We started off today with a quick you tube video by Graham Cooke. It is called The Missing Piece, Part 1. It is only four or five minutes long, so watch it if you can. Graham Cooke is one of my favorite pastors and teachers. John 15:5-8 was our basic text for today. God intends for us to bear fruit and this is possible only by living in constant, prayerful relation to Christ. We need to understand what is important to Him and that must be the foundation of the relationship. Don't bring your religious "to do" list to Jesus and ask Him to bless it. Anything done without abiding in Christ does not count towards the fruit. It will be thrown out like wood, hay and straw and it will not last for eternity. Fruit-bearing depends on remaining in Christ and drawing from His sustaining grace. We must let the Father, the Master Gardener cut wrong practices and habits out of our lives so we can bear much fruit. Branches not in Christ die and are placed in the fire to burn. God is refining us so that we will be transformed into the image of Christ.
The foundation of the abiding relationship is God's love for us. Not our love for God. Christ's message, death and resurrection is founded on His love for us. Our love for God is often undependable and changes in intensity. We don't have to strive in our flesh to abide in Him. All we have to do is to live intentionally in His love for us! It is all about Him...not us. It is all about who He is. 1 John 4:16-18 says that to be in Christ is to be in God and by being in Christ, we will live a lifestyle that is characterized by divine love. Pray to know and experience more and more of the depths of His love. His love will change us from the inside out. Eph. 3:18 tells us that Jesus loves us more than we can begin to understand. Ask the Lord to give you a heart that longs to be one with Him. You can rest and rejoice that this abiding relationship is founded on God's love for us . The only thing you need to do is intentionally stay, remain and rest there. Living in this posture should change your perspective on life. Circumstances may still be bad, but you see them through the lens of His love.
We talked a lot about how to enter into this relationship. It does not happen just because you get up early and read the one-year-Bible and a devotional reading. It is a very intentional act of proclaiming who God is, committing your day to Him, confessing your sin to Him and enjoying His presence. It is resting in Him and receiving His love. It is being very still and quiet and listening to what He has to say to you. To enter into this relationship should not cause a lot of stress for you. It is fine to get up, make your coffee, put on the praise music and just be still before the Lord. As you start to wake up and pray some of these verses, do so very gently and let the Lord lead you in the direction He wants to take you for the morning. Some days will be filled with tears. Some will be filled with exhuberant joy. Some days He will just hold you close. It won't always look the same. The Holy Spirit knows what you need for the day and He does a great job of guiding us. When you start your day, be sure and call your Spirit to the fore front and tell your soul and your body to sit down, and that the Spirit man will be in charge today!
In the morning, I like to start the day by declaring and proclaiming who He is and by blessing His name. Some verses that help me with this are listed below: I have all of these verses on a spiral flip notebook.
Ps. 92:1-2
Ps 118:24
Ps 89:1-2
Lam 3: 21-23
Ps 33:22
Ps 32:10
Ps 84:11
Ps 147:11
Prov 9:10
I commit my day to Him by declaring these verses....be sure to say all of these out loud!
Jn 15:7-8
Ps 32:8
Col 3:2 Col 3:17 Col 3:23-24
1 Cor 10:31
Prov 16:3
Gal 2:20
Gal 5:16
Next move on to a time of confession. Ask God to reveal each and every sin so that you may confess it to Him.
Ps 139:23-24
1 Jn 1:9
Prov 28:13
This is also a great time for positive confession. Confess out loud who you are in Christ.
Read Song of Solomon 2:15. The little foxes are weeds. Ask yourself "what is the fastest growing weed in my life?" If you continue to confess the same sin over and over, that just might be a weed that needs to go!
Next, it is time to move into intercession. Pray for the things that are on God's heart. Pray for His kingdom to come and His will to be done . Ask God for an open heaven over certain situations, relationships, cities, nations, the lost, etc. Pray God's Word and insert a name in the verse! As I pray for my family everyday, I use several different resources. I love Prayer Portions by Sylvia Gunter and have used it for years. I also pray the Prayer of Jabez (1 Chron. 4:10) from a prayer book by Sylvia. She has written 31 different prayers based on that verse. One for each day of the month. It is also very important to put on the full armor of God for the day. It can be found in Eph. 6:10-18.
I enjoy praying from Stormie Omartian's books, too. I highly recommend the Power of a Praying Wife and the Power of a Praying Parent. It was suggested today that we buy the Power of a Praying Husband for our husbands for Valentine's Day! I also pray from Praying the Scriptures for your Children and Praying the Scriptures for your Teenagers by Jodie Berndt. There are so many great prayer books out there. The main thing is to pray the Word. I pray Psalm 91 over my family every day. Some other devotion books that really challenge me and bless me are My Utmost for His Highest by Oswald Chambers (updated version) and Jesus Calling by Sarah Young. Streams in the Desert by Mrs. Charles Cowan is an awesome little book, too. Come Away My Beloved by Frances Roberts (today's language) is another favorite of mine. Blessing your Spirit by Sylvia Gunter has probably changed my life more than any other book I have ever read. It is simply amazing. Sylvia is very annointed.
Liz also mentioned the CD "Home" by Laura Woodley for soaking in His presence. I use Pandora and sometimes I use www.soaking.net Connie shared the website for the personal promise Bible. This company actually prints a Bible for you with your name inserted into the verses! So cool!
When you finish praying, it is very important to thank God for the complete confidence that we have in Him based on 1 Jn 5:14-15 All believers have the guidance of the Holy Spirit when they pray. God will answer when the Christian asks according to His will.
I know how tired we are when it is bed time and it is hard to have a meaningful prayer time when you are bone tired and sleepy. No matter how tired you are, be sure to thank God at the end of the day for His protection, His provision and His faithfulness in your family that day. It is so important to be thankful and to tell him how grateful you are for His presence in your life.
Next week , we will finish up prayer and watch a Graham Cooke DVD. I pray that the Lord will bless your marriage through the marriage conference this weekend.
Every blessing,
JoAnne
Great teaching Joanne! I watched IHOP this morning and used soaking.net. They were both great and I fixed my coffee first to help me get woken up. It went pretty well and I'm encouraged that it will continue to go better and get easier now that I don't have morning prayer sessions to watch and guide me each morning.
ReplyDeleteSince our group yesterday, abiding in His love and making Him first priority has really been resonating in my spirit. It sounds so simple and like something that should be obvious to me but I told Steve that I just really feel that when Samuel is grown he won't necessarily remember all the meals, how clean the house was and whether the laundry was done. But he will remember if I possessed the fruits of the spirit and if the love of Jesus was shining through me each day or whether I was a grouch and difficult to live with. I feel like there is no point in me doing all those things out of my flesh. That taking care of home will be a natural flow out of my relationship and time with Jesus. If my spirit is fed and I'm supercharged then cooking, cleaning, bathing and so on will happen as a by product and that God will bless those areas and they will be successful and fruitful.
Anyway, I'm so thankful that you are focusing on this teaching and reminding us that we are disciples first and foremost. That is exactly what I have been needing to hear not another way to clean my bathroom in 2 minutes or less. It's so easy for me to get wrapped up in the to do list because I'm so task oriented so this is forcing me to put all those duties under the blood and the cross and to go there first.
Blessings, LGC
I just adore this group! My spirit has had such a washing, and I really had no idea that I was needing that. LG, I love what you said about the overflow of abiding, and how Samuel won't remember the details...but he will have tuned into whether or not you had fruition the spirit. That was a great word for me to remember! Love you ladies, and am looking foward to next week.
ReplyDeleteBlessings!
Kristen