An inspiring experiment

I saw a meme on social media the other day (pictured), and attended a webinar, each of which inspired me to share this with you.  Read on.

As Christians, we are called to love one another as Christ loved us. Part of that love includes praying for one another. Praying for others is a powerful way to show our love and concern for them, and it can have a profound impact on their lives.

The Bible tells us to pray for one another, to bear each other’s burdens, and to encourage one another. When we pray for others, we are demonstrating our faith in God’s power to intervene in their lives. We are also aligning ourselves with God’s will for their lives, which is ultimately for their good.

Prayer is not just a one-way street. When we pray for others, we are also opening ourselves up to receive the blessings of prayer. We become more compassionate, more patient, and more loving as we focus our attention on the needs of others. We also become more aware of our own needs, and we can bring those needs before God in prayer as well.

Prayer is not just a private matter between ourselves and God. When we pray for others, we are also building community and strengthening relationships. We are showing our love and support for one another, and we are creating a network of support that can sustain us through difficult times.

So let us commit ourselves to praying for one another. Let us take the time to lift each other up in prayer, to encourage one another, and to bear each other’s burdens. Let us trust in God’s power to work in our lives and the lives of those around us. And let us rejoice in the blessings that come from a life of prayer and love for one another.

I hope this inspired you.  It inspired me.

But I must provide full disclosure.  This was an experiment.  I did not write the piece.  I asked ChatGPT, an artificial intelligence machine available widely online, the following:  “Please write a one-page Christian devotional on the importance of praying for one another.”  Within about sixty seconds, it produced what you read above in italics.  (The webinar I attended was about how church leaders can make use of artificial intelligence tools like ChatGPT.)

Of course, you who know my writing style will have immediately picked up on the fact that this did not come from my hand.  Nevertheless, while it may lack some of the colour I might normally include, there’s nothing inherently wrong with what it says.

Artificial intelligence is here to stay, I think.  And we will have to wrestle with how best to use it as followers of Jesus. Undoubtedly, it will have some benefits for society, if used with integrity.  But it will never replace the importance of such things as praying for each other through the gaps of life, as the meme illustrates.  AI will never replace authentic, praying community.  Who are you praying for these days?

“Share each other’s burdens, and in this way fulfill the law of Christ” (Galatians 6.2, NLT).

How Do I Pray?

In this worship gathering, we hear a message that helps us learn the basic how-tos of prayer. You can watch the whole worship gathering below, or just the message below that.

The alternative to prayer in school

In last week’s Encouragement From the Word, I recounted part of the story of Cassie Bernall, the student at Columbine High School who was killed for being a Christian, relating that to the reality of suffering and persecution among believers.  This elicited a heart-tugging response from a subscriber who was part of a tragic school shooting at one time.

This person told me how important a role prayer played in the aftermath, noting that “Amongst the sirens and the ambulances and the police, we gathered in small groups, holding hands and praying.  God was there giving comfort to us in our time of greatest need”, and that when the school reopened, a few days later, a prayer was offered over the PA system to bring comfort to the injured and the families of the victims.

Most schools today, at least where I live, don’t offer the option of public prayer.  And while I would welcome a call to restore school prayers, I fear that horse has left the barn, as the saying goes, and that nothing short of national revival is going to bring it back, especially in the political culture in which we find ourselves these days.

So what is the alternative?

Prayer at home.  (Now there’s a concept.)

Those students who gathered to pray amid the chaos in my interlocutor’s story must have had some foundation of prayer, both at home and in the church, to lead them to pray together.  It served them well to provide comfort in an unimaginable moment.

Too often, in our consumer culture, we depend on institutions to do work that more rightly belongs to the family.

We should not rely on the school system – even a Christian parochial school system, if that’s where our kids go – to teach them such foundational faith basics.

I dare say we should not even rely on the church to do this.  (Gasps come from the crowd.)

I think this is the responsibility of parents.  In fact, this is not my idea; it’s deeply rooted in the history of God’s people.  Consider that sharing the basics of faith has been considered a family mandate from as far back as the time of Moses:

“Listen, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord alone.  And you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your strength.  And you must commit yourselves wholeheartedly to these commands that I am giving you today.  Repeat them again and again to your children. Talk about them when you are at home and when you are on the road, when you are going to bed and when you are getting up” (Deuteronomy 6.4-7, NLT).

Of course, parents themselves have to learn this, if they weren’t taught it by their own parents.  And that’s where the church comes in.  The church’s job is to equip parents to be used by God to shape their children as followers of Jesus.

Someone has said, tongue-in-cheek, that as long as there are exams, there will always be prayer in school.  But in an age of increasing persecution for followers of Jesus, all the more do children and young people need to be spiritually formed at home – including knowing how to communicate with God in a loving relationship – so that they can be strong in their faith, no matter what they face, in school or elsewhere.

It may not be bullets that they face (and so we earnestly pray!), but it may be words, which injure in different ways, or something else that comes with persecution.  As the church equips the parents to form the children, we will see great spiritual renewal among the people of God, which we need for the world in which we live today.

Pray for Afghanistan

Finally, something has eclipsed the pandemic in the news:  the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan.  It is fraught with political nuances and challenges for those of us who may not have been following the story closely for years, going back to the time before and during the western nations’ war and occupation that sought to keep the nation under some form of democratic rule.

But with the final withdrawal of American troops, the Taliban has solidified its control.  And with that will come some form of Islamic law, which is concerning to many women, as well as to Christians in general.

It is said that this nation is second only to North Korea in its record for persecution of Christians.  And that is only apt to get worse, not only in Afghanistan, but in other middle eastern countries, where terrorist groups may feel empowered by recent events favouring the Taliban.

I want to encourage you today to take some time to pray for Christians and churches in Afghanistan, and throughout the middle east.  Pray for protection, for peaceful co-existence, and for the power of the gospel to triumph over hatred and persecution.  And pray that western nations will stand up for the rights of women and religious minorities in these countries.

You may have trouble finding the words, but give that to the Lord, too.  He will know the groaning of your heart.

“And the Holy Spirit helps us in our weakness. For example, we don’t know what God wants us to pray for. But the Holy Spirit prays for us with groanings that cannot be expressed in words” (Romans 8.26, NLT).

Forty Days later…

Yesterday was an important day in the Christian calendar, but because it always falls on a Thursday, many believers in western society ignore it, and that’s unfortunate. 

It was Ascension Day.

It commemorates the ascension of Jesus, 40 days after he rose from the dead.  And 40 days after Easter Sunday always falls on a Thursday.  While we in North America don’t celebrate it widely (though many Anglicans, especially those whose parish churches are named “The Church of the Ascension”, will have special services for it), in much of western Europe, it’s still a public holiday.

Why does it matter?  Why should we mark the ascension of Jesus?

It fulfills the promise he made to the disciples, even before he went to the cross.  In John 14.28, Jesus told them, “I am going away, but I will come back to you again. If you really loved me, you would be happy that I am going to the Father, who is greater than I am” (NLT).

Of course, the disciples didn’t understand this at the time, though everything became clear as time went on.

Jesus, in ascending to heaven, went to be with the Father, and began his promised role as our Intercessor.  From that day forward, Jesus’ primary responsibility as the Second Person of the Trinity would be to pray for us.

Isn’t that amazing?  Jesus sits at the right hand of the Father’s throne in heaven, interceding on our behalf.  And it all began on that first Ascension Day.

When we pray in Jesus’ name, he lays our case before the throne of grace.  Think of that every year, 40 days after Easter.  And think of it every day as you pray in the powerful name of Jesus.

Groaning

Where I live, Wednesday morning was dreary.  The sky was dark, indicative of the thunderstorm that was rolling through.  Even in front of a window, I needed artificial light for the Zoom call I had with my spiritual director.

As we talked about finding the fingerprints of God in my unique life situation these days, the word “weird” came up…a lot.  There is no doubt that for all of us, these “unprecedented times” are weird; in some weeks, there are varying kinds of ‘weird’ by the day!

My spiritual director asked me about my response to the weirdness in terms of prayer.  I said that, along with my usual Benedictine prayer offices, there are a lot of brief, incomplete sentences being offered to God in prayer these days.

She asked if these brief, incomplete sentences could be termed ‘groans’. 

I nodded in agreement.

We both welled up a little, but in a good way.

This was a realization for me that even these brief utterances of prayer which, on some days, are all we can muster with the Lord, are important parts of our relationship with God.

If you have days where your prayers seem like little more than groans, don’t despair.  God is listening.

And be encouraged by the words of the apostle Paul:  “…the Holy Spirit helps us in our weakness. For example, we don’t know what God wants us to pray for. But the Holy Spirit prays for us with groanings that cannot be expressed in words” (Romans 8.26, NLT).

Post-Script:  After I wrote this, I read this in N.T. Wright’s little book, God and the Pandemic (Zondervan Reflective, 2020, p. 42):  “…when the world is going through great convulsions, the followers of Jesus are called to be people of prayer at the place where the world is in pain.  Paul [the apostle, in reference to the latter part of Romans 8] puts it like this, in a three-stage movement:  first, the groaning of the world; second, the groaning of the Church; third, the groaning of the Spirit – within the Church within the world.”

Groan on, church.  Groan on.

Created to pray

Early in the pandemic, my friend, Adelle Lauchlan, shared with me some thoughts that she had shared with the congregation of which she is a part.  From time to time, with her permission, I have shared one with you, and this one in particular spoke to me today.  Enjoy! – Jeff+

I think a lot about prayer, maybe because I pray a lot. Praying is one of the perks and privileges of my work. 

But praying isn’t something I grew up doing. 

Although I grew up going to church, prayer wasn’t part of my response. Prayer was something someone else did for me, or more accurately, “over me”. I fell away from church for over a decade after high school, and when I found my way back to church, I asked my pastor for a book on how to pray. He handed me a book titled Teaching Conversational Prayer. 

I never read it. 

It sat beside my bed for months. But it was the most transformative book never to be read. The title taught me what I needed to grasp. Prayer is a conversation. Prayer is a response to God’s love. 

That book title was a revelation for me. Once I let faith rule in my heart, once I let Christ live in my heart, prayer became natural. Prayer didn’t need to be fancy, it didn’t need to be formatted, it just needed to be me talking to my God, my Creator, the One who loves me, the One who sent his only Son to save me; it just needed to be done. 

I didn’t need to know how to pray, I just needed to pray.

My prayers are a loving response to the One who loves us best, to the One who is love. He created us to pray. And when I forget this or my prayer life turns stale, I need only look to Scripture for encouragement, for a reminder of God’s love.

The Apostle Paul prayed a lot. I love his prayer for the Ephesians; here is just a small bit of it.  This is my prayer for you: “I ask him to strengthen you by his Spirit – not a brute strength but a glorious inner strength – that Christ will live in you as you open the door and invite him in” (Eph 3:16-17, The Message). 

Thanks, Adelle!

Slaves No More

In this message, based on Jeremiah 17.5-10 and Romans 6.15-23, we learn how God does not want us to be slaves to sin, but slaves to righteousness. How can we do that? Root ourselves deeply. How does that happen? Through engaging in spiritual disciplines. We learn three of them in this message. You can watch the whole (edited) broadcast below, or catch just the message just below that.

 

 

Longing and Praying

Around the world, governments are starting to loosen restrictions from the Coronavirus pandemic.  I find this encouraging, and I view it with guarded optimism.

“Guarded”, I say, because we need to be careful.  We’ve never been down this road before, so just because we may have more freedom, for example, to go to the hardware store, doesn’t mean that the virus is dead and gone and will never return.  We will still need to practise procedures that will keep everyone healthy.

Like me, you may be longing – deeply! – to return to holding public worship gatherings, where we can praise the Lord together, instead of uniting by faith, separately, in our homes, watching modified services broadcast over the Internet.  We don’t know when the green light will be given for that.  And we will need to be wise in our roll-out of new practices and procedures that will allow us to be together safely.

In the midst of all that, let me encourage you to pray for the leaders of your church.  At St. Paul’s Church, Nobleton, where I serve, our elders have begun thinking about what will be permitted once gatherings are allowed once again.  We don’t know how the government of Ontario will roll out permission together, so we will have to abide by those guidelines, but as a witness to the goodness of God, we will err on the side of caution, because doing so demonstrates our love, and God’s love, for the community.

Let me also encourage you to pray for the people of your community.  Pray that they will be released from fear, while not being released from caution.  Pray that they will be given wisdom to retain the important habits and practices they have learned through this time of restriction.  And pray that people will see that only the gracious hand of God has permitted us all to get through this, and that they will want to respond in worship and praise, gathering with the church in celebration of God’s grace.

“Always be joyful.  Never stop praying.  Be thankful in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you who belong to Christ Jesus” (1 Thessalonians 5.16-18, NLT).

Brightness in dark days

Today’s Encouragement From the Word is a guest post from a long-time friend of mine, Dawn Champagne, with whom I went to high school.  Her poetry has shown up here before. The prayer in the image at the end is hers, too.  Thanks for the inspiration, Dawn!  – Jeff+

That second day between the crucifixion and the resurrection of Jesus must have been the darkest day ever experienced by the 11 remaining disciples. When Jesus had called each one of them to “follow Me,” they did so without hesitation. They readily left their careers, and eagerly listened to His teachings on the Kingdom of Heaven and how it was at hand.

How could they make sense of what they had just witnessed the day before as Jesus hung on that cross, and now dead in the tomb. While we know what occurred on the third day, they did not: all of their ambitions, hopes, and dreams were buried in that tomb as well.

The crisis was now over, and they were left alone. How could they make any sense of what happened, with no hope for the future that they had been taught about? 

When the third day dawned, their grief was changed from sorrow to rejoicing when they found the tomb empty. What a wonderful day of rejoicing that must have been as Jesus began to present Himself to them! A pondering inexpressible joy that cannot be put into words! 

We live in a world of what now seems to be in a season of dark days and turmoil with COVID-19 adding to the tears that flow from those who are suffering. Unlike what the disciples experienced on that second day, praise God, the Christian has been given the ultimate hope at the opposite end of the spectrum as we go through these difficult times. Jesus is alive! 

“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead…In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, if need be, you have been grieved by various trials, that the genuineness of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire, may be found to praise, honor, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ whom having not seen you love” 1 Peter 1.3, 6, 8a (NKJV).

Below are words given to me as the Holy Spirit ministered to me in a time of need following a difficult season in the fall of 2016. Praying they will minister to you as well through these uncertain times, and May Jesus be the Brightest Ray on your darkest of days! 

Wishing you all a blessed Easter!

Praying together when we can’t be together

When our church’s leaders met on Tuesday (electronically, of course), one of them shared a good idea that I want to share with you.

It’s hard for us to pray in each other’s presence right now.  In times of crisis, one of the church’s greatest and most powerful and encouraging tools is corporate prayer.  But we can’t get together to pray in these days.  It’s just not safe.

It’s possible to have online prayer meetings, and they can be valuable.  But we can also pray, on our own, in our homes (or at work, if we are deemed essential services).

The elder I mentioned above shared with me an email from the Yonge Street Mission that expressed ways that the church can pray.  I’m going to adapt its suggestions as ways that we can pray together, even though we are apart:

• Pray for peace to reign in our communities. In place of panic and fear, ask the Lord to fill our villages, towns and cities with compassion and grace.
• Pray for people who will be most impacted by service interruptions, such as access to meals, food banks, fellowship groups, and those who cannot connect with community online because they do not use the Internet.
• Pray for people whose employment is affected by this crisis – those who have lost their jobs permanently or temporarily, those who are deep in debt, as well as those whose work demands have ramped up or become more dangerous because of Coronavirus. Pray especially for those on the front lines of medical care, and those in essential services.
• Pray for people who struggle with isolation, especially those who live alone and those who depend on regular visits from friends or loved ones.

As you pray, ask the Lord how he can use you to make someone’s situation better, whether through a phone call or an email, leaving a few needed groceries on their front porch, or sending a card of encouragement.

And pray in faith.

“Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4.6-7, NLT).

By the way, if you don’t have an online church home in these days, you are welcome to join the online community with St. Paul’s Church, Nobleton on Sundays at 10:00 a.m. on Facebook Live, or for replay anytime on our YouTube channel.

Unity Amid Diversity

Continuing from last week’s message, we look in this service at John 17.13-26, which contains Jesus’ desires for his people.  We often think about what Jesus wants *from* us, but in this message, we look at what Jesus wants *for* his disciples of all time, as he offers a deep prayer to the Father.

You can watch the whole service, or catch the message, which begins at 25:09.

A snapshot of the church

This worship gathering was primarily led by young people, and their theme was the Holy Spirit; my job was to integrate with their theme, so I chose to bring a message from Acts 2.42-47 that shows a picture of the early church as it responded to the giving of the Holy Spirit.  The message itself starts at 39:37, or you can watch the whole service below.

Bonus: an audio recording of the message is below, if that suits you better…

The Sound of Silence

The sound of silence.

For some, it is a reference to Simon and Garfunkel.

For others, it is the noise made by the refrigerator or the HVAC system.

For some, it is deafening.

For others, it is the most beautiful sound on earth.

Whatever it may mean to us, the sound of silence is a gift, whether we acknowledge it or not.  For it is in silence that we are most clearly able to commune with God as friend to Friend, as servant to Master, as disciple to Lord.  Think about it:  when you are having an intentional conversation with a close friend, you’re probably not having to shout over a loud racket, right?  When it’s a serious conversation, there’s probably no discernible noise in the background.

So why not do this with the Lord?

At times, we may wonder why we don’t hear from God; it’s less likely that God is silent, and more likely that we are not making space to listen.

As you read the Bible, as you pray – whatever shape that takes – consider doing it accompanied by the sound of silence.  You may be surprised how much you hear.

“For God alone my soul waits in silence,
    for my hope is from him.
 He alone is my rock and my salvation,
    my fortress; I shall not be shaken” (Psalm 62.5-6, NRSV).

Religious Respectability

In his book Prayer:  Finding the Heart’s True Home, Richard Foster writes about various facets of the gemstone of the Christian life that is prayer.  Among them is “authoritative prayer”, in which Foster suggests that God’s people are too often too timid about exercising their God-given abilities in prayer.

He cites all kinds of times when Jesus spoke authoritatively in prayer, and then he writes,

“Certainly I should not be expected to do those kinds of things.  But then I came upon Jesus’ shocking words:  ‘Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father’ (John 14:12)….In my concern over falling off the deep end, I realized that I just might fall off the shallow end.  My desire to maintain religious respectability could easily result in a domesticated faith”  (pp. 234-235, emphases mine).

Re-reading this book always challenges me, and on this go-round, it was this section that slapped me ‘upside the head.’  Am I more interested in religious respectability than I am about doing the work God has intended for me to do?

It’s as if I would sooner sit in the cold than get up and turn on the furnace.

Now, what might be running through your mind certainly courses through mine, and that’s this:  What about the sovereignty of God?

Foster would remind us that any prayer we offer authoritatively must come not from any authority of our own, but from the authority of the Holy Spirit working in and through us – and the Holy Spirit, as the third Person of the Trinity, is sovereign and ultimately decides whether a prayer should be granted or not.

Yet, I want to suggest, too often we don’t even bother.

Instead of shrugging our shoulders and saying, “There’s nothing we can do,” what if we were to speak to the sickness in our loved one, in Jesus’ name?

Many of us are reluctant to do such things because we don’t own a white polyester suit, or a personal jet; we don’t want to be lumped in with those Christians.  To be sure, any authoritative ministry we exercise does not happen for our own self-aggrandizement, but for the glory of God.  But if God were willing to heal, willing to cast out, willing to aid – if we were simply to ask – would that not be worth the risk of losing religious respectability?

Thoughts and prayers

The dreadful mass killing in a Texas church last Sunday once again brought forward a recent phenomenon creeping into social media, that is, the idea that we should abandon the notion of “thoughts and prayers” in favour of gun control in the United States.

This piece is not about gun control in the United States.  I am not an American; I am not entitled to an opinion about US domestic policy or constitutional law.  This piece is, instead, about “thoughts and prayers” – something with which I have some experience.

Is there a flippancy with which we toss out that we are offering “thoughts and prayers” when we see word of a tragedy?  Perhaps.  If we type something like that on a post about an unfortunate event on social media, without acting on it, then the gesture is as flippant as the all-too-common “How are you?” question, for which the interlocutor really doesn’t want an answer anyway.

For some people, perhaps “thoughts and prayers” has become a benign term of sympathy.  After all, in the face of adversity, many people don’t know what to say to others.  (Have you ever paid attention to what people say when they greet mourners at a funeral visitation?  Often, they fill the air with meaningless words in an attempt to cover up the fact that they don’t know what to say.  Perhaps the next trend we’ll see in the funeral home will be people walking up to grieving friends and greeting them with the words, “thoughts and prayers.”  It sounds preposterous, but I don’t think it’s a stretch.)

If typing “thoughts and prayers” is as phony as air-kissing, though, let’s abandon it.  But what if thinking about, and praying for, troubled individuals or grieving family members or challenging situations actually did some good?  Would we continue to do it?

Prayer is conversation with God, and conversation with God – for the faithful – is always comforting (or at least centring).  And those who are prayed for usually feel encouraged, knowing that they are being supported by others.  (It is a different, and rather more challenging, question as to whether or not prayer can change the mind of God, but we’re not going there today.)

So if we actually pray when we offer “thoughts and prayers”, then carry on!  I know how much it matters to me that others pray for me, and when I pray for others, I seek to let them know in some meaningful way.  Maybe there’s a way we can communicate that we are praying for those suffering in tragic situations that doesn’t sound flippant.

Then, the challenge for us who pray is this:  if God calls us to act as a result of our prayers, will we?  Perhaps it isn’t necessary to separate praying for people from acting to ameliorate their situations.

“Search for the Lord and for his strength; continually seek him” (1 Chronicles 16.11, NLT).

A lesson from Vegas

Welcome back to Encouragement From the Word!  It’s good to be back in the saddle.  My time off was, in part, a study in contrasts.  To mark our 25^th wedding anniversary (which is actually next Tuesday), my wife and I embarked on a four-night trip to Las Vegas.  Following that, I went on retreat at a monastery for a few days.

Yep, that’s quite a difference.

I learned a lot about life during our visit to Sin City.  One of the most profound takeaways for me was the need some people have constantly to be stimulated.  If you’re one of those people, Vegas is your place.  Without exaggeration, the only places where we could escape from some sort of aural or visual stimulation were our hotel room, and the hallway that led to it.  Every other place we went in Las Vegas had lights flashing, music playing, bells ringing – always something stimulating the senses.

It seems to me that it’s not healthy for us to experience constant stimulation.  Sometimes, we need the silence, we need the stillness – for our own sanity, frankly – but also if we have any hope of hearing from God.

There’s a comic frame that has made its way around social media over the last several years, picturing a sheep in a chaise lounge wearing sunglasses, with a computer on his lap, a TV in front of him, a radio blaring behind him, and an iPod connected to his headphones.  He’s reading one from a pile of magazines that are stacked on top of his Bible, and he asks, “I wonder why I don’t hear from the shepherd anymore?”

The answer is obvious, and the comic challenges us.  We need time away from the noise, so we can hear from God.

What allowance do you make for quiet time?  A few days praying with monks was good for me, but it wasn’t enough; I need time daily, away from the noise.  So do you.

The Lord Jesus, during his ministry in Palestine, often found crowds of people drawn to him.  And he was compassionate toward the people and brought healing and life to many.  But the Bible also says this about him:  “Jesus often withdrew to the wilderness for prayer” (Luke 5.16, NLT).  Even Jesus needed a quiet place and a quiet time.  So do you.  What will you do to make that happen in this season of trying new things?

Ask Anything?

In this new series, we’re looking at a few Scripture passages that get twisted from time to time.  The series is inspired by Craig Groeschel from LifeChurch.tv in Oklahoma, and I have adapted his outlines for my own voice.  This week, we look at the notion that when Jesus tells us we can ask anything in his name, he’ll do it.  So where’s my Cadillac?  We read John 14.12-14 and allude to Habakkuk 3.17-18.  Listen or watch below:

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Caught and taught

Recently, I received a bunch of papers from one of my favourite subscribers to Encouragement From The Word:  my mother.  Slowly but surely, she is starting to get rid of unnecessary things.  She has a difficult time throwing them away, so she gives to me things that she thinks might be of interest, because she knows that when I’m done with them, I can throw them away.

This bunch of papers came from my grandmother; they were notes in her handwriting.

There were some that cited Bible verses, some were prayers, some were notions.

One of them was some advice from my grandmother on how to pray, particularly for me.  (Apparently, at that time, I wasn’t the easiest person in the world to deal with.)

I will throw out those papers, but having read them, the memory, which takes up no room in a box, will stay with me.  My grandmother’s legacy of faith remains in some of these little notes, simple means by which she could impart the wisdom of years of faith and faithfulness to my mother, and to me.

If you are a seasoned follower of Jesus, how are you leaving your legacy of faith?  And if you are a newer believer, are you inviting wiser Christians to build into your life?  Many don’t want to inflict themselves on you, but they are just waiting to be asked.

After all, faith is as much caught as it is taught.  Whose faith are you catching?

“I remember your genuine faith, for you share the faith that first filled your grandmother Lois and your mother, Eunice.  And I know that same faith continues strong in you” (2 Timothy 1.5, NLT).

A praying church is a growing church

What makes churches grow, and what keeps them from growing?  There’s lots to learn in this field.  Today, we looked at the one commonality among all churches that grow:  they pray.

Based on Acts 4.23-31, listen to the message here:

Or watch the Facebook video feed, whether you belong to Facebook or not:

https://www.facebook.com/plugins/video.php?href=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2Fjeff.loach%2Fvideos%2F10212194241588406%2F&show_text=0&width=560