Prayer
God, Do You Even Care?
I preached a sermon recently as part of a team preaching through 1 Peter. The second point of that sermon was, “Life is Pain.” That’s just a fact. Life is pain. Peter jumps with both feet directly into that reality. Jesus modeled a life of prayer for us. The apostle Paul directs us to “pray…
Read MorePanting After God
My prayer life is a true struggle for me. I pray, but I wouldn’t say I pray well … whatever that means. (How does one “pray well?”) Jesus prayed often. This is so much the case that Luke 22:39 describes Jesus as going off to pray and characterizes that with the phrase, “…as was his…
Read MorePestering God
In Luke’s gospel, immediately on the heels of teaching the disciples to pray, Jesus launched into a story that expands a bit on the idea of prayer. This is a longer blog posting, so before diving in, grab your coffee, a blanket, and your Bible. Pestering God And he said to them, “Which of you…
Read MoreWhen You Pray . . . (Part 4)
For the past few weeks, we have been letting our minds marinade in the sauce of the Lord’s prayer. This week we are looking at . . . Thy Kingdom Come In brief, a kingdom is a domain. It is a reign or a rule; a realm over which one has control. As followers after…
Read MoreWhen You Pray . . . (Part 3)
Two weeks ago we began our examination of Jesus’ response to his disciples’ request that he teach them to pray the way John taught his disciples to pray. We made it as far as “Our Father.” That examination continues below. Hallowed Be Thy Name I have written previously of the time my eldest son was…
Read MoreWhen You Pray . . . (Part 2)
Last week we examined an incident wherein the disciples asked Jesus to teach them to pray. Before we look at what Jesus said in response to the request, let us note a number of things he did not say. Jesus did not mandate that prayer be done with the closed eyes and folded hands so…
Read MoreWhen You Pray . . .
In two different gospels, Jesus used similar verbiage to teach his disciples to pray.1 The two incidents are different enough that they appear to be distinct events, and if so, they are similar enough that it captures our attention to know that Jesus would go through this same lesson twice. The lesson, recorded by both Matthew…
Read MoreWhen God Turns a Deaf Ear to Prayer
I recently overheard a conversation wherein two people were discussing prayer. One was a prayer advocate and the other more of a scoffer. The scoffer asked the advocate, “So, you really believe in the power of prayer, huh?” The advocate responded, “No, but I believe very much in the power of God to whom I…
Read MoreChristianese Phrases to Drop, #4
When a brother or sister in Christ finds themselves in a difficult circumstance, we want to help. Indeed, we are called to do so, as we “Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ” (Galatians 6:2, ESV). Love demands we do this. In that spirit, one will often ask, “How can I…
Read More