Prayer

Recently, as I think I’ve stated in previous entries, I’ve been burdened for a friend of mine. And within the past week or so I’ve been burdened more and more to pray for this individual.

During the message tonight(Though the topic was unrelated to this matter), God and I had a powwow. I began praying again for my friend because I was impressed again to pray for him. So, I was initially carrying on hypothetical conversation in my head with a youth worker at my church.

“What should I do if God lays on my heart constantly to pray for someone?”

Obvious reply, “Pray for them”.

Then I thought, “Well, what if God is giving me this burden to talk to them, help them, guide them? Am I given this to immerse myself in their problems for their benefit?”

Then God took over. “Why can’t you simply pray? Are you so without faith that you can’t trust me to handle it? True, I use people to further my will, but do you recall my word ‘Lean not unto thine own understandings, and in all thy ways acknowledge Him’? Your heart is deceitful. Leaning on your understandings of any matter, but this matter in particular, you will come to a point where you “understanding” thins out. I will handle this. He is my child, and I love him. When I want you to help him beyond asking me to help, I will bring him to you in my time.”

 

 

So, there apparently are things he needs to learn. Things he has to know now. He knows I’m praying for him, he knows I’m always there for him—I’ve told him such. It isn’t my place to pry open his heart. He has to open it himself.

 

How little faith it is to think there has to be something more than just praying to help. I’m coming before the throne of the one who made heaven and earth, who divided the Red Sea with his breath, the one who created me—created my friend. I’m asking His divine help. I’m begging Him to intervene and work mighty wonders in his life.

 

In the end of it all, I must acknowledge God. I must trust in the Lord with all my heart—not leaning on my own understanding. He hears the cries of His children. He loves me, and he loves my friend. I must realize praying may be one of the most powerful things I can do—because it is beseeching the help of the one who can help. I may screw things up if I try to intervene in my time, in my understanding, in my strength. But in God’s time, in God’s understanding, in God’s strength my friend will be healed. “Confess you faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.”

 

Healing begins with prayer. Prayer avails much when God hearkens to it. God hearkens pray to those whose hearts regard not sin.

 

 

May this situation push me to live right in God’s eyes so he will hear my cry, so he will attend to the needs of my friend.

 

-Kevin

“And not to please ourselves”

“We then that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak, and not to please ourselves. Let everyone of us please his neighbor for his good to edification. For even Christ pleased not himself, but, as it is written, the reproaches of them that reproached thee fell on me.” –Romans 15:1-3

 

At my church, in the youth group, we have opportunities to study God’s Word and to memorize it. We are supplied lists of verses to study on different subjects. For today, I went about studying a verse sheet categorized on “serving.”

 

Lately, I’ve been really burdened for my friends who are struggling and hurting. I love to help people, and it hurts me when my friends hurt—and hurts even more when there isn’t anything I can do.

So, because of that, I’ve been praying hard about a particular friend. Uncertainties cloud my mind as to what I ought to do. I want to help, but I don’t know how. I want to be there for him, but I don’t want to come across as pushy, or overstep any boundaries. (After all, how can I help if I lose him as my friend?)

 

But as I studied that verse sheet Romans 15:1-3 jumped out at me. I am commanded to bear the infirmities of the weak. But in the same breath I am commanded not to please myself. I am to please that person to HIS edification. Not my edification. I’m not to bear his burden so I can fill some void, to appease some longing in my heart, to quench some worries?

No, I am to bear the infirmities of my weaker friends for their edification.

 

May God enable me to remove myself from the picture. May God enable me to launch out in service to my fellow brethren, but for the right motives.

 

Another thought God presented was the fact that even Christ didn’t please himself when he bore the reproaches of the men that reproached us.

From the surface, I am assuming this is a reference to Calvary. So, think about it. Christ was beaten and killed so we could have a sacrifice for salvation.
I kind of always assumed it was dual purpose(and no, not a selfish reason that we, as finite beings, would assume). One was to, obviously, save us. And second so we, His creation, would be able to spend eternity with him.

But, this verse says he didn’t accept those reproaches to please himself. He did it for us. How humbling is that? The God of the universe, that knows all, is all, loves all, is everywhere, is love, is patience and power…that God…He bore our infirmities on the cross…for us as his motivation? Not because he wanted us to be with him for his pleasure, but for our benefit.

Wow.

 

Anyway, that’s what God has recently laid on my heart: Serve others for others’ edification. I hope God can speak to you through this. Life would be tons easier if everyone had a friend they could lean on, who can bear their burdens with them. Someone who will ignore their own pleasures, but seek to help them, to edify them.

 

-Kevin