Propitious Prayer: Placeholder

Propitious Prayer: Knowing

I submit to your thinking that "To Know, Is To Believe" would be a good axiom to integrate into your life and conversations with God.

Let's look at some definitions ... for the word knowing (adjective) it is "affecting, implying, or deliberately revealing shrewd knowledge of secret or private information" (see "shrewd" below).  To know (noun) is "the fact or state of knowing", with know (verb) as "to perceive or understand as fact or truth, or, to apprehend clearly and with certainty".  For shrewd, it states "astute or sharp in practical matters" - as in the shrewd manager who was commended for his actions (Luke 16:1-12).

In the image of a suspension bridge above, there is a good "tension" needed in order for the bridge to function properly. In our relationship with God, a "tension" is good when it comes to approaching Him in humility on one hand versus reality on the other.  We must understand that we are finite and He is infinite.  We are human (creation), He is the Creator.  We are dependent upon Him for life, He is dependent upon nothing - He needs nothing.  Yet, He desires to commune and live with us and in us, His created beings.

When it comes to our conversations (prayer) with the Creator of the Universe, we must approach Him with a knowledge of reality.  Some scriptures to consider are (Psalm 145:18, Proverbs 15:29, James 5:16, 1 John 1:9).  We must know that we can call on Him, and that He hears the voice of the person made righteous by the Cross of Jesus Christ.  That is reality!

Likewise, we must also be cognizant of our humble and needy approach to the Awesome Creator.  Consider these scriptures (Psalm 4:1, Philippians 4:6, Matthew 7:11).  There will be times that we don't even know how or what to pray, scripture provides the means for that in Luke 18:1 and Romans 8:26.

Suffice it to say, that scripture has all that we need to understand who we are in Christ, how to talk with God about our needs, converse with Him for our petitions, cry out to Him in our pain and suffering, thank Him for His blessings, and seek forgiveness in our failures.

Do you want to know how and what, where and when, why and for whom to pray?  Seek Him and His word.  Knowing comes from learning.  Learning comes from seeking out what the Truth of His Word says.  Seeking comes from conversations with Him while we bathe in His Word.

Blessings!!!

Propitious Prayer: No Meeting

Propitious Prayer: Exhales

We continue to consider paradigm shifts in our walk with God.  When considering the change in vision that Elisha prayed for his servant in 2 Kings 6:15-17, we should long to see things as God sees them.  How does this help us in our prayer journey?  Well, it makes us consider that our view of things is limited where God sees all things.  When we approach life with a limited view, we limit our ability to pray effectively.  Isaiah 55:8 states that God's thoughts and ways are higher than ours.  According to The Message version, it is phrased: "The way you work isn't the way I work."  This alone should help us realize that our way of praying must be enlarged to align more with the way God thinks - even as we look again at 1 Corinthians 2:16 - we have the same mind as Christ!!  That's powerful!!

As our prayer is influenced by this, we realize that other parts of our lives will follow suit and change as well. One thought brought up by a couple of wonderful folks (thank your Cindy and Kathryn!) in our discussion was the fragrance, aroma, or scent of our life as it's spoken of in 2 Corinthians 2:15-17.  To some we bring an aroma of death, to others we bring an aroma of life.  Rather than pray, speak and live out of the "sewer of our soul", we want our exhales of our existence to bring life and not death.

When God calls us, we choose to obey - even in our conversation with Him.  Out of that time with Him, our exhales can impact eternity - yes, the exhales of our life can bring life!  Our exhales can contain praises to God (Psalm 66:4, Psalm 92:1, Psalm 146:2, James 5:13), proclamatory snippets of biblical facts (Psalm 92:2, Psalm 145:4, Psalm 145:6), or even petitions for ourselves or others (Philippians 4:6-7, 1 Timothy 2:1).  When scripture says to "pray without ceasing" (1 Thessalonians 5:17), this is one avenue in addition to praying in the spirit (1 Corinthians 14:15).

Make your exhales count!!