prayer

Day 17 – The Prayer Cafe “31 Day Challenge”

October 23, 2015

TCU-44-sw-gevelot

Day 17

 

‘Call to me and I will answer you and tell you great and unsearchable things you do not know.’ – Jeremiah 33:3

 

“For prayer is of transcendent importance. Prayer is the mightiest agent to advance God’s work. Praying hearts and hands only can do God’s work. Prayer succeeds when all else fails. Prayer has won great victories, and rescued, with notable triumph, God’s saints when every other hope was gone. Men who know how to pray are the greatest boon God can give to earth—they are the richest gift earth can offer heaven. Men who know how to use this weapon of prayer are God’s best soldiers. His mightiest leaders.” – E.M. Bounds

 

Let us pray:

Father we desire to be weapon experts when it comes to prayer. As female and male soldiers we want to be ready and well prepared for the battles that lie ahead.

Thank you for the experiences, trials, tribulations, and victories we have experienced so far through, with, and in prayer. Thank you for fashioning us via Your grace to be soldiers of valor.

Although it may be tough, we look forward to the future training challenges. We know they will force us to grow as prayer weapon experts. May Your plan and purpose for our lives be made manifest. This is our prayer today. We love You. Amen.

 

#Call #Weapon #Expert #Soldier

 

 

Day 15 – The Prayer Cafe “31 Day Challenge”

October 21, 2015

lionofjudah

Day 15

 

The end of all things is near. Therefore be alert and of sober mind so that you may pray. – 1 Peter 4:7

  

“God, our Father, we are exceedingly frail and indisposed to every virtuous and gallant undertaking. Strengthen our weakness, we beseech you, that we may do valiantly in this spiritual war; help us against our own negligence and cowardice, and defend us from the treachery of our unfaithful hearts, for Jesus Christ’s sake.” – Thomas Kempis

 

Let us pray:

Lord, hear our prayers.

 

#Honesty #SoberMind #BeAlert

 

Day 14 – The Prayer Cafe “31 Day Challenge”

October 20, 2015

CommunionBreadWine-300x229

Day 14

 

But to you who are listening I say: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. – Luke 6:27-28

 

“True prayers are born of present trials and present needs. Bread for today is bread enough. Bread given for today is the strongest sort of pledge that there will be bread tomorrow. Victory today is the assurance of victory tomorrow. Our prayers need to be focused upon the present. We must trust God today, and leave the morrow entirely with Him. The present is ours; the future belongs to God. Prayer is the task and duty of each recurring day — daily prayer for daily needs.” – E.M. Bounds

 

Let us pray:

Give us this day our daily bread, our daily sustenance, our daily understanding, our daily protection, and our daily communion. Thank you for being such a great provider, supporter, and friend. Thank you that we cannot even imagine what Your abundance looks like for our lives. We humbly receive it and as little children we smile knowing we are loved so tremendously. 

Thank you Daddy.

 

#Trust #Provision #Daily #Grace

 

 

Day 13 – The Prayer Cafe “31 Day Challenge”

October 19, 2015

Secret-place

Day 13

 

When you pray, go into your room, and when you have shut your door, pray to your Father who is in the secret place; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly. – Matthew 6:6

 

“Jesus did not say, “Dream about your Father who is in the secret place,” but He said, “…pray to your Father who is in the secret place….” Prayer is an effort of the will. After we have entered our secret place and shut the door, the most difficult thing to do is to pray. We cannot seem to get our minds into good working order, and the first thing we have to fight is wandering thoughts. The great battle in private prayer is overcoming this problem of our idle and wandering thinking. We have to learn to discipline our minds and concentrate on willful, deliberate prayer. It is impossible to carry on your life as a disciple without definite times of secret prayer.” – Oswald Chambers

 

Let us pray:

Find that secret prayer today.

 

#Honesty #Separation #MakeTime #SecretPlace

 

Day 12 – The Prayer Cafe “31 Day Challenge”

October 18, 2015

Prayer-Closet

Day 12

 

Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need. – Hebrews 4:16

 

“The little estimate we put on prayer is evident from the little time we give to it. The time given to prayer by the average preacher scarcely counts in the sum of the daily aggregate. Not infrequently the preacher’s only praying is by his bedside in his nightdress, ready for bed and soon in it, with, perchance the addition of a few hasty snatches of prayer ere he is dressed in the morning. How feeble, vain, and little is such praying compared with the time and energy devoted to praying by holy men in and out of the Bible! How poor and mean our petty, childish praying is beside the habits of the true men of God in all ages! To men who think praying their main business and devote time to it according to this high estimate of its importance does God commit the keys of his kingdom, and by them does he work his spiritual wonders in this world. Great praying is the sign and seal of God’s great leaders and the earnest of the conquering forces with which God will crown their labors.” – Oswald Chambers

 

Let us pray:

Father forgive me. I am guilty as charged. Help me establish prayer as my main business.

 

#Wonderful #Grace #DeepCallingDeep #Embrace

 

Day 11 – The Prayer Cafe “31 Day Challenge”

October 17, 2015

SELF-RELIANCE

Day 11

 

For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them. – Matthew 18:20

 

“What the Church needs to-day is not more machinery or better, not new organizations or more and novel methods, but men whom the Holy Ghost can use — men of prayer, men mighty in prayer. The Holy Ghost does not flow through methods, but through men. He does not come on machinery, but on men. He does not anoint plans, but men — men of prayer.” – E.M. Bounds

 

Let us pray:

There are many of us, women and men, who are looking for answers and looking for guidance Lord. We need You. Sometimes we stumble along the way with our best designed plans. We are brilliant people, but the truth is we don’t see everything. We need You.

There is a sect of us who hold our sacred allegiance to self-reliance. Help us to find our alliance and reliance in You. Help us to be MIGHTY merely because we find our MIGHT in prayer, through prayer, and with prayer. Help transform the lens through which we see prayer in this season. Help us to be found in You because of prayer. 

This is our prayer today. Amen.

 

#Prayer #Strength #Mighty #Reliance

 

Day 10 – The Prayer Cafe “31 Day Challenge”

October 16, 2015

bedtime-prayer-sterling-brown_grande

Day 10

 

Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. – Jeremiah 29:12

 

A Prayer for the Grace of Devotion

O Lord, my God, you are my all and every good.  And what am I, that I should presume to address you?  I am the poorest of your servants and a wretched worm, far more poor and worthless than I can ever realize or express.  Yet, Lord, remember that I am nothing: I have nothing, and can do nothing.  You alone are good, just and holy; you can do all things, fill all things, bestow all things, leaving only the wicked empty-handed.  Remember your mercies, Lord, and fill my heart with your grace, since it is your will that none of your works should be worthless.  How can I endure this life of sorrows, unless you strengthen me with your mercy and grace?  Do not turn your face from me; do not delay your coming, nor withdraw your consolation from me, lest my soul become like a waterless desert.  Teach me, O Lord, to do your will; teach me to live worthily and humbly in your sight; for you are my wisdom, who know me truly, and who knew me before the world was made, and before I had my being.

Amen.

– Thomas Kempis

 

Let us pray:

Share with God what is in your heart.

 

#Honesty #Grateful #Mercy #Grace

 

 

Day 8 – The Prayer Cafe “31 Day Challenge”

October 14, 2015

healing_of_steve-meyer-by-the-finger-of-god

Day 8

 

The Lord is near to all who call on him,
to all who call on him in truth.

– Psalm 145:18

 

“Few Christians have anything but a vague idea of the power of prayer; fewer still have any experience of that power. The Church seems almost wholly unaware of the power God puts into her hand; this spiritual carte blanche on the infinite resources of God’s wisdom and power is rarely, if ever, used—never used to the full measure of honouring God.” – E.M. Bounds

 

Let us pray:

Praying in this moment would be presumptuous of me. Let’s just marinate in what E.M. Bounds shared.

I know there will be some people who will shout how they know all about that power and glory. My first reaction is to ask us to refrain from shouting.

Maybe Mr. Bounds is talking about a prayer level we know nothing about. Some of us start shouting when we get to the rooftop of a private house and I think Mr. Bounds is speaking on a skyscraper level. Maybe there is more. Maybe the answer is found deep in God. Maybe there are untold riches of grace and miracles we don’t really know about because we don’t see them regularly manifesting in our lives and in the sacred places we congregate.

And I am not talking about emotion. We can manufacture that very well. I am talking about true power.

Maybe we are in need of a new normal. What about a miracle-working prayer life where cancer flees bodies and dead people rise from the grave? What about an intimacy with God where the peace that passes all understanding falls on those who stand within our presence without us saying a word? What about a contagious joy that envelops the hearts and bones of those we interact with on the daily?

Thank you Mr. Bounds for challenging my imagination. Thank you for enlarging my territory for a prayerful thirst.

How about you? Where are you challenged?

 

#Honesty #Power #Levels #Pause

 

Day 7 – The Prayer Cafe “31 Day Challenge”

October 13, 2015

il_570xN.357512093

Day 7

 

Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. – Colossians 4:2

“As the engine never moves until the fire is kindled, so preaching, with all its machinery, perfection, and polish, is at a dead standstill, as far as spiritual results are concerned, till prayer has kindled and created the steam. The texture, fineness, and strength of the sermon is as so much rubbish unless the mighty impulse of prayer is in it, through it, and behind it. The preacher must, by prayer, put God in the sermon. The preacher must, by prayer, move God toward the people before he can move the people to God by his words. The preacher must have had audience and ready access to God before he can have access to the people. An open way to God for the preacher is the surest pledge of an open way to the people.” – Oswald Chambers

 

Let us pray:

Father as our lives are the stories people read, may we spend time with you in prayer in such a way that our lives will be the greatest sermons people will ever experience. Grant us opportunities to live our lives out before people in such a way they will experience you and know there is truly a God in heaven. Be glorified.

#Truth #Grace #Prayer #LivedOut #Intimacy

 

 

Day 2 – The Prayer Cafe “31 Day Challenge”

October 8, 2015

Change

Day 2

 

…one of His disciples said to Him, “Lord, teach us to pray…” – Luke 11:1

 

“Prayer is not a normal part of the life of the natural man. We hear it said that a person’s life will suffer if he doesn’t pray, but I question that. What will suffer is the life of the Son of God in him, which is nourished not by food, but by prayer. When a person is born again from above, the life of the Son of God is born in him, and he can either starve or nourish that life. Prayer is the way that the life of God in us is nourished. Our common ideas regarding prayer are not found in the New Testament. We look upon prayer simply as a means of getting things for ourselves, but the biblical purpose of prayer is that we may get to know God Himself.

To say that “prayer changes things” is not as close to the truth as saying, “Prayer changes me and then I change things.” God has established things so that prayer, on the basis of redemption, changes the way a person looks at things. Prayer is not a matter of changing things externally, but one of working miracles in a person’s inner nature.” – Oswald Chambers

 

Let us pray:

How true is this for you? Is prayer changing you? Talk to God right now about how He has changed you and what things you still see that need changing. Open up your heart to Him and be as candid as possible. He can handle it. He’s waiting to meet with you right now.

 

#Candidness #Change #Intimacy #NewEyes