Loving God with all my Mind

Found this prayer on Paul Tripp's blog.  If you haven't, you really should get acquainted with his writing.  He has a seriously unique and God-given gift of making theology completely, 100% practical. Here's just a taste of that:

 

I know I should watch my meditation.
It is important to guard my thoughts.
It is a battle to not be taken captive.
It's hard to think after you.
There are so many things that compete
for my thoughts,
so many things that call after my desires.
It really is war, fought in the neighborhoods
of my mind.
"If only" commands too much of
my meditation.
"I wish" controls too much of
my thoughts.
"I need" fights for
control.
It is so easy in the midst
of it all to forget
the one thing I was created
to remember:
You.
I now confess
it is so easy to lose sight of
Your presence
Your power
Your kingdom
Your glory
Your plan
Your grace.
In my right mind I know that
forgetting is the
first step in losing
my way.
So, I humbly ask once again,
O, Spirit of wisdom and grace,
please empower me to
meditate on You,
please enable me to fight
distraction.
Please deliver me from the
one thing I cannot escape:
my fickle heart.
So that everything
I do would bear the mark of
remembering You.

Earnest Prayer for the Persecuted

 Yesterday I came across this verse in Acts 12:5

...So Peter was kept in prison, but earnest prayer

was made to God by the church....

How often do you think of other followers of Christ all over the world who are being daily tortured, beaten, murdered for the sake of the gospel?

Now, how often are you praying for them? 

I know that the answer for me is: little to never. And I'm ashamed of that.  Someday I am going to stand in the presence of these brothers and sisters, hearing their stories of how much they endured for the sake of Jesus Christ while I sat in the comfort and ease of America, neglecting to earnestly pray for them.

So, where do we begin?  What do we pray for?

Our first thought is to pray for the persecution to stop.  But, that's not what they want us to pray.

A few years ago, I had the privilege to be at a gathering of church leaders from all over the Middle East, Central Asia and North Africa--all home to some of the most persecuted believers in the world.  You would never know just by looking at their faces the torment and pain and fear that they face on a daily basis.  Without fail, each got up and asked for prayer for those they knew that were imprisoned or were facing death sentences. They asked for boldness and continued opportunities to share about Jesus.  What they never asked for was that the persecution would stop.  In fact, a man from Iran got up and said, "I know you'll be tempted to pray that we would be freed from persecution.  But, please do not pray for that.  Pray that persecution would continue, but that we would remain faithful in the midst of it and that God would use our suffering to advance the gospel."

What a stark contrast that is to our natural inclination to comfort and avoidance of anything even slightly painful. We have much to learn from their faith and perseverance.

Let us not neglect our brothers and sisters all over the world who, even now, are facing pain--even death--on account of Christ.  They need our earnest, consistent, bold prayers.  We serve the same God, no matter how great of a distance separates us. 

"...Keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints, and also for me, that words may be given to me in opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains, that I may declare it boldly, as I ought to speak..." {Philippians 6.18-21}

*Voice of the Martyr's is a great tool to get started praying for persecuted brothers and sisters.  They have an e-newsletter you can sign up for and send out daily tweets about the persecuted Church.