Perhaps one of your New Year’s goals is to pray more. Well, January is a good time to take stock and ask God what major issues or topics He wants you zero in on for the year. Join Mary and I as we discuss what topics God has laid on our hearts this year. You’ll be encouraged to pray your way through 2011 with us!
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Perhaps one of your New Year’s goals is to pray more. Well, January is a good time to pray and ask God what major issues or topics He wants you to zero in on for the year. Of course, as the year goes along, you’ll find plenty of things, people and situations to pray for. But right now we can all take some time to seek God on what ongoing requests He wants you to focus on for 2011. Mary and I were just talking about this the other day and decided to share our Top 6 Prayer List of what we’re focusing on this year.
Top 6 Prayer List for 2011
1. Pray that we can love God with all our hearts. (Deuteronomy 6:5)
2. Pray that we can believe God to do big things in our lives. (Ephesians 3:20,21)
3. Pray for perseverance. (2 Peter 1:5-7)
4. Pray for persecuted Christians. (2Thessalonians 3:1-2)
5. Pray for justice for the oppressed. (Psalm 103:6)
6. Pray that we would be developing and using our God-given gifts. (1 Corinthians 12:4-11).
You may be led to similar prayer goals, or God may reveal to you totally different goals. One of the challenges with goals is actually doing them or keeping them. What I decided to do to help keep these fresh before me for the whole year is to write each goal on its own index card and keep it in my prayer card file. I’ll use a larger 4 x 6 size card. (See Ready, Set, Pray if you need suggestions to help you establish a prayer time.) As I go through the year, I’m going to record any specific requests or how I see God working in these areas on the appropriate cards.
Set aside some time tonight or over the weekend to ask God what your prayer priorities should be this year. If you want to share any of your prayer goals for the year, just leave a comment. We’d love to hear them.
Click to listen to the Pray Your Way Through 2011 podcast.
Pray on!
This is an amazing video by seven-year-old gospel singer Rhema Marvanne. God has blessed her with a voice to praise Him. I hope you enjoy it!
Lately it seems that I am being challenged on my expectations for my prayers. To be more specific, I am praying, but am I really expecting God to work through my prayers? I’ve heard several teachings on authority in prayer, a theme that has been repeating itself at church, in prayer meeting and in my devotional readings. I know from past experience that when I keep hearing the same theme repeatedly that I need to pay attention. God is trying to teach me something!
What I am hearing lately is that Jesus had to go back to heaven to be with His Father for a very important reason: so that the Holy Spirit could come and fill each believer on earth. Jesus was only one person and while on earth was limited to the number of people He could reach. But once He returned to heaven, God put into the action the next phase of His plan–and that is filling and equipping believers (that’s you and me) with His Holy Spirit. God is using us to spread His message to the ends of the earth. Let’s consider some of Jesus’ amazing words to us before He left this earth.
“Behold, I give you the authority to trample on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall by any means hurt you.” Luke 10:19
“Most assuredly, I say to you, he who believes in me, the works that I do he will do also; and greater works than these he will do, because I go to my Father. And whatever you ask in My name, that I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask anything in My name, I will do it.” John 14: 12-14
“Nevertheless I tell you the truth. It is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I depart, I will send Him to you.”
John 16:7
Those are powerful words. Have your ever let them sink in to your mind? Jesus really said that we were to do even greater works than what He did. Do we take Him at His word on this? In other words, when I am praying, do I believe that God will work through my prayers?
So many things to consider here …. In the next blog post, I want to explore this topic further. Until then …
Pray on!
Join Jane VanOsdol and Mary Kane as they finish discussing how to pray for your teenagers. The teen years are exciting and stressful times. Today Jane and Mary finish discussing how to pray for all the important issues in your teens’ lives. This is the second part of a two-part series.
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I’m reading a good book by Henry and Norman Blackaby called Experiencing Prayer with Jesus: The Power of His Presence and Example. I came across this quote that really made me stop and think .
Prayer is not for the purpose of getting God to help us … but for getting us in line with what God is about to do. Prayer is God’s invitation to enter His throne room so He can lay His agenda over our hearts.
I haven’t ever looked at prayer in quite this way before. It really is a training and molding ground for our hearts. It’s more about God preparing us so that He can start using us by working through us. I began to think about how much of my time I spend on asking God for things versus how much time I am in prayer for the Spirit to use me. Now I still think we need to bring our requests before God, but I also see how we need to be quiet so that the Spirit can start to do the work in our lives that God wants to do.
What do you think? What does this look like for your prayer time? Does it change anything? 
Feel free to share your thoughts by leaving a comment and pray on!