Prayer to Be Still

I often journal my prayers, but I've been neglecting to share them here on the blog. I'm hoping to get more regular in sharing some of these prayers with you.

God help me to not fear,
though the earth gives way
and the mountains fall into the sea.
Help me to trust in you God
in every circumstance.
Increase my faith.

God, if you are within me,
I will not fall.
Nations are in uproar.
You lift Your voice,
and the earth melts.
You bring desolations on the earth.

God, let nothing hinder
your people from loving You.
It is amidst destruction and war
that you say,

"Be still and know that I am God;
I will be exalted among the nations.
I will be exalted in all the earth."

We can be still
because we know that there is an end.
You WILL be exalted.

How can I live with this as the vision?
How can I live so that You will be exalted?

I need to be still.
I need to trust You.
I need to know You
to know You as GOD.

I can claim to know someone
without knowing all their sides.
God I want to know You fully,
as You know me.

THE LORD ALMIGHTY IS WITH US.
THE GOD OF JACOB IS OUR FORTRESS.

23 October 2005

Praying Across Time Zones

I have been really blessed the last few days by being able to pray along with people at the International House of Prayer in Kansas City. Since there aren't many believers over here to pres into intercession with, it's great to be able to tune and pray with the teams at IHOP.

An audio subscription is onlly $5/month, and for me I'd say it's definitely worth it. My prayer times had gotten stale and dry and it's nice to have other people praying and inspiring me to pray.

This morning (my time) they were praying for women in prostitution in Cambodia. It spurred me to intercede for the many women in my city who are working in brothels or red light districts. The Holy Spirit was showing me God's heart for these women to come to know Him and be free, physically and spiritually.

Check out The Prayer Room Live

Spirit of Death

"There was blood splattered all over the walls. Her neck was just hanging from her head; half off. Nobody knows why he did it. It was the most disturbing thing I've ever seen."

This is a paraphrase from a conversation I had with one of my friends this week. I called her to see how she was doing, and she told me the gruesome story of how her husband's aunt had been murdered by her own servant. Living in an upper to middle class section of the city, an incident like this came as a shock to the family. Nobody knows why, but the servant (hired about a month an a half ago) attempted to chop off the aunt's head with an axe. The blade was too dull to make a clean cut, but he succeeded in cutting into her neck enough to kill her.

A second servant had gone out for Friday prayers when the murder took place. When the second servant arrived, he saw the aunt partially decapitated and the other servant running away. He caught the murderer and called the police and family. My friend was one of the first to arrive at the scene, even before the police had come.

Are you wondering why you did not see this story on the news? If this had happened in the US or Europe it surely would have been in the papers. But here, these kind of unnatural deaths happen all too often. I wrote another blog before about the little blurbs about gang rapes, killings, and other horrendous crimes that come in the back of the paper where almost nobody bothers to read them.

As I reflected on this crime, I felt that there must be a spiritual reason behind the high frequency of unnatural deaths and heinous crimes. My friend's aunt who died was only in her early fifties. It reminded me that we are engaged in a spiritual battle. Over here, I feel that we are deeply entrenched in territory the enemy has held for thousands of years.

Oh Lord, even though many times it seems so hard to pray and to press in, help me to intercede for the peoples of this land. So many people die unnatural deaths every day, and most of them have probably never heard the gospel. Lord, help me to be intentional in sharing the Word of truth. Empower me with boldness. Send more laborers for this harvest over here, so that all may hear the truth that is the power of salvation to those who believe.

Praise & Prayer Update March 11th

Praises:

• D and a friend went to a city in our province (3 hours away) to do some outreach training over the weekend. It seems that the training was well received. Please pray that those who attended would feel a burden to be intentional in reaching the lost.
• H is finally driving! She was able to go out shopping this weekend and hand out some literature in the local language. Pray that we both would want to sow the Word abundantly, even if it may not always be well received.
  
• We have both been able to share more with people at our workplace. Pray for the student who D will be giving the Bible to this week.
  
• Electricity! We have had 20+ hours a day of power which has been a blessing in school and at home.
  

Prayers:

• Travel - We will be leaving the country on Saturday to check out a language school for the summer. Pray that we will focus on the Lord during our vacation and that He we will also be intentional about sharing with the different people we meet during the journey. It will take 1-2 days of travel to reach our destination.
  
• Platform - Please pray for us as we make decisions about what we'll be doing professionally next year. We need the Lord's guidance as well as his provision for the proper visas.
  
• Strategic Outreach - We heave been feeling burdened to be more focused on sharing and being strategic with our time. Pray that the Lord will give us his plan and method so that we may bear fruit in this land. May we not only think of our friends and coworkers but may we have vision to see multiplication of faith among the people groups of this region.
  
• Laborers for the Harvest - There are 180 million people in this country who speak over 60 languages. Most foreign organizations in the country focus on mercy ministries, and while those efforts are much appreciated we are not seeing many people come to know the Lord and follow him. In short, we are not seeing much eternal fruit in this field. Even if there may be foreign workers in a village hospital (which would still be rare) there may not be an active witness of the truth. Pray for more workers who are willing to be bold, creative, strategic, and full of the Holy Spirit to come to this land. Pray that those of us who are here would not get bogged down in the mundane or neglect to focus on what's going to make an eternal difference.

The Ultimate Note Part II - Reflections

The first time I read "The Ultimate Note" I left it with a, "Oh, wasn't that nice" feeling। It didn't have any impact on my thinking or my walk with God. When I read it yesterday, something clicked and I felt the Lord speaking to me.

We can feel when notes create dissonance। My problem, as a bassist, is that I can always tell when notes are not matched, but I never know which way to turn the knobs to make it right. I can't tell whether the mismatched note is too high or too low. That's how I feel now, in the spiritual. I feel restless because my life is not in tune with the Holy Spirit. I should not be disocuraged, but encouraged that I can at least tell I'm not in tune. I may not have "perfect pitch" but at least I have a musical ear.

So many believers are not living in tune with the Holy Spirit। It's like they've heard awful, out of tune, music so much that it sounds good to them. They don't know there's something better, more beautiful.

"The spirit of God testifies to our spirit that we are children of God, and if children then also heirs।" Romans 8:16-१७

This is the perfect note। Being in tune with the fact that we have been adopted as children of God. We are his sons and daughters. We have the right to live as his heirs. We don't have to live in dissonance. We can allow our lives to be tuned perfectly to what the Father has for us. But first, he must open our ears. The badly out of tune guitar will never be tuned if the guitarist doesn't realize how bad it sounds and that there is something much much better. There is SO much more than this.

We must always desire to hit the perfect note। We should not settle for anything less. Just because your badly tuned guitar may not be as bad as those around you doesn't mean that you shouldn't bother to get yours in tune to produce more beautiful music. The best music the guitar was made to produce. An out of tune guitar will never produce music the way it was meant to. Guitars were not made to be played out of tune. We were made to be satisfied with falling short of all that God has for us. Instead, we were created with an inner longing for the fullness of God's kingdom to come.

Prayer: Purify your Bride Jesus! Stir us up out of complacency and lukewarmness so perhaps you will not spit us out of your mouth. May we desire to be one with you. May we cray COME! Maranatha! Come quickly our Lover, our Bridegroom God!

Global day of Prayer May 27

As believers gathered in prayer in the upper room for ten days after Jesus' ascension and the coming of the Holy Spirit, the organizers of the global day of prayer are encouraging churches and believers all over the earth to gather in 10 days of night and day prayer leading up to Pentecost and the Global Day of Prayer 2007.

12Then they returned to Jerusalem from the hill called the Mount of Olives, a Sabbath day's walk[b] from the city. 13When they arrived, they went upstairs to the room where they were staying. Those present were Peter, John, James and Andrew; Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew; James son of Alphaeus and Simon the Zealot, and Judas son of James. 14They all joined together constantly in prayer, along with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brothers. (Acts 1:12-14)

1When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. 2Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. 3They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. 4All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues[a] as the Spirit enabled them. (Acts 2:1-4)

All over the earth night and day prayer watches are being established, from majestic cathedrals in France to tin houses in the slums of South Africa, people are gathering in continual prayer.

Isaiah 62:1, 6-7
1 For Zion's sake I will not keep silent,
for Jerusalem's sake I will not remain quiet,
till her righteousness shines out like the dawn,
her salvation like a blazing torch.
6 I have posted watchmen on your walls, O Jerusalem
they will never be silent day or night.
You who call on the LORD,
give yourselves no rest,
7 and give him no rest till he establishes Jerusalem
and makes her the praise of the earth.

Will you and your church join in this worldwide movement to seek God in repentance, intercession and praise? God is setting watchmen on the walls in all nations of the earth. He is calling his people to see Him in radical obedience. Will you call your brothers and sisters to gather in a solemn assembly and cry out to Lord to heal your Lord? Will you ask God to show you His heart for the world and be willing to be broken as He reveals it to you? Will you keep watch?

35For it will come upon all those who live on the face of the whole earth. 36Be always on the watch, and pray that you may be able to escape all that is about to happen, and that you may be able to stand before the Son of Man." Luke 21:35-36

14 if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land. 15 Now my eyes will be open and my ears attentive to the prayers offered in this place. (2 Chron 7:14-15)

14 Declare a holy fast;

call a sacred assembly.

Summon the elders

and all who live in the land

to the house of the LORD your God,

and cry out to the LORD.

(Joel 1:14)

Global Day of Prayer

http://www.globaldayofprayer.com/

Mobilize ten days of Prayer -May 17-26

http://www.globaldayofprayer.com/10days.php