Archive for April, 2010

Dear TC-HOP Family,

              The Book of James, Chapter 3, contains many verses pertaining to the tongue.  First, James tells us in verse 2 that, “We all stumble in many ways.  If anyone is never at fault in what he says, he is a perfect man, able to keep his whole body in check.”  But then in the following verses he tells how difficult this is. vs.5, Likewise the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts,..vs.6, The tongue is also a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body.  It corrupts the whole person, sets the whole course of his life on fire, and is itself set on fire by hell. vs.8, but no man can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison… vs.9, With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men who have been made in God’s likeness.”  With these verses in mind we should realize the importance of contending in prayer for our speech. 

            The next letter in our F-E-L-L-O-W-S-H-I-P is the S, which stands for Speech.  First I will pray that the Lord would set a guard over my lips as I set my heart to obey You.  Ps.17:3, “Though You probe my heart and examine me at night, though you test me, you will find nothing; I have resolved that my mouth will not sin.”  Ps.39:1,”I said, “I will watch my ways and keep my tongue from sin; I will put a muzzle on my mouth as long as the wicked are in my presence.”

            I will also pray for the Lord to free me from defensive, angry and foolish speech.  Eph. 4:29; “Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it benefit those who listen.”  I will also pray for sustained communion with the Spirit and restrained communion with man.  “Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, O Lord…” Ps.19:14.

            The next letter in the acronym is H, which stands for Humility. Jesus says in Matt. 11:29, “Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and I will find rest for your souls.”  I pray, Jesus, I want to learn from you how to walk in lowliness.  I commit to take Your yoke of meekness (humility) on my life in my attitudes, speech and actions. 

Some scriptures that I can meditate on and pray from are; Isaiah 66:2 which says, “This is the one I esteem: he who is humble and contrite in spirit, and trembles at my word.”   James 4:10 Humble yourselves before the Lord, and He will lift you up.” 

Prov. 22:4 “Humility and the fear of the Lord bring wealth and honor and life.”  

Phil. 2:3, “Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves.”  Finally, I Peter 5:5-6, “All of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because, “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.”  Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time.”

            I’m praying these prayers so that out of God’s immense fullness of wisdom, power and mercy, I may be strengthened with power by the Holy Spirit in my soul so that I may walk in speech and humility that would honor God and give Him glory.

            Come join us at the TC-HOP this week as we seek the Lord in prayer.

 Blessings,

Gary

Dear TC-HOP Family,

The next letter in our F-E-L-L-O-W-S-H-I-P prayer acronym is W, which stands for Walking Worthy.  In these prayers of supplication for ourselves and others we are asking that out of God’s immense fullness of wisdom, power and mercy, we may be strengthened with power by the Holy Spirit in our souls, and that this would be evident in our lives in serving Him.

II Thes. 11-12 says, “With this in mind, we constantly pray for you, that our God may count you worthy of His calling, and that by His power He may fulfill every good purpose of yours and every act prompted by your faith.  We pray this so that the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you, and you in Him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ.”  As I walk in faith, I’m asking that God would strengthen me to walk in a way He would consider worthy of my highest calling, and that he would fulfill through me the acts of righteousness prompted in me by the Holy Spirit.  Through me I pray that His name would be glorified and that the Lord would fully perfect in me all goodness according to His purpose.

If there is any good in us it is from the good pleasure of His goodness, which is grace.  Pray that by His grace and power God would complete in me the work of faith with power.

Eph.4:1-2 says, “I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received.  Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love.”  So to walk worthy of my calling I’m also asking that the Lord would strengthen me to walk humbly with gentleness and patience towards others, and show the love of Christ in my life.

I also pray for the power to escape the escalating sin in the End-Times and that I may stand in obedience to God’s leadership.  I pray for the strength to keep me from taking the grace of God in vain, and let me lay hold of the fullness that I may not ever “waste” the power He gives me.  I Thes.5:23 says, “May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through.  May your whole spirit, soul, and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.”  I pray Ps.51:10, “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.”

Father, I set my heart to obey You in my war against the lust of the flesh (related to food, alcohol, drugs, immorality, etc.) and the lust of the eyes, (Luke 21:34-36).

 “The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes…comes not from the Father but from the world.” I John 2:16.

I pray, Father, that you would lead me from the storm of temptation and rescue me from its waters and cleanse me from secret faults, (Ps.19:12).  “Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts.”

So, just as Paul admonished the church of Philippi in Phil.1:27, “Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ,”  in my life circumstances my prayer is that I may walk worthy of the calling God has given to me and that His name would be glorified in my life.

Come join us at the TC-HOP as we seek the Lord in prayer.

Blessings,

Gary

4-12-10

Dear TC-HOP Family,

            In Ephesians 3:16 we read, “I pray that out of His glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through His Spirit in your inner being.”  In praying this for ourselves and for others we are asking that out of  God’s immense fullness of wisdom, power and mercy, we may be strengthened with power by the Holy Spirit in our souls, and that this would be evident in our lives in serving Him. 

The next letter we will use in our prayers of supplication using the

F-E-L-L-O-W-S-H-I-P acronym will be the second L, which stands for Light of Glory.  Moses, in Exodus 33, had been in intimate communion with God, and yet he is still desiring a closer acquaintance.  He asks God to show him His glory.  Even though Moses had heard a voice out of a pillar of cloud or fire, he desired to see some representation of the divine glory. He dreaded the thought of going forward without God’s presence.  So the Lord caused all His goodness to pass in front of Moses, and proclaimed His name, The Lord, in his presence. I pray that the reality of all God’s goodness be revealed to me and that His compassion, graciousness, forgiveness, and His abundant love may break into my inner being. 

While attending the Awakening services and the Passion for Jesus Conference this past week in K.C. I  can say that the glory of the Lord was revealed in physical and emotional healings, forgiveness, restoration, and His abundant love flowing into my heart and many others. In experiencing this it not only encourages me in faith, but excites me in my fervency in prayer to continue pressing in for more of God’s glory to be revealed to me.

The next letter in our acronym is O, which stands for One Thing Life Focus.  Of course all of the other prayer focuses need to fall in line after this one.  Our primary prayer focus should be to align our hearts to sit before the Lord and be in His presence.  I pray that I can be a person of one thing by setting the Lord continually before my heart, both in times of prosperity and difficulty.  In Luke 10:41-42, Jesus told Martha, “you are worried and troubled about many things.  But one thing is needed, and Mary has chosen that good part, which will not be taken away from her.”  Mary chose the “one thing” needed, to sit at Jesus feet and be in His presence.  Pray as David did in Ps. 27, “One thing I have desired, that will I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord, and to inquire in His temple.”  Remember the “beholding and becoming principle.”  The more we sit in His presence and behold His beauty and see His glory, the more we become like Him.

Finally, from II Corinthians 4:6, we can pray, “For God who said, “ Let light shine out of darkness, made His light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.”  As we dwell in His presence and seek His face, we’re asking that His light and glory would break into our hearts so we will be strengthened in our inner being.

Come join us in prayer as we seek the Lord together this week at the TC-HOP.

Blessings,

Gary

Dear TC-HOP Family,

Last week I began writing about a prayer list I have been using to help me in my prayers of supplication. It is taken from the acronym F-E-L-L-O-W-S-H-I-P, and last week I wrote about the first letter F, which stands for the Fear of the Lord. Eph. 3:16 says, “I pray that out of His glorious riches He may strengthen you with power through His Spirit in your inner being…” As we pray these prayers it is our desire that the Lord would strengthen us in our inner man to walk in the power He has ordained for us.

The next letter E, stands for Endurance or patience. Rom. 15:5 states that it is God who gives endurance, so if He is the one who is giving, we are the ones who should be doing the asking.

First of all we need to be reminded, as is written in IICorth.1:3-5, that He is the God of all comfort, and that He comforts us in all our troubles. For what reason does He do this? So that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God. So as we are going through difficult circumstances in our lives which test us, we need to pray that the Lord would strengthen our spirit so that we can persevere with a steadfast heart, and that also we in turn, as we are comforted, will be able to comfort others, which produces “patient endurance of the same sufferings we suffer.” Also, as Paul later states in verses 9-10, we may feel in our hearts the sentence of death, but this happens so, “that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead. He has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and He will deliver us. On Him we have set our hope…” So we will also pray as stated in Col.1:11, to be “strengthened with all power according to His glorious might so that you (I) may have great endurance and patience, and joyfully giving thanks to the Father..”

The first L of the acronym stands for Love. As I pray concerning this I like to use John 17:23-26 and substitute my name for those who Jesus is praying for. “You (father) …have loved them (Gary) as You have loved Me. Father, I desire that they whom You gave Me (Gary) may be with me where I am…I have declared to them (Gary) Your name, and will declare it, that the love with which You loved Me may be in (Gary).” I pray that the Father would tenderize my heart by releasing revelation of His love for me. I ask that I may feel the power of His four-fold love (love from You, for You, to myself then overflowing to others). I pray from Song of Songs 8:6-7, that He would place His seal over my heart, this love as strong as death, that blazes like fire and which waters cannot quench. I also pray from Eph. 3:18-19 that I may have the power, ”to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the Love of Christ, and to know this love (in my inner man) that surpasses knowledge…” Finally, I pray from Phil.1:9, “that your (my) love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, so that you (I) may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ…”

So my prayers are that the Lord would give me the patient endurance I need to persevere through my life circumstances, be able help others in difficult situations because of the comfort the Lord has given me and through the power of His love.

Please come join us this week as we seek the Lord at the TC-HOP.

Blessings,
Gary