As you prepare for worship, give thanks

This morning you may be in a hurry to get to church to worship. Your clothes may not look or feel right; your children may be complaining; you may have had some conflict with your spouse; you may have slept too late and now you are rushed. But in your haste to leave the house, […]

“Pray for me”

“Now may the God of peace [who is the author and the giver of peace], who brought back from among the dead our Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of the sheep, by the blood [that sealed, ratified] the everlasting agreement (the new covenant), strengthen (complete, perfect) [and] make you what you ought to be [and] […]

Praying for today’s election

Sunday, I reprinted the pastoral prayer I offered that morning for our congregation and country. Since then, I have seen Al Mohler’s list of ten components of a prayer for our nation and this election. Here is a summary… First, we should pray that God will bless America with leaders better than we deserve.… Second, […]

A prayer for election week

“To You I lift up my eyes, O You who are enthroned in the heavens! Behold, as the eyes of servants look to the hand of their master, As the eyes of a maid to the hand of her mistress, So our eyes look to the LORD our God, Until He is gracious to us. […]

Why go to a prayer meeting?

With our church having begun a weekly prayer meeting again, I was encouraged by reading this post about the significance and importance of weekly times of prayer: Privilege… Community… Edification… Training… Serving… Reminder… Read the rest of Why Should You Go to A Prayer Meeting?.

The primacy of prayer

Having lived during my college years in a military community, I’ve seen the stress of a husband and father separated from his family for six-month intervals. Such absences weigh heavily on all members of the family. One thing that becomes very important, then, is mail. It is the life-line of information and communication between these […]

He is able

A well-known Christian chorus says: He is able, more than able to accomplish what concerns me today He is able, more than able to handle anything that comes my way He is able, more than able to do much more than I could ever dream He is able, more than able to make me what […]

God has spoken

Reflecting on Psalm 108:7, Charles Spurgeon wrote the following: THERE is an old promise, concerning God’s people, which says, “Before they call, I will answer; and while they are yet speaking, I will hear.” This text is one of the instances in which the Lord has dealt with his saints upon the lines of that […]

How to pray for your pastor

Have you ever wondered about how to pray for your pastor? Have you pondered, “What are the needs he has and what would be most beneficial for me to pray for him?” The apostle Paul’s requests for the prayers of the churches for him are fitting places to start (see Eph. 6:19-20; Col. 4:3-4 as […]

An appropriate prayer

On the sixth day of NASA’s moon mission of Apollo 13, the astronauts aboard the badly damaged space vehicle needed to make a critical course correction in order to position themselves to reenter the earth’s atmosphere. Unfortunately, the ship’s onboard computer had been shut down to conserve power, so the craft had to be steered […]

He hears our prayers

In reading through the Psalms on Sunday mornings, certain themes recur. One of those is the frequency with which the psalmists pray and the regular reminders of the truth that God hears (and responds to) our prayers. Consider these recent examples: “Oh, give ear, Shepherd of Israel, You who lead Joseph like a flock; You […]

Excuses for prayer

Instinctively and automatically [the carnal mind] will mobilize all the reasons it can conceive of for not praying now: You are too busy; your mind is too preoccupied; your heart is not inclined toward prayer; later on you will have more time, your mind will be more calm and collected, and you will be able […]

Praying for others

Ask any believer about his prayer life, and he will invariable acknowledge something like, “It’s not what it should be.” And as a pastor, I am not only called on to pray often, but prayer is actually part of my calling. You won’t find “prayer” in most pastoral job descriptions, but the apostles believed that […]

Peter was sleeping…

Christians are prone to talking much about prayer and praying too little. We have attend conferences on praying, we preach sermons about praying, and we read books about praying. We develop methods for keeping track of prayer requests (I now have an app on my phone to do that task) and we frequently tell our […]

Grab bag

Some helpful articles from around the internet: Justin Taylor offers “Eight Reasons Why My Anxiety is Pointless and Foolish.” In “Pray the Scriptures,” Scotty Smith confesses, I am a recovering self-centered pragmatic pray-er — a believer who spent many of my first years in Christ thinking of God more as a sugar daddy than the […]