“Why Aren’t We Praying?”

“Nothing of eternal consequence is accomplished apart from prayer”.  I heard this statement so many times in my college and seminary years that I will never forget it. In turn, I have used these same words in sermons I’ve shared and in our church publications I am quite sure you will never forget them.

Though you and I know the importance of prayer and perhaps have even experienced, to some degree, its power in our lives we often times have weak anemic prayer lives. In examining my own life in the light of Scripture I have found a number of reasons this is true of me and I suspect of many of you as well. Here are my top ten reasons I and, perhaps, you fail to pray.

We fail to pray because:

#10 – We have an unyielded heart – We are afraid that as we pray God will ask else to do something we don’t want to do or go someplace we don’t want to go. So we don’t pray. We need to surrender our hearts to Him (Rom. 12:1-2)

#9 – We have an unwilling heart  – Epaphras is said to be one who labored in prayer (Col. 4:12). Real prayer is hard work. We don’t like to expend energy. We don’t want to get up early or stay up late to pray. We are lazy and unwilling to change.

#8 – We have an unbending heart – We prefer to believe that we know what we are doing and that we can handle what comes our way.  Nothing could be further from the truth. Prov. 3:5-6 tells us to “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him and He will direct your paths.”

#7 – We have an undisciplined heart – As we come to God in prayer we find our minds wandering here and there and everywhere. I have even heard of some people like the disciples falling asleep when they should have been praying. Jesus’ rebuke fits both them and us when He says “What, could you not watch (pray) with Me one hour?” (Matt. 26:40)

#6 – We have an unsettled heart – Like Martha we are troubled and worried

about many things and only one thing is an absolute necessity. That one thing is what Martha’s sister, Mary, chose, sitting at the feet of Jesus (Lk. 10:38-42).

#5 – We have an unfocused heart – We know we should be spending time in prayer yet we put off that commitment in our lives for a rainy day. We know God is telling us to do this but we are waiting for a more convenient time in our lives to put it into practice.

#4 – We have an unforgiving heart – There are people who have hurt us in our lives. We know that God wants us to forgive but for whatever reason we won’t. This hinders our prayer life greatly. We must, by God’s grace, forgive even as God in Christ has forgiven us (Eph. 4:30).

#3 – We have an unclean heart – We know that “all have sinned” and that we continually fall short of the standards and expectations God has for us. We feel guilty coming before a holy God. We know that “If I regard iniquity in my heart the Lord will not hear me”. We must also remember His promise in 1 John 1:9 that if we confess our sins he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness”.

#2 – We have an unthankful heart – We have forgotten how much God has done for us. We have forgotten His promises and the answers to prayer we have already experienced in our lives.

#1- We have an unbelieving heart – We say that we believe that God answers prayer and that prayer makes a difference. However, in our heart of hearts we doubt that it actually does. We need to get back to His Word and trust what He says. The Bible says “the effective fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much” (James 5:16b). Prayer works.

Clearly prayer is a heart thing. Whatever our reason for not praying we should with the song writer sing:

“Change my heart O God, Make it ever true, Change my heart O God, Make it more like you. Thou art the potter, I am the clay, mold me and make me this is what I pray.”

In His Service,

Pastor Dave Watson

NYC Shepherd

  

We’ve put together a Fifty Day Lenten Devotional that is a study of 1 Peter and the Life of the Apostle Peter. We call it “Believers in Babylon, Serving our Savior in the Secular City”. If you would like a free Pdf file of this devotional for your personal enrichment during this special time of year please simply email me at NYCShepherd@gmail.com and say send me the devotional and I will send it to you asap.

Join us todayon WMCA, 970 A.M. at 11:00 A.M.. Today’s show is all about the New York Institute of Biblicl Studies. Our guests are

Pastor Paul Schooling, Ms. Betsy Maddox and

our Dean, Tom Riley. Here is the other important information:

Join us tomorrow on 570, wmca, January 26th  at 11:00 A.M. for our

Super Bowl Show featuring the chaplin of the New

York Giants, George McGovern. Email me your

Super Bowl pick with score  and total points scored.

Email to nycshepherd@gmail.com. Winner gets two books. four runner ups will get one book.

Our New Radio Program “God in our City” airs today, Janaury 12^th at 11:00 A.M.- Leave a comment to tell us what you thought about it. Next week’s guest is Father Frank Pavone with “Priests for Life”

     In a few short weeks Americans will go to the polls and pull a lever to elect a President of the United States as well as to elect state and local office holders. We are truly a privileged people. Christians in centuries past had to put up with maniacal dictators who persecuted and martyred our forbearers. Even today there are places in the world where believers are suppressed and oppressed. Because of our freedoms I hope you will avail yourself of the right to vote. Being a good Christian means being a good citizen, rendering to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s, so go and vote on Tuesday, November 6th.

     A sample of internet sites from and for believers will yield a multitude of reasons to vote for one candidate or another. Many times we are told to pray and seek the Lord’s leading as to who we should vote for. I do believe we should pray. However, I don’t think we should so much seek a leading as we should seek discernment. We need discernment to see through the media’s hoopla and the candidates’ smoke and mirrors. They are, after all, politicians. We may not want to buy what they are selling. But there is more.

      As Evangelical Christians we believe we have been given the infallible, life-changing, inspired Word of God. From these Scriptures we can discern, at best, which candidate we should vote for or, at worst, which candidate not to vote for. It seems to me that there are five timeless truths in Scriptures that give us the guidance we need. They provide us with a buyer’s guide if you will.

These timless truths are:

 #1 – A commitment to a pro-life position – All life is sacred because we are all made equally in the image of God (Genesis 1:27-28). The life of the innocent unborn is indeed precious. The Scriptures teach us that God supervises our creation in the womb (Psalm 139:13-16) and that He has a purpose for us from before we were born (Jeremiah 1:5). In Amos 1:13, God promised to judge the Ammonites for their mistreatment of the unborn. God is clearly on the side of the unborn, so the person we vote for should be fully of that persuasion as well, both in their personal and political convictions.

#2 – A commitment to a pro-traditional family position – From the time of Creation, God has defined marriage as a covenant between one man and one woman; Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve or Eve and Elaine (Genesis 2:22-25). Same sex marriage and or polygamous marriages are outside of God’s design. A society cannot survive without strong traditional families. Every effort should be made to hold this Biblical model up as the standard. What’s more, any major deviation  from God’s original design for the family is both dangerous and destructive to a society. The person we pull the lever for should share God’s view of marriage and the family as outlined in the Bible.

#3 – A commitment to a pro-Israel position – God promised Abraham, “I will bless those who bless you. And I will curse him who curses you.” (Genesis 12:1-3) This Abrahamic Covenant is unconditional and carries through to today. It behooves our nation then to bless Israel, to support her. This is a Biblical conviction we should embrace and hold to. It doesn’t mean we don’t confront Israel’s evils and faults. Israel doesn’t get a free pass to do whatever it pleases. However, it is clear that the Jewish nation is still the apple of God’s eye and we and the person we vote for should see them that way.

#4 – A commitment to a pro-Judeo/Christian values position – Proverbs 14:34 tells us that “Righteousness exalts a nation but sin is a reproach to any people”. The Ten Commandments and the Sermon on the Mount reflect what the Lord means by righteousness. Psalm 94:20 asks, “Shall the throne of iniquity which devises evil by law, have fellowship with You?” The Lord says He will have no part with the nation that legislates evil. .

     As serious followers of Christ we should support those who share our values. We live in a pluralistic society but we are under no obligation to vote for those who don’t share our Judeo/Christian values. These values are a major foundation for the goodness of our land as well as the blessings of God.

#5 – A commitment to a pro-compassion position – Psalm 9:17-18 tells us, “The wicked shall be turned into hell and all nations that forget God. For the needy shall not always be forgotten, the expectation of the poor shall not perish forever.” It is clear that God cares about the poor and needy. The Church should have that same concern and so should those we vote for. Turning our back on those who are genuinely in need can result in God turning His back on us as a nation.

     I encourage you to use these five timeless truths to determine which candidate would best reflect our Christian values. As believers in Jesus Christ we are told to “seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness”. Thus, we don’t vote a political party but our Savior’s priorities. We cannot vote our color, but His creed. We don’t vote our ethnicity but His ethics. We don’t merely vote for “A change we can believe in”, we vote according to “God’s Word that we can count on.” We don’t vote “Country First”, we vote “Christ’s Kingdom First.” We don’t even vote according to our pocketbook, but rather, we must vote according to His principles. And in the end, our prayer is not for what we want but what He wills.

     If you aren’t sure where a candidate stands, Google that candidate and the principles above. This time around, let’s be sure we search the Scriptures, search the internet, search our hearts and on Tuesday, November 6th search out our polling place.

    As a citizen of the United States of America I am grateful for the privilege of voting to elect a president and other public officials. As a citizen of heaven I am grateful for the knowledge that the Lord ultimately selects our leaders. Daniel 2:20 tells us that the Lord “changes the times and the seasons; He removes kings and raises up kings”. First, foremost and always though, you and I are committed to follow one person, our Lord, Jesus Christ. He is our only real Hope both now and eternally.

I CHOOSE THE CITY
by Francis DuBose

I choose the city…
Not simply to live in it,
to see it,
to hear it;
But to touch it;
yes, to embrace it,
to hold it,

To feel the wild glory of its
pulsating soul,

To move over its wide,
hurried broadways,

To stand stilled and sobered
at the nowhere of its dead-end streets,

To be trapped with it in its
pain and problems,

To be at once chilled by its ill
and covered with its confetti.

I choose the city because I choose God,
Because I choose humanity,
Because I choose the divine-human
struggle–

The struggle which will be won
Not in the serene path through
meadow and wood,
among the bees and birds, and flowers,

But in the city street
Made by the hand of man
Through the gift of God–
Main Street: the final battle field,
The scene of the ultimate struggle,
Where man chooses right
Because he is free to choose wrong.

Babylon, dirty and daring–
Babylon, yes–
Babylon today–

Tomorrow…
The New Jerusalem!

Francis DuBose, Mystic on Main Street, Chapel Hill, NC: Professional Press, 1993, pp. 78, 79.

It’s Now or Never

 

     Indisputably, the most influential document in our world has been the Bible. This is the theme of a recent book by Vishal Mangalwadi entitled, The Book that Made Your World: How the Bible Created the Soul of the Western World.  Since the time that the average person has been given the opportunity to read and study the Bible for themselves the world has experienced radical change.

 

     Nearly 700 hundred years ago, men like John Wycliffe and John Hus stood up against the religious hierarchy of their day at the cost of their lives in order to give the Holy Scriptures to the common man. With the invention of the Guttenberg Printing Press and thus the printing of the first Bibles around 1440, wide distribution of the Scriptures began. The rest, as they say, is history.

 

     The availability of the Bible gave a reason for individuals to be educated (to read and understand the Sciptures). Quickly this led to an understanding that many practices of the dominant church such as indulgences for the dead and the primacy of the priesthood were shown to be blatantly unbiblical. Soon there followed a Protestant Reformation where the mantra became “sola scriptura.” Shortly afterward, peace loving pilgrims came to this country’s shore in search of religious freedom. Their fervor fueled by their understanding of Scripture.

 

    One hundred years later when the Colonies were struggling politically and morally, Jonathan Edwards and George Whitfield preached the Bible in the new world and a Great Awakening followed. This set the stage for the American Revolution. Across the ocean in England a parliamentarian named William Wilberforce was beginning a nearly 50 year struggle to see slavery abolished because of his belief in the Scriptures.  Time and space will not let us detail the Second Great Awakening before the Civil War which caused the end of slavery and birthed the modern missions movement, or the effect the Bible had on the industrial revolution. Neither will time and space let us wax eloquent on the Bible and the Fulton Street Revival in New York City that prepared us for two Word Wars or the Bible’s affect on Evangelist Billy Grahm who in turn has ministered to every President our nation has had since Harry Truman.  Suffice it to say the Bible has dramatically shaped the world we live in.

 

    Tragically, Biblical illiteracy among professing Christians is now at an all time high. That’s right, the book that shaped our world is now the book that occupies most book shelves but is largely unread and misunderstood by those who claim it as their authority for life and practice. The average Christian is more familiar with the primetime TV schedule than they are with their Bible. We may know John 3:16 and Psalm 23 or other familiar passages by heart, but that’s about the extent of our saturation with Scripture. The product of this is that we are no longer the salt and light to our culture that we are called by God to be.

 

     Regrettably, we now live in a post-Christian culture and world.  The Bible was once required reading in every classroom in our country. But now, because we have “evolved and are more pluralistic and tolerant” you’d be hard pressed to find a Bible anywhere in a public school except in the dark corner of a library shelf.  As result, the influence of the Scriptures has waned, and the values that are critical to our nation’s prosperity and survival are no longer supported because our spiritual foundation has deteriorated. We have climbed far out on a limb and cut the branch behind us and now we wonder why we find ourselves in freefall in a less civil, less moral, less stable, less peaceful culture.  

 

     Undoubtedly, it is time for a change.  It is, in fact, past time for a change. It is time that we, as followers of Jesus Christ, once again fully embrace the Scriptures– God’s love letters to us. It is time we know what the Bible says about our obligations to each other and to our neighbor. It is time for us to once again experience the Bible’s life changing work. It is time for a change.  For if we don’t change things now there will be no turning back from the abyss of secularism that we find our culture hurtling toward.

 

I would like to suggest five simple things that can and must be done by each of us in order to change the current trend lines.

 

1. As a practicing believer, determine to read the Bible every day. If you are unsure where to start, go to my new blog www.nycshepherd.com and sign up by placing your email address in the box to follow me or send me an email at nycshepherd@gmail.com and I will send you a free 40 Day Devotional on the book of James, one of the most practical books in the New Testament.

 

2. As a Bible student determine to take a class on the Bible from a trustworthy source. Either find something online or attend our New York Institute for Biblical Studies (go to www.nyibs.net for more information). Don’t be content to continue in Biblical illiteracy.

 

3. As a Christian parent determine that in your home the Bible will be read and taught. Read the Bible as a family and talk about it as a family. Buy a simple devotion book for your family and get your family into the Word. Let’s make sure the next generation is not Biblically illiterate. Check out this book by Josh McDowell for family devotions

(http://www.amazon.com/Year-Book-McDowells-Family-Devotions/dp/0842343024)

 

4. As a concerned citizen, determine that you will be relentless about keeping the Scriptures in our culture. The values that made us great as a nation, the values that have helped us overcome our many flaws as a people are Biblical values. Get informed at the Revelation Movement http://www.revelationmovement.com/

 

5. As a Lay Church member determine to not sit idly by and hope for the best. Volunteer to help your church family teach the Bible to its members and the next generation.  Host a small group Bible Study or teach or assist in Christian Education in some way. You can make a difference. Check out the free spiritual gift analysis to see where you best fit in at http://www.churchgrowth.org/cgi-cg/gifts.cgi?intro=1 .

 

I implore to you to take all of these steps. The time for change is now. It’s now or never.

 In His Service,

 Pastor Dave

NYC Shepherd