Archive for October 2020

I was talking to a friend who was discouraged about a difficult family matter that was impacting her young daughter in a very negative way. I had watched my friend get more and more overwhelmed by the anxiety and stress to the point that I could see her own health was being jeopardized. I was reminded that when God brought the Israelites out from their oppressive captivity in Babylon that He promised they would “go out in joy and be led forth in peace” (Isaiah 55:12). So I encouraged her that if we’re going to come out of dark places like she was in, if we’re going to stand under the trials of life, we have to come out with joy and walk in peace. We have to use joy to deliver us from anxious thoughts, defeat, and discouragement. Joy is the key, and it’s inside us.

Humanity, as the image of God, is stamped from the beginning for beautiful community. That is, we’re marked out for a God-glorifying life of unity in diversity. This is where God is taking humanity. We’re fractured and divided, but he’s going to knit the human race together under the lordship of Jesus Christ. And the church is called to pursue beautiful community in the here and now as a witness to the world of the Holy Spirit’s reconciling power. Experiencing community means experiencing a sense of belonging, of welcome and embrace, a sense of being at home. It’s the exact opposite of feeling you’d rather be someplace else. Since beautiful community is a matter of the Spirit and can’t be engineered, there’s a cost to becoming the kind of people who welcome and embrace fellow image-bearers across lines of difference.

Most children are introduced to prayer through prayers offered before meals and before bed, but when trials strike, those traditional prayers fall short of helping our kids through life’s most difficult days. Is there a prayer to pray when your best friend moves away? How do you approach God when you lose the big game? How do you face God the day after you get caught cheating on a test?  What can help our kids connect with God through a more severe trial like when a family member is hospitalized or when a beloved grandparent passes into glory? The Psalms provide Spirit-inspired examples of petition, confession, declaration, and lament for our kids and us to learn and follow. Turning to these prayers in times of trouble move our focus away from our weakness and onto God’s strength.

I confess I have a prayer problem—sometimes my own prayers bore me. So boring that my mind completely wanders away from God. At times, I’ve even fallen asleep while praying! Over the years, I’ve noticed that I tend to pray the exact same phrases over and over in a kind of empty way. My prayers can be dull and repetitive. My mind and heart drift, and I feel like I’m just going through the motions instead of communicating with the Living God. This doesn’t exactly fit my image of a vibrant prayer life!