PROMPTED TO PRAY

Prompted to Pray

I constantly remember you in my prayers.

2 Timothy 1:3

READ 1 TIMOTHY 2:1–8

“Several years ago I was prompted to pray for you often, and I wonder why.”

That text message from an old friend came with a photo of a note she’d kept in her Bible: “Pray for James. Cover mind, thoughts, words.” Beside my name she’d recorded three separate years.

I looked at the years and caught my breath. I wrote back and asked what month she began to pray. She responded, “Sometime around July.”

That was the month I was preparing to leave home for extended study abroad. I would be facing an unfamiliar culture and language and have my faith challenged like never before. As I looked at the note, I realized I’d received the precious gift of generous prayer.

My friend’s kindness reminded me of another “prompting” to pray, Paul’s instruction to his young missionary friend Timothy: “I urge, then, first of all, that petitions, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for all people” (1 Timothy 2:1). The phrase “first of all” indicates highest priority. Our prayers matter, Paul explains, because God “wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth” about Jesus (v. 4).

God moves through faithful prayer in countless ways to encourage others and draw them near to Himself. We may not know someone’s circumstances when they come to mind, but God does. And He’ll help that person as we pray!

By James Banks

REFLECT & PRAY

Loving God, please help me to pray often and to make a lasting difference in others’ lives through my intercession for them. To learn more about prayer, checkout Spiritual Life Basics.

Who comes to mind that needs your prayers in this new year? How can you remind yourself to pray for them often?

SCRIPTURE INSIGHT

One of the ways we pray for all people is by praying for authorities (1 Timothy 2:1-2). Such praying contributes to “all people” being able to “live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness” under leaders who take their responsibilities seriously. Notice the two pairs of ideas Paul is presenting as the goal of these prayers. The first pair, “peaceful and quiet,” refers to a dual focus of calm. Vincent’s Word Studies tells us that “peaceful” speaks of a lack of outward disturbance and “quiet” refers to “tranquility arising from within.” The second pair of ideas, “godliness and holiness,” speak to how we live out our faith.

 “Godliness” refers to a life that flows out of a right belief in God, while “holiness” speaks of respectful behavior. To pray for “all those in authority” (v. 2) would have been difficult for Timothy, given the political upheaval and generally anti-Christian sentiment in the Roman Empire at that time. Bill Crowder

DAILY PRAYERS & BLESSINGS

DECEMBER 31

“O Lord, bless our life stages, for they read like growth rings on a might tree:  our beginnings and firsts with their excitement, newness, and anxiety; our middles, full of diligence and commitment and, yes, we confess, sometimes boredom, but also risk and derring-do; our “nexts,” the harvests and reapings; the slowing down and freedom.  In your hands this time can be rich and full like an overflowing cup, not a last or a final or an empty or an ending stage at all.  You are an Alpha and Omega God, the parentheses between which we live, move, and have our being.  Bless our comings and goings.” 

In Jesus’s name.  Amen.

LOOK BOTH WAYS

GREAT IS THY FAITHFULNESS

365 DEVOTIONS FROM OUR DAILY BREAD

LOOK BOTH WAYS

READ:  Joshua 1:1-9

Moses My servant is dead.  Now therefore, arise.  Joshua 1:2

During our church’s annual New Year’s Eve Communion service, we say this prayer together:  “Father, we surrender this past year and give it up to you.  We give you our failures, our regrets, and our disappointments, for we have no more use for them.  Make us now a new people, forgetting what lies behind and pressing on toward that which lies ahead of us.

“”We give you all our hopes and dreams for the future.  Purify them by your Spirit so that our wills shall truly reflect your will for us.

“As we stand on the threshold of another year, encourage us by our successes of the past, challenge us by the power of your Word, and guide us by the presence of your Holy Spirit.”

In every transition, it’s good to look both ways.  When Joshua assumed leadership of Israel, God told him to consider the past and the future:  “Moses My servant is dead.  Now therefore, arise, go over this Jordan, you and all this people, to the land which I am giving to them” (Joshua 1:2).  Then He promise, “As I was with Moses, so I will be with you…Do not be afraid, nor be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go” (vv.5, 9).

With confidence in God, we can look back and look ahead, then walk boldly into a new year.   DCM

Forgive us, Lord, for failures past,

Then help us start anew

With strength and courage to obey 

And closely follow You.  -Sper

The victories of the past give courage for the future.  

BEAUTIFUL FRUIT

Beautiful Fruit

The seed is the word of God.

Luke 8:11

READ LUKE 8:4–8, 11–15

“Kids should be able to throw a seed anywhere they want [in the garden] and see what pops up,” suggests Rebecca Lemos-Otero, founder of City Blossoms. While this is not a model for careful gardening, it reflects the reality that each seed has the potential to burst forth with life. Since 2004, City Blossoms has created gardens for schools and neighborhoods in low-income areas. The kids are learning about nutrition and gaining job skills through gardening. Rebecca says, “Having a lively green space in an urban area . . . creates a way for kids to be outside doing something productive and beautiful.”

Jesus told a story about the scattering of seed that had the potential of producing “a hundred times more than was sown” (Luke 8:8). That seed was God’s good news planted on “good soil,” which He explained is “honest, good-hearted people who hear God’s word, cling to it, and patiently produce a huge harvest” (v. 15 nlt).

The only way we can be fruitful, Jesus said, is to stay connected to Him (John 15:4). As we’re taught by Christ and cling to Him, the Spirit produces in us His fruit of “love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control” (Galatians 5:22-23). He uses the fruit He produces in us to touch the lives of others, who are then changed and grow fruit from their own lives. This makes for a beautiful life.

By Anne Cetas

REFLECT & PRAY

I want a beautiful life, Father. Please produce Your fruit in me that I might live a life that points others to You.

How are you staying connected to Jesus? What fruit do you want Him to produce in you?

SCRIPTURE INSIGHT

When Christ’s disciples asked Him to interpret the story of the sower (Luke 8:9-10), He first quoted from the prophet Isaiah to explain why He spoke to the crowds in parables (Isaiah 6:1-10). As in the days of Isaiah, Israel still wasn’t ready to recognize the kind of good news they needed. While looking for political relief and material prosperity, they couldn’t imagine a rescue and kingdom found in the mercy and love of a rejected Messiah—and in a harvest of peace, joy, and goodwill that would grow in and by His Spirit. Mart DeHaan

DAILY PRAYERS & BLESSINGS

DECEMBER 30

For all the gods of the nations are idols:

but the Lord made the heavens.

Psalm 96:5

“Lord, as I clean out closets and make lists for the New Year, show me any “gods” I have placed before you.  Help me to look honestly at how I spend my time and my money.  Does one of these areas of investment reveal a strong allegiance to something other than you?  If so, Lord, help me eradicate those distractions from my life once and for all.”  In Jesus’s name.  Amen.

OUR CHANGING WORLD

GREAT IS THY FAITHFULNESS

365 DEVOTIONS FROM OUR DAILY BREAD

OUR CHANGING WORLD

READ:  Psalm 102:25-27

I am the Lord, I do not change.  Malachi 3:6

Change is one thing we can be sure of in this life.  Our relationships change as we move to new places, experience illness, and ultimately face death.  Even the cells in our bodies are always in the process of change.  When cells wear out, most are replaced by new ones.  This is especially noticeable with our skin-we shed and regrow outer skin cells about every twenty-seven days.

Yes, change is the one certainty in our world.  Henry Lyte’s melancholy line in his hymn “Abide with Me” is true:  “Change and decay in all around I see.”  But the hymn immediately adds, “O Thou who changes not, abide with me!”

By faith in Jesus Christ we can have a relationship with the unchanging God, who says of himself in Malachi 3:6, “I am the Lord, I do not change.”  We can depend on God to be the same forever, as the psalmist says (Psalm 102:27).  Hebrews 13:8 adds this reassuring testimony:  “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.”  He is our firm foundation, who can give us confidence and security in this changing world.

We creatures, caught up in the swirling tide of time, can rest our souls on the everlasting arms, which will never let us go.  VCG

Swift to its close ebbs out life’s little day,

Earth’s joys grow dim, its glories pass away;

Change and decay in all around I see-

O Thou who changes not, abide with me! -Lyte

To face life’s changes, look to the unchanging God.

A DESIGNED DEFICIENCY

A Designed Deficiency

You did not look to the One who made it, or have regard for the One who planned it long ago.

Isaiah 22:11

READ ISAIAH 22:8–11

There’s a natural spring that rises on the east side of the city of Jerusalem. In ancient times it was the city’s only water supply and was located outside the walls. Thus it was the point of Jerusalem’s greatest vulnerability. The exposed spring meant that the city, otherwise impenetrable, could be forced to surrender if an attacker were to divert or dam the spring.

King Hezekiah addressed this weakness by driving a tunnel through 1,750 feet of solid rock from the spring into the city where it flowed into the “Lower Pool” (see 2 Kings 20:20; 2 Chronicles 32:2-4). But in all of this, Hezekiah “did not look to the One who made it, or have regard for the One who planned it long ago” (Isaiah 22:11). Planned what?

God Himself “planned” the city of Jerusalem in such a way that its water supply was unprotected. The spring outside the wall was a constant reminder that the inhabitants of the city must depend solely on Him for their salvation.

Can it be that our deficiencies exist for our good? Indeed, the apostle Paul said that he would “boast” in his limitations, because it was through weakness that the beauty and power of Jesus was seen in him (2 Corinthians 12:9-10). Can we then regard each limitation as a gift that reveals God as our strength?

By David H. Roper

REFLECT & PRAY

God, I’m weak. I pray that others would see that You are my strength.

What are your deficiencies? How are they helping you gain trust in God?

SCRIPTURE INSIGHT

During the reign of King Hezekiah (728-686 bc), the Southern Kingdom of Judah faced a significant military threat from the Assyrians, who’d already destroyed the Northern Kingdom of Israel (722 bc). To prepare Judah to fight the Assyrians, Hezekiah adopted the defensive strategy of denying the invading army access to their water supply (2 Chronicles 32:1-8). He “blocked all the springs and the stream that flowed through the land” (v. 4) and at the same time dug tunnels to bring water into the city to ensure they’d have sufficient water to last them through a prolonged siege (2 Kings 20:20). He also fortified the wall defenses that protected the city and the water supply and made large numbers of weapons and shields (2 Chronicles 32:5). K. T. Sim