Why do we Pray

   In this weeks preaching passage of Matthew 7:7-12 and among the many things Pastor Fred preached on is prayer. The message reminded me of a C.S. Lewis quote of “I don’t pray to change Gods mind, but for Him to change mine.” It got me pondering and I asked myself the question of why do we pray? Do we pray so that we can get what we want and we view God as a genie and His only purpose is to grant us our wishes. Or do we pray as an act of desperation, hoping God will hear us and grant us our wishes. I think our prayers can reveal our intentions and how our relationship with God is going. Is our prayers centered focused? What I mean by this is our prayers more about make us and others comfortable and even asking God to take away opportunities for us to grow? Or are we asking God to make us equal to Him? Instead of treating God like Santa Claus and our prayers being a wish list, how about we treat prayer as communicating with God. It is building a relationship with God and having a continuous conversation with Him through out the day. 17th century French Monk Brother Lawrence became famous (and later turned into a book) for his idea of practicing the presence of God.  It didn’t matter if he was doing dishes or other mundane task, he was in constant conversation with God. When we do this, we build a relationship with God and we see Him as a loving Father instead of someone who only gives us what we want or as a thug who will smite us if we don’t prat. So here are some questions to ponder

  What are some of the challenges to your prayer life?

  What would it look like for you to practice the presence of God through out the day?

  How often do we try and change Gods mind instead of Him changing ours?

Crap in Crap out

  Recently I had the opportunity to preach at youth group and my preaching passage was Proverbs 8. The  main thrust of my message was the idea of what goes in often comes out. The ideas we consume whether it is what we read, watch and who or what we listen to will shape our character. Another way to put it is crap in and crap out. If we consume questionable food, speech and or ideas, we end up living out those ideas. If we eat horrible, we will have weight gain and health problems related to it. We will also feel horrible. The same is said about the ideas we consume and continuously think on. If we consume horrible ideas, we will start speaking about them, believing them and living them out. The opposite is true also. If we continuously consume good ideas, that will affect how we speak and live our lives. The Apostle Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians that we are to take every thought captive. It is more than just throwing out the bad thoughts, speech and actions, but it is filtering everything through Gods truth and aligning what we do, consume and say with Gods truth. I will close with Psalm 19:14 which is “May the words of my mouth and the meditation be pleasing to you God.”

 Questions to Ponder

Do you take inventory of what you consume on a daily basis?    

How do we take every thought, action and speech captive? 

What does it mean to meditate? 

How does what we meditate on shape our character? 

Called to Serve

   This past weekend Pastor Ben preached a great message and one of the verses that he used was John 15:13 which is “no greater love than this, that a man lays down his life for his friends.” Through this, Ben preached about how we should have a servants heart and that we are called to serve other people. It doesn’t matter if we are the CEO of a fortune 500 company or a janitor at a rescue mission, we are all called to serve other people. Here are some of my takeaways from the sermon. 

  The first one is that acts of service will often cost us something and sometimes it is a great cost. When we serve, it will cost us either our time, money, and or talents. This might mean we can’t go to a movie because someone needs a listening ear, or it might cost us a phone upgrade because someone needs the money more than we do and our phone still works fine. It is saying no to our selfish desires is tough no matter how much we think we need them. 

  The second idea is that we need to start seeing people as someone who God loves dearly and are created in His image. In essence we have to stop with the us versus them, or not liking them because of their stance on immigration or who they voted for. We serve because we are being the hands and feet of Jesus and we are proclaiming not our own goodness but what God does through us. 

  The third idea is that Godly service will often make us uncomfortable. It’s because we are rubbing shoulders with people who do not look, think or act like us. Are we not wanting to serve because it makes us uncomfortable and we don’t want to grow. Maturing spiritually, emotionally and relationally only happens when we are forced to operate out of our comfort zone. It is forcing us to rely on God and not what we can do. Remember service isn’t always about the warm fuzzies, but it is doing what is needed and what God has called us to do. As kids we wanted a steady diet of candy and sweets, but good parents make sure that those things are done in moderation and that we eat a salad more than candy. 

Here are some questions to Ponder

  What and where you are those uncomfortable places we need to go and spend time in?

   Who are those people or doing things that God is calling us to spend time with or doing but we are not wanting too?

   Do we serve for the warm fuzzies or to point people to God?

Grace and Peace

  Tom Boustead