Wednesday night we gathered together for a time of prayer. We have been using the Pslams to help guide our prayer time over the last month.
Why have we done this? We want to be serious about prayer at Faith; in its tone, tenor, and time. Too often when Christians have prayer meetings we end up spending our time in conversation with one another, sometimes even devolving into gossip in the name of prayer, squeezing in some prayer with the last few minutes to make sure we can say we met for prayer. We want to do better.
We want to be passionate about prayer. We want to acknowledge our dependance upon God with our prayer. We want to pursue God zealously because he is an awesome God in prayer. How great it is to go before the throne of grace, that Jesus has given us free access to, with locked arms together in a time of focused, sustained prayer. What better way to do that then allowing the scriptures to guide us!
We use the Psalms to help us worship as we pray, to help us remember our standing before God as we pray, to wrestle with our emotions as we pray, and to help us build the healthy rhythm for life in Christ expressed through up, in, and out (up is our life with God, in is our life in the body of Christ, and out is the life that God calls us to live in our domains of society, both locally and globally).
Will we always use the Psalms as the guide for our prayer time? Not every time we meet to pray. We will mix things up from time to time. Sometimes we will use other scripture to guide us. Sometimes we may do something else for some specific purpose, like we did last Wednesday when we split up and walked around Faith praying for certain areas of ministry and specific people. In the mean time, the Psalms are the perfect place to start for people whose desire is to get serious about prayer. Linked below is a great blog post from Donald S. Whitney that expands this idea more in depth but with brevity.
If you weren’t able to be there last Wednesday, below is what we prayed together. Take some time and pray at home today!
Prayer 1
103 Bless the Lord, O my soul,
and all that is within me,
bless his holy name!
2 Bless the Lord, O my soul,
and forget not all his benefits,
3 who forgives all your iniquity,
who heals all your diseases,
4 who redeems your life from the pit,
who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy,
5 who satisfies you with good
so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.
6 The Lord works righteousness
and justice for all who are oppressed.
7 He made known his ways to Moses,
his acts to the people of Israel
Up – Praise God from the depths of our soul for his steadfast love and mercy, that he would draw us nearer to him through his goodness shown toward us
In – Pray that we as a church would remember his acts and he would renew our youth like the eagle’s
Out – May God open doors to do righteous works in his name
Prayer 2 –
8 The Lord is merciful and gracious,
slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.
9 He will not always chide,
nor will he keep his anger forever.
10 He does not deal with us according to our sins,
nor repay us according to our iniquities.
11 For as high as the heavens are above the earth,
so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him;
12 as far as the east is from the west,
so far does he remove our transgressions from us.
13 As a father shows compassion to his children,
so the Lord shows compassion to those who fear him.
14 For he knows our frame;[a]
he remembers that we are dust.
15 As for man, his days are like grass;
he flourishes like a flower of the field;
16 for the wind passes over it, and it is gone,
and its place knows it no more.
Up – Pray the Lord forgive us for our sin and thank the Lord for his slowness to anger and his heart to not deal with us according to our inequities
In – Pray for practical needs of our church family because we are like grass and we need the Lord to sustain us
Out – May the message of the hope of the gospel go forth from our lips and pray for people who we know need hope and
Prayer 3
17 But the steadfast love of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear him,
and his righteousness to children’s children,
18 to those who keep his covenant
and remember to do his commandments.
19 The Lord has established his throne in the heavens,
and his kingdom rules over all.
20 Bless the Lord, O you his angels,
you mighty ones who do his word,
obeying the voice of his word!
21 Bless the Lord, all his hosts,
his ministers, who do his will!
22 Bless the Lord, all his works,
in all places of his dominion.
Bless the Lord, O my soul!
Up – Pray that our lives would be a living sacrifice unto the Lord and he would equip us to live for his glory
In – Pray that we as a church would hear the Lords call for us and that we would obey the voice of his word as we worship and serve together.
Out- Pray for the dominion of Christ to extend over the hearts of the people of our city, to the ends of the earth, pray for our local missions partners and our missionaries
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