Dear Tom:
I am always looking for an edge to get prayers answered, aren't we all ? Little Amelia has been on my thoughts every day.
A few things have hit me like a ton of bricks lately; I can start in Rom 4:4. "now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace but of debt." 4:3 " for what saith the scripture: Abraham believed GOD and it was counted unto him for righteousness"
Gal: 5:3 "standfast therefore in liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free and be not entangled ""again"" with the yoke of bondage.
Entangeled again ? meaning the law. Christ came to set us free from bondage. The law was bondage because men wanted to be the source of their own righteousness.
Was Christ a loan to us ? No. Once we have Christ He is ours for all eternity.
So what is my point ? Only this, being burdened for someone in prayer IS the yoke of bondage. I know that this is a popular thing to do and Lord knows how many times I have done it myself, but I am rethinking this position.
Quite often, the Lord will ask us to pray for an individual; so when He does let us do it. He may ask us to pray for family members or relatives or friends or this nation, or the president or government officials and we should it.
But the mere idea of being burdened by it is very distasteful to me. We are instructed to humble ourselves, to pray, and to seek Him.
I want everyone on this thread to be free in Christ, I do not want us to be burdened down. There is a fine line between handing over our prayers to the Lord and wanting them, for ourselves, to repeat over and over, or to shed tears over, or become emotionally constricted.
Did not Christ have a way of emotionally disjointing himself from those he healed. The blind men, the sick, there are no accounts of Christ picking them up cuddling them in his arms and saying things like you poor person, you poor pitiful person, tell me about your poor wretched life, all your less than human ex-husbands, your miserable family.
Christ cut to the chase, non stop, do not pass go. Let us do the same here; I'm not singling out anyone, but myself !!
When we have someone to pray for , let us do it. We are anointed for ministry here. A hospital is for sick people ; and this is a prayer line. Let us go about our ministry. Let us be efficient. Let us keep our sense of humor. Let us enjoy one anothers company. Let us have peace and joy and all fruits of the spirit.
I am here for one purpose and that is to commit to a heavenly charge those individuals and those situations that God himself entrusts us with. God will find us we do not need to find him. It is his desire to use us even though we are vessels of dishonor. He could have chosen angels to bring his gosple message to the world but He chose us; so I for one will listen to His voice. He may instruct me to pray for Amelia every day for a month or a year; I will do as He wishes.
But as for the groaning and moaning and wails let us leave that to the Holy Spirit.
My little girl , 7 yrs old, asked my wife if she has ever seen me cry. She said sure, daddy cries a lot; to be honest with you I do most of my crying in church and by the time my little girl sees me my tears are dry. However, I realized that she probably has not seen me cry. I thought this is weird !! She really has no idea of my true nature. I used to rock her to sleep when she was a baby and just cry and cry. Well when she wants something from me she doesn't usually come to me crying saying daddy I need a pair of new shoes or a dress the ones I have are old ect. She usually states her case like a veteran diplomat. Cuts to the chase, states her desire, and usually doesn't have to provide me with a lot of reasons or justification for what she wants. She just lays it out and says how about it, and almost always she gets what she asks for. Let us all do the same.
In Christ..gregor |
