Becoming A Best Friend of God
Rick Warren said:
You will never grow a close relationship with God by just attending church once a week or even having a daily quiet time. Friendship with God is built by sharing all your life experiences with him.
Of course, it is important to establish the habit of a daily devotional time with God, but he wants more than an appointment in your schedule. He wants to be included in every activity, every conversation, every problem, and even every thought.
You can carry on a continuous, open-ended conversation with him throughout your day, talking with him about whatever you are doing or thinking at that moment.
“Praying without ceasing” means conversing with God while shopping, driving, working, or performing any other everyday tasks.
Prayer, what's it all about
Stormie Omartian
Prayer is much more than just giving a list of desires to God, as if He were the great Sugar Daddy/Santa Claus in the sky. Prayer is acknowledging and experiencing the presence of God and inviting His presence into our lives and circumstances. It’s seeking the presence of God and releasing the power of God which gives us the means to overcome any problem.
Rev. Egerton C. Long
As Christians somehow we do not realise the power of prayer or understand its usefulness. We know about it but do not use it. For most of us it could be said that we lack a proper understanding of what prayer is all about.
Or perhaps we have been disappointed in prayer. So many say “I prayed once and nothing happened.” But God, the Almighty God, our Heavenly Father does hear and does answer prayer.
When we pray we are acknowledging the presence of a God, One who is all-powerful. We grasp the assurance of His love and can wait on His guidance for direction. Prayer is the contact of a living soul with a living God. It is personal, a conversation — it’s simply talking to God and listening to Him.
How to Begin
In our Christian life, we all would have experienced once or serveral times when we did not know how to pray, or what to pray. Is it really that hard?
Prayers are not just means which we ask God to do things for us, but they are in fact the intimate and personal conversations with our dear father in heaven.
Following are excerpts from Prayer, what’s it all about?, Rev. Egerton C. Long, Mission Publications of Australia.
Conditions for Praying
When we pray, remember these:
- We need to pray with our hearts prepared.
Known sin must be confessed to God (1 John 1:9). Then fellowship with God needs to be maintained by continuing obedience to His Word (John 15:7, 1 John 3:21-24).
- We need to pray with a desire for God’s glory
that He might be glorified by the answer (John 14:13).
- We must pray according to the will of God.
Read and study the Bible and make your requests consistent with its principles.
- We must pray in Jesus’ Name.
Our access to the Father is only through the Son (Ephesians 2:18, 1 Timothy 2:5).
- We must pray with sincere meaningful language.
Our prayer must come from a sincere heart which desires to be in the presence of God. Make our prayers personal, as if we were talking visibly to Him, face to face.
- We must pray definitely and specifically.
A prayer list of specific requests is helpful. Record the date you first asked and the date God answered.
- We must pray persistently with boldness
until God answers (Luke 11:8, 1 Thessalonians 5:17). Give God time to answer.
- We must pray believing that God will answer.
Faith is essential. Claim the promises regarding prayer and claim their fulfilment, thanking him already for the answer. “No” is just as much as an answer as “yes”.
- We must pray with a submissive spirit.
‘Not my will, but yours be done’.
- We must praise God and pray
even when we least feel like it. Be honest with God. He understands.
- Pray with a friend, or with a group of God’s people.
This can ease burdens and bring real encouragement.
Content of Prayer
Here are the essential areas which should come frequently into our praying.
- Adoration.
Acknowledge who God is. Worship and praise Him in the prayers.
- Thanksgiving.
Acknowledge what God has done and thank Him for doing it.
- Confession.
Acknowledge what we have done. Confessing our sin brings forgiveness and restoration of fellowship with the Father (1 John 1:9).
- Intercession.
Pray for others and their needs (1 Timothy 2:1) – for those who do not know God personally (1 Timothy 2:4), for those ministering God’s Word (Ephesians 6:19-20), for other Christians in need (James 5:16), for believers out of fellowship with God (1 John 5:16) and those who wrong us (Matthew 5:44).
- Petition
In our times of trouble we can come to God for comfort and strength (Matthew 11:28-30, Hebrews 4:16). Ask Him to develop our spiritual life and to form the character of Christ in us; to increase our love for Him, for His Word and for others (Romans 8:32). There is no limit to the things we can ask God for, provided they are within the broad scope of His will.
Points to Note
- Our prayers should be addressed to the Father in the name of the Son (John 14:13) with the help of the Holy Spirit (Romans 8:26).
- The posture of prayer can be every position we could think of.
- We can pray to God any time (Luke 18:1). Effective intercession, however, often requires regular, even prolonged praying.
- We can pray to God at any place (1 Timothy 2:8). It is wonderful to be assured and aware of His constant presence with us wherever we may be.
So then, posture, time, or place are not what makes prayer.
What is important is the attitude of our hearts towards God. Jesus said ‘God is Spirit and his worshippers must worship in spirit and in truth’ (John 4:24).
God May Say ‘No’
Why does God say no when we earnestly asking Him to say yes?
- God may say ‘No’ when He has something better planned for us.
Has God ever done this for you – said no to your request and then later you saw how He had something better planned for you?
- God may say ‘No’ when it is not His will.
This was experienced by Paul (2 Corinthians 12:7-10). His request was not granted but God assured Paul of His sustaining grace to meet this continuing trial.
- God may say ‘No’ when it is not His time.
His answer may be delayed as a test of our faith. Or He may have further work to do in us, before He can use us in the way we are asking Him to do (James 1:6-8, 1 Peter 1:6-7).
Things Hindering Praying
There are times that we need to make personal decision and take action, or even have strong discipline to deal with the
- external distractions, such as the TV, the radio, the telephone, family demands, pressure of our employment or other problems, or
- internal, personal distractions, such as fatigure, procrastination, wandering thoughts, emotional upsets, lack of faith, lack of persistence or even impatience with God as we have seen before.
With the help of the vey One to whom we are praying, by following Christ’s example in Mark 1:35, and spend time with God before we do anything else. We can be honest with God even telling Him that we don’t feel like praying and He understands how human we are (Hebrews 4:15-16).
Things Hindering God’s Answering
- Defective relationships in the home (1 Peter 3:7)
We may need to humble ourselves and say ‘I am sorry’ to someone we’ve wronged before God can answer our prayers.
- Problems in the heart, such as unconfessed sin
God cannot condemn sin in a sinner and condone it in a saint. (Matthew 5:23-24, 6:14-15 & Ephesians 4:32) Unrelinquished sin can stand in the way of God answering. Psalm 66:18 says plainly: ‘If I had cherished sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened.’
- Being disobedient to a directive He has given us for our life.
Or we may be unwilling to give up a relationship or an ‘idol’ in our life which displeases God. Any of these problems can prevent God answering our prayers.
Pray for Evans Head SUFM team
0 comments | Posted by St Peters on 23 Nov 2009 in :: St. Peter's News
Hi there,
You are a part of this email as someone from your congregation has joined the Evans Head SUFM team this year.
We would love for you to be sharing in our ministry by praying for us, as we head out into the mission field.
There are a number of prayer requests and we think that it is really exciting that you (and your congregation) can be supporting us over the next 2-3 months.
For any more details please don’t hesitate to contact me.
Katrina Orenstein
Director
Evans Head SUFM
Scripture Union
trina_9000@hotmail.com
Prayer points for SRE at Killara High
0 comments | Posted by St Peters on 06 Sep 2009 in :: St. Peter's News
compiled by Matt Mulready, KHS
Thanking God…
SRE teachers; Pete Stevenson, Pete Horden, Rob Hughes, Dan Perritt, David Chen, Jason Street, Adam Clark, Kimberlee Gross
The continued enthusiasm & initiative of the TAG Team student leaders
Stuart Pratt’s work coordinating SRE
5 new Year 9/10 girls who came to TAG last week
The freedom to teach
Continue reading ...
