Worshipleading4god's Blog

Perking Up Our Prayers-Amazing Addition of Adoration

worshipleading4god — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 23:55:06 +0000

Perking-Up Our Prayers

It is time for us to realize the great value in prayer and supplication. Sadly, many won’t see the great blessings because they don’t pray often enough.

Sometimes people look at prayer as a big “gimme” list and find themselves dissapointed when the answer is different than their desires. Some become disillusioned because the answers to prayer comes too slowly. Prayer is much more than asking for things.

Prayer is also an expression of praise and adoration. No communication to God is really complete without this aspect. Just speaking words of adoration teaches and emphasizes to our hearts the goodness and greatness of the Lord.

“O Lord my God, When I in awesome wonder,
Consider all the worlds Thy Hands have made;
I see the stars, I hear the rolling thunder,
Thy power throughout the universe displayed.

Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee,
How great Thou art, How great Thou art.
Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee,
How great Thou art, How great Thou art!” –Carl Broeberg.

Our prayers should contain expressions of the lofty attributes of God. They remind us of how different we are from Him. It is a helpful exercise to create lists of words of adoration and meditate upon these qualities of God. The fruits of this will bring those thoughts to mind as we pray.

Communications with the Divine Provider should remind us of our dependence upon Him. My prayers will then brim over with expressions of thankfulness. Gratitude for God’s gifts should abound in the heart of the Christian. It is in God that we “… live move and have our being” (Acts 17:28). He provides “all things pertaining to life and godliness” (2 Pt. 1:3). It is God who freely gives my daily bread and all the blessings that I enjoy every day. Thanking God for specific blessings will soon encourage an aching soul. We will soon forget what we don’t have when we realize the abundance we do have (John 10:10).

Our prayers are going to be richer and fuller as we practice just these two simple ideas: adoration and thankfulness.

Perking Up Our Prayers-Supplication Brings His Supply

worshipleading4god — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 23:49:25 +0000

“…praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints” (Eph 6:18)

This is the last in our series on prayer. We have discovered how much better prayer becomes when we extol the qualities and nature of God through adoration. Then we looked into the need of confessing our sins and dependence upon the God of heaven to help us. We noted how adoration and confession lead us to thankfulness. Now we turn to the quality of supplication. Supplication is asking humbly and earnestly in prayer. It carries with it the idea of persistence. Some define it as beseeching or begging.

Most people learn that how we ask for things can make the difference in receiving our request. Humility and earnestness are keys to opening the door to our prayers to be answered favorably.

There is a chasm of difference between nagging and pleading. The attitude of the heart that nags is arrogance, harassment and greed. The pleading heart is humble, and unassuming. Look at the difference in the Pharisee and tax collector (Luke 18:9-14). Supplication is realizing a great need in our lives and seeking God’s help and grace in a time of need (Hebrews 4:16). Badgering or annoying the Father will not bring His justification to us. Pleading and supplication coupled with thankfulness will (Philippians 4:6).

When we plead we might persist in a request. Asking more than once in a humble way is not frowned on by God. Paul went to God three times about his thorn in the flesh (2 Corinthians 12:8). There is a clarifying character to asking for things more than once. It helps us see if something is truly a flippant desire or a true need. But even more importantly it reminds us of our inability to provide for ourselves. This is not to speak on why God delays clear cut answers to our pleadings, it is foolish to think we can speak for God’s reasoning.

Jesus taught in a parable about a woman who repeatedly besought a king for justice. It was because of her persistence that she was granted her request. We all can learn a lesson from this woman. Prayer should come often, and God doesn’t tire of hearing our earnest requests.
This series on prayer brings us full circle. Seeing God’s goodness and nature drives us to our knees to confess that we depend on Him for all things. We then humbly approach Him to ask for His kind providence.

Joe Chase
Missionary to Jamaica
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Perking Up Our Prayers with Confession

worshipleading4god — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 23:46:01 +0000

In our past thoughts on prayer we looked at the value of adoration language in our prayers. We saw that in describing God’s awesome qualities we come closer to appreciating Him.

There is another way to make our prayers more meaningful and powerful. There is deep benefit to confessing our sins and admitting our need for strength and guidance from the Father. The second naturally follows the first.

Confessing our sins and short fallings helps us to empty our pride and make room for God’s guidance. Confession does not always come easy. It requires admission of imperfection and exposes our frailty. Don’t we avoid exposing our sins? Many of us build elaborate covers to hide what we don’t want others to know about us. The truth is, God already knows. Remember what the Psalm 90:8 says, “You have set our iniquities before you, our secret sins in the light of your presence.” It is foolish to believe otherwise (Isaiah 29:15), for God knows the secrets of man and He knows our hearts and intentions (Acts 15:8; Hebrews 4:12). Telling God what we have done wrong is the beginning of cleansing and renewal (Acts 8:22; 1 John 1:9).

Confessing specific sins and failures helps us to identify clearly where we need help. Exposing the problem brings the realization of needed change. Change will not happen until we see our need to change. Most any twelve step program for addicts include the need for confession. No one works on a problem until they recognize that they have one. King David is the prime example of hiding his sin so well that even he was blind to it until Nathan’s “You are that man” speech (2 Samuel 12:7). After that recognition David’s heart softened and he confessed his sinfulness and sought God’s forgiveness (Psalm 51).

There is quite a bit of pain involved in confession that leads to repentance. So much so that it is often described as “crushing” or “breaking” (Psalm 51:8; 34:18). We are not going to find it easy to come face to face with the enormity of the consequences of sin.

Hearing our own call for help with a struggle will anchor us in our humility. Recognizing our weakness drives us to the realization that we cannot overcome sin without God’s help. None of us are able to live sin-free (Romans 3:23). No one can live sinless and worthy of heavenly reward. Confessing to God that we are relying on His grace, strength and help is a powerful key to finding God’s help in the time of trouble (Psalm 46:1). We should all remember these comforting words:

“The LORD is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth” (Psalm 145:18).
“For what great nation is there that has a god so near to it as the LORD our God is to us, whenever we call upon him?” (Deuteronomy 4:7)
“Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you… (James 4:8)

And perhaps most appropriate to our thoughts here…

“Come, let us return to the LORD; for he has torn us, that he may heal us; he has struck us down, and he will bind us up” (Hosea 6:1).

Confession is good for the soul. It strengthens our connection to God and is an important aspect of prayer.

Joseph Chase
Missionary

Perking Up Our Prayers-Through Thankfulness

worshipleading4god — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 21:55:13 +0000

Perking Up Our Prayers-Through Thankfulness
We now know that adoration and confession make our prayers more effective and richer. Let’s turn our thoughts to thankfulness as a means to fortify our prayer lives. So often the grace of thankfulness is neglected in our lives. Sadly, thankfulness has almost disappeared from common society. How long has it been since you sent or received a thank you card? How often are we drawing attention to the good deeds of others? Isn’t it amazing how something that is simple to do is left out of our daily conversations?
Neglecting thankfulness is absent most often when it comes to thanking the Lord for all he has done for us. God has done so much so often that it is easy for us to take it for granted or worse yet come to think we deserve His benevolence without any acknowledgement from us. The old gospel song that calls for us to count our blessings is still good advice today.

Count your blessings, name them one by one,
Count your blessings, see what God has done!
Count your blessings, name them one by one,
And it will surprise you what God has done.

John Oatman Jr.

It is surprising to see everything that God is doing for us every day. We could never exhaust the list of deeds that God is doing for us or on our behalf. Perhaps that is why it is so easy to overlook thanking Him. Paul reminded us that it is in God that “we live, move and have our being” (Acts 17:28). The Psalms remind us to “Bless our God, O peoples; let the sound of his praise be heard, who has kept our soul among the living and has not let our feet slip” (Psalm 66:8-9). God’s abundant providence is certainly something easily seen and worthy of our thanksgiving. The songs on our lips should be filled with gratitude and hymns of thankfulness.

“And let them offer sacrifices of thanksgiving, and tell of his deeds in songs of joy!” (Psalm 107:22)

The enemy of thankfulness is selfishness. People who focus too much upon themselves are seldom thankful. You will not often hear them thanking others let alone the Father in heaven. Selfishness is a twin brother to pride. Pride will cause us to take credit for those things God has done for us. God’s view of the haughty and prideful is wrathful (Proverbs 16:18; Isaiah 16:6). Those who build themselves up in their own mind will be brought low by God’s own judgment (Jeremiah 49:16). Ingratitude leads us down a dangerous road of self-destruction and wrath-filled judgment (Obadiah 1:3).
Cultivating the attitude of gratitude will enrich your world. It opens your heart to more blessings and grace. It is only natural that we enjoy doing good deeds for those who appreciate them. God wants to bless us if we will be thankful. (Malachi 3:10).

Try making a list of the good things God has done for you today, list the people who God has put in your life, list the blessings of nature you enjoy. It won’t take long to have a list longer than you can write. Now look at the spiritual blessings God has granted to those who live according to His precepts. Paul teaches us that we have all spiritual blessings when we are in Christ (Ephesians 1:3). Paul lists a few in Ephesians: Chosen in Him, Predestined for adoption as sons, Blessed us, Redemption, Forgiveness of our trespasses, Uniting us with Him, Obtained an Inheritance, have hope, heard the good news, sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise. This is an abbreviated list just from the first chapter of Ephesians.

Just as we saw that speaking the attributes of God so we hear them and come to appreciate Him more, this is true of thankfulness. Your heart will swell as you see the graciousness and steadfast love of God.

Here is a simple devotional list for you to ponder as you develop your thanksgiving nature in prayer. Let me encourage you to make your own and meditate upon it.

“How precious is your steadfast love, O God! The children of mankind take refuge in the shadow of your wings” (Psa 36:7)
“See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are. The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him” (1Jn 3:1)
“In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins” (1Jn 4:9-10)
“They shall pour forth the fame of your abundant goodness and shall sing aloud of your righteousness. The LORD is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. The LORD is good to all, and his mercy is over all that he has made. All your works shall give thanks to you, O LORD, and all your saints shall bless you!” (Psa 145:7-10)
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life” (Joh 3:16)
“by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire” (2Pe 1:4)

Joseph Chase

Missionary to Jamaica

Worship Leading For God

worshipleading4god — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 15:46:32 +0000

I am looking forward to using this blog to post tips for worship leaders. I’ll also include various devotional readings and things to bolster our faith. God bless us as we pursue the greatest task on earth: Worshiping the Great God of Almighty.