I love preaching about prayer. To be honest, it’s one of those places where people’s conscious longings intersect really obviously with material in the text of the Bible. To be more honest, I’ve done a lot of thinking about prayer, a decent amount of reading about it and have listened to as many messages on prayer as about anything else I can think of. To be even more honest, this is because for a good chunk of my journey with God, prayer hasn’t been something I’ve been strong in. It’s been a struggle, even after I was called to ministry. But it’s also been all the sweeter to see God come to my aid, to have Jesus “teach me to pray” (See Luke 11:1).
So this weekend we were back in the Our Father / Lord’s Prayer / pater noster (lots of names for the same amazing prayer) with this simple idea: PRAYER HELPS! God does stuff as we pray. Sometimes God waits for us to ask. The whole deal lies in the incomprehensible, mysterious relationship between God’s sovereign control and the freedom He has created us with. He wants us to participate with Him.
When you read that last sentence, don’t think of a little kid watching His dad work, handing him the hammer or the drill and occasionally being sent out to retrieve some other item. We are a part of bringing the Kingdom; we ask – surrendering and insisting – that His will is done in every corner of this earth that we touch! I mean BIG stuff, the MAIN stuff.
Maybe the highlight of the weekend was the Summer Fun Camp report video! It’s great to talk about God’s will being done on earth as it is in heaven. It’s even better to see it in action!
Worship was awesome!
I love this quote by N.T. Wright from his book Simply Christian. If there are 3 Treatments of the Lord’s prayer that I’ve loved the most it would be this one, Dallas Willard’s in The Divine Conspiracy and Dietrich Bonhoeffer in The Cost of Discipleship.
I’m stoked for the WEEK OF PRAYER that starts this coming Sunday with a Selah. There are prayer gatherings every night (Monday – Thursday), you can sign up for one of the 24/7 Prayer Hours, Pick a day to fast and pick up a PRAYER JOURNAL for the week.
