God is our refuge, and very present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear. Psalm 46 is reminding us of the ancient truth that the Lord of hosts is with us. In this PrayerPodcast we pray for our nation and our government, that He may be exalted among the nations!
I sought the LORD, and He heard me,
And delivered me from all my fears. Ps 34:4
Prayer Insights … from Alistair Begg 1
What is chief among our prayers? Probably the things most often on our list of prayers are the things that most matter to us - our situations, our family, our work, and our health, etc. Likely the material and practical things in our day-to-day.
But when we read the prayers in the epistles of the apostle Paul, what is noticeably absent are his prayers for his own material things. It may well be that he didn’t include his own personal prayers in his letters to the churches, but we note that he also didn’t include any instructions that the church should be praying for them either.
All that matters may be brought before God, but what we bring before God is not always what matters most.
Perhaps, what we are to be seeking most is His kingdom and His righteousness. When we look with the eyes of our hearts to the future, writes Alistair, it changes our lives now. We pray less about the practical details of this life, and first and foremost about the spiritual realities of our eternal life. Eternal matters more; the concerns of today less.
I want to pray bigger, and better. And I want you to enjoy praying like that too. (Begg)
So let’s learn to pray like an apostle, and pray big prayers — from the Word of God, which are the prayers of what matters most. That is, what we really need is to know the truth of the gospel, and who we really need to know is Jesus. Alistair writes that more than anything else, what you and I really need is to be made experientially aware of the truth and reality of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Whatever situation we are facing, we need God’s help with that and so what we most need to know is the gospel. The gospel truth makes a difference in prayer and in practicalities. First though, we need to pray spiritually and then, as we move on to our practical concerns in our prayers, we need to let the way we pray about them flow from the spiritual truths we’ve prayed about.
Using the letter to the Ephesians as a guide, Alistair picks out five great qualities which Paul prays for the church there. We will highlight the first four this week and explore the final one next week.
Pray For The People Of God From The Word Of God
Here are four passages we are praying from this week:
Thu - Pray for Focus: Eph 1:17-18, that we learn to see and know God
Fri - Pray for Hope: Eph 1:18, that we are certain of eternity not yet realized
Sat - Pray for Riches: Eph 1:18, that we see our inheritance is God’s glory
Sun - Pray for Power: Eph 1:19, that his great power is working in us to believe
Will you join me in praying these verses, and ask one person to join you?
Until Monday, grace and peace
Pray Big Prayers