Big Prayers, Big Answers (by Jonita Barram)

A Praying Church

       Have you noticed that some of Faith’s members are looking slimmer, healthier, more buffed? Would you believe that their appearance is an answer to a BIG prayer? Last March 4, small prayer groups prayed “that all of Faith Baptist Church will be good stewards of our relationships, our bodies, our families, our homes, our resources, and everything that God has given us to manage” (emphasis added). That is indeed a BIG prayer!
      Did God answer 100 percent of those requests in 100 percent of our membership—I like to think yes; some of us are just slower to respond, but the Holy Spirit is still working, still answering this BIG prayer.
And speaking of 100 percent of our membership, that membership has increased to at least 1,000, largely in answer to BIG prayers, like this one, also from Mar. 4, 2012: “That souls will be saved, new believers baptized, and that discipleship will happen at every level.”
      Or how about this BIG prayer, one that cannot be answered in the short-term: “That Faith Baptist Church will have the courage to see the FX vision all the way to the end—an entire community changed by the gospel”! All the children who have believed on Jesus Christ through the FX ministry are the fruits of this BIG prayer and the hope for “an entire community changed by the gospel.” Now we’re asked to pray for and give toward establishing the first Faith Baptist Refuge, a courageous step toward fulfillment of the FX vision.
      On Mar. 25, 2012, Faith members prayed “that God blesses our April Faith Day offering on Sunday.” With an offering of over $130,000, God’s answer was a big YES!  (You can read specifically about April Faith Day 2012 here.)

BIG Answers from the Past

Dot Malcolm, one of the church’s charter members, recalls some BIG answers to prayer.

     One of our deacons, Pete Jenks, was critically injured in an accident. This was when our church was new. He had a head injury; he had broken ribs, a broken hip. It was touch and go. His wife, a nurse, stood by him, took him home in a full body cast, she was working full-time, they had four children, they were living in a mobile home. We just prayed and prayed. She had to teach him the alphabet all over again; she had to teach him to feed himself—it was just amazing. Yet he had a quick recovery. And to this day you would never know about the injuries because he has been able to compensate because now his brain causes him to read backwards, but he’s done it so for so many years now that he’s used to it. That was a big prayer request and a big thing for our church to go through when we were just new.

     Even finding places to meet—God answered those prayers. God answered prayers for property. God answered prayers for our first pastor, Missionary Pastor Willard Benedict. Then when we had some really challenging times come along, God helped us through those. And then when we were two years without a pastor, God sent such wonderful men to the pulpit at that time who just kept our church going.

     A large prayer group formed, and we prayed and prayed for a pastor. God sent us Pastor Osborne, and that’s probably one of the biggest blessings our church has ever experienced, because he has taught us and shown us what we were and what we should be.

     Pastor is very plain about God not being pleased with a critical spirit, to love people where they are, and to try to see them as God sees them, where they’re going to be. All the discipleship classes available and Bible study groups available we never had before. And the programs—it seems like a lot of programs that our church is involved in, but they’re all helping to show people Jesus Christ. That’s our purpose. And they’re tools, and we’re just so privileged to have the people who can head up those programs and keep them going and give them insight as to where they want to be in a few years with that. And, of course, our pastor is a visionary. He stretches our faith, and that’s a good thing. So we have been challenged through the years, and God has been faithful to lead us along through the good and the bad times.

     We’re so thankful for where we are today, and we know that we have much to learn, and we’re eager to learn, eager to continue learning, and to be able to just serve the Lord on this corner and to reach out to the whole world where He sends us.

It is no surprise that Faith has been and continues to be a praying church.

     Dot says that large prayer group—about 30—met before every evening service. “We were just praying mainly for a pastor at that time,” she says. Over the years, “that prayer group has dwindled down to where there are two or three of us now, but we still meet—mainly to pray for different individuals in our church—people who are ill or people who are hurting or any specific need in our church.” This group still meets every Sunday evening at 5:30.

‘BIG Prayers’ Groups

     People in “BIG prayers” groups met the first three months of 2012 and have been meeting in these early months of 2013. Volunteers lead the groups, which comprise the leader and those he or she invites to join; and they meet when and where they choose. That’s not to say the groups are closed to newcomers. If you are interested in joining a “BIG prayers” group, contact the church office.

Other Prayer Groups

     Most of the “BIG prayers groups” disband after April FaithDay (the first Sunday in April), but the Faith family has plenty of opportunities to join other prayer groups that meet regularly.

I am privileged to attend a monthly meeting to pray for six or eight of our missionaries. Most of them work in connection with the USA. Then, once a month on Mornings for Missions, we meet together and remember the camp ministry at Camp Gilead and organizations that carry on missionary work if we have some requests from them.—Lorraine Hooser

Intense Prayer

In a letter dated Feb. 27, 2013, Pastor Osborne wrote:

     The Deacons and Prayer Leaders and I are urging and pleading with all of you to enter the month of March on your knees with us for a 31 day season of INTENSE PRAYER. Every day will find us—and I hope everyone of our church members—on our knees fervently praying for God to save souls in Winter Haven, praying that the baptismal waters would be constantly used, praying that God would show His powerful and victorious hand in establishing the first Faith Baptist Refuge, establishing Faith Baptist Christian Academy, and building a new auditorium that will be used to transform lives for generations to come. That Intense Prayer time will culminate on Easter Sunday March 31st with a service of Glorious Praise. I pray you and your family will join us in those days of INTENSE PRAYER.

     Our leadership has BIG faith, so they’re not afraid to ask God for BIG things. As a church family we have a BIG future of ministry to look forward to—because God gave the vision, honors our faith, and is glorified in granting our BIG requests.

How About You?
Which prayer group are you a part of?  To learn more about any of these prayer groups please contact our church office.

"The Disciple's Prayer" - A Sermon Series by Pastor Osborne

(image by Sue Whicker)

"If you think prayer is for your benefit you have missed the point.  The reason we pray and the reason God answers is to put Himself and His glory on display.  His glory is the issue."  (Pastor Osborne - from the 1st sermon, Jesus Teaches His Disciples to Pray)

On Sunday morning January 23, 2011, Pastor Osborne began a 12 sermon series on The Disciple's Prayer from Matthew 6:9-13.  For convenience, we have gathered links to all of the sermons and also to the PowerPoint notes that went with each sermon.  We hope this will be a blessing to you.

We plan to prepare a DVD package of all of these sermons.  The editing process is long, but it has begun and we hope to have this available sometime this fall. 

1. Jesus Teaches His Disciples to Pray (audio and PPT notes)
2. "Our Father"  (audio and PPT notes)
3. "Hallowed be Thy Name"  (audio and PPT notes)
4. "Thy Kingdom Come"  (audio and PPT notes)
5. "Thy Will Be Done"  (audio and PPT notes)
6. "On Earth As It Is In Heaven"  (audio and PPT notes)
7. "Give Us This Day Our Daily Bread" - part 1  (audio and PPT notes)
8. "Give Us This Day Our Daily Bread" - part 2  (audio and PPT notes)
9. "Forgive Us Our Debts" - part 1  (audio and PPT notes)
10. "Forgive Us Our Debts" - part 2  (audio and PPT notes)
11. "Lead Us Not Into Temptation"  (audio and PPT notes)
12. "Thine is the Glory"  (audio and PPT notes)

Book Recommendation - When God Doesn't Answer Your Prayer

 

In January of this year, Camp Gilead hosted a Men's Retreat.  Several from our church attended.  Pastor Peter Hubbard from North Hills Community Church, in South Carolina, was the main speaker and brought several messages from Matthew 7.  At one point during the weekend, he recommended a book entitled When God Doesn't Answer Your Prayer by Jerry Sittser.  After the conference was over, my father bought several copies of the book and gave me one to read.  (Thanks Dad!)

It took me a while, but I eventually I finished reading the book.  One chapter in particular stood out to me.  Chapter 3 is entitled "Can God Take Our Complaints?"  In my opinion, that one chapter makes the whole book worth reading.

In this chapter Sittser addresses the emotion that we often feel toward God when He doesn't answer our prayers.  Most of us have experienced that natural unavoidable emotion that comes after a tragedy.  We feel like God has let us down.  Often we want to express our emotion to God but feel guilty about telling God that we are angry with Him.  Sittser explains it well, "The real question, then, is not whether we have emotion but what we do with it, especially when God is the one to whom our emotion is directed.  After all, he is sovereign, and therefore ultimately responsible for what happens int he world."  (p. 61)

So, we feel stuck.  We know that the solution is to take our emotion and grief to God.  But, we don't want to because we feel angry at what God has done and don't want to be honest with Him.  We feel ashamed and hesitant to 'let God know' how we honestly feel.  (As if He doesn't already know!)

Sittser wisely points us to the Psalms.  "The Psalms put negative emotions into words.  Half the Psalms contain complaints, usually directed toward God.  The psalmist does not hesitate to wrestle with God, cry out to God, weep before, even blame God for misery and suffering."  (p. 63)  Later he writes, "that we pray honestly seems to be as important as praying properly."  (p. 67)  This was the important lesson that I took away from the book.  God can handle our complaints.  God can handle my brutal honesty.  

This book is not easy to read.  It is not a book will leave you with a warm fuzzy feeling.  It will challenge your convictions and force you to examine your heart.

May thy Fear be My Awe - A New Year's Prayer

O Lord,

Length of days does not profit me except the days are passed in Thy presence, in Thy service, to Thy glory.

Give me a grace that precedes, follows, guides, sustains, sanctifies, aids every hour, that I may not be one moment apart from Thee, but may rely on Thy Spirit to supply every thought,
     speak in every word,
     direct every step,
     prosper every work,
     build up every mote of faith,
     and give me a desire to show forth Thy praise;
     testify Thy love,
     advance Thy kingdom.

I launch my bark on the unknown waters of this year,
     with Thee, O Father as my harbour,
     Thee, O Son, at my helm,
     Thee O Holy Spirit, filling my sails.

Guide me to heaven with my loins girt,
     my lamp burning,
     my ear open to Thy calls,
     my heart full of love,
     my soul free.

Give me Thy grace to sanctify me,
     Thy comforts to cheer,
     Thy wisdom to teach,
     Thy right hand to guide,
     Thy counsel to instruct,
     Thy law to judge,
     Thy presence to stabilize.

May Thy fear by my awe,
     Thy triumphs my joy.


The Valley of Vision

Prayer - Week Three

Concluding the Wednesday prayer theme, here is the remainder of the modern Puritan prayer.
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In the face of disaster, teach me to pray prayers that trust in your plan and Providence, wherever you lead me in life and whatever circumstances I might face. Because of your dominion, may I greet all things as gracious gifts from my Father in whom there are no shadows. Your sovereign mercy enables me to give thanks in all things so that your peace that passes all understanding will guard my heart and mind. Even in the most difficult events help me to pray a prayer of rejoicing and hope like Habakkuk prayed:

Though the fig tree should not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines, the produce of the olive fail and the fields yield no food, the flock be cut off from the fold and there be no herd in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the LORD; I will take joy in the God of my salvation. GOD, the Lord, is my strength; he makes my feet like the deer's; he makes me tread on my high places.

And when overwhelmed, Spirit, search my heart and mind giving expression to the cries of my heart with groanings too deep for words, bearing witness with my spirit that I am still your child and these cries are acts of faith that long for your kingdom to come.
Don’t let me be like Jabez Lord, who prayed for you to bless him and you graciously answered his prayer, but we are not told of any good Jabez did for you.
Most of all Lord, teach me to trust in your sovereign mercy the way Christ did. For trusting in your sovereign plan he could pray both, “Take this cup from me but not my will be done but Thine, Oh Lord.” Then give me the grace to like my Savior, who when persecuted for righteousness sake was able to say, “Forgive them Lord, for they know not what they do.”
For it is only then Lord, that I will have learned to pray in faith, realizing that you have taken the list from my hands, and in my prayers you have mingled my desires with your will so that I have received something far greater than I could have hoped, thought or imagined. You will have given me what my heart truly desires and all that I need. You, Father.
For in trying to get what I want out of you by my prayers, you have gotten what you want out of me. For I have taken my eyes off my list and see only you and in that moment, I know why the Psalmist asked for just one thing, and sought just one thing, and that I like him pray, “may I dwell in your house Lord all the days of my life, to behold your beauty, and to meditate on you in your temple.”
The prayer can be read in it's entirety at this link.

Prayer - To Be Continued

The next portion of last Wednesday's modern Puritan prayer.
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If I cannot have your place, then at least I can blame you for the deadness in my soul that is evident in the absence of prayer. After all Father, why should I pray if you already know and have already decided? Forgive me Lord, again like my first parents, I have believed Lucifer’s lie, the one he planted in our souls to doubt your goodness and love. Teach me to see you rightly Lord, that in all your attributes you are sovereign and your sovereignty fills all your qualities of wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth. Knowing you this way allows me to pray joyfully, “thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”
Don’t let me hide my lack of love for others and my disobedient heart behind theological speculation that would leave you responsible for my sin. Show me how your plan and my actions fit together, how your will and my freedom merge so that they are one. Help me understand that your election does not exempt me from praying for the lost, sharing the gospel and pleading with people to be reconciled to you, but because of your sovereign plan I can be outrageously bold, confident, and at the same time patient when calling others to Christ.
Instruct me Father in what the older saints knew, that your sovereignty was the reason to pray, and to pray prayers filled with blessing, thanksgiving and praise. Make me understand you the way the Psalmist did, who being convinced of your sovereignty, argued and plead his case before you using your own promises as his evidence. Or to say with Job, “behold he will slay me, I have no hope, even so, I will plead my case before him.”
Reveal your majesty to me like you did to Isaiah, that in seeing you, I will see the true folly of my sin and being cleansed by a baptism of fire can then, from a cleansed heart offer myself in service to you.
Move my heart like you moved the apostle Paul’s, that as he laid out your plan of redemption for the church in Ephesus he was caught up in blessing and glorifying you, so much so that he could not take a breath for almost an entire chapter.
Let me rest in the mystery of your election, knowing that I am but clay in your hands, that you harden the heart of whom you please, love whom you please, pass over some, cut off nations and graft in others. Behold, your kindness and severity. Until like your apostle I can pray,

Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and unfathomable His ways! For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who became His counselor? Or who has first given to Him that it might be paid back to him again? For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen.

Make me to know the promises I look to and hope in, “that nothing can ever separate me from the love of God in Christ, that I am more than a conquerer,” can only comfort me if these promises are grounded in your sovereignty, “that you work out all things for the good of those who love you.” And resting in your plan, keep me Lord, from murmuring against you, manipulating and scheming to get my way.
Help me to see life like Joseph, who when he had a chance to take revenge on his brothers for their betrayal, saw himself not as the victim of their evil act but understood that his life fit into your much greater plan. And when I do not get my way or what I want, help to me see that it is not others who are obstacles, but you My Shepherd are leading me in the paths of righteous.

A Modern Puritan Prayer?

I am often humbled and challenged by Puritan prayers as they focus on sovereign God and our response to His character in all of our life. I recently came across the following prayer and thought that I would share the first portion of it with you. It's too long to include all of it in today's blog, so I'll finish it in the next few weeks. It's not a Puritan prayer but it does have many of the same qualities, with a 21st century perspective. Here's the first portion.
___________________________________________________________
Our great God and Heavenly Father,
Forgive me, because my prayers are too often only selfish attempts to get what I want from you. I come, list in hand and little else. I justify this kind of prayer because you tell us in your word to ask, seek and knock.
My misconception of your true character robs you of your Sovereign Majesty and glory, an idolatry that is most evident in the way I pray. How dare I treat you, the Lord of the Universe, as if you were my delivery-boy: unconscious of you most of the time, summoning you when I need something, and dispatching you without so much as a “thank you.” Forgive me, Jesus, for treating you with less respect than the guards who mocked you, struck you, spit in your face, and then crucified you.
Forgive me for not praying in faith but rather out of a heart that is filled with superstition. For in truth, I believe prayer’s power lies in me or in another or even in prayer itself.
I have often gone to pastor, priest or saint, because they are “special”; they most certainly are able to get your ear, for you wouldn’t hear me. But it is my ears that are deaf to your voice calling me to come. And do not I betray you by believing that I need another mediator than the one you provide? What man could be more righteous than you Christ, and whose prayers would accomplish more? Is there any other who is continually interceding for me? I am faithless for not believing in your promises to come boldly into your presence because the way is made possible by the blood of your Son. What could you value more Father, than the blood of your Son?
I have ignored your instructions when I pray because I sound like a pagan, endless babbling and rants, trusting in my many words or getting the form right. My prayers have been long, elegant and emotional all to impress, to get your attention and win your approval; if not from you then at least from others. Sometimes I shout hoping that you will hear and answer me. If nothing else I hope that I am convincing myself and I call it faith.
Teach me again to pray as you taught your disciples to pray - so differently than I pray. For your prayer O Lord, is short, only eloquent in its simplicity, and straightforward.
Forgive me, for my prayers question your goodness and love by denying the very words my lips are confessing when I call you “My Heavenly Father.” How my prayers must break your heart because I don’t know you nor do I trust your word. Why do I not rest on your promises that guarantee with the giving up of your own Son that you will with him freely give me all things? Why do I call the bread you give me a stone and the fish a snake? If I being evil know how to give good gifts, how much more should I have confidence in you, Father.
But Lord, some days I feel like I can really pray and you hear me because I have been good or done something for you. Doesn’t that place you in my debt? Forgive me for making Christ’s death meaningless by valuing my pitiful acts as more significant than Jesus’ life and death. Why do I, Lord, desire to cover the perfect righteousness of Christ with my own filthy rags?
Father, dare I say, your sovereign rule offends me! How can you? How can you force your will on all creation, especially your children? What offends me is not the power, but that it is yours and not mine. Of course I never would admit that this is the reason I question your sovereignty. I prefer to look thoughtful and reflective, to be philosophical but if the truth were known, you hold all power, glory and all authority- and I want it. Have mercy on me Lord, for I still long for what my first parents coveted. For not being satisfied with bearing your image, I long to take your place. But this is not something you have denied me. In Christ you call me to join you, to reign with him. But Lord, Christ has chosen another direction than the one my heart is telling me; He in his glory steps down, to serve and to suffer but I want neither! Teach me Father to be like Christ and to desire a cross, that humiliation comes before exaltation, and that the glory of the resurrection and the fellowship of his suffering cannot be separated.