God has given us an amazing Book! The Bible addresses the human condition—all our desires, frustrations, hopes, and the only path on which we can find eternal and unfading joy.
The Bible not only tells us how to live, but it also tells us how to pray. And it’s as we pray that the principles in the Scripture come alive with fresh applications for our daily life. We don’t have to fumble around, attempting to find the right words to pray and then wondering if those prayers were heard on high. We can learn to pray in agreement with God’s perfect will.
God has spoken to us through His Word, and He invites us to use His words to form our prayers back to Him. I love beginning each new year with a reminder of the power of prayer, so I invite you to join me at Calvary Assembly of God for this life-changing series of sermons called Our Prayer Book.
If you have missed any of the messages, you can find them here:
When we speak God things TO God about God, and when we speak good things TO God about our neighbors, then we will have good things FROM God to speak to our neighbors.
The Greek word for “bless” (eulogeo) literally means good (eu-) words (logos). We can bless people simply by saying good words to them, as well as good words about them to both God and others.
Listen to the podcast of this post by clicking on the player below, and you can also subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or Audible.
I take some time at the end of each calendar year for a quick recap of everything we have learned during this year at Calvary Assembly of God. I do this because I want to make sure we are all on the same page with each other before we move into a new year. And I also think it’s very important that we are continually reminded and reassured of what God has done for us. In our series on gratitude we talked about the dangers of forgetting to remember and re-tell the blessings of God. We see in the letters from the apostles both a re-telling of their own words, and reusing and amplifying the words of Jesus and other apostles.
You can click on the sermon series title to find a list of all of the sermons in that series. Clicking on those individual sermons will give you a short written recap of that message, and it will also give you the link to watch the video of the full sermon.
Kingdom Praying. Jesus made it clear time and time again that He came to reveal the Kingdom of God to us. He described what the Kingdom was like and told us that He came to be the means by which we could enter God’s Kingdom. He also told us how God’s children could access the power and privileges of our Heavenly Father through the means of prayer. He assured us with words like, “Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the Kingdom” (Luke 12:32). Jesus said quite simply that we had access to our Father through prayer. And then to make sure we didn’t miss out on this awesome privilege, He instructed us, “This, then, is how you should pray” (Matthew 6:8).
Jots and Tittles. As we get closer to the death and resurrection of Jesus, there are an increasing number of prophecies that are fulfilled in these events. Jesus appears to have been very attentive to making sure that each and every one of these prophecies were fulfilled to the smallest detail. Near the beginning of His public ministry, Jesus noted that not one iota—or “one jot or tittle” in the Old English vocabulary—of any of God’s promises would be left unfulfilled (Matthew 5:18). It’s amazing that Jesus so carefully attended to all of these, but it’s also important to ask ourselves what these fulfilled prophecies mean to us today.
Takin’ Him to the Streets. Just before Jesus ascended to Heaven, He told His followers that they would have the joyful responsibility of taking the good news of forgiveness and eternal life to all the highways and byways of every nation. Later on, Paul would get more specific about all of the groups to which he was taking the message of Jesus (see Luke 24:46-47; 1 Corinthians 9:20-22). That commission is still in effect for Christians today: We are to share the gospel with everyone—from easy street to skid row, from Wall Street to Main Street, and every street in between. The streets on which you live and work are different from the streets where I travel. In fact, all of us live on different streets, but everyone we meet on every street needs to hear about Jesus. In this new series of messages, we are going to learn how the Holy Spirit can help us be ready to take Jesus to those on each street where God sends us.
Ascending. Every year, Jews from around the world made four pilgrimages up to Jerusalem for various feasts and sacrifices. These journeys reminded them of God’s goodness as they went to the Temple to worship, and they helped refocus on God’s ways as they returned to their regular routines. Jerusalem is over 2500 feet above sea level, so the pilgrimage there was a physical workout as well as a spiritual workout. These workouts were beneficial for God’s people, preparing them to minister in their cities in the following months. The Book of Psalms contains 15 songs that these pilgrims would sing to and with each other as they traveled up to Jerusalem. These Psalms of Ascent are still instructive for Christians today.
Living in your Gift Zone. God created each and every human being uniquely. We all come in different shapes and sizes, but we all share one thing in common: He created each of us with a unique personality and a unique gift package. By unique, I truly mean that we are all one-of-a-kind creations that have never existed in all of history! Here’s another thing we all have in common: We usually live in a comfort zone that is far smaller than our gift zone. Living this way keeps us from soaring through life in the way that God intended. He wants each of us to know our gifts, and to use our gifts in a way that benefits our world and brings Him glory. It starts with believing that we are indeed gifted by our Creator. Then we must have the courage to step out of our comfort zone into the much larger gift zone God has given us.
Is that in the Bible? A meme that makes me chuckle every time I see it is a “quote” attributed to Abraham Lincoln in which he says, “The problem with quotes found on the internet is that they are often not true.” (Not to spoil the joke for you, but unless Lincoln knew how to time travel to the future, I don’t think he knew about the modern internet!). I love this meme because it captures something that so many people fall into: a quick acceptance of a statement without verifying its source or thinking through the implications of the statement’s truthfulness. In this series I think you may be surprised to discover just how many phrases we call biblical aren’t, and how many phrases there are that we never realized are actually in the Bible.
Be Thankful. It’s so easy to spot the negative things. It’s so easy to gripe about the bad stuff with others. It’s so easy to complain about what’s wrong with the world. But the Bible repeatedly calls the saints of God to rise above this downward pull of negativity. In fact, for those who have a relationship with their Heavenly Father, who call Jesus their Savior, and who call the Holy Spirit their Counselor, there is really only one way to live: Grateful!
Christ’s Advents. The word Advent means the appearing—something that bursts onto the scene. At this time of year we are actually thinking about TWO Advents. We look backward in gratitude to celebrate the first Advent of Jesus when He was born in a manger in Bethlehem. And then we look forward in joyful expectation to the second Advent of Jesus when He will return to earth again as King of kings. As Christians live in this time between the two Advents, our celebration and expectation should bring four noticeable attributes from our lives: hope, peace, joy, and love.
This next year promises to be another amazing time of learning and growing. If you live in northern Kent County and don’t have a home church, I would love for you to visit us!
Now in the same way the Spirit also helps our weakness; for we do not know what to pray for as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words; and He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. (Romans 8:26-27)
The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit all want us to live in the fullness and freedom of the Kingdom of God. The Father longs to give us the kingdom, and Jesus and the Holy Spirit intercede for us!
Do not be afraid, little flock, because your Father has chosen to give you the kingdom. (Luke 12:32)
Therefore [Jesus] is also able to save forever those who come to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them. (Hebrews 7:25)
Listen to the podcast of this post by clicking on the player below, and you can also subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or Audible.
When a shepherd leader is bitten by a sheep under their care, it’s quite natural to say, “What’s wrong with them?” Let me highlight that word: natural.
In my book When Sheep Bite, I contrast the natural response with the supernatural response. It takes a lot of work because “natural” comes just so, well, naturally. But to respond supernaturally is going to take some re-training.
We need to be able to reflect after we’ve interacted with a biting sheep. If we reacted in an inappropriate way, we need to ask forgiveness and attempt to make things right. Then we need to engage in some Holy Spirit-led introspection to switch the natural question of, “What’s wrong with them” to the supernaturally-led question, “What can I change in myself?”
In a recent interview with Karl Vaters on his Church Lobby Podcast, we talked a bit about this topic.
One chapter in my book is titled ‘Is God Trying to Get My Attention?’ Here’s an excerpt—
Pain always takes priority. It always gets our attention and demands to be attended to immediately. We don’t schedule painful things on our daily “To Do” list, but that painful item will become the one and only thing which clamors to be addressed.
The same thing is true when the sheep bite and kick their shepherd. It hurts, it demands an immediate response, and it seems to become the only item on our agenda. But I would like to advocate that we don’t respond immediately. Why? Because our primal, gut-level response is almost always very shortsighted, and frequently, upon reflection, we later end up second-guessing what we said or did.
I believe there is also a more important reason we need to delay our response to those slights: We need to make sure the bites we receive are not God’s attempt to get our attention for being dull in our shepherding. God told Jeremiah, “For the shepherds have become dull-hearted, and have not sought the Lord” (Jeremiah 10:21 NKJV). As a result, God had to send something painful to those religious leaders to make them aware of the dullness that had set in.
I conclude this chapter with a prayer for shepherds who have been bitten—
Father, Your sheep continued to wallow in the unhealthy habit of biting the hand that fed them and cared for them. In Your perfect love, You knew just how to discipline them, always with a heart of drawing these wayward sheep back to You. I ask You to please cultivate this loving heart in me.
Jesus, even as You were nailed to the Cross by the very sheep You came to save, You didn’t lash out in anger but lovingly prayed, “Father, forgive them for they don’t know what they are doing.” You know how much it hurts when my loving shepherding of these flock under my care is repaid with bites and kicks and abandonment. Jesus, help me to learn to respond in loving forgiveness as You did.
Holy Spirit, as David prayed, so I pray, “Search me.” As I do, please show me where my words, actions, or attitudes have rubbed the sheep under my care the wrong way and prompted them to lash out. Help me to repent, forgive, and ask forgiveness. Even if the attack was unprovoked by anything I have done, my heart’s desire is for none to be lost so please help me learn how to bring about restoration.
I pray this in the name of my Good Shepherd, Jesus. Amen.
To find out more about When Sheep Bite, or to pick up a copy for yourself, please click here.
“The world cares very little what you or I know, but it does care a great deal about what you or I do.” —Booker T. Washington
T.M. Moore is in the midst of sharing an eye-opening series of posts on what eternal life truly is. Here is a short snippet: “In Ephesians 1:15-23 Paul provides insight to how we may engage heavenly realities throughout our earthly and temporal sojourn. As he prayed for the Ephesians, so, we can believe, he would have prayed for us as well. But what did he pray? First, that God would give us His Spirit for ‘wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him’ (v. 17). The Spirit, we know, works with the revelation of God in Scripture to make us more like our Lord Jesus Christ (2 Corinthians 3:12-18). He uses the entire Bible to help us increase in our experience of eternal life. This is true for knowing more of our great salvation as well as for glimpsing more of our eternal life.”
“Comparison sabotages two relationships at the same time: your relationship with God, and your relationship with other people. You can’t fully love others when you’re jealous of them or trying to outperform them. And you can’t love God when you think maybe God has given you a bad deal.” —Practicing Gratitude reading plan on YouVersion
Recent studies have shown a connection between rising boredom rates and increasing digital media usage. The Axis Culture Translator reported, “Most of us (including our teens) reach for a digital device when we feel boredom creeping in. We might logically assume that the near-constant stimulation we receive from our devices would reduce our experience of boredom—but the truth might be the opposite. Analysis and discussion based on ten years’ worth of data suggests that while boredom might drive us towards digital media, it isn’t actually satisfied by it. Many users find themselves in a loop where the perceived solution to restlessness and boredom actually amplifies those uncomfortable feelings. In other words, the ‘thirst’ of boredom leads us to the ‘water’ of digital media, but the water is salty.”
Listen to the podcast of this post by clicking on the player below, and you can also subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or Audible.
It is nearly impossible to overstate how fearful Christians in the first century were of the Jewish zealot named Saul of Tarsus. Saul called himself “extremely zealous for the traditions of my fathers” (Galatians 1:14) as he sought to seek out and destroy all who were followers of The Way.
Not only was he personally bent on his ruthless mission, but he had the full sanctioning of the Sanhedrin (Acts 8:3, 9:1-2). This was the religious body that had successfully goaded Pontius Pilate into crucifying Jesus.
So you can imagine the apprehension in Ananias’ heart when Jesus calls him to visit with Saul after he had encountered Jesus for himself. Ananias said, “I’ve heard all about this man and the harm he has done. And I also know he has come to my city with the authority to drag Christians off to prison” (Acts 9:13-14).
Ananias’ interaction with Jesus seems to me to echo the prayer that Jesus prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane. It is as if Ananias is praying, “Is there another way? But not my will but Yours be done, Lord” (see Luke 22:42).
Ananias is called a disciple of Jesus (Acts 9:10), and Paul even refers to him later as “a devout observer of the law and highly respected by all the Jews” (22:12). In other words, Ananias is an early church leader. What he does or doesn’t do here will set the pace for other Christians.
So I love the fact that Ananias didn’t just begrudgingly do only what Jesus instructed him, but he said and did only what Christ’s love could empower him to say and do.
Jesus told Ananias to lay his hands on Saul and pray for the restoration of his sight (9:12). Ananias did more. He laid his hands on him in such a loving way (9:17), that Luke uses the same word as when Jesus laid His hands on people for their healing (c.f. Luke 13:13). Ananias even called him “brother Saul” (9:17).
Jesus told Ananias to simply pray for Saul’s physical healing, but Ananias did more: he prayed for Saul to be baptized in the Holy Spirit as well (9:17, 22:13).
Jesus told Ananias what His plan was for Saul’s ministry, but He didn’t tell Ananias that he had to repeat that to Saul. Ananias did more: He reaffirmed to Saul what Jesus had already said to him and encouraged him to get up, be baptized, and began to do what Jesus had told him to do (9:15-16, 22:14-16).
When Ananias called Saul “brother,” he used the term that fellow Christians used for each other (Philippians 4:1; Hebrews 2:11; 1 John 3:14). That means that Ananias is the first one to recognize the genuine conversion of Saul the persecutor to Paul the Christian.
When the love of Jesus is in us, we will not be looking for ways to begrudgingly obey what Jesus tells us, but we cannot wait to lavishly do more loving things out of the overflow of Christ’s love in us. What a fantastic example Ananias has give all of us who call ourselves Christians!
Is it okay to pray a prayer written by someone else? Sure! But let’s use those prayers merely as guides to help us form our own personalized prayers to our loving Heavenly Father. I shared a whole series on prayer that you may want to check out.
I have lots of new content every week, which you can check out on my YouTube channel.
T.M. Moore wrote, “The Holy Spirit comes to dwell in believers with an agenda. His agenda is not ours, and unless we can put our agendas aside, we will never line up with His to realize more of the presence, promise, and power of the Kingdom of God. The Spirit has not come to make us ecstatically happy. He has not come to fulfill our every wish. He comes to bring forth in us distinctly Kingdom values and virtues: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. He comes to distribute among us spiritual gifts, God-given abilities to serve one another in caring and sharing ways. He comes to empower us as witnesses for Jesus, both in how we live and what we say. And He comes to build our churches up into Christlikeness by our unified and focused work.”
I am really enjoying these mini-biographies of key leaders in the Reformation presented by Desiring God. One that I found especially fascinating is about Menno Simons—“If you are familiar with the contemporary Mennonites, you may be surprised to learn that the group’s founder started as a Catholic priest who had never read the Bible.” Yet, near the end of his life, Menno wrote, “Although I resisted in former times Thy precious Word and Thy holy will with all my powers…nevertheless, Thy fatherly grace did not forsake me, a miserable sinner, but in love, received me…and taught me by the Holy Spirit until of my own choice I declared war upon the world, the flesh, and the devil…and willingly submitted to the heavy cross of my Lord Jesus Christ that I might inherit the promised kingdom.”
“What strikes me is that there’s a very fine line between success and failure. Just one ingredient can make the difference.” —Andrew Lloyd Webber
This past Sunday I spoke to my congregation about how Christians should behave biblically during an election season. Someone forwarded to me a related graphic from the Pentecostal Evangel magazine (a publication of the Assemblies of God) from 1984. I love these reminders for Christians!
Researchers unveiled the largest brain map ever completed. It was of a fruit fly, whose brain “includes nearly 140,000 neurons and captures more than 54.5 million synapses”! It took four years to complete this map. “All told, the researchers identified 8,453 types of neuron—much more than anyone had expected. Of these, 4,581 were newly discovered.” This level of complexity and order in a fruit fly is astounding to me. Can you imagine what it would take to map the much larger and more complex human brain?! Truly, David was right when he said that we are wonderfully made by our Creator!
“Freely, willingly and joyfully do good to everyone, serve everyone, suffer all kinds of things, love and praise the God who has shown such grace. Thus, it is just as impossible to separate faith and works as it is to separate heat and light from fire!” —Martin Luther
“Faith the mother of all good works justifieth us, before we can bring forth any good work: as the husband marryeth his wife before he can have any lawful children by her.” —William Tyndale
Listen to the podcast of this post by clicking on the player below, and you can also subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or Audible.
Much like Jude who had a message he wanted to deliver to the saints, but was compelled by the Holy Spirit to address something concerning him (Jude 3-4), I, too, was excited to deliver the next message in our series on discovering your gifts and then living in your gift zone. But I am deeply concerned about the words and actions of Christian saints during these past election cycles.
I recently heard John Stonestreet say, “Currently, politics is carrying far more cultural weight than it is able to bear.” I agree: Christians are putting far too much emphasis on political candidates than the Bible would suggest.
I frequently quote something from Charles Colson that always makes people smile. He said, “Salvation will never arrive in Air Force One.” The flip side is true as well: Neither will the Apocalypse arrive on Air Force One.
We have to remember that the Most High is sovereign over all the nations of the earth, and He gives them to whom He choose (Daniel 4:25, 32). When we think that our candidate or our party is the only way our nation can be saved, aren’t we elevating the political process above God’s plan?
I hope this doesn’t come as a shock to anyone, but there are no perfect candidates, perfect political parties, nor perfect party platforms. We can study our Bibles, pray, study the candidates’ lifestyle and policies, but ultimately we will have to cast a ballot for an imperfect candidate.
God doesn’t have an “R” or “D” next to His name. He has not endorsed a political candidate. You may be sitting next to someone right now that is going to vote for the opposite political party that you will be voting for. And the way we interact with those people—whether they are fellow Christians or not—is deeply concerning to me.
Moses saw a couple of fellow Israelites fighting each other, and he asked them, “Why are you hitting your fellow Hebrew” (Exodus 2:13). The Hebrew word rea means a friend who is also a fellow citizen. These Hebrews were citizens of Zion, but they were living in Egypt, and they definitely weren’t treating each other in a way that would be a testimony to the Egyptians.
When Stephen retold this portion of the story in his sermon, he phrased it this way, “Men, you are brothers” (Acts 7:25-26). Stephen used the Greek word adelphos which literally means “from the same womb.” But the Christians used this word to mean brothers and sister in Christ—people with whom we will spend eternity.
Let us always remember that others who are participating in the American political process are BOTH fellow US citizens AND brothers and sisters in Christ.
In J.R.R. Tolkien’s Return of the King, when Gandalf sees fellow citizens and friends at each other’s throats, he exclaims, “Work of the enemy! Such deeds he loves: friend at war with friend, loyalty divided, and confusion of hearts.” Indeed, the enemy of our souls would love to see the chaos of a nation at war with itself; especially to see Christians at odds with each other.
Paul said, “Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people,especially to those who belong to the family of believers” (Galatians 6:10). On the flip side, Jesus said that when we think or speak poorly of a fellow human, we are in danger of judgment (Matthew 5:22).
Listen to Paul’s appeal to his friends at Philippi—
Therefore if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from His love, if any common sharing in the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind.
I plead with Euodia and I plead with Syntyche to be of the same mind in the Lord. Yes, and I ask you, my true companion, help these women since they have contended at my side in the cause of the gospel, along with Clement and the rest of my co-workers, whose names are in the book of life. (Philippians 2:1-2, 4:2-3)
The politicians we have are always downstream from culture, which means we have allowed those sorts of politicians to be in place.
John Stonestreet used a phrase I hadn’t heard before, but I think it’s appropriate: “Christian political engagement should hit its fever pitch notduring elections. The only way to relieve the political pressures of our day is to build up the pre-political aspects of our life together, especially the family and the Church. When we care well for our children, our neighbors, and our communities, the state doesn’t have to.”How true this is!
I wrote something this summer based on Isaiah 3:4-5. In essence, I wrote that God gives nations the “leaders” they deserve. They are leaders in that they occupy an office, but they don’t lead people nor care for the citizens—they don’t have wisdom to lead nor do they care about anyone but themselves. This is the inevitable result for a nation that turns its back on God! So if we think our political and civic leaders are self-focused, unskilled, and childish, we should look in the mirror. It’s not “them,” it’s us. We have to change—turning wholeheartedly to God—and only then God can change our leadership.
We need to be praying for our governmental leaders, not vilifying them. We need to be speaking well of our fellow US citizens. We need to be especially treating our fellow brothers and sisters in Christ well.
Our hope is not in the results of an election. Our hope is in Jesus. The way we treat BOTH fellow US citizens AND brothers and sisters in Christ will either point people to Jesus or to manmade political systems.
I pray we can do better at pointing people to Jesus! I pray I can do better!
Craig T. Owens 