Guidance & Direction

1. What makes it difficult to read the Bible and pray?

2. How do you or could you deal with those challenges?

My Prayer Warm-Up

I found that I was having a difficult time moving past certain things in my life.  I found that I was focused on certain significant frustrations and not experiencing God’s perspective or peace in those areas (job loss, marriage, etc.).  I developed a document called a “Prayer Warm-Up.”  I desired a  warm up to the truth about God.  I wanted to stimulate an attitude of prayer for the remainder of the day and a reminder to view my frustrations/issues/concerns from His perspective.  

I begin with passages of Scripture that are meaningful for the issues that I face.  After reading them, I pray reactively about the concerns and issues in my life.  I am specific about the things that bother me about myself and my situations and circumstances.  This is very personal and helps me to give those areas to God.  

Then I pray proactively - reminding myself of who God is and asking Him to work in my life.  I ask God to help me as I communicate with people throughout my day.  Before I look at anything on my computer in the morning, I usually read and pray through a document I call a "Prayer Warm-Up."  The verses are changed from time to time.  The exciting thing has been that as I’ve been praying about concerns, I find that over a period of time, I find they aren’t concerns any more.  I can delete them from the document and praise God for His work in my life.  There are other concerns that surface and they are added.  

I’ve had stops and starts with this document over the years, it gets easier with time in one sense.  In another sense, I can drift and think that I don’t need it.  I’ve learned that’s a sign that I really need God’s presence.  I have not “arrived!”  Just ask my wife!  But, I am so thankful that God is at work and I pray that I will be more and more open to His leading and perspective.  

This is only an idea.  It’s not for everyone.  I pray, at the very least, that this will stimulate you to figure out how you can open your concerns in your life up to God and allow Him to direct you and transform you through the Bible and through prayer.  If you feel like God can use this in your life, I encourage you to pray through a few verses and a few reactive and proactive requests...  Starting small was key for me and determining a consistent time/place to do it really helped.       

May God direct you as you seek to His guidance, strength and peace.  May our relationships with Him deepen this year!


Blessings,

Jeb
 

Prayer Warm-Up
Hebrews 12:1-3
1Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. 2Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. 3Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.
John 15:9-17
“As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you.  Now remain in my love.  If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father’s commands and remain in His love.  I have told you this so that My joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.  My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you.  Greater love has no one than this; that he lay down his life for his friends.  You are my friends if you do what I command.  I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business.  Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.  You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit – fruit that will last.  Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in my name.  This is my command: Love each other.”
Galatians 2:20
I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me.  The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.
Psalm 19:13,14
13Keep your servant also from willful sins; may they not rule over me.  Then will I be blameless, innocent of great transgression.
14May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, O LORD, my Rock and my Redeemer.
Psalm 139:23,24
23Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts.  24See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.
Psalm 86:11
Teach me your way, O LORD, and I will walk in your truth; give me an undivided heart, that I may fear your name.

I need to daily give these areas to Jesus so that they will not inhibit my relationship with Him.
Ephesians 4:22
22You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires
Here are some less personal examples:
- affirmation and approval of others
- trying to do everything humanly possible in my job
- lack of appropriate assertiveness with my wife
- not embracing God’s love or forgetting that God’s forgiveness or thinking it’s not enough

Now that I’ve given the above things to God, I pray that God will help me to put on these things…
Ephesians 4:23-24
23to be made new in the attitude of your minds; 24and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.”
Here are some less personal examples:
1.    God is holy and no one can fathom His greatness.
2.    God the Father loves me as much as He loves His Son Jesus.  John 17:23
3.    God has forgiven me and my sin.
4.    God will do great things in and through me because He is a great God.
5.    God is my ultimate audience.
6.    Please help me plan with Your ideas in mind.  Help me to say “yes” and “no” and obey You

I need spiritual direction!

A man in his 30's worked for a respected orange producer in Florida. When asked what was the most difficult part of his job, he explained how he watched oranges pass in front of him all day and was responsible for removing any orange that did not meet the standards set by the producer. With fatigue and concern all over his face, he said, "I don't know how long I can keep at it. All day long, decisions, decisions, decisions!"

Does life at times seem to you to be an endless string of decisions? Do you ever wonder how God connects with your daily decision making? When was the last time you faced a decision that frankly seemed like more of a game of chance then a rational Spirit-led decision making process?

Spiritual GPS: Getting Guidance is designed for you - getting practical answers to the often times ambiguous task of "Discerning the Will of God".

Let us know how this 4 week teaching series helps provide you with guidance and direction

Craig Bishop's books now on Amazon!

If you haven't stopped by Amazon lately, check it out. Craig's series of books are available there.
Faithspace in the Workplace: Fifty Days of Rediscovering Your Soul At Work
Emerging Faith
Discovering Your Divine Design

What are your top 5?

A good friend of mine emailed me yesterday to ask what my top 5 books are that are "able to change one's way of living and thinking" (he is perhaps looking for some Christmas gift ideas). Here's how I responded, considering those books I tend to return to again and again:

1. “A Severe Mercy” by Sheldon Vanauken (an autobiography of a love story, and of how a young couple comes to Christ through the influence of C. S. Lewis; a beautiful book that I have read many times).

2. “The Cross of Christ” by John R. W. Stott (the very best book on the most important of subjects; a treasure).

3. “The Contemporary Christian” by John R. W. Stott (no other book has impacted me so greatly in terms of my philosophy of ministry).

4. “Jonathan Edwards: A New Biography” by Iain Murray (my favorite biography of one of my heroes; ever wonder where my son got his name?).

5. “The Chronicles of Narnia” by C. S. Lewis (I’ve read them many times, most recently to my kids – love these stories!)

What are your top 5?

- Dave Detwiler

Life While You Wait

Your choice is simple.  You can Trust God, or you can Worry!  But you can't do both.

 

Find out more this Sunday… 

 

-chuck faber

Saint Nicholas - The Man, the Myth, the Legend

Saint Nicholas is the primary inspiration for the lovable and grandfatherly giver of Christmas gifts. He was a fourth-century Christian bishop in the city of Myra in Lycia, a province in modern-day Turkey. Although involved in the normal affairs of the Church, Nicholas was famous for his generous gifts to the poor in his area. In one instance he is said to have presented three daughters of a dear Christian man with dowries to keep his daughters out of prostitution. He is the patron saint of several towns around the world, including both Amsterdam and Moscow....read more of this article on our December Rising.

Read it, for the love of God!

I'm always on the lookout for helpful resources to encourage us in our reading and study of the Bible, and this is a really good one: The Books of the Bible, published by the International Bible Society.
This is a printing of the Bible that encourages our reading and understanding of God's story by removing chapter and verse numbers (did you know those weren't added until well over 1000 years later?), presenting the text according to the internal divisions that the authors likely intended, and placing the individual books or letters in an order that will help us understand them better.
I think it's a great idea, and I'm enjoying reading through this version a little bit each morning, as I arrive at my office. You can learn more about it by clicking here.

- Dave Detwiler

Looking for guidance? Not sure where to turn?

 We all need help finding our way.  During the month of January we will be learning how to find Godly guidance in our series GPS: Spiritual Guidance.  Help us know what problems you are facing.  Please answer these questions by clicking on comments below.  (You may log in annonymously)

 

1. What one important decision are you currently seeking direction over?
2. What would you say is the greatest hinderance to knowing God’s direction in your life?
3. What are the most effective distractions of Satan in keeping you from knowing God’s direction for your life?

I, God, Am All-Knowing

1. What changes do you need to make in your life in order to make knowing God your highest priority?

2. The idea that God is all-knowing can be either good news or bad news. How do you respond to this truth about God, and why?

3. How might knowing that God is all-knowing encourage you to be more honest when you pray?

4. Of all of the things you learned about God over this past month, what has proved most encouraging, and why? What questions remain?