Encouragement for Praying Christians

From Rolling Roads Baptist Church Reminder,  March 2015

“Encouragement for a Praying Church”

Our church is a busy place, full of busy Christians. We involve ourselves in many aspects of ministry and Kingdom of God work. In all our activity, we can't forget that one of the top priorities we have from God is praying. It is an honor for Christians to share one another's burdens (Galatians 6:2, 9-10). However, the “labor of prayer” is not for the faint of heart! If we take this work seriously, we will find how difficult it can be. Often prayers are not answered in the way we expect, and so we may become confused or discouraged. Sometimes we don't ever hear of an answer; we've just prayed in faith and left the answer to God. We are in danger sometimes of getting so engrossed in the details of situations people share, so that we almost forget to pray!

I believe strongly that the foundation for prayer is the promise of God. God is not unpredictable or capricious, as some would tell us. Rather, God's people are in a secure, unchangeable covenant relationship with Him through Christ. God has made manifold promises to His people. Among these are that He will not leave us hopeless in any circumstance. In Luke 11:13 Jesus says, “...how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him?” In Romans 15:13 Paul prays, “Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you will abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.” So our labor of prayer is always an expression of hope-filled dependence on the God of promise, who loves us and gives His life to us. So no matter the challenges of prayer, may we always fulfill the commands of I Thessalonians 5:16-18, “Rejoice always; pray without ceasing; in everything give thanks; for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus.”

Happy because of Jesus,

Pastor James

"Finding Jesus" on CNN... whatever.

CNN Finding Jesus

You won't want to miss the latest "Jesus" documentary, promising to reveal the truth about Jesus.  Each year we are subjected to these sure bet programs, usually during Lent.  There is no use in complaining, after all "all truth is God's truth" as long as you have the right set of facts, right?  I would recommend that if people really want to discover the truth about Jesus, they may want to pick up a Bible and learn to read it carefully for themselves, and then consider attending a Christian worship service where Jesus is worshiped, experienced, and followed in person.  (This to me would sure beat a TV program designed to sell advertising.) Join with me in praying that all who view the program will "repent and believe the Gospel" in obedience to Jesus' command in Mark 1:15. That would be "finding Jesus" for real!

Frequent Church Attendance Again

Here we go!

http://www.gallup.com/poll/181601/frequent-church-attendance-highest-utah-lowest-vermont.aspx?utm_source=Social%20Issues&utm_medium=newsfeed&utm_campaign=tiles

The Black and Blue in the "Grey"

Concern over the real problems regarding 50 Shades of Grey

Prudish Christian Sexual Hang-ups and the Real Problem with “50 Shades of Grey”

Why I Went On Mission To Jamaica

"...if we would not be infinitely parochial, and thus fail in true virtue, then our private life, our public life, and our global life must be driven not by a narrow, constricted, merely natural self-love, but by passion for the supremacy of God in all things--a passion created through supernatural new birth by the Holy Spirit, giving us a new spiritual taste for the glory of God--a passion sustained by the ongoing, sanctifying influences of the Word of God--and a passion bent on spreading itself through all of culture and all the nations until Christ comes."

John Piper, God's Passion for His Glory: Living the Vision of Jonathan Edwards, p.113, 1998

In Him was life, and that life was the light of men

John 1:4 is saying that creative life-giving power comes from Jesus.  That life itself resides in Jesus.  A little later on in John's Gospel we will hear Jesus say, "I am the resurrection and the life."  It is hard for us to see the one on one correlation between life itself and Jesus himself.  What does it mean that Jesus gives life?  I think that God has necessarily brought about the existence of Jesus because of the very nature of life itself, but what does it mean?  John adds the application at the end of verse 4, "and that life was the light of men."  Jesus' life is the thing that provides spiritual illumination, understanding, comprehension, or in our modern language: good information about God. This is profound, it means that the life of Jesus is the source of spiritual information for everyone.  This isn't such a far fetched exclusivist idea as you would think, because people from many religions have a place for Jesus somewhere, as a great prophet, a holy man, or other things.  Even so, to have true spiritual understanding one cannot ignore, but rather must accept, Jesus' own self-disclosure that was so clearly preserved in the Gospels. Spiritual darkness doesn't necessarily mean that a person has no knowledge about God, or has not heard some really good information about God.  Spiritual darkness can be like a dark cloud of circumstance that envelops our life, that hangs over our head like a blanket, so that we neither see, nor even breathe!  An understanding and acceptance of Jesus will dispel this.  A realization and communion with the Lord will pull the blanket from our head.  Coming to Christ is like coming out of the spiritual fog, out of the darkness.  But, with John's Gospel, we sometimes see that "the light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it."