“Giving thanks always for all things to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.” Ephesians 5:20

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite times of the year. I’ve always loved the story of the Pilgrims traveling by the Mayflower to America. I especially like how the Native Americans helped the Pilgrims to survive that first devastating winter—it was a time of peaceful coexistence before trouble started between these two groups.

To celebrate Thanksgiving of 2011, Mary and I are having a Thanksgiving contest. We’re giving away a prize to one adult and one student who leave a comment on this blog. All you have to do is share with us in the comment section about something you are thankful for this Thanksgiving. Even if this has been a difficult year for your family, think of one thing you’re thankful for and tell us about it.  By focusing on the blessings God has given us, we can change our attitudes about our circumstances. We’ll randomly choose one adult winner and one student winner from the responses we receive. Be sure to leave your name. We’ll announce the winner on the blog, and then the winner will need to e-mail us your mailing address.

What are you thankful for this year?

Happy Thanksgiving and pray on!

(The painting is called “The First Thanksgiving” by Jean Louis Gerome Ferris, courtesy of commonswikimedia.org.)

Praying scripture is a powerful way to pray for yourself and others. I often use this way to pray when I find a scripture that seems to speak directly to a person or situation.

For example, I’ve often prayed Jeremiah 29:11-13 for my children. I pray that they will know that God has a plan for their lives, to give them a future and a hope, and that they will seek God with their whole hearts. These words of God filled with hope and affirmation seem just right to pray for my children.

Recently, I’ve realized that I can also take some of the scriptures that are warnings or admonishments and pray them for myself and others as well. I’ve not often used some of these words in prayer because of their negative connotation, but the Holy Spirit prompted me to pray the opposite of them.

For example, a few months ago I was reading in 2 Timothy and came across verse 7 “ Always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth,” (NKJV). This verse perfectly describes a friend of mine who loves to study and learn, but thus far has rejected the truth of God’s word. I began praying the opposite of this verse for my friend. “God, thank you that you have given ______ an incredible mind that is always seeking, always learning. I pray that he will be always learning yet able to accept your word as truth. Amen.”

Another example of praying the opposites came to me just a few days ago as I was reading in Isaiah chapter 1. Verses 5 and 6 are talking about how the whole person has been stricken with sickness due to rebellion. Note: I am NOT saying that anyone who is sick is rebellious! In this particular case God was talking about rebellious Judah and how most of the people were in such rebellion that the “whole head is sick and the whole heart is faint,” (v 5). Verse 6 goes on to say, “From the sole of the foot even to the head there is nothing sound in it only bruises, welts and raw wounds, not pressed out or bandaged, nor softened with oil,” (NASB).

These words struck me, because if any of you have been reading a blog for Andrea Vellinga (For the Love of Andrea), a survivor of the Indiana State Fair tragedy, which her brother has been writing for her, one of the ways he has been asking people to pray for Andrea is a complete “head-to-toe healing.” As I read these verses in Isaiah, I thought, “That’s where his prayer came from!” Then I realized what a wonderful way this is to pray for anyone who is sick, no matter what the illness is. We can pray specifically for, say, someone’s diabetes to be healed, but if we also include prayers for healing from the “sole of their feet to their head,” we can also be praying for problems we don’t know about that may exist and could be contributing to the diabetes. And, these verses also refer to the whole person—the” whole heart,” so we need to remember that praying for spiritual healing or emotional healing is just as important as physical healing, and sometimes they are connected to each other.

Now, I don’t shy away from some of these “hard” verses, realizing that I can use them to “pray the opposites” for myself and others.

What about you? Do you have an opposite verse you like to pray for others? Feel free to share it below.

Pray on!

Image: graur razvan ionut / FreeDigitalPhotos.net (image of Bible and praying hands)

Recently I attended a prayer retreat with the prayer team at my church. For the first hour we met to discuss a book we had been reading, and then we split up to spend the rest of the time in solitude with God. We were free to go into the chapel, into private rooms, or we could also wander the grounds outside. I headed out into the sunshine, deciding between a trail through the woods, the flower gardens, a prayer labyrinth or the stations of the cross.

My feet led me down a trail into the woods, a cool, peaceful refuge from the heat of the summer day. I settled on a bench and quieted myself, tuning into my surroundings and the Lord. Birds called back and forth to each other and a light breeze ruffled my hair. A ray of sunshine penetrated the trees and landed on me, warming my skin. “Thank you, Lord, for this beautiful place,” I prayed. “Help me to hear you clearly today.”

I closed my eyes and breathed deeply. Then I felt it. The irritating bite of a mosquito. I slapped it away and refocused my thoughts on God. Zing. Another bite. And then another. I snapped my eyes open to see mosquitos swarming around me. Flies soon joined the mosquitoes. Under the bench I saw beetles and a centipede. Uggh! So much for focusing clearly on God. Sheepishly I remembered that before I left that morning, I had slathered on peach lotion. Good grief! The sun was warming my skin, broadcasting the peach scent on the morning breeze to every nearby insect.

I was going to have to move along and find a spot free from pesky insects. I gathered my things when the thought hit me: “Isn’t this what our lives as Christ-followers are to be like?”

The Scent of Jesus

The more we become like Jesus, the more we will emanate the scent and lusciousness of Jesus to everyone, just like a ripe piece of fruit advertises its scent to all who walk by—people and mosquitoes alike. We may sometimes feel that we attract the wrong kind of attention—people antagonistic to our faith may frequently cross our paths. If you’re a person who always seems to be attracting antagonistic or needy people, maybe it’s because you’re doing something right, and they’re being drawn in by the Jesus they sense in you. As God gives you the opportunity, you can then point them to Jesus.

That’s what happened to Jesus. Everywhere He went, people flocked to him. And He loved them all—the tax collectors, the adulterers, the lepers, the little children. All the people groups that society said were outcasts or unimportant, Jesus took the time to love and bring life to.

God impressed upon me that day how important it is for us as Christ-followers to have patience, grace and love with everyone we meet. He allowed me to see that at many different stages in my life, I myself have been a “mosquito” to a believer—and may even be right now!

I think through this little analogy God was telling me we need to expect the mosquitoes in life, and that if we don’t have any, then maybe that’s the real problem, because that means we don’t smell any different from anyone else in the world.

What do you think?

Pray on!

Forest image courtesy of the following:

Image: dan / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

“Whoever has no rule over his own spirit is like a city broken down without walls.” Proverbs 25:28

A big snowstorm the night before had dropped lots of snow in our city—so much that the schools were closed for the day. But of course that didn’t slow down my 9-year-old son, and he and his neighborhood friends had been outside for hours playing. After awhile, the boys split into two groups and began building snow forts in preparation for a massive snowball fight. They needed strong, sturdy walls to keep the enemy out and to protect “command central” from which they would stockpile their ammo (lots of snowballs) and plan their warfare.

With preparations finally complete, I watched as the boys tried to break into each other’s snow forts, knowing that if they could breach the enemy’s walls, they could probably win the battle.

Today, I’m fascinated by the history of city walls and gates. According to BibleHistory.com, in ancient times, walls around cities were of utmost importance to both cities and villages. Cities were large areas with many homes, a metropolitan area, and were surrounded by protective walls. Villages were smaller areas than cities and did not have walls around them. They were often located close to a city and depended on that city for commerce and protection.

The walls of a city were very tall and several meters thick, with a flat top and towers. The flat top enabled guards to walk along the top edge and see far in every direction—both inside and outside of the city. They could watch for criminal activity inside the city, and they could watch for enemy invasions coming from outside the city.

Towers were built higher than the rest of the wall and were often positioned on top of a gate. They were also located where the walls turned a corner (called corner towers). The towers allowed even greater visibility and also provided a protected place to fire off arrows and hurl other weapons at the enemy. The gates themselves were an important part of a city’s life. The gates were open during the day to allow for commerce and travel and were closed at night to protect the city. Important meetings were often held at the gates.

Ultimately, a city depended upon its walls for protection. If the walls were breached or knocked down, an enemy could overtake the city. Understanding the importance of a city wall helps us understand this analogy as God compares a man who has no rule over his own spirit to a city without walls.

When we go through our days without taking charge over our own spirits, we are like a biblical city that didn’t have a wall to protect it. We are vulnerable to attack from the enemy.

So, how do we have rule over our own spirit? By protecting our “walls.”

I believe the main way is by putting on the armor of God as described in Ephesians 6:10-18. God does not leave us without protection while we are living on this earth. We have our armor to protect us from enemy attacks, we have prayer to fight the battle, and we have the Holy Spirit to guide us. We need to be proactive to protect ourselves.

However, the threat is from more than outside sources. Just as the soldiers of an ancient city could see criminal activity within their own city walls, we must also protect ourselves from the battle we fight with our flesh from within ourselves, because it’s just not outside enemy attacks that can hurt us—our own decisions and choices can lead to our downfall as well. Having control over our own spirits means that we live as mature believers, taking control of our emotions, actions and words. It means walking in the Spirit so that we do not gratify the desire of the flesh. We must set a guard on what we watch, read, hear and do.

When we set boundaries, our “walls of protection” can’t be breached, but when we ignore our own boundaries, we can end up saying things we regret; we can end up dwelling on negative, fearful thoughts; or, we can end up in places we shouldn’t be doing things we shouldn’t be doing. We have then breached our own walls of protection, giving the enemy a foothold into our lives. If we repent and make a better choice, we can move forward. If we repeat the bad pattern, it can become a stronghold.

Just as a bunch of 9-year-old boys understood the importance of walls in winning the battle, as Christians we too must be savvy enough to maintain the walls of protection in our own lives.

Thought: Keep your wall of protection in good repair.

Prayer: Dear Jesus, We thank You that You have not left us defenseless. You have given us the armor of God to protect us, prayer to wage the battle and the Holy Spirit to guide us. Help us to make the right choices each day so that we can live in freedom, not in bondage. Amen.

Image: xedos4 / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Who do you think of when you hear the word hero? Perhaps you think of our military. Maybe you think of the first responders who raced into the Twin Towers on 9/11. Or maybe someone you know is your hero.When my son was young, he used to spend hours playing with his superhero action figures as they battled the “bad guys.”

Well, last week my pastor Dave Rodriguez gave me plenty to think about in his third sermon in our Hero series. He said that heroes of the faith “are ordinary people with a deep conviction that spills over into extreme action for the love of others and the glory of God.”

I guess the emphasis on ordinary people caught my attention, because … that means that all of us are candidates to be a hero. As a matter of fact, the subject of his sermon that day was as unlikely a candidate for a hero, as ever has been: Rahab. If you remember Rahab from the Bible, she was a prostitute who ended up saving the lives of the two Hebrew spies who came to scope out the city of Jericho before the Israelites took it over. When the king’s men came knocking on her door looking for the spies, she sent them in the other direction, while she hid the spies on her roof.

Rahab had heard the stories of God and his people, and she chose to believe them and believe in Him. She went against the tide of what everyone else was doing, because she put her faith in the one, true God. Then she acted on that faith. As Dave said, “No one ever becomes a hero by just thinking about it. Intentions play no part in heroism–action does.”

A few weeks ago, Mary and I spoke at a women’s fellowship luncheon at the Foundation of Truth Worship Center in Indianapolis. Our topic was on Defeating Your Strongholds and Rahab’s story was one we used as an example of a woman who broke her strongholds. Her story is amazing, and it doesn’t end in Joshua 2.

Rahab is actually mentioned in Matthew 1 in the genealogy of Jesus (!), and she is listed in Hebrews 11 as one of the heroes of the faith, along with many others. Praise God that our pasts don’t keep us from doing big things for God. You see, it wasn’t that there was anything special about Rahab or the others listed in Hebrews. What Hebrews emphasizes was that by faith they each did their heroic deeds. Not faith in themselves, but faith in the great God we serve.

Rahab didn’t have a lot of time to decide or pray about her decision to hide the spies–heroes rarely do. It’s a risky faith that makes a person a hero, one that’s willing to act by faith when no one else is.

And like Rahab, anyone of us has the potential to be a “by faith” hero–because we serve that very same great God!

Pray on!

American Idol, America’s Got Talent…the Gong Show! Everyone is trying to prove that they have talent! You may not know it, but God has given you talent also. The question is…what are we to do with these talents. To do the study Church’s Got Talent just click on the link!

Photo Red Piano by Salvatore Vuono

www.freedigitalphotos.net