Seeking the Heart of God - Prayer Guide

Seeking the Heart of God – 1

Fire from Heaven

1 Kings 18:21-40

We read that Elijah brought down fire on Mount Carmel. The prophets of Baal cried long and loud, but no answer came. The God of Elijah heard and answered that prayer. Let us remember that the God of Elijah still lives. The prophet was translated and went up to heaven, but his God still lives, and we have the same access to Him that Elijah had. We have the same warrant to go to God and ask the fire from heaven to come down.

D.L. Moody (adapted)

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 2

The Example of Jesus

Mark 1:35

Jesus is an example for us in all things – especially in his prayer life. He maintained constant fellowship with the Father, often rising early to steal away in quiet places to spend time in prayer. Every great crisis in His life was preceded by prayer:

• Baptism
• Appointing the Twelve as apostles
• Transfiguration
• Crucifixion

Jesus provided us a model that we should follow in His steps.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 3

Sin of Prayerlessness

Mark 9:14-29

“God I am deeply grieved! Please have mercy on me and forgive me for not praying.”

The lack of prayer is the cause of a deficient spiritual life. This lack of prayer proves that, for the most part, our lives are still under the power of “the sinful nature.” Prayer is the pulse of life; by it the doctor can determine the condition of the heart. A Christian who does not pray has a sick, weak soul.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 4

Beyond Our Own Needs

Ephesians 3:14-21

Persevere, in addition to all that you ask for yourself, in prayer for your church, your minister; for all believers; for the whole Church of God, that God may strengthen them with power through His Spirit, so that Christ may dwell in their hearts by faith. Blessed time when the answer comes! Continue in prayer. The Spirit will reveal and glorify Christ and His love, Christ and His cross “as the Lamb slain standing in the midst of the throne.”

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 5

Just in Simple Faith to Trust

Hebrews 11:6

A Christian woman had enjoyed wonderful fellowship with the Father in prayer. The joy had gradually been lost. She could not get right. Desperate, she talked to her minister. He advised, “As you pray, do not try to force yourself into the right attitude. Acknowledge God as your only hope. Trust Him with a childlike trust. In trust you are in a right relationship to Him. You have nothing–He has everything.” She found new joy in prayer. She had learned that faith in the love of the Lord Jesus is the only way of getting into fellowship with God in prayer.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 6

Men and Women Like Us

James 5:17-18

The Apostle James tells us that the prophet Elijah was a man “subject to like passions as we are.” I am thankful that those men and women who were so mighty in prayer were just like ourselves. We are apt to think that those prophets and mighty men and women of old time were different from what we are. To be sure they lived in a much darker age, but they were of like passions with ourselves.

D.L. Moody

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 7

The Prayers of Our Lives

Psalm 66:18-20

Our lives have great influence on our prayers; just as in the same way our prayers influence our lives. The entire life of a person is a continuous prayer. This natural prayer of the life can be so strong in a person who also prays to God that the words of prayer which the mouth utters cannot be heard. At times God cannot hear the prayer of our lips because the desires of our hearts cry out to Him much more strongly and loudly. Do our lives help or hinder our prayers?

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 8

The Spirit of Prayer

Galatians 4:6

The Holy Spirit is “the spirit of prayer.” Twice Paul refers to Him in the matter of prayer: Romans 8:15 and Galatians 4:6. The Holy Spirit is given for the express purpose of teaching us, from the very beginning of our Christian life onward, to cry “Abba, Father” in childlike trust and surrender. We are to come into God’s presence not with our ignorant prayers, not with many words and thoughts, but in the confidence that the divine work of the Holy Spirit is being carried on within us. Our Father awaits.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 9

Possession

Ephesians 5:18-21

The Spirit desires to have full possession of us. We pray for more of the Spirit, but we must remember that the Spirit wants more of us. The Spirit would possess us entirely. He will lead us in this way in prayer, to forget ourselves and make us willing to offer ourselves for training as intercessors, to whom God can entrust the carrying out of His plans, and who day and night cry to Him to avenge His Church of her Adversary. God help us know the Spirit and to reverence Him as the Spirit of prayer!

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 10

Partners in God’s Work

Colossians 4:2-4

The redeemed, God’s believing children, are the channels through which the love of the Father, the grace of Christ, and the powerful operation of the Spirit are brought to the earth, there to be imparted to others. What a wonderful partnership into which God brings us–dispensers of the grace of God! Prayer, when we chiefly pray for ourselves, is but the beginning of the life of prayer. The glory of prayer is that we have power as intercessors to bring the grace of Christ, and the energizing power of the Spirit, upon souls which are still in darkness.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 11

A Matchless Inheritance

1 John 5:14

God gave us all things in prayer by promise because He has given us all things in His Son. Amazing gift — His Son! Prayer is as illimitable as His own blessed Son. There is nothing on earth nor in heaven, for time or eternity, that God’s Son did not secure for us. By prayer God gives us the vast and matchless inheritance which is ours by virtue of His Son. God charges us to “come boldly to the throne of grace.” God is glorified and Christ is honored by large asking.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 12

Holy God

Isaiah 6:1-9

It has often been said that we have lost our sense of sin and the holiness of God. In the prayer closet we have the place where we may learn again how to give God’s holiness the position it should have in our faith and life. Around His throne, before Him we kneel. All in His presence call out, “Holy, holy, holy!” Bow before Him. Give yourself time, and give God also time, that He and you may come into touch with one another. It is a great work, but one filled with great blessing.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 13

Pray First, Plan Later

Acts 16:25-40

We learned that things could happen when we didn’t plan at all, but just prayed. God expects us to be orderly. He expects us to manage our time, to discipline ourselves, to prepare well-planned programs, but if we could learn to pray first and plan afterward how different would be our homes, our churches, our Christian women’s clubs, our Bible studies, whatever we are doing for Christ. Maybe, just maybe, we are planning in one direction and God’s will is in another direction.

(From What Happens When Women Pray by Evelyn Christenson)

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 14

Abundantly More

Ephesians 3:20-21

Christ commanded us to tell unbelievers of His love and salvation. Why is it that millions of Christians have no greater influence? Nothing but this–no prayer. In our study, work, faithful preaching, and conversation with the people, we lack that ceaseless prayer which has attached to it the sure promise of the Spirit and the power from on high. It is nothing but the lack of prayer which is the cause of the lack of a powerful spiritual life!

Andrew Murray (Adapted)

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 15

United in a Practice of Prayer

Acts 4:23-37

When people start praying together on this basis–in one accord, to our Father in heaven, in the name of Jesus–and practice prayer, not when we talk about it, not even when we memorize beautiful Scripture verses on prayer; it is when we actually pray that things begin to happen. And we don’t suffer from the “paralysis of analysis.” We are not paralyzed by analyzing prayer, but we take the problems at hand and pray about them.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 16

Withdrawing to Draw Near

James 4:8

An often overlooked but very important part of prayer is the drawing nigh to God. Before we are ready to start our intercessory prayers, we need to wait before God until we know we have established communication with Him. This is a time of silence when we are shutting out every other thought and distraction around us. There is no talking to God, just a complete mental drawing to Him; and then as He promised, He will draw nigh to us.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 17

When We Can’t, He Can

Romans 8:26-27

The Holy Spirit teaches us how to pray. One of the things He teaches us is His power and our weakness. When we do not know how to pray, or, what to pray for, He intercedes for us in a depth and sincerity that words cannot express. When we are confused, overly stressed, or speechless before God, know that the Spirit loves us and is interceding for us according to the Father’s will.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 18

A Matter of the Heart

Luke 18:10-14

Everywhere we are impressed that it is more important and urgent that men pray, than that they be skilled in the form and language of prayer. Prayer is a matter of the heart, not of the school. It is more of feeling than of words. Jesus told of two men who went into the temple to pray. One had the right posture and vocabulary. The other would not so much as lift his eyes toward heaven. With head bowed, he prayed simply, “God be merciful to me a sinner.” The prayer was simple and heart-felt. That man, Jesus said, went home justified.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 19

Talking and Listening

Psalm 91:14-16

The great reason why the prayer closet is not attractive is that people do not know how to pray. Their stock of words is soon exhausted and they do not know what further to say, because they forget that prayer is not a soliloquy, where everything comes from one side; but it is a dialogue, where God’s child listens to what the Father says, and replies to it, and then asks for the things he needs.

Listen for the voice of God today.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 20

Getting to Know God

John 10:11-15

How can any man on earth obtain intimate knowledge of another man of remarkable wisdom, if he does not associate with him, and place himself under his influence? And how can God Himself sanctify us, if we do not take time to be brought under the power of the glory of His holiness? Nowhere can we get to know the holiness of God, and come under its influence and power, except in the place of prayer. It has been well said, “No man can expect to make progress in holiness who is not often and long alone with God.”

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 21

First, the Will

Psalm 100

If your heart is cold and dead, remember that our faith is not a matter of feeling, but has to do first with the will. Raise your heart to God and thank Him for the assurance you have that He looks down on you and will bless you. Thanksgiving is the key to the presence of God. Through such an act of faith you honor God and draw your soul away from being occupied with itself.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 22

Bow Before Him

Ephesians 3:14

God’s holiness expresses the unspeakable distance by which He is separated from us. Yet, it also expresses His love that longs to hold fellowship with us. Bow in humble reverence, as you think of the immeasurable distance between you and God. Bow in childlike confidence in the unspeakable desire of His love to be united with you in the deepest intimacy; and count on Him to reveal Himself to the soul which thirsts after Him and waits upon Him and is quiet before Him.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 23

Paul’s Labor of Prayer

Colossians 1:9-11, 2:1-2

These passages teach us that unceasing prayer formed a large part of Paul’s service in the gospel; we see the high spiritual aim which he set before himself, in his work on behalf of believers; and the tender and self-sacrificing love with which he ever continued to think of the Church and its needs. Let us ask God to bring each one of us, and all ministers of His Word, to a life of which such prayer is the healthy and natural outflow.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 24

Prevailing Prayer

Luke 6:3-8

Prayer is not a mere habit, riveted by custom and memory. It is not something which must be endured, its value dependent upon the decency and perfection of the performance. Prayer is not a duty which must be performed in order to ease obligation and to quiet conscience.

Prayer is not a mere privilege, a sacred indulgence to be taken advantage of, at leisure, at pleasure, at will and with no serious loss attending its omission.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 25

God Is Personal

Luke 11:1-4

I understand prayer to be talking to God who listens to us and responds to us because he loves us. If prayer is talking to God, and if God listens and responds because he loves us, then it is clear that God is personal. I believe that is true; God is personal. This is a matter of great importance, for it means that the ultimate reality is not an impersonal force, a blind fate, or a remorseless law, but it is someone.

Fisher Humphreys

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 26

The Spirit Must Have Us

Galatians 5:16-26

Many pray for the Spirit, that they may make use of Him and His power in their work. This is certainly wrong. It is He who must use us. Our relationship toward Him must be one of deep dependence and utter submission. The Spirit must have us entirely, and always, and in all things under His power.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 27

Tending to Do, Needing to Be

Psalm 46:9-11

The tendency of these times is to an ostentatious parade of doing, which enfeebles the life and dissipates the spirit of praying. There may be kneeling and there may be standing in prayerful attitude. There may be much bowing of the head and yet there may be no serious, real praying. Prayer is real work. Praying is vital work. Prayer has in its keeping the very heart of worship. Above all things we do, we must pray.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 28

Praying in a Brand New Way

Romans 8:14-18

Jesus taught that God loves us like a father. Thus Paul could write, The Spirit....makes us sons, enabling us to cry “Abba! Father!” (Rom. 8:15, NEB). What Paul meant in his statement was not, of course, a literal use of the word Abba. Jesus made it very clear that God is never impressed by our choice of words. Paul meant that Christians pray in a new way because they understand God in a new way–as a Father who is compassionate and interested. Prayer is the simple, understandable, open, honest speaking of trusting children to their loving Father.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 29

As Natural as Breathing

Ephesians 6:18-20

Oh, the sacredness and power of prayer, if it takes possession of the heart and life! Prayer becomes as natural as breathing out and breathing in. It is continuous. It keeps one constantly in fellowship with God.

We can then literally say, “I wait on Thee all the day.” Let us be careful to consider not only the length of the time we spend with God in prayer, but the power with which our prayer takes possession of our whole life.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 30

House of Prayer

Mark 11:15-19

As angry as Jesus ever became, He became angry at the religious structure and the leaders of the Temple. He saw the people of God who had journeyed hundreds of miles in pilgrimage to pray in the House of God. They had to pass through the gauntlet of money exchanges, temple taxes, and sacrifice examinations and rejections. Jesus became furious, overturning tables, driving out the money changers. His challenge and condemnation was that the House of God was to be a House of Prayer and not a den of thieves.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 31

The Call We Need to Make

Jeremiah 33:3

George Washington Carver is known for his experimentation into the lowly peanut. He worked in his small laboratory at Tuskegee Institute. However, it was not in the lab that the secrets of the peanut were unlocked. Early each morning he would walk in a nearby copse of woods. In that retreat, he would pray, “Lord, You made this peanut. Show me what’s in it.” From the peanut, Carver developed over a 1000 products and invented a whole industry.

What do you need to know today? Make the call!

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 32

To Control, Yield

Romans 6:11-13

Prayer can exercise a mighty influence over the life. If one yields entirely to God in prayer, then prayer can conquer the life of the flesh and sin. The entire life may be brought under the control of God. Prayer can change and renew the whole life, because prayer calls in and receives the power of the Father, the Lord Jesus, and the Holy Spirit to purify and sanctify the life.

Adapted from The Prayer Life by Andrew Murray

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 33

Always What We Need

2 Corinthians 12:7-10

Jesus said, “Ask, and it shall be given you.” That doesn’t mean that the exact thing you ask will be given. The promise is that something will be given. God may have something much better than you ask for. The faith to pray must include faith in God’s love and His plan.

In Lloyd C. Douglas’ novel, The Big Fisherman, a Roman officer prays for Peter’s life. But Peter is condemned to die. The officer says, “I prayed for you but it hasn’t done any good.” “I’m sure it has,” says Peter. “I haven’t been afraid.”

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 34

Our Father Knows

Matthew 6:5-8

Many find it difficult to worship in prayer, perhaps for the same reasons they find it difficult to express genuine appreciation for human beings who mean a great deal to them. The way forward in worship is first to determine not to engage in insincere flattery, but, rather, to reflect at length on the fact that Jesus has shown God’s actual likeness. When we understand even a little about God’s goodness and love, we will be awed to the extent that we will continually speak to Him out of the overflow.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 35

God’s Great Abundance

John 10:10

Prayer fills man’s emptiness with God’s fullness. Prayer fills man’s poverty with God’s riches. Prayer puts away man’s weakness with the coming of God’s strength.

It banishes man’s littleness with God’s greatness. Prayer is God’s plan to supply man’s great and continuous need with God’s great and continuous abundance.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 36

Ask…Seek…Knock

Matthew 7:7

Deep desire will lead you to : “Ask…seek…knock.” These three prayer words in the original Greek are in the present tense and they call for continuing action. The better translation is “keep on asking, keep on seeking, keep on knocking.” Life is both alike and different from mountain climbing. Alike in that the climber is constantly struggling higher; different in that in life we never reach the top. In life we never arrive because we never run out of heights to climb. The moment we give up the struggle of the climb, we begin to fall back and die.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 37

God’s Plan

Luke 6:12-16

We are constantly stretched, if not strained, to devise new methods, new plans, new organizations to advance the Church and secure enlargement and efficiency for the gospel. This trend of the day has a tendency to lose sight of the man or sink the man in the plan or organization. God’s plan is to make much of the man, far more of him than of anything else. Men are God’s method. The church is looking for better methods; God is looking for better men.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 38

The Lawgiver Who Prayed

Exodus 15:1-18

Moses prayed! The most serious and strenuous business of his serious and strenuous life was prayer. As intimate as he was with God, his intimacy did not abate the necessity of prayer. This intimacy only brought clearer insight into the nature and necessity of prayer, and led him to see the greater obligations to pray, and to discover the larger results of praying. In one crisis, the very existence of the nation was in peril. He writes: “I fell down before the Lord forty days and forty nights.” Wonderful praying and wonderful results! God received the glory.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 39

Adventurers Wanted

1 Chronicles 4:10

Charles Crowe says prayer is for the adventurous. No adventure–no need for prayer. Many are satisfied just to be alive. Wanting nothing, they pray for nothing. In contrast, the words of Dean Alfange: “I do not choose to be a common man. It is my right to be uncommon–if I can. I want to take the calculated risk; to dream and to build, to fail and to succeed. I prefer challenges to guaranteed existence; the thrill of fulfillment to the stale calm of Utopia.” There is a man who prays. He has a reason to pray.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 40

People of Prayer

2 Chronicles 7:14

What the Church needs today is not more or better machinery, not new organizations or more and novel methods, but men and women whom the Holy Spirit can use–people of prayer, persons mighty in prayer. The Holy Spirit does not flow through programs, but through people. He does not come on machinery, but on men. He does not anoint plans, but people—people of prayer.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 41

God’s Will

1 Thessalonians 5:16-18

God’s concern for prayer shows how vital it is to His work in this world, and how far-reaching are its possibilities. In Paul’s final words to the Thessalonians, prayer is at the center of the will of God for His people. “Rejoice evermore, pray without ceasing, and in everything give thanks. For this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.” Prayer is the pole star around which rejoicing and thanksgiving revolve. Prayer is the heart sending its full and happy pulsations up to God through the glad currents of joy and thanksgiving.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 42

Mighty Work

Matthew 26:36-44

What is this prayer to which men are called? It is not a mere form, a child’s play. It is serious, difficult work, the manliest, the mightiest work, the divine work that man can do.

Prayer lifts men out of the earthliness and links them with the heavenlies. Men are never nearer heaven, nearer God, never more God-like, never in deeper sympathy and truer partnership with Jesus Christ, than when praying.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 43

Rich, but Poor

Revelation 3:14-22

Dr. Robert E. Goodrich, Jr. asks in What’s It All About: “Don’t we believe in prayer? Don’t we know what it could mean to our lives?…Of course we know about prayer. Then why don’t we pray?” Many answers are given: our lives are crowded and hurried, we lack faith, we don’t know how to pray, or because sin in our lives makes us ashamed to face God. None of these are the real reasons. The real reason is, we have nothing to pray for. We have everything we want without praying. That is the reason and a supreme tragedy. What is it we really need?

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 44

A Child’s Request

Matthew 7:9-11

Prayer is a solemn service due to God, an adoration, a worship, an approach to God for some request, the presenting of some desire, the expression of some need to Him, who supplies all need, and who satisfies all desires; who, as a father, finds His greatest pleasure in relieving the wants and granting the desires of His children. Prayer is the child’s request, not to the winds, nor to the world, but to the Father.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 45

The Sure Cure for Worry

Philippians 4:6-7

Worry creeps (sometimes it just runs) into our lives. We tend to worry about our families, our careers, our finances, our health. Practically every aspect of our lives can be a source of worry. Jesus told us how futile it was, “Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life? [Or single cubit to his height] (Mt. 6:27)? Worry changes nothing.

How do we stop worrying? When Paul was in prison, he wrote–worry about nothing, pray about everything, be thankful for anything, and the peace of God will guard our hearts. The sure cure for worry is simply to trust God.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 46

The Elephant in the Room

1 Samuel 12:19-25

Sometimes it’s not what we do that is sin, sometimes, it is what we don’t do. Sin can be grouped into two large categories–sins of commission and sins of omission. Sins of commission are things we do, active engagement in disobedience against God. For most Christians, that is not the major problem. The “elephant in the room” is our sins of omission, those things we know to do and simply do not. James said it this way, Anyone, then, who knows the good he ought to do and doesn’t do it, sins (James 4:17).

If we know to pray, let’s do it!

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 47

The Best Place to Live

Matthew 26:38-46

Ask the three Hebrew men who were cast into the fiery furnace (Daniel 3:14-30). Ask the Apostle Paul when he was in prison in Caesarea or in Rome (Philippians 1:12-18). Ask Jesus when He was on the cross dying for the sins of the whole world–the innocent dying for the guilty. Ask them where the best place in the world to live is and they will tell you in the very center of God’s will. No better place of security exists.

The best place to live is not a physical address. It is a condition of the soul. The best place to live is in the very center of the will of God.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 48

Too Busy

Psalm 63:1

It is told of John Wesley, the great Anglican preacher whose followers went on to found the Methodist Church, that he arose extremely early to pray. He would spend hours with God. He felt the press of many responsibilities and a very demanding schedule. When urged to rest longer, to stay with the bed, he responded, “I am far too busy not to pray.” Wesley realized that the greater the demands, the greater the demand to pray.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 49

By Prayer

Luke 18:1

Prayer was a core to Jesus. He rose early to pray. He taught His disciples to pray. He gave them a model to follow in His life and His words. By prayer God’s name is hallowed. By prayer God’s Kingdom comes. By prayer His Kingdom is established in power and made to move with conquering force swifter than the light. By prayer God’s will is done till earth rivals heaven in harmony and beauty. By prayer daily toil is sanctified and enriched, and pardon is secured, and Satan is defeated.

MY RESPONSE:

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Seeking the Heart of God – 50

Being with Jesus

Luke 5:1-11

“Follow me.” The Lord said this to those He would make fishers of men. The task of sharing the good news can be learned only in close and persistent fellowship with Christ. While the Twelve followed Him daily, we have the same privilege. He indwells us. We can read His word. We fellowship continually with Him through prayer. Being with Jesus is the only training required for witnesses. The woman said of Peter: “This man was also with him.” It was noticed then; it still is. Follow Him.

MY RESPONSE:

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