45 Seconds of Cute

The Practicality of Prayer

Prayer

You ever have those friends that you care about, but you never make the effort to talk to them, and neither do they, so you basically just grow apart. That’s essentially what happens with God, we love Him (at least we say we do, and try to convince ourselves we do even if we don’t), but we neglect to speak to Him because there are so many “Tangible” things in front of us that we rarely even give Him thought. Where that analogy falls short though is that unlike some lack luster friendships, God never ceases to reach out to us. We just aren’t paying attention. It’s like we’ve put God on “silent”. God tells us that the very world we live in, the planet we reside on “Declares” His glory.

 Numbers 14:21
Nevertheless, as surely as I live and as surely as the glory of the LORD fills the whole earth,

 Psalm 19:1
The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. He gives us His written word, and even speaks to us through His spirit and messengers. Our lack of communication with our creator is simply negligent.

Our level of prayer truly summarizes the “reality” of our God to us personally. How many of our friendships would grow and survive if we spoke to them with the same frequency and authenticity that we speak to God. How many relationships would grow, or end at our current level of communication? We become so comfortable with our “relationship” with Christ being more like a “cause” it’s something we believe in, it’s morals we abide by, standards we live up to, things we abstain from. It becomes more of a guiding light than a relationship with a Creator/Savior. It becomes a (wait for it)…… religion. The difference between our faith and the belief system of others is that we serve a living and active God. But if we honestly look into our lives, you wouldn’t be able to tell that.

Ask yourselves do you truly believe what you say you believe. Do you believe you have access to a living, omnipotent, and loving God, a selfless compassionate savior? Do you honestly believe it? Say it out loud “I believe I have access to a living, omnipotent,  and loving God, a selfless compassionate savior “ If this is a reality to you, you have no choice but to interact with Him.

You ever met someone that could “give you a hook up”, someone that “knew a guy” that could get things accomplished that you couldn’t. At an amusement center In hopemills, Berea’s youth group, and another churches youth group decided to hang out together for the evening. The other church arrived first. When they went to pay, they found that their price was drastically increased from the price I had been given. I went up to the counter when I arrived, and as soon as the guy saw me he said “oh, their with you? Ok they can have that price.” We use people with connections all the time, we strategically approach certain people in certain ways because we know who we approach and how they are approached will drastically effect the outcome. We do this with the people in our social network, but we neglect to approach the God of all creation with our needs.

James 4:2-3 You desire but do not have, so you kill. You covet but you cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not ask God. ³ When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures

James 1:6 ⁶ But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt, because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. ⁷ That person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. ⁸ Such a person is double-minded and unstable in all they do.

The simple fact is when we face needs we tend to either ignore God, Ask God for the wrong reasons, or ask but not really believe we will receive what we ask for. I can be stern with Rosa, but the simple fact is, if my daughter truly looks at me and asks me for something she needs, or even desires within reason. Every fiber in me longs to give it to her. How much greater a father is God, than me?

Luke 11:  ⁹ “So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. ¹⁰ For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.

   ¹¹ “Which of you fathers, if your son asks for^[f] a fish, will give him a snake instead? ¹² Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? ¹³ If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”

If you believe these things to be true, why on earth would you suffer? Why would you struggle through problems alone? Why would you face the constant disappointment of relying on others only to be let down? Hellloooooo Think MCFLY!

Prayer is only impractical because we make it impractical. There is an omniscient, omnipresent, omni powerful God who knows you by name, loves you like a father, wants a relationship with you and wants the best for you. Speak Up! Prayer is only as real and effective as you allow it to be. You are the one standing in the way of God doing amazing things in your life if you aren’t seeking after Him.

1 Thessalonians 5:17  pray without ceasing,

Like when you first fall in love and want to fall asleep on the phone, God desires constant communication with us. Not only does He want to communicate with us, He wants to provide for us, bless us, and take care of us.

Approach God with the confidence of knowing He wants to hear from you. Clear out the “Junk” that’s in your life that hinders your communication with God

Isaiah 59  ¹ Surely the arm of the LORD is not too short to save,  nor his ear too dull to hear. ² But your iniquities have separated
   you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you,  so that he will not hear

I won’t provide a “how to” on praying, or a handy dandy acronym on steps for prayer. He’s the creator and sustainer of life, He loves you and wants to talk with you. If you believe this to be true, then live it out.

"Born This Way"

Over the last decade “I was born this way” has been an anthem cry for many different culturesIt is a concept that obviously rings true with many, for understandable reasons. We all want to be loved, to be accepted, and we want people to love us exactly for who we are. We think “I am who I am, and I should be able to be free in that and not have to change for anyone.” We then take pride, and have great defense on our own personal identity. I question though, are we who we are at birth? Or are we shaped and molded? I think there are distinct characteristics of our identity that are shown right at birth, but I think a vast majority of who we are is shaped by where, how, and by whom we were brought up. The one thing I agree with about being “Born this way” is that we are all born broken.

Psalm 51:5 Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.

I believe we are all born sinful, broken, and missing part of who we are. I know how volatile and inflammatory a statement this is to some, but the fact is I see it even in my own girls. Before Rosa could form whole sentences, she could lie. Before she could say her alphabet she could disobey. That sin nature is born into us, but I believe that we are children of God who knows we are broken, and has no desire to leave us that way. He wants us to come to Him, to be made complete.
When we say “I was born this way” and that’s our defense for our “individual identity”, it’s like saying “I am fine being broken, I have no need to be fixed or for redemption. I am proud of being broken, how dare you tell me I need to change.”

When someone is born with a life threatening illness or medical condition, how many parents do you hear say “Don’t you dare heal him, he was born that way”

Today more than anything you hear people use that as an excuse to shrug off responsibility for choices they make. Child Molesters, pedophiles, rapists, serial killers, etc. There are countless documented cases of people convicted of these offenses standing whole heartedly behind the statement “I was born this way”

Now, please take into consideration, I am a Christian Pastor, and what I’m saying is guided by Biblical principals, so of course if you don’t believe in the Bible this won’t mean a things to you, but let’s say for a minute though, hypothetically speaking, that you were born this certain way. Jesus tells us in no cloudy terms, to forget how we were born, and to follow how He is leading.

 Mark 8: 34 Then he called the crowd to him along with his disciples and said: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.35 For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me and for the gospel will save it.

So if you are “Born this way”, Jesus tells us to Deny ourselves, to Deny who we were born as. In as much as the same way as we change citizenship of a country or a state. If you don’t really believe you were “Born this way”, and that you really are making your own choices, the same applies.

Guess what, I’m a married man. I love my wife and respect her, that being said I was born with a heart that somehow see’s fit to desire other women. This isn’t a marital development, this is something I’ve struggled with since I was 12 years old. I long for, and at times yearn for other women. Most married, honest men, would say that deep inside them, they feel the same way. I was “Born that way”, but that’s not what I pursue, that’s not how I live. I love my wife like the air I breathe, and I consciously desire and choose to keep myself only for her, but if I was going off of my “Born” instincts, then I wouldn’t. I “deny myself”.

I think I can be pretty witty, but often the “witty” things that are in my head are cutting, hurtful, tear others down, or don’t need to be said. But I was “born that way.” If I just let go and said every word that came out of my mouth, would a valid defense be “I was born that way?” The only people that get away with that are stand up comedians.

I think the fact is we need to be less concerned about what way we were born, because Jesus tells us regardless of we were born the first time we need to be born again.

John 3:3 Jesus replied, “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again.” 4 “How can someone be born when they are old?” Nicodemus asked. “Surely they cannot enter a second time into their mother’s womb to be born!” 5 Jesus answered, “Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit. 6 Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit.

Jesus tells us that our first birth got us here, but everything we are in that first birth is perishing and we need a second birth.

1 Peter 1:21Through him you believe in God, who raised him from the dead and glorified him, and so your faith and hope are in God. 22 Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for each other, love one another deeply, from the heart.23For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God. 24For, “All people are like grass,    and all their glory is like the flowers of the field; the grass withers and the flowers fall, 25 but the word of the Lord endures forever.” And this is the word that was preached to you"

This is my take on it, we are born broken. We need to deny/forget what way we were born, and seek after Christ to be born again as 1 peter 1:23 states " For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God.”Through knowing Christ we can lose the broken nature of what was before, be born again in Christ and because we have been born again in Christ we stand before a Holy God able to say “I was born this way”

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