, He will let others get the credit for the work you have done, and this will make your reward ten times greater when He comes.
The Holy Spirit will put strict watch over you, with a jealous love, and will rebuke you for little words and feelings, or for wasting your time, which other Christians never seem distressed over.
So make up your mind that God is an infinite Sovereign, and has a right to do what He pleases with His own, and He will not explain to you a thousand things which may puzzle your reason in His dealing with you. He will wrap you up in a jealous love, and let other people say and do many things that you cannot do or say.
Settle it forever, that you are to deal directly with the Holy Spirit, and that He is to have the privilege of tying your tongue, or chaining your hand, or closing your eyes, in ways that others are not dealt with.
Now, when you are so possessed with the Living God that you are, in your secret heart, pleased and delighted over this particular personal, private, jealous guardianship and management of the Holy Spirit over your life, you will have found the vestibule of heaven.
The Lausanne Covenant
The Lausanne Covenant is a documented covenant between 150 leaders of the evangelical community in 1974. Some leaders include John Stott, author of The Cross of Christ, and Billy Graham. The covenant is extremely interesting and has very good fundamental truths that many evangelicals today have forgotten. I enjoyed Chris Wright's of Langham Partnership International statement regarding this piece of work.
21ST CENTURY REFORMATION
‘My concern,’ said Chris Wright, ‘is not just that the world church should become more evangelical, but that world evangelicals should become more biblical. We need repentance and renewal in the church, as well as renewed passion for world mission. Otherwise, we may become, as the Lausanne Covenant put it, “a stumbling block to evangelism… a betrayal of the Gospel”. Indeed,’ he concluded, ‘my hope for Cape Town 2010 is that it would launch and foster nothing less than a 21st Century Reformation – among evangelicals, who need it as much as any other Christian bloc.’
For there are scandals and abuses in the evangelical world that are reminiscent of the worst features of the pre-reformation medieval church in Europe.
• There are some mega leaders, like ancient prelates, wielding vast wealth, power and control – unaccountable, unattractive and unChristlike.
• There are multitudes of ordinary Christians going to so-called evangelical churches, where they never hear the Bible preached or taught.
• Instead they are offered, in the ‘prosperity gospel’ a form of 21st century indulgences, except that you pay your money not for release from pains after death, but for material ‘blessings’ here and now.
• And there are evangelicals parading ungodly alliances with secular power – political, economic and military – identifying themselves (and the gospel they claim to preach) with agendas and ideologies that reflect human empire not the kingdom of God in Christ.Will we have the courage to identify and renounce such scandals and to seek a reformation of heart, mind and practice?
The 16th Century Reformation was criticized because it lacked missionary awareness and energy until much later. They were so obsessed with tackling abuses in the church that they neglected world mission. How ironic and tragic will it be if 21st Century evangelicals are so obsessed with world mission that we neglect abuses in the church, blind to our own idolatries and syncretism?
• If reformation without mission was defective,
• then mission without reformation will be deluded, self-defeating and even dangerous.The Lausanne Covenant, like the Bible itself, commits us to the integration of both.
50 Most Influential Churches
According to Church Report these are the 50 most influential churches in America. I sort of want to do a side by side comparison of doctrinal statements of each of these churches and line them up to new testament Christianity described by Jesus and lived out by the saints in the book of Acts.
Carnal Christian
My purpose in this booklet is to argue that this classification is wrong and to set out the positive, historic, and biblical answer to this 'carnal Christian' teaching. The argument from Church history is not unimportant, for it is a fact that less than two-hundred years ago this teaching was unknown in the churches of North America, but I am concerned to rest my case on an honest statement of the teaching of the Bible. I have written after study, private meditation and prayer, and after using many of the old respected commentaries of another day, but my appeal is to the Word of God and it is in the light of that authority that I ask the reader to consider all that follows.
Link: Ernest Reisinger - The Carnal Christian
Pragmatism and Entertainment
Definition:
A term, first used by CS Peirce in 1878, describing a doctrine that determines value through the test of consequences or utility. The pragmatist insists that no questions are significant unless the results of answering them in one way rather than another have practical consequences. The pragmatists' world is pluralistic, attentive to context, relativistic about truth and value, devoid of metaphysical concerns except as they have practical consequences. ...
The institutionalized church has fallen into this misconception that we should entertain our congregation to build up our numbers. This idea is tied hand in hand with the false teachings of marketing strategies for church growth and seeker sensitive methodologies. We should strive to continue to build authentic christian living and quit trying to fill pews with unregenerated and unconverted members. Below is a piece of an article that John McArthur wrote regarding this issue.
Just how far will the church go to compete with Hollywood? A large church in the southwestern United States has installed a half-million-dollar special-effects system that can produce smoke, fire, sparks, and laser lights in the auditorium. The church sent staff members to study live special effects at Bally's Casino in Las Vegas. The pastor ended one service by ascending to "heaven" via invisible wires that drew him up out of sight while the choir and orchestra added a musical accompaniment to the smoke, fire, and light show.4 It was just a typical Sunday show for that pastor: "He packs his church with such special effects as. . . cranking up a chain saw and toppling a tree to make a point. . . the biggest Fourth of July fireworks display in town and a Christmas service with a rented elephant, kangaroo and zebra. The Christmas show features 100 clowns with gifts for the congregation's children."5
Link: Article
Frank Laubach
Deep in the Congo, black tribesmen had a name for Frank Laubach. "Mender of Old Baskets," they called him. An old leaky basket can be patched so that it can carry grain without dribbling it on the ground. In the same way, an old, leaky mind can be taught new ideas. It can be taught to read.
Frank Laubach died at 85 on this day, June 11, 1970, having given his life to service for mankind. This especially took the form of teaching them how to read. He had become aware of the importance of literacy while serving as a missionary among Maranao Moro Muslims in the Philippines. Poverty and injustice crushed their lives. Much of it could be remedied, he decided, if only the people could read.Educated himself at Princeton, Columbia and Union Theological Seminary, Laubach conceived simple instructional primers and charts that allowed even these poor people to learn to read. Laubach also founded a community newspaper for them. Gradually he realized that he could enlist the newly-literate to teach their neighbors and friends. "Each one teach one," became his slogan.
After they were adapted for world-wide use, his methods are credited with equipping over one hundred million people with the ability to read, relieving mental and spiritual poverty.
In spiritual matters, most of us are poorer than we need to be. Laubach tried to call the attention of Christians to this fact. Any one of us can spend his day in Christ's presence, he observed. And yet we do not. He urged us to think to Christ instead of thinking to ourselves. And he suggested turning to Christ constantly for advice on what to do next:
"All during the day, in the chinks of time between the things we find ourselves obliged to do, there are the moments when our minds ask: 'What next?' In these chinks of time, ask Him: 'Lord, think Thy thoughts in my mind. What is on Thy mind for me to do now?' When we ask Christ, 'What next?' we tune in and give Him a chance to pour His ideas through our enkindled imagination. If we persist, it becomes a habit."
Laubach insisted that the most mediocre mind praising Christ could do more good for mankind "than all the cunning schemes of diplomats or the fine-spun guesses of philosophers who leave Jesus out."
The "Apostle of Literacy" and his wife Effa are buried in Benton, Pennsylvania under a tombstone that reads "World Missionaries."
Mega Church in Mega Division
There has been an extremely controversial message that was preached at the pulpit of one of the biggest churches in the city of Tucson. I have visited the church and have friends that have attended and served under the leadership there.
I will try to comment on the issues I have found in the sermon.
The primary issue of this sermon is it is a single individuals struggle to find truth in literal interpretation of scripture. Whites basic premise is that the bible is metaphorically written and its sole purpose is to help the reader find meaningful personal application. This in itself is error because the bible is not only meant for personal application but it is to demonstrate the characteristics and attributes of God, which is primarily done through the work of Jesus Christ on the cross. It is not wise to read the bible in order to fix your life's problems. It is read to learn and know God.
Next, White's theological understanding is heavily flawed in the fact that he is unable to discern symbolic and literal text. This is apparent in the way he concludes what is "far-fetched" and what is considered "reasonable" forms of Gods miracles. For instance, White says, resurrection of the dead is "reasonable" but creation in 6 24 hour days is "far-fetched". His line is never drawn and thus leads to very relativistic/post-modern idea of biblical interpretation. "whatever seems right is right".
In general White's sermon was extremely contradictory and showed how confused he is and thus casting doubt and confusion in the congregation. It was not God honoring and did not edify anyone.
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Sermon: Text
Sermon Audio: Link
I will try to comment on the issues I have found in the sermon.
The primary issue of this sermon is it is a single individuals struggle to find truth in literal interpretation of scripture. Whites basic premise is that the bible is metaphorically written and its sole purpose is to help the reader find meaningful personal application. This in itself is error because the bible is not only meant for personal application but it is to demonstrate the characteristics and attributes of God, which is primarily done through the work of Jesus Christ on the cross. It is not wise to read the bible in order to fix your life's problems. It is read to learn and know God.
Next, White's theological understanding is heavily flawed in the fact that he is unable to discern symbolic and literal text. This is apparent in the way he concludes what is "far-fetched" and what is considered "reasonable" forms of Gods miracles. For instance, White says, resurrection of the dead is "reasonable" but creation in 6 24 hour days is "far-fetched". His line is never drawn and thus leads to very relativistic/post-modern idea of biblical interpretation. "whatever seems right is right".
In general White's sermon was extremely contradictory and showed how confused he is and thus casting doubt and confusion in the congregation. It was not God honoring and did not edify anyone.
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Sermon: Text
Sermon Audio: Link
Funny
Ok, This really doesnt have anything to do with theology or christianity. But it did make me laugh alot =]
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I was at the checkout of a K-Mart. The clerk rang up $46.64 charge. I gave her a fifty dollar bill. She gave me back $46.64. I gave it back to her and told her that she had made a mistake in MY favor and gave her the money back. She became indignant and informed me she was educated and knew what she was doing, and returned the money again. I gave her the money back again...same scenario! I departed the store with the $46.64. This actually happened to me in Austin at MoPac Blvd and Parmer Lane.................They Walk Among Us and Many Work Retail.
One day I was walking down the beach with some friends when one of them shouted, "Look at that dead bird!" Someone looked up at the sky and said, "Where?"................They Walk Among Us!
While looking at a house, my brother asked the real estate agent which direction was north because, he explained, he didn't want the sun waking him up every morning. She asked, "Does the sun rise in the north?" When my brother explained that the sun rises in the east, and has for sometime, she shook her head an d said, "Oh I don't keep up with that stuff." ................They Walk Among Us!!
I used to work in technical support for a 24/7 call center. One day I got a call from an individual who asked what hours the call center was open. I told him, "The number you dialed is open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week." He responded, "Is that Eastern or Pacific time?" Wanting to end the call quickly, I said, "Uh, Pacific."...............They Walk Among Us!
My sister has a lifesaving tool in her car designed to cut through a seatbelt if she gets trapped. She keeps it in the trunk of her car.................They Walk Among Us!
I couldn't find my luggage at the airport baggage area, so I went to the lost luggage office and told the woman there that my bags never showed up. She smiled and told me not to worry because she was a trained professional and I was in good hands. "Now," she asked me, has your plane arrived yet?" ...............They Walk Among Us!
While working at a pizza parlor I observed a man ordering a small pizza to go. He appeared to be alone and the cook asked him if he would like it cut into 4 pieces or 6. He thought about it for some time before responding. "Just cut it into 4 pieces; I don't think I'm hungry enough to eat 6 pieces."................Yep, They Walk Among Us!
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I was at the checkout of a K-Mart. The clerk rang up $46.64 charge. I gave her a fifty dollar bill. She gave me back $46.64. I gave it back to her and told her that she had made a mistake in MY favor and gave her the money back. She became indignant and informed me she was educated and knew what she was doing, and returned the money again. I gave her the money back again...same scenario! I departed the store with the $46.64. This actually happened to me in Austin at MoPac Blvd and Parmer Lane.................They Walk Among Us and Many Work Retail.
One day I was walking down the beach with some friends when one of them shouted, "Look at that dead bird!" Someone looked up at the sky and said, "Where?"................They Walk Among Us!
While looking at a house, my brother asked the real estate agent which direction was north because, he explained, he didn't want the sun waking him up every morning. She asked, "Does the sun rise in the north?" When my brother explained that the sun rises in the east, and has for sometime, she shook her head an d said, "Oh I don't keep up with that stuff." ................They Walk Among Us!!
I used to work in technical support for a 24/7 call center. One day I got a call from an individual who asked what hours the call center was open. I told him, "The number you dialed is open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week." He responded, "Is that Eastern or Pacific time?" Wanting to end the call quickly, I said, "Uh, Pacific."...............They Walk Among Us!
My sister has a lifesaving tool in her car designed to cut through a seatbelt if she gets trapped. She keeps it in the trunk of her car.................They Walk Among Us!
I couldn't find my luggage at the airport baggage area, so I went to the lost luggage office and told the woman there that my bags never showed up. She smiled and told me not to worry because she was a trained professional and I was in good hands. "Now," she asked me, has your plane arrived yet?" ...............They Walk Among Us!
While working at a pizza parlor I observed a man ordering a small pizza to go. He appeared to be alone and the cook asked him if he would like it cut into 4 pieces or 6. He thought about it for some time before responding. "Just cut it into 4 pieces; I don't think I'm hungry enough to eat 6 pieces."................Yep, They Walk Among Us!
Keith Green Story
The KEITH GREEN STORY -
Keith Green was a fiery young prophet/ musician from the late1970's/ early 1980's. His music and ministry impacted a wholegeneration of youth for Jesus. Here is a well-made documentaryabout his life - in seven small parts.
The links to all 7 are below-
PART ONE-http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6hOyx8LF4I
PART TWO-http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OWqolYSEihM
PART THREE-http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6I9dLO63YlA
PART FOUR-http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5edisiviuM
PART FIVE-http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5edisiviuM
PART SIX-http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-FCSYf4OIe8
PART SEVEN-http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Em5Dwsh0S8A
God bless you all.
Early Christian Writings
More early christian writings. Here is a free e-book for anyone to download and read.
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What did Christianity look like before it became an institution?
In these firsthand accounts of the early church, the spirit of Pentecost burns with prophetic force through the fog that envelops the modern church. A clear and vibrant faith lives on in these writings, providing a guide for Christians today. Its stark simplicity and revolutionary fervor will stun those lulled by conventional Christianity.
Early Christian Writings in their own Words
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What did Christianity look like before it became an institution?
In these firsthand accounts of the early church, the spirit of Pentecost burns with prophetic force through the fog that envelops the modern church. A clear and vibrant faith lives on in these writings, providing a guide for Christians today. Its stark simplicity and revolutionary fervor will stun those lulled by conventional Christianity.
Early Christian Writings in their own Words
Charles Spurgeon on Prayer
How I delight to listen to a brother who talks to God simply and from his heart; and I must confess I have no small liking to those rare, old-fashioned prayers, which are now quite out of date. For the most part we are getting too fine and respectable nowadays; too genteel to allow of prayers such as once made the walls to ring and ring again.
O for a revival of these glorious, violent prayers, which flew like hot shot against the battlements of heaven! (Matt. 11:12).O for more moving of the posts of the door in vehemence, more thundering at the gates of mercy! I would sooner attend a prayer meeting where there were groans and cries all over the place, and cries and shouts of "Hallelujah!" than be in our polite assemblies where everything is dull as death and decorous as the whitewashed sepulchre!O for more of the prayer of God, the body, soul, and spirit working together, the whole man being aroused and startled up to the highest pitch of intensity—to wrestle with the Most High! (Gen. 32:24-28).
Such, I have no doubt, the prayer of Jesus was on the cold mountainside.
Want to be a missionary?
Do you desire to be a missionary? Do you sense God’s call? Are you burdened for His glory and the souls of men? This is good, but it is not enough! You must now give yourself to the tedious endeavor of preparation:
Submit to Godly Leadership: “You younger men, likewise, be subject to your elders; and all of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, for God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble” (I Peter 5:5).
Associate with the Wise: “He who walks with wise men will be wise, But the companion of fools will suffer harm” (Proverbs 13:20).
Study to Show Yourself Approved:
“Be diligent to present yourself approved to God as a workman who does not need to be ashamed, accurately handling the word of truth” (II Timothy 2:15).
Become an Intercessor:
“I searched for a man among them who would build up the wall and stand in the gap before Me for the land, so that I would not destroy it; but I found no one” (Ezekiel 22:30).
Be Faithful to Serve in Your Local Church:
“His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful slave. You were faithful with a few things, I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your master’” (Matthew 25:21).
Prepare Yourself for a Life of Sacrifice: Understand that missions is nothing more and nothing less than an opportunity to die (Amy Carmichael).
Being a missionary is much different from a “mission trip” or attending a missions conference. It is a hard work which demands enduring sacrifice and promises few temporal rewards.
- HeartCry Magazine 52nd Ed. Page 14-15
Submit to Godly Leadership: “You younger men, likewise, be subject to your elders; and all of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, for God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble” (I Peter 5:5).
Associate with the Wise: “He who walks with wise men will be wise, But the companion of fools will suffer harm” (Proverbs 13:20).
Study to Show Yourself Approved:
“Be diligent to present yourself approved to God as a workman who does not need to be ashamed, accurately handling the word of truth” (II Timothy 2:15).
Become an Intercessor:
“I searched for a man among them who would build up the wall and stand in the gap before Me for the land, so that I would not destroy it; but I found no one” (Ezekiel 22:30).
Be Faithful to Serve in Your Local Church:
“His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful slave. You were faithful with a few things, I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your master’” (Matthew 25:21).
Prepare Yourself for a Life of Sacrifice: Understand that missions is nothing more and nothing less than an opportunity to die (Amy Carmichael).
Being a missionary is much different from a “mission trip” or attending a missions conference. It is a hard work which demands enduring sacrifice and promises few temporal rewards.
- HeartCry Magazine 52nd Ed. Page 14-15
Polycarp of Smyrna
This is truely an incredible historical account of faithfulness to our Lord and Savior. Polycarp was a friend and disciple of the beloved Apostle John and appointed bishop of Smyrna during the first century church. The below is an account of his death and steadfast faithfulness.
----------------------------------------------"He who gives me the strength to bear the flames," he said. "will enable me to remain steady." - Polycarp
Part 1
CHAPTER IV: ST. POLYCARP (AD 166)
About the same time with Justin the Martyr, St. Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna, was put to death. He was a very old man; for it was almost ninety years since he had been converted from heathenism. He had known St. John, and is supposed to have been made bishop of Smyrna by that Apostle himself, and he had been a friend of St. Ignatius, who, as we have seen, suffered martyrdom fifty years before. From all these things, and from his wise and holy character, he was looked up to as a father by all the Churches, and his mild advice had sometimes put all end to differences of opinion which but for him might have turned into lasting quarrels.
When the persecution reached Smyrna, in the reign of Marcus Aurelius, a number of Christians suffered with great constancy, and the heathen multitude, being provoked at their refusal to give up their faith, cried out for the death of Polycarp. The aged bishop, although he was ready to die for his Saviour, remembered that it was not right to throw himself in the way of danger; so he left the city, and went first to one village in the neighborhood and then to another. But he was discovered in his hiding-place, and when he saw the soldiers who were come to seize him, he calmly said, "God's will be done!" He desired that some food should be given to them, and while they were eating, he spent the time in prayer. He was then set on an ass, and led towards Smyrna; and, when he was near the town, one of the heathen magistrates came by in his chariot, and took him up into it. The magistrate tried to persuade Polycarp to sacrifice to the gods; but finding that he could make nothing of him, he pushed him out of the chariot so roughly that the old man fell and broke his leg. But Polycarp bore the pain without showing how much he was hurt, and the soldiers led him into the amphitheatre, where great numbers of people were gathered together. When all these saw him, they set up loud cries of rage and savage delight; but Polycarp thought, as he entered the place, that he heard a voice saying to him, "Be strong and play the man!" and he did not heed all the shouting of the crowd. The governor desired him to deny Christ, and said that, if he would, his life should be spared. But the faithful bishop answered "Fourscore and six years have I served Christ, and He hath never done me wrong; how then can I now blaspheme my King and Saviour?" The governor again and again urged him, as if in a friendly way, to sacrifice; but Polycarp stedfastly refused. He next threatened to let wild beasts loose on him, and as Polyearp still showed no fear, he said that he would burn him alive. "You threaten me," said the bishop, "with a fire which lasts but a short time; but you know not of that eternal fire which is prepared for the wicked." A stake was then set up, and a pile of wood was collected around it. Polycarp walked to the place with a calm and cheerful look, and, as the executioners were going to fasten him to the stake with iron cramps, he begged them to spare themselves the trouble. "He who gives me the strength to bear the flames," he said. "will enable me to remain steady." He was therefore only tied to the stake with cords, and as he stood thus bound, he uttered a thanksgiving for being allowed to suffer after the pattern of his Lord and Saviour. When his prayer was ended, the wood was set on fire, but we are told that the flames swept round him, looking like the sail of a ship swollen by the wind, while he remained unhurt in the midst of then. One of the executioners, seeing this, plunged a sword into the martyr's breast, and the blood rushed forth in such a stream that it put out the fire. But the persecutors, who were resolved that the Christians should not have their bishop's body, lighted the wood again, and burnt the corpse, so that only a few of the bones remained; and these the Christians gathered out, and gave them an honourable burial. It was on Easter eve that St. Polycarp suffered, in the year of our Lord 166.
Lost Doctrine of Church Discipline
After a couple days of reading 1 Corinthians and seeing Pauls concern about the wayward behavior of the congregation in Corinth I have been led to research the concept of church discipline. I have noticed that there is a lack of this practice and lack of mention in our churches today and would encourage our elders, deacons and pastors to relook at this important piece of church history.
Read more here
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In such corrections and excommunication, the church has three ends in view. The first is that they who lead a filthy and infamous life may not be called Christians, to the dishonor of God, as if his holy church [cf. <490525> Ephesians 5:25-26] were a conspiracy of wicked and abandoned men. For since the church itself is the body of Christ [ <510124> Colossians 1:24], it cannot be corrupted by such foul and decaying members without some disgrace falling upon its Head. Therefore, that there may be no such thing in the church to brand its most sacred name with disgrace, they from whose wickedness infamy redounds to the Christian name must be banished from its family. And here also we must preserve the order of the Lord’s Supper, that it may not be profaned by being administered indiscriminately.F404 For it is very true that he to whom its distribution has been committed, if he knowingly and willingly admits an unworthy person whom he could rightfully turn away, is as guilty of sacrilege as if he had cast the Lord’s body to dogs. On this account, Chrysostom gravely inveighs against priests who, fearing the power of great men, dare exclude no one. "Blood," he says, "will be required at your hands. [ <260318> Ezekiel 3:18; 33:8.] If you fear a man, he will laugh at you; but if you fear God, you will be revered also among men. Let us not dread the fasces, the purple, the crowns; here we have a greater power. I truly would rather give my body to death, and let my blood be poured out, than participate in that pollution."F405 Therefore, lest this most hallowed mystery be disgraced, discretion is very much needed in its distribution. Yet this can be had only through the jurisdiction of the church.
The second purpose is that the good be not corrupted by the constant company of the wicked, as commonly happens. For (such is our tendency to wander from the way) there is nothing easier than for us to be led away by bad examples from right living. The apostle noted this tendency when he bade the Corinthians expel the incestuous man from their company. "A little leaven," he says, "ferments the whole lump." [ <460506> 1 Corinthians 5:6.] And he foresaw such great danger here that he prohibited all association with him. "If any brother," he says, "bears among you the name of fornicator, miser, worshiper of idols, drunkard, or reviler, I do not allow you even to take food with such a man." [ <460511> 1 Corinthians 5:11 p.]
The third purpose is that those overcome by shame for their baseness begin to repent. They who under gentler treatment would have become more stubborn so profit by the chastisement of their own evil as to be awakened when they feel the rod. The apostle means this when he speaks as follows: "If anyone does not obey our teaching, note that man; and do not mingle with him, that he may be ashamed" [ <530314> 2 Thessalonians 3:14 p.]. Likewise, in another passage, when he writes that he has delivered the Corinthian man to Satan: "that his spirit may be saved in the Day of the Lord" [ <460505> 1 Corinthians 5:5]; that is (as I interpret it), Paul gave him over to temporary condemnation that he might have eternal salvation. But he speaks of "delivering over to Satan" because the devil is outside the church, as Christ is in the church.F406 Some authorities refer this phrase to a certain vexing of the flesh,F407 but this seems very doubtful to me.
Challenged By An Atheist
This atheist had a better conception of our understanding of eternity then most professing believers today. I can see why it challenged C.T. Studd to recognize that the normal Christian life is to live with an eternally focused mindset.
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A Letter From An Atheist
Eye Opening Insights
"You are really convinced that you've got all the answers. You've really got yourself tricked into believing that you're 100% right. Well, let me tell you just one thing. Do you consider yourself to be compassionate of other humans? If you're right, as you say you are, and you believe that, then how can you sleep at night? When you speak with me, you are speaking with someone who you believe is walking directly into eternal damnation, into an endless onslaught of horrendous pain which your 'loving' god created, yet you stand by and do nothing.
If you believed one bit that thousands every day were falling into an eternal and unchangeable fate, you should be running the streets mad with rage at their blindness. That's equivalent to standing on a street corner and watching every person that passes you walk blindly directly into the path of a bus and die, yet you stand idly by and do nothing. You're just twiddling your thumbs, happy in the knowledge that one day that 'walk' signal will shine your way across the road.
Think about it. Imagine the horrors Hell must have in store if the Bible is true. You're just going to allow that to happen and not care about saving anyone but yourself? If you're right then you're an uncaring, unemotional and purely selfish (expletive) that has no right to talk about subjects such as love and caring."
Life Changing Incident For C.T. Studd
One of the turning points in the life of Studd, diverting him to a life of missionary leadership from athletic fame and financial ease, was a brief tract. An atheist wrote the lines: “Did I firmly believe, as millions say they do, that the knowledge and practice of religion in this life influences destiny in another, religion would mean everything to me. I would cast away earthly enjoyments as dross, earthly cares as follies, and earthly thoughts and feelings as vanity. Religion would be my first waking thought and my last image before sleep sank me into unconsciousness. I should labour in its cause alone. I would take thought for the morrow of Eternity alone. I would esteem one soul gained for heaven worth a life of suffering. Earthly consequences should never stay my hand nor seal my lips. Earth—its joys and its griefs—would occupy no moment of my thoughts. I would strive to look upon Eternity alone and on the immortal souls around me soon to be everlastingly happy or everlastingly miserable. I would go forth to the world and preach to it in season and out of season, and my text would be, ‘What shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his soul?’“Whether or not this was composed in mockery of the church, we do know that Studd, who captained the cricket team of Cambridge in his last year (1883), ranks as one of the greatest athletes that England has ever known. With his two brothers he established a record never yet matched at the University of Cambridge, each of them serving as captain of the cricket team in successive years. And with six other distinguished young men, C. T. Studd formed the well-known “Cambridge Seven” that went out to China on missionary service. Ten years afterwards Studd was touring the American universities at the start of the famous Student Volunteer movement of this land. In 1910 once again he commanded attention by starting to evangelize the largest unreached mission field of Africa. And to think that an atheist helped to point the way! “The children of this world are in their generation wiser than the children of light,” our Lord said.
Does the present generation of believers need the same kind of awakening as Studd? In the opinion of many, Satan is lulling the church into a sense of contentment and relaxation today, so far as the great essentials of the Faith are concerned, hiding from vision, for example, the primary task to reach the ends of the earth with Christ’s message. The Evil One knows by long experience how to circumscribe thought, so that all our concern focuses on the local congregation and denomination as if the church was needing our support rather than lending us all our support in virtue of its own inherent strength, born of God. In some cases today, too, the Enemy sidetracks conservative Christians by promoting useless controversy (whether with true or false brethren, it really makes little difference in the end). He can even halt the progress of world evangelization by getting us occupied with church union, since that often amounts to no more than far-fetched, impractical plans for organization and administration. It is not difficult to bury oneself under statistics and the burden of committee meetings, harmonizing activities of one sort or another. Not that all of this is uncalled for, but simply that basic things may not be kept foremost, putting first what Christ Himself placed first.
To be sure, our own house must be put in order before those outside can be proffered aid. But let it never be forgotten that a worldwide ministry will prove a blessing in the meantime, as a definite means to the end that the church at home be revived. Experience will testify to this. Outside interest, so far from weakening the home church, will divert into other channels what otherwise might be a rising tide of selfishness with its attendant bickering.
Starting this thing up
Hello, I Just wanted to start up a blog about Christian writing, poetry, and preaching that has affected my way of thinking and attitude. I pray some will be moved with these ideas.
Seek those things that produce the loving nature of Jesus in our lives. I would rather have the wrong facts and a right attitude, than right facts and a wrong attitude. God can change my understanding of the facts in a moment, but it often takes a lifetime to effect changes of attitude.
-Chuck Smith