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Isaiah 56:6-8—And the foreigners who join themselves to the Lord, to minister to him, to love the name of the Lord, and to be his servants, all who keep the Sabbath, and do not profane it, and hold fast my covenant—these I will bring to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer; their burnt offerings and their sacrifices will be accepted on my altar; for my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples. Thus says the Lord God, who gathers the outcasts of Israel, I will gather others to them besides those already gathered. 

God is eager to welcome us to into His House.  He eagerly desires to enjoy the intimacy of relationship with us, His Creation.  His House is open to both those who already know Him and to those who do not.  God takes special delight in welcoming the outcasts into His home—those that society would reject or throw aside have a place with God.  His love for us knows no bounds.  Our responsibility is to continually seek Him and try to understand His Ways.  We should constantly listen for His Call and remove any barriers in our relationship with Him.  Because our God is a god of relationship, we must identify whatever selfishness lies within us and remove it so that it does not interfere with our ability to commune with God.

Today as you pray and meditate, rejoice in God’s Word.  Thank Him for seeking you out and desiring an intimate relationship with you.  Recommit yourself to knowing God through His Word.  Open your spirit to His Call and ask Him to speak to you and guide you in everything.  Pray for Him to bless you with understanding and to replace any selfish desires with the blessings of relationship with Him.

Be Wise

Wednesday: Proverbs 3:13-18—Happy are those who find wisdom, and those who get understanding, for her income is better than silver, and her revenue better than gold.  She is more precious than jewels, and nothing you desire can compare with her. Long life is in her right hand; in her left hand are riches and honor. Her ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace. She is a tree of life to those who lay hold of her; those who hold her fast are called happy.

Gaining wisdom and understanding can be challenging, especially when we find ourselves in the midst of confusing circumstances.  The older we get, it is impossible for us to process new information outside the context of what we already know.  It becomes increasingly difficult to escape our patterns of thinking or see things from a new perspective.  As children, though, we had an open curiosity about the world around us.  We did not have the foundations to make judgments or the experience to be stuck in a particular thought pattern.  When we study God’s Word, our challenge is to come to it as a child with an open mind and heart so that we may hear God’s Voice speaking to us.  God gives us wisdom and understanding when we read and study His Word with open hearts and minds.

Today as you pray and meditate on God’s Word, come to Him as a child ready to marvel at the wonder of His amazing Ways.  Praise His Holy Name and ask Him to open your mind and infuse you with a Spirit of wisdom and understanding that you might accomplish His Will for you.

Don't you get it, yet?

Mark 8:14-21—Now the disciples had forgotten to bring any bread; and they had only one loaf with them in the boat.  And he cautioned them, saying, watch out—beware of the yeast of the Pharisees and the yeast of Herod.  They said to one another, “It is because we have no bread.”  And becoming aware of it, Jesus said to them, “Why are you talking about having no bread? Do you still not perceive or understand? Are your hearts hardened? Do you have eyes, and fail to see? Do you have ears, and fail to hear? And do you not remember?  When I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you collect? And the seven for the four thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you collect?” And they said to him, “Seven.” Then he said to them, “Do you not yet understand?”

Time and again, the disciples struggled to “get it.”  Here they were, not long after the fishes and loaves miracle, and they are complaining that they have no bread.  There are two messages being conveyed here.  The first is the more literal message—obviously, if Jesus has provided for them in the past, He will continue to provide for them in the future.  Their doubts are an insult, especially because they have witnessed the miracles with their own eyes and ears.  They have been a part of the miracles.  The other message is more abstract.  When Jesus warns the disciples about the yeast of the Pharisees and Herod, He is warning them not to rely on or be lifted up by hypocrisy (like the Pharisees) or by worldly obsessions and man-made religions (like the Herodians).  The Pharisees had already attempted to test Jesus by demanding more miracles, and here, Jesus is telling His disciples to be satisfied and not demand He continue to prove He is who He says  He is.  He is also encouraging them to fully trust Him to provide for them.  We are not so different from the disciples in this story.  We, too, struggle to get it, and we regularly find ourselves torn between the world and our spiritual lives. 

Today as you pray and meditate on His Word, declare to God that you want to “get it.”  Pray that He would open your heart and mind to His desires.  Acknowledge your weaknesses and shortcomings before Him and pray that He would fill you with His Holy Spirit so that you might grow in faith and understanding.

A Checklist for Faith?

Luke 18:10-14—“Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector.  The Pharisee, standing by himself, was praying thus, ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other people: thieves, rogues, adulterers, or even like this tax collector.  I fast twice a week; I give a tenth of all my income.’  But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even look up to heaven, but was beating his breast and saying, ‘God be merciful to me, a sinner!’  I tell you, this man went down to his home justified rather than the other; for all who exalt themselves will be humbled, but all who humble themselves will be exalted.”

In their day, the Pharisees were known for their self-righteous piety.  They believed themselves to be better than other “ordinary” people because they were “better” at following the law.  They basically checked off the boxes and sneered down their noses at everyone else battling the plight of human imperfection.  Time and again, Jesus demonstrates that the Pharisees’ attitude of empty obedience to the law is not His way.  We are created to be in relationship with God and with each other.  So, if we get to a point where we are merely checking off the boxes of our faith at the expense of being in true compassionate and caring relationship with one another, we are doing it wrong.  When Jesus came, He turned religion on its head.  He made it okay to do the right thing despite the letter of the law—that’s why He did things like heal and pick grain to eat on the Sabbath.  Over 2,000 years later, we still struggle to find the balance of knowing God through intimate relationship with Him and others and adhering to the rules that are supposed to facilitate those relationships.

Today as you pray and meditate on His Word, lift up prayers of thanksgiving for the gift of His Word.  Pray for God to speak to you through His Word and reveal His Purpose in your life.  Ask God to show you how to be compassionate and loving in the way that He desires.  Offer yourself to Him as a living sacrifice today. 

Should I Keep a Prayer Journal?

Romans 8:26—Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words.

God has given us an amazing gift in the Holy Spirit.  The Spirit is all around us.  The Spirit experiences what we experience and knows what we know.  The Spirit feels our hearts and minds, rejoices with us, cries with us, and even comforts us.  When we pray, the Holy Spirit embraces our words to intercede on our behalf, especially when we don’t even know what to pray for.  When we start to pay attention, we can see the movement of the Holy Spirit in every aspect of our lives.  We can see how the Holy Spirit has carried us through storms to bring us into better places than we could have imagined.  An easy way to start paying attention to the Holy Spirit in your life is to keep a prayer journal where you write down all your prayers.  As you grow spiritually, you can go back and read it to see how the Holy Spirit has answered your prayers, and you can also see how God speaks to you through your prayer life.

Today as you pray and meditate on His Word, take out a piece of paper and write down everything that is on your heart.  For today, treat your prayer like a letter to God.  Tell Him how you are doing, ask Him the questions that burn your soul, make a list of your thanksgivings and blessings, and write down any requests you have in your life.  Approach God with an open spirit asking Him to speak through your prayers.  Praise His Name and rejoice in the gift of the Holy Spirit.

Be Careful What You Pray For...

1 John 5:14-15—And this is the boldness we have in him, that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us.  And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have obtained the requests made of him.

God is not a slot machine.  This is what I tell my kids as they are learning to pray.  They actually tend to think of prayer as a wish—yes, they even call it wishing sometimes.  The thing is, lately, I have started to notice how many adults I know who also go to God as if He is a slot-machine.  There is a disturbing movement toward praying specific prayers that seems to condone focusing on and praying for all that we want without much regard for what God wants.  To give you an example, a neighbor of mine (who was a Christian missionary) once boasted that she had spent years praying for the exact house she was living in.  She had drawn pictures and made lists of every feature, down to the paint color and shelving in the pantry, and that one day God had answered her prayer.  To be sure, God is able to answer prayers like that. But all I kept thinking as she spoke was, “Why in the world would you want to limit God’s plans for you?”  God has said, “I know the plans I have for you.”  Scripture also tells us that God knows our hearts and we can approach Him with just sounds and moans and He will know what we need.  Certainly, there are benefits to praying specific prayers.  After all, the more specific our conversations with God are, the deeper our relationship can plunge.  On the other hand, if we are so specific in what we ask that we bind God’s hands or seek to limit His Will for us, our specificity removes intimacy with the Holy Spirit.  In the end, we just might get what we ask for instead of the true blessings God had planned.

Today as you pray and meditate on His Word, consider making a list of those things you frequently pray about.  Shift your focus from what you want by asking God what He wants in your life.  Relinquish control over these matters and ask God to take up those matters and resolve them in His perfect way.  Listen for His Voice to speak to you and guide you.  Pray that you would grow in understanding the Spirit of the Lord so that any requests you make are first inspired by the Holy Spirit and not by your human flesh.  Rejoice in His Name and give Him praise for all He has done and will do.

The Perfect Prayer

Matthew 6:9-15—“Pray then in this way: Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come. Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And do not bring us to the time of trial, but rescue us from the evil one.  For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you; but if you do not forgive others, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.”

Jesus taught His disciples very specific lessons on how to pray, and in Matthew, He teaches them what we now call the Lord’s Prayer.  It is a model prayer that we should continue following even in the modern age.  First, the prayer begins by acknowledging and praising God’s name.  Throughout the Bible, God has many names, but here Jesus tells us to approach God as the Father.  As Father, God is caring and all-knowing, warm and compassionate, and most of all a safe confidante.  The word “hallowed” means holy, consecrated, sacred, and revered.  We praise God and demonstrate our love and respect for Him by saying the words “hallowed be your name.”  Second, Jesus says to pray for the coming of God’s kingdom.  By praying for the coming of God’s kingdom, we are not so much praying for the arrival of some far-off, remote place.  Rather we are praying a very personal prayer that God will become more alive in us because His kingdom already lives within us.  Third, we are to ask for God’s will to be done on earth as it is done in heaven.  In other words, we are asking God to take away our free will, at least some of it, to do as He sees fit rather than as we see fit.  Our personal human desires are set aside in this prayer as we ask God to do His will.  Fourth, we are to ask for our daily bread.  Again, Jesus teaches us to be content with God meeting our basic needs, for which God will always provide.  Fifth, we are to ask God to forgive our debts as we have also forgiven our debtors.  This word “debt” is translated in many different ways: sins or transgressions are the other two most common words we see.  What Jesus is driving at here is that the measure by which we have forgiven others who have wronged us is the same measure by which God will forgive us.  When we pray this part of the prayer, we ought to be mindful of any grudges, ill will, and other anger we hold onto, because that failure to forgive will interfere with God’s ability to forgive us.  Finally, Jesus instructs us to pray for deliverance from trials and evil.  We know that by virtue of being human, we are going to encounter trials and evil circumstances in this world.  God is all powerful to deliver us, though, and when we pray, we ought to continually seek God’s wisdom and deliverance.

Today, pray the Lord’s Prayer as your devotional, but pray it with a renewed spirit and newfound understanding of what Jesus was instructing us to do.  Praise God openly and come to Him with a spirit of thanksgiving and rejoicing.  Allow the kingdom of God to light up within you as you invite the Holy Spirit in.  Sincerely ask God to do His will in your life, even if it is inconsistent with what you think you want.  Forgive those in your life who need forgiveness and then ask God to also forgive your sins.  Finally, ask God to send the Holy Spirit to protect you from evil at all times.