~Open in prayer~
Icebreakers
What is your biggest pet peeve?
Would you rather see a movie or go on a hike?
What famous person would you have over for dinner?
MESSAGE REVIEW
According to Wikipedia “prayer in the Hebrew Bible is an evolving means of interacting with God, most frequently through a spontaneous, individual, unorganized form of petitioning and/or thanking.” Last Sunday Pastor Ron taught about two characteristics of prayer we should be utilizing in our daily prayer lives. 1) Relational Prayer- Building intimacy w/God, by giving thanks, praise, and worship for God’s goodness, mercy and grace. 2) Petitions- making our request known to God in the legal realm, God’s heavenly court. Asking God for support and assistance in the state of affairs of our lives.
How does this happen?
Through Prayer!
Let’s dig in and find out more.
LET’S TALK ABOUT IT!
Read John 13:36
36 Jesus is preparing the disciples for his absence. Jesus is getting ready to purchase redemption for all humanity. Simon Peter asked him, ‘Lord, where are you going?’ Jesus replied, ‘Where I am going, you cannot follow now, but you will follow later.’
What does it mean to truly follow Christ?
Read John 14
Jesus continues to prepare the disciples of His death and records the promised gift of the Holy Spirit.
Let not your heart be troubled: The disciples had reason for their heart to be troubled. For one Jesus was leaving them. Second, Jesus had just told them that Peter would deny him three times and that one of them was a traitor. All of these events would legitimately bother the disciples, however, in the midst of it all, Jesus told them, let not your heart be troubled.
Jesus never wanted us to have life without trouble, but He promised that we could have an untroubled heart even in a troubled life.
What assurance do we have that it is possible to have an untroubled heart while living a troubled life?
Read Ephesians 2:6
6 And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus. God made death behave by sending his only begotten son to die on the cross for our sins. Jesus got up on the third day with all power and might to sit at the right hand of the father and now because we are in Him, we are seated at the right hand of Jesus. How awesome is that? Pastor Ron said it best we are not seated under our situation we are seated in heavenly places. John 14:3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also.
Jesus was preparing the disciples to give them encouragement that His departure was for the best, but He wanted to nurture an ever-deepening trust in Him and His Word, just as they had a trust in His Heavenly Father and His Word. Christ became the mediator between God and mankind, for no one comes the Father except through Him.
Read Hebrews 11:6
“God is not the Judge of all the earth because he applied for the job, was found to have all the right qualifications and was then promoted. No. He is the judge of all the earth because he is the one who created all the earth, and he is the ultimate standard of judgment. To think that the most qualified created being is able to handle the affairs of the universe is to misunderstand the distance between God and man. Ultimate judgment is the responsibility of God alone.” (Hillsdale Daily News) We are heirs and joint heirs to the kingdom of God covered in the blood of the lamb.
PRAYER FOCUS & REQUESTS
Support one another in your prayer requests and share and celebrate praise reports. Share prayers in which you are “standing in the gap” for someone or something to happen.