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 - Endorsed - Indifferent - Contested
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| The Nashville Statement
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Name:Daniel
Home: Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada
About Me: I used to believe that evolution was reasonable, that homosexuality was genetic, and that people became Christians because they couldn't deal with the 'reality' that this life was all there was. I used to believe, that if there was a heaven - I could get there by being good - and I used to think I was more or less a good person. I was wrong on all counts. One day I finally had my eyes opened and I saw that I was not going to go to heaven, but that I was certainly going to suffer the wrath of God for all my sin. I saw myself as a treasonous rebel at heart - I hated God for creating me just to send me to Hell - and I was wretched beyond my own comprehension. Into this spiritual vacuum Jesus Christ came and he opened my understanding - delivering me from God's wrath into God's grace. I was "saved" as an adult, and now my life is hid in Christ. I am by no means sinless, but by God's grace I am a repenting believer - a born again Christian.
My complete profile...
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Daniel's posts are almost always pastoral and God centered. I appreciate and am challenged by them frequently. He has a great sense of humor as well.
- Marc Heinrich
His posts are either funny or challenging. He is very friendly and nice.
- Rose Cole
[He has] good posts, both the serious like this one, and the humorous like yesterday. [He is] the reason that I have restrained myself from making Canadian jokes in my posts.
- C-Train
This post contains nothing that is of any use to me. What were you thinking? Anyway, it's probably the best I've read all day.
- David Kjos
Daniel, nicely done and much more original than Frank the Turk.
- Jonathan Moorhead
There are some people who are smart, deep, or funny. There are not very many people that are all 3. Daniel is one of those people. His opinion, insight and humor have kept me coming back to his blog since I first visited earlier this year.
- Carla Rolfe
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| Encouragement In Prayer |
When we get together for prayer, it happens that some are laboring in the strength of their sincerity, and in the hope of their piety, to move God to look upon their request with mercy.
Yet others come to prayer filled with joy in this act of worship and fellowship - not trusting in their own piety to open God's bowels of compassion as though they could encourage God to answer their prayers by being especially sincere, or especially pious, but these have learned that they are not calling God into their work, but have been called by Him into His work. They regard themselves as His ministers, working in His field, and trust that it is His work they are about, and not their own. They do not fret about whether or when God will do His work, for it is God's work, and they trust that He is a fit Manager.
I encourage you, especially when you come to pray for something that seems impossible or difficult, to consider whether this is God's work, or your own - and if you can say with certainty that this is God's work, and that you are His worker - then take courage brother, sister, for you are not laboring to move God, rather He is laboring to move you. Believe therefore that you are not calling down heaven to do your bidding, but heaven is calling you to do its bidding. Have the heart in you that is a servants heart, and not a beggars.
Do not imagine it a noble thing to beg of God, as though God were some tyrant who is withholding good - rather imagine yourself a soldier, and God your general, and know that your prayer is just your communication to your Commander explaining what you will need, or others will need, in order to see His plan completed.
You are not the Initiator of prayer, God knows already what you will pray, prayer is for -your- benefit, and you should enter into it with praise, because it is worship. Yes, there will be broken hearted prayers, yes, there will be tears, yes, you will feel alone on the battle field at times, and cry out in what seems to you to be intolerable isolation - but you are not alone, and you are not forsaken. No one said that the war was going to be easy, but you are promised victory, and promised to never be left to fend for yourself. You are a soldier in God's army - your battlefield is your own desires, which you are to make war upon daily - and prayer is given you as a means by which you may be edified, and edify others in the struggle. It is not something you do to make things happen, it is something God gives you so that you can be edified in longing for what He longs for, in sharing His deepest longings.
Pray therefore, not timidly wringing your hat in your hands and begging - but as a child of the King of kings, as one of royal blood, who comes into the royal palace seeking what is needed to carry out the will of Him who sits on the throne. You are not a beggar, you are a cherished son, a prince. Have you been asked to pray for something that seems impossible to you? Good gravy!
God doesn't hear you because you are pious, He hears you because you are His child, and if you think a thing is impossible, it is because you forget who God is, or you imagine that prayers are answered according to how well you have brokered your piety. Throw that in the trash heap today, and pray with that Spirit that cries out, "Abba, Father!" - and know that you are entering into His work when you do.Labels: prayer |
posted by Daniel @
7:02 AM
 
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| 5 Comments: |
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I like to put one of these up every now and again - it is good to be reminded of these things.
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It is also good to discuss them.
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It is good to be reminded. I need to be reminded often of this. When I started praying the way the Bible outlines prayer, I noticed those prayers being answered. But the Bible changed my prayer requests. Instead of requesting a change of circumstance, I requested a change of heart. That boosted my faith in God hearing my requests, because He answered them. I know that God controls all circumstances, and though I still bring them to God, I know that they are not as dire a situation as my own heart sickness is.
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Our father never turns away from His children. Even when we grieve Him.
It seems throughout my prayer life, that the Lord has answered my prayers that were complaints, and my prayers for others with a heavy, heavy heart, and my prayers of joy.
But mostly, my prayers are ones of need. I need the Lord every hour.
Just as the hymn writer said.
This was a good post. And it's such a powerful truth to realize we are His children, and He is our gracious and loving sovereign "Abba Father".
thanks.
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I should have added a caveat: "Don't pray for a million dollars and expect God to reward your greed."
Sometimes people think of prayer and faith as though God was saying, "If you can convince yourself that I will say yes to anything you ask, then I will give you whatever you ask" - as though faith were a matter of positive thinking, and as though God were a spiritual vending machine just waiting to give people whatever they want.
We can ask the impossible of God, only when that request isn't rising up to aid and abet some sinful lust. If we ask God to win the lottery, guess what? Our loving God knows that greed is destroying us, and certainly isn't going to augment that which destroys us just because we are in bondage to the thing that is killing us. God isn't likely to answer those prayer that would damage us spiritually if they were answered as asked.
Just a caveat.
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I like to put one of these up every now and again - it is good to be reminded of these things.