21 Days of Prayer - Day 12 - Thursday - January 18 - God’s Work in Us -Our Relationships

Day 12 - Thursday - January 18 - God’s Work in Us -Our Relationships  

Most important of all, continue to show deep love for each other, for love covers a multitude of sins. 1 Peter 4:8 (NLT)

Relationships are in crisis these days.

Relationships eroding - kids distancing from their parents, marriages ending.

If we're honest, we have been or maybe are in our lives too?  What is missing in these relationships?

1 Peter 4 gives us the idea and the answer.

Could it be that the missing ingredient is love - but not eros love or phileto love - but the agape love (agopow - sacrificial, self giving love that is primarily concerned with the good of someone else).

As we pray for relationships, let think about this:

1. Know that Jesus Loves me.

“As the Father loved Me, I also have loved you; abide in My love. John 15:9 (NKJV)

I’m so grateful for the simplistic love of Jesus. 

Prayer: Thank you Jesus for loving me the way you do.

2. Let Jesus’ love be our standard.

Let’s lay down our own interests and seek what Jesus’ interest is for our relationships.

So now I am giving you a new commandment: Love each other. Just as I have loved you, you should love each other. John 13:34 (NLT)

Let Jesus be our model for our love for one another.

Prayer: Forgive me for not loving the  way you do. Today, I make you the standard.

3. Surrender to the Holy Spirit

We can’t do this on our own. We need the Holy Spirit.

And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever— 17 the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you. John 14:16-17a (NIV)

When we surrender to the Holy Spirit, He produces fruit in our lives - love.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Galatians 5:22-23 (NIV)

Prayer: I surrender to you Holy Spirit. Work in me so I can love like Jeus loves.

4. Love is what love does.

Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud 5 or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. 6 It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. 7 Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance. 1 Cor. 13:4-7 (NLT)

Prayer: Help me to demonstrate love the way Jesus does!

Let’s all apply the missing ingredient - the agape - the extravagant love of Jesus.

21 Days of Prayer - Day 11 - Wednesday January 17 - God’s Work in Us - Our Growth

21 Days of Prayer - Day 11 - Wednesday  January 17 - God’s Work in Us - Our Growth

Today we’ll talk about our Growth. Just look back and know.. I’m not where I want to be but I’m not where I once was.

11 So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, 12 to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up 13 until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.

14 Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming. 15 Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ. 16 From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work. Ephesians 4:11-16 (NIV)

Today let’s ask God, “Lord, I want to grow in 2024.”

Perhaps start your year by reviewing your life in different areas - goals where you want to grow.

1. Growth requires vulnerability.

I’m going to let God or someone else point out to me an area where I can grow.

Mature people will ask others to look into their lives and give advice for growth.

Search me, God, and know my heart;  test me and know my anxious thoughts.

24 See if there is any offensive way in me,   and lead me in the way everlasting.

Psalm 139:23-24 (NIV)

The worst counsel comes from me, myself and I.  It’s good to ask God and maybe ask some godly counselors into your life.

2. Growth requires change.

Some people don’t like change, but God wants us to change.

17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. 2 Cor. 5:17 (NKJV)

Just say, “Lord, there’s no area of my life that is off limits for change.”

We should have a willingness for God to bring change into your life.  Ask the Holy Spirit to do a work of change on the inside of us.

3. Growth requires pliability.

We should be soft for God to work with. Like clay in the Potter’s Hand.

I don’t want to be hard and brittle because change can hurt. I want to be soft in His Hands.

6 “O Israel, can I not do to you as this potter has done to his clay? As the clay is in the potter’s hand, so are you in my hand.!  Jeremiah 18:6 (NLT)

I want to be pliable and easy to change.  

Maybe pray and ask God for His guidance to help us grow in these different areas.

21 Days of Prayer - Day 10 - Tuesday January 16 - God’s Work in Us - Our Future

21 Days of Prayer - Day 10 - Tuesday  January 16 - God’s Work in Us - Our Future

“For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord. Plans to prosper you and not harm you. Plans to give you hope and a future.” Jeremiah 29:11 (NIV)

God’s plans are always good plans -and because of these plans we can have hope and be confident that God has a future for us.

This verse is often much easier to memorize than to live out.  God knows the plans but often we don’t know the plans He has for us.

When we are in the dark, we can’t see around us - it’s unknown to us and it creates some anxiety and fear.

We can have in our heads God has great plans for us, but often in our hearts, we have anxiety - will may think will we ever see the great plans God has - will it come to fruition. 

We can’t stay in  that place of fear and anxiety - that’s the enemy's plans for us. But we stand in prayer and spiritual warfare to claim those plans - to fight in prayer. Here’s what we can stand on today -

Pray these truths today:

God is for me - we know this -  

What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us.  Romans 8:31 (NIV)

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? …. 37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,[a] neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.  Romans 8:35, 37-39 (NIV)

If we have God - we have all we need.  Me + God = all we need.

God is with me - His presence is with us every day.  The last words of Jesus before He ascended - 

“…and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”  Matthew 28:20 (NIV)

If you have felt all alone - presence or future - you need to remember that Jesus is with us to the end of the age.

God has my future in His hands -  

“But I am trusting you, O Lord,   saying, “You are my God!” Psalm 31:14 (NLT) 

Our future is in the good hands of a good, good Father.

Samuel reminded people of God’s help.  

Then Samuel took a stone and set it up between Mizpah and Shen. He named it Ebenezer,[a] saying, “Thus far the Lord has helped us.” 1 Samuel 7:12 (NIV)

- They raised up a stone (Ebenezer) - a stone of hope - that God is faithful. He’s been faithful in our past and He will continue to be faithful to us. 

The past 5 days we have experienced winter at it’s finest - bitter cold, a ton of snow, power outages, plugged driveways - clogged drains - and sickness (colds) - It throws us off our usual schedules, it keeps us from getting together for worship and it raises some anxiety and fear in our lives  - YET KNOW THIS - WE HAVE A GOOD GOOD FATHER - HE IS OUR HOPE. 

He has blessed us before and He’ll continue to bless us. You can have confidence in this: God is for me. God is with me.  God has my future in His hands.