Updates:
- Remember to keep Dwayne in your prayers. He is recovering well, but is rather bored and looking forward to more physical freedom.
- Lisa had complications after her massive surgery and a serious infection has set in. Please intercede on her behalf and for her family as they go through this difficult time.
- Shirley continues to recover, but still needs to be lifted up in prayer daily.
Prayer Requests:
- Aaron is still at Camp War Eagle. Please pray that the Lord would touch his spirit and draw Aaron closer to Him.
- Peace in the city of Noel
- All the families in Norway who were affected by the dreadful massacre
- Phillip, Lisa, and Cameron Kyle
- Roy, Julie, Rebecca, Brenna, and Gabe
- Mary, Byron, Pam, and Markus.
- Rita and Charlotte.
- Sandy's trip to Oregon
- Sulphur Springs
- Vanessa and her family.
- Tammy Rhinegold and the mass on her brain
- This week please pray and listen for insight as to what God’s plans for Harbor House and the property here are. May His vision be fulfilled for this place and for us!
airplane in sky, a photo by Sean MacEntee on Flickr.
Every day thousands of people board huge machines weighing tens of thousands of pounds and expect them to fly through the air, staying aloft hour after hour. And many of them never think a thing of it! Riding an airplane takes confidence, and everyone exercises this same kind of confidence every day. We walk in front of moving vehicles on crosswalks, we swim in deep water, we play around with electrical wiring, and are confident that we’ll be all right and the job will get done.
And yet many times when we go to pray for a person, we don’t have that same simple confidence that what we ask will be granted. How many times have you prayed for something that hasn't come to pass? It’s sort of a slap in Jesus’s face, isn't it, when His people declare things in His name and they don’t come to pass. Why does that happen? One reason is praying outside the will of God. James 4:3 says, "When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures." But there is one simple truth that could revolutionize your prayer life and the way you approach Kingdom living.
We can’t open the Bible and read a promise of healing for all who pray for it, we aren’t guaranteed that God will always grant us victory in our small struggles, and we don’t know that He will save and prosper all of our nearest and dearest. But there is one thing that we know God wants to give to every living creature.
For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.-John 3:16.
It’s love. God loves all of us, and it’s not just a love that finds its fulfillment on judgment day; it’s a love that we can have confidence in today.
Have you ever been in conflict about what to pray for? “Should I pray for healing, or is God doing a work in them that necessitates this disease? What do I do?” Here is the key—we know that God loves the person you’re praying for, lavishly. That is the heart of God, the will of God, for that person. So let’s pray in God’s will! Let’s pray that God’s love be manifested in that person’s life. And do you know what happens when you do that? The prayer hits the mark every time. Perhaps God's love won’t look exactly as you might picture it, but all good things (healing, provision, success) do come from love. If we’re praying God’s love on a person, we’re praying His divine will for them.
Sometimes in our prayers we appeal to justice, but when the “sons of thunder” wanted to incinerate a Samaritan village because of their irreverence, Jesus rebuked them. Sometimes we appeal to mercy, but time and again we read of God’s mercy running out for a nation or person. However, there is never a time in scripture when God says, “I will stop loving you.” He is love, and would have to go against His nature in order to stop loving someone. When we pray that God will pour out His love on a person—no matter the outcome—we can know that we have not prayed in vain.
And that is a great source of confidence.
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