Finding God's Peace Through Prayer

TRANSCRIPT

I kind of really love the way that the way the, the prayer is just, it's, it's conversational. It's, it's just life. It's as it's happening, it's very natural. And sometimes we've projected over the years as church leaders, it's, it's kind of very religious and then you go to pray the right way on the right things.

But scriptures even tell us that God knows what we're gonna pray even before we pray it. So therefore there's a, there's a deeper. Relational thing that's going on and a deeper relational connection. And, uh, Nick kicked it off with this whole thing about prayer, just being conversational, but I wanna say it, it's can't be just conversational, actually has to be spirit led as well.

'cause I, I've discovered over the years of pastoring that, uh, we pretty much. Do not understand ourselves, have no idea what's going on in ourselves, and we have no idea what's going on in others. And so we start to then pray not really understanding what is going on underneath the surface. So I think really to really engage in prayer, I think it should be a spirit led initiative.

The Holy Spirit should be speaking to us about the things that we should be praying about. So the challenge for it is, hello there, how are you? Hello there. Oh, so cute. Um. Don't worry about editing that out. Um, where was I? The Holy Spirit is just working with us always. Our, our challenge is the fact that we grow up in a broken world.

It says we, we arrive in this world, we're born in sin. We are born into a sin broken world. And then what happens is we are raised by broken parents that have no concept either, and they're just doing the best that they can. And then you get damaged and you get hurt, and then there's all these different layers.

Of confusion that end up piling up upon us and 'cause we don't know who we are and we don't know what God is about and doing how much he really loves us. So I think that's really a bit of a challenge. So I'm hoping that out of today, you'll make the decision that, um, you'll just lead a spirit led spirit empowered prayer life.

You'll allow him to initiate rather than you. And I'll explain why as we're going along when you. Lead and you praying in line with the spirit, something happens that would, that uh, Lucy just said over there. Suddenly there is this peace that comes that is just supernatural. I shouldn't have peace in the midst of this disastrous thing that's going on, but suddenly it's there.

And that's how you know you're being prompted to pray in line with the Holy Spirit. So this, this whole series just about making space, making space for God, we started make space to set a Jesus Jesus' feat so that he can speak to you out of the teachings of Jesus and the apostles so you can apply it to your life so you can form to the image of Christ.

But it happens in a conversation. And I'm gonna suggest not a conversation based in intellect, but a conversation coming out of the spirit. Jesus made a very, very important statement in John chapter 15. Now, John was one of Jesus' followers, very close. It was a bit annoying for the other ones, 'cause apparently John was the favorite, but he was just quoting some of the things that Jesus said, and this is what he wrote down.

Jesus said, I am the vine and you are the ranchers. He was trying to say, I am the giver of life. You are the recipient of it. And then he goes on, if you remain in me and I in you. So there, it's very intimate. It's a connected relationship. It's a one relationship. You will bear much fruit. Now I get this 'cause I, I get to, uh, see some of the different leaders.

Uh, and like Lindsay, she does retro, she does line dancing. And that if, when she does something, there's no fruit, there's no growth, there's nothing taking place. This frustrates her because it's, it helps her. See, I, I'm. For some reason, I'm not making the right connection with God. 'cause if I'm connected to the vine on this issue, this should be growing because fruit comes.

But here's the kicker at the end, apart from me, you can do everybody say that. Nothing. How much can you do apart from Christ? Nothing. Nothing, nothing. Nothing. Which means even when it comes to prayer, prayer can be nothing. It can be nothing. Or it can be everything. But if you do it out of your own mind, your own intellect not connected to the vine, it's the best part of nothing.

So this is really important about being spirit led. Now, I asked our youth to do something, a couple of the girls, Mary and Ika, and I said, I want you to come up with a way of helping us understand that layers. We've got all these layers that are stopping us from seeing who we are and who God is and what his message is to us.

So they came up with this great idea of past the parcel, and so they've wrapped. Something really precious inside. And they've got about 18 layers, I think, or something like that, maybe 19, I'm not sure. And so she's gonna pass the parcel and you can have three in here and four can open in here, and four and four and then three over there.

And then we'll see what's in the center. So, um. You just go ahead and do that whenever you like. You pick whoever you want to and then we'll have a look at the end. But as you're unwrapping, these are the things that they've, they've written on that they think are the things that's hindering from their perspective, their connection with God.

So I dunno about you, but I continually never. Really know what to pray about or how to pray in a given situation. And we all have these questions and we all have these decisions in every stage of our life. Like I can remember growing up as a kid, the decisions I had to make, like who would I be friends with?

That was a big decision and that's, it's a weighty decision. 'cause if you get it wrong, you can get on the wrong side of the bully in the school. And I got on the wrong side of the bully in the school. His name was Rodney Benichi. And he was a big guy and he used to, he used to beat me up, take my lunch money and sit on me.

That was, it was huge. But it all started with one day, I, I didn't know what to do. I didn't know where to look. So I'm coming in and I'm thinking he's over there. I just, I, I'll, I'll smile. I'll be nice to him. So I'm carrying my little lunchbox, you know, I'm, and I'm coming in and I'm just kind of smiling like, like you do when you, you dunno what to do.

And, uh, he goes, Hey, you come here. And I go, yeah, come here. He goes. Why are you laughing at my face? I'm gonna change yours. Oh, well that didn't work. So I went back home and I thought, what's my next strategy gonna be? How I'm gonna do this thing? Okay, I'm not gonna look at him. I'm just gonna look at him.

I'm head down, take him my little lunchbox, and I go. And then he goes, Hey, you come here. And I go, oh. And I go across, said, don't you love the look on my face? I'm gonna change yours. And that was how it went. But he said, these are decisions you gotta figure out as a kid. All these decisions, all these things.

Like who am I gonna be friends with? 'cause you get in the wrong place, it's gonna be bad. And, and then it goes on to like, why are mom and dad fighting all the time? Why do people not like me? And then you gotta be a use. And it's, what's wrong with me? Why don't I fit anywhere in the world I. Why can't I stop doing things that I know drive mom and dad crazy?

Am I just trying to hurt them as much as they're hurting me? I don't know what's going on. All this stuff. And then maybe in the middle of it, mom and dad divorce, and somehow you figure it's all your fault. It's all your fault. And then you're angry and you don't know how to process that. And what should I, should I get a job?

And there's no point in getting a job. The whole world's gonna burn up in climate change. There's no point. Well, there are other opinions out there other than a few select scientists that have different opinions, and God has a different opinion again. And he says, nothing's ending until he says it's ending.

So you can relax a bit on that, but then you become a young adult and then you gotta think about careers and you want to get a career that you love to do, but everyone's telling you No, you gotta do the one that pays the most money. You make your decision based on money. So now you get great money, but you're miserable all the time.

That's terrible. It's okay to be poor and miserable, but rich and miserable. That's just pathetic. You know, like, but it's, it's where you end up and you're kinda like going, I dunno, and then I gotta pick a partner for life. How do you pick a partner for life? I've got no idea what to do. Should I even bother with marriage?

Most of 'em are falling over. I dunno. And then you get married. And you realize everything you thought you knew, understood about relationships is wrong. You don't understand anything until you get in close quarters with a person like that and you realize, I don't even know who you are, and you've got all this pressure.

And then kids come along and you start to panic because you dunno what the heck to do with these things. There's no manual. And then they start displaying character traits of your poor choices. And that's even more freaky. And then you've got poor people that go, I'm man, I man, I thought by now I'd be married and they're trying to process and I'm still single.

And then you've got ones that are single and, and they want to be married and they're not married. And then you've got married people that figure out, I don't know if I wanna stay married, I should get unmarried. I dunno, can you do that? And it's going more and more. And then the kids grow up and eventually they leave home.

Yes. They leave home. You've made it. You've successfully, sorry, little bit longer. Yeah, bro. Little bit longer.

About about 10, Andy. And they leave home. And then you look at your wife and you go, who the hell are you? Why do we even get married? I mean, this is ridiculous. And then you decide to go away from them because you think, you know, the grass is greener on the other side, but then you get full because the grass is greener where you water it, not on the other side.

So therefore, then the whole thing blows out and then one day you get to a little bit older around about, I dunno, Phil's age. Hey,

and you're filled, you end up filled with sadness and you end up filled with regret. When you realize your life is the sum total of all the poor decisions that you made, and never once did you consult your creator about how he created you and what you are on the planet for, and it's like, whoa. So I love what they're sharing because you're learning to keep God in every part of the journey, and he cares about every part of it.

And the reason we get in this mess and we get all these layers is because we make our decisions based in the heat of the moment. This thing that I want right here, right now. And we never take time to say, Lord, is this a good thing for me? Is this a bad thing for me? Because you are looking at right here in this moment, becauses looking at the whole picture and can see how that decision is gonna affect the whole thing.

It's amazing. And then we get all these layers and then God uses the Holy Spirit to help us peel these layers back to try and get to what is the truth about who we are and who God is. I remember going to my, I. 10 year, uh, school reunion. And there was a guy called Christopher and he had a mate. And those, these two guys, they were like the golden, you know, the golden kids of school, you know, everything they did just turned to gold.

It was just like, it was perfect everywhere, but they kept very quiet to themselves, never spoke. They just very happy. So we get to the 10 year reunion and he gets up and does a little bit of a talk and he says, oh, I've got like five houses and I'm running three businesses and I'm driving here. Ferrari and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

And then at the very, very end of it, he goes, and, uh, by the way, I'm a Christian. I said, what? I said, I'm a Christian. And I took him aside afterwards. I said, man, why didn't you share that with any of us at the start? And he, oh, I didn't think you would be interested. I said, mate, I've just been to hell over the last 10 years and I nearly didn't make it back.

I said, we, I'd been interested to know why you were so blessed. And I was so miserable. But he didn't share his faith publicly. It was, oh, it's a, oh, it's a private thing. It's not a private thing. We all need help. But this is what's the, the these, these things cause the layers. When you make all the wrong decisions, then you gotta write your way, make your way back, and now only the Holy Spirit can do that.

I love what John wrote when he said, I wrote to you dear children, because you know the father. He's referring to us. You know, the father's an intimate connection with the father. He says, I write to you fathers because you know him is from the beginning. So there's a maturity in the fathers that should be there, can then can lead the young ones to know how to have intimacy with God.

Then he goes, I write to you young men and young women, because you are strong. You are strong, and the word of God lives in you. How does the word of God live in you? You make space to sit at Jesus' feet. To do your soap devotions, to let the Holy Spirit speak to you about what you've gotta apply to be conformed to the image of Christ.

And then it says, and you overcome the evil one, work it back. So how do you overcome the evil one? The word of God has to live in you, has to be living in you. How do you get the word of God living with you? Are you where you gotta be? An intimate relationship with the father? Intimate relationship. God has a lot to say about this topic of being spirit led and including him in everything.

Now, think about this. Jesus had to pray himself and be led by the Holy Spirit and in order to accomplishes God's plan and purpose for him on the earth. If Jesus had to be led by the Holy Spirit to accomplish his plan and purposes, what chance have you and I got of accomplishing it on our own? I. Zip, doodah, zip.

We need the Holy Spirit to teach us how we are created so we can see our purpose, why we are here, what God wants to do through us. What this is about is remaining tapped into that vine. He's the vine, he's the life giver. We are the branches. We're the recipients, but we have to stay intimately connected.

Have a look at the scripture outta the book of Jeremiah. Now I know it's in the old covenant, but not everything in the old covenant is not to be applied. Some of it actually can be applied. You just gotta make sure that it is applied in Jesus' new covenant. And this one is particularly interesting. You, you'll be able to see how this is working.

So before I formed you in the womb, just a question. Anybody here get into this world other than through a womb? I'm just asking, you know, just in case there's something that I've missed. So this is relevant. This comes across the ho, the both covenants. So, but he says, before I formed you in the womb, I knew you.

Now think about that you had a relationship with God spiritually before you were clothed in flesh and made it into this world that changes everything. So you don't need to be afraid of making a new relationship with God. You already had it before you came into this world, and it got all marked up and covered with all sorts of layers.

But it goes on and says, but Jeremiah, I set you apart and appointed you as a prophet to the nations. So think about this before he's here, God knew him, his clothed in flesh. He comes in, but he comes in with a purpose. There's something for him to accomplish. It's the same for us. Before you got here, you have got rule in the DNA that God has put into you for you to accomplish his plan on purpose for you.

It's all there. He put it in at the beginning. It's just unfortunately coming into this world, things got really marked up and as I said, everyone's broken. So therefore you get these layers that are going on. Now we know God's will for us is to be holy as he's holy. His call for us is to be conformed to the image of Christ and then go and make disciples.

I can even make that simpler for you. Love God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength, and outta that place of health. Love your neighbor and help them love God with all their heart, mind, soul, and strength so they can love their neighbor. And there you've got the great commission and it's moving out and it just keeps going like that.

It's not hard. So let's just talk a little bit. Why don't we pray? Why don't we pray allowing the Holy Spirit to actually prompt that? Well, um, before I came down here, they, they rang me and said, would you come down? I'd had been in clinical depression and my wife knew that I wasn't in a good place, and I said, no, I'm not coming.

And they said, no, I want you to go there. I said, no, I'm not coming. I said, I'm not interested in the church. I don't think it's, I think it's a waste of time. That was, that was how bad I was, and I said, I'm not coming. And anyway, after a little while, Anne said to me, I think, I think we should pray about it.

What a good wife. What a good wife. To which I said, I'm not even praying about it. She goes, why wouldn't you pray about it? I said, because if I pray about it, he's gonna make me go and I don't want to go. I want to sit here in my self pity a little bit longer and just wallow, allow me that in my depression.

So eventually we prayed. And of course

some would say that's a blessing to you. Others would say it's the opposite, but that's how it is. I think we don't pray because when we come to pray, we're using our head and we already know what we want. And so I'm not gonna ask him in case he says something that I don't want to hear. And then what happens is then you basically don't listen to him.

So now you settle for what I call a lesser life. And a lesser life makes decisions based out of your head, and when the decision goes wrong, you get another layer of dysfunction that stops you from being able to actually hear God. It is just part of how it works. When we come into this world, we come in through sin.

It's there, it's the bro. The whole thing's broken, and then our parents don't mean to do it, but because they don't have a great relationship with Christ, most of us don't have what Simon and Katie have got and the, and the Arnold Brown family. It's just five generations of Christ followers. That's amazing.

Most of us don't have that. Some of us are first, maybe second, but there's a lot of dysfunction and we gotta work through it now, even if you can get this down and you peel it down and you actually get the layers off and you get back down to the treasure, here's the deal. You'll have to fight to keep it.

You'll have to fight to keep it because people believe it or not, have other plans for you. They actually have other plans for you that they would like you to do. And the like way that you would behave. Uh, Jesus encountered this. He knew his purpose. He knew what he was coming into this world for. And he sat with his guys and he said, and it's getting close to him, going to the cross and he said, here's the deal guys.

This is what's gonna happen. I have to go and the chief priests and the teachers of the law and the elders, they're gonna kill me and I'm on the third day. I'll be raised to life. Now, of course, Peter never heard any of the second little bit, he never heard the raise to life. He's just heard the first part.

And so, listen, Peter takes Jesus aside and begins to rebuke him. Now that's got, that's some brass cahoon right there, taking the son of God aside and like rebuking him. Uh, he, so he does that, but this is what he says. He goes, never Lord, never Lord, this shall never happen to you. Human concern. Hmm. Jesus turned him.

And this is nice and said this, get behind me, Satan. How would you like that said about you in front of your mates? I'm one of the 12 disciples. Oh, I'm Peter, the the rock on. Who's this gonna build? Yeah. Yeah. Get behind me, Satan. Well, that didn't go so well. That's how fast you can go. You can go bat into the wrong team and the right team.

You can happen that fast. You are a stumbling block. Why am I a stumbling block? Jesus. 'cause you do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns. Human concerns. Listen to it. Human concerns derail. It's coming. There it is. It's coming. Watch my finger.

Oh, we don't have that slide. How about that? I should have watched up there. Okay, so what I did have written there, isn't there? No, no. It's another one. I actually had one that said Human concern derails God's ultimate plan and purpose. I'll put it out this week. Human concern, that is what deros it. That is what causes the layers of dysfunction.

That's what causes us to end up settling for a lesser life, and we allow people to put on us the things that they want us to do, not necessarily what God has actually created us and called us to do. It's why Jesus spent enormous amount of times in prayer. He had to spend praying because he had to stay in that place where he fulfilled the father's will and not the will of all the people that are around him.

And that's difficult. It's difficult when you have to stand up in that space. I can remember with my dad, he always wanted me to take on the brick lane business that he'd, he'd set up and anyway, got to the point where he was grooming me to take that and do that, and I had to say. Dad, I can't do this. This is, this is not what I'm on this planet to do.

And it was uncomfortable and it was not nice. And he did not respond particularly well until many years later that this is kind of what it's about. You've gotta stay faithful to the, to the promises of God and his plan and purpose for your life. So here's the danger for this stuff with human concern.

The more you make in this world, the more successful you are in this world. The more it's gonna require discipline for you to stay focused on the plan and purpose of God for you. I'll say it again. The more success you have in this world, the more you're gonna have to be disciplined to stay focused on making sure you are achieving God's will for your life.

Yeah, otherwise you'll live out of this human concern everywhere and then you'll make decisions based in that moment and you'll miss and mark up the whole thing. This. So you gotta be really careful of it. And you don't wanna settle for a lesser life. Don't wanna settle for a lesser life. I mean, there's a scary scripture in Corinthians Paul talking to the Corinthian church when he, he's basically saying to them, you know, you gotta be very careful how you build.

'cause see when Jesus returns. It says he's gonna sort out the kingdom with the angels. They're gonna sort out the kingdom. Who's in and who's out. The ones that are out, they're going to a great white throne judgment. It says, now if you happen to see a great white throne and you pass through this world, you're in real trouble.

'cause that's not, that's not our like, oh, well, let's see how you're going. No, that's just a declaration. You rejected Christ. But those of us that do get get in, we have to go to the judgment seat of Christ and at the judgment seat of Christ, our life is reviewed and our works are reviewed to see did what we do was what God wanted us to do.

Did we build what God wants us to build or we've got our own thing? And then in these Corinthians it says this, when the day comes, it will bring it to light. It'll be re revealed with fire. The fire will test the quality of each person's work. If what is built survives, the builder will see a reward. If it is burned up, he will suffer loss, yet still be saved only as one escaping through the flames.

So. You may still make it into heaven, but if you are not careful and you settle for a lesser life, you might be standing back watching the sum total of what you thought was so important in your life. Go up in flames and that is not gonna be a pleasant, but you'll still be joyful 'cause you're in heaven.

But you'll be going, oh my gosh, I missed it. I missed it. God was trying to, always trying to nudge me and trying to do stuff, and I just kept missing it. So we have to stay instead with the Holy Spirit. He is the only one that knows the whole plan for you. He is the one that is working things out, so you've gotta stay for him.

Tapped to the vine, there's is chapter one, more scripture in Romans. It's in chapter eight, it. He's talking to the church in Rome. This is what he says about the spirit. He says The Spirit helps us in our weaknesses. We do not know what we ought to pray. I. Well, I've been there a lot of times, but the spirit himself intercedes through wordless groans within us.

He searches our hearts and our minds, uh, and the mind searches our hearts and the mind of the spirit because the spirit intercedes for God's people in accordance with what the will of God

the spirit. It is prompting you to pray, which is to lead you in the direction. He's trying to outwork the will of God for you, and that's where you've gotta make sure that you lead from the heart, from the spirit, not from your head. The battle is between your head, which is really good and does all this kinda stuff and can work out all sorts of things, but that may not necessarily be part of God's will for you.

I remember a guy that built a huge church. I won't mention his name 'cause everyone know him, huge church. And one day he said to me, he said I, he said that scripture in Corinthians terrifies me. He said, I built this massive thing, but I'm not sure that's actually what I was supposed to do. He said, I don't think this is what I'm supposed to do.

And then he started to pour out of his heart the thing that he was supposed to do. And he said, I just. I just think I missed it completely. And I thought, wow, that's interesting. So you can do a bunch of good things that look like good things for God and it still not be part of your his plan for you. So it's, it's amazing.

So this is, this is the rest, the rest of, I made a big mistake in this. I had a business advisory group and, uh, I lost two or three of the guys because I, I didn't really give enough clarity on the start about what. Their role was, and the fact is, I wanted them there. I wanted their best brains, their best minds, the best of everything.

Uh, so I could gather as much information, but then I always, once the information comes in from all directions, it goes back at the foot of the cross and I wait to see where the Holy Spirit leads. Sometimes it will line up with. Our best thinking and sometimes it goes the other direction. And I forgot to put that caveat in.

So when I didn't go that direction and it looked like the Holy Spirit was going somewhere that didn't make sense. Uh, it, a few of the guys ended up a bit outta sorts and eventually leaving. So I do have to start the business advisory group up again shortly. But that's gonna be the caveat right there.

Our best thinking we want, I want it all, but the end, it has to go. It has to go down and has to, for God to pick it up because we are only looking at whatever that particular project is that we are trying to figure out. Whereas God's looking at the whole thing and he knows what happens here, how it affects this.

So sometimes it has to go a different direction. And my verse for that, of course, is in the old Covenant, oh man, I'm in real trouble today. Asiah chapter 55 for my thoughts are not your thoughts neither. Um, your ways, my ways declares the Lord. Keep going. As the heavens are higher than the earth, so my ways are higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.

So. I'm gonna get these guys together. I say, I want your best, everything that we can to think this thing through. We put it there, and then the elders say, okay, is this Lord, is this the right way? And if not, then Lord, if there's a different way, we'll go your way. Because we want the whole picture. We wanna achieve the whole thing that's on your heart, not just this particular moment.

So we gotta understand it. Our heart must be propelled along by the Holy Spirit, even in this area of prayer. Those of you that are opening the parcels, I dunno what the girls have written on those kind of things as the, the bits and pieces, but you're getting to see some of the things that they think are the are, are the obstacles.

So Holy Spirit helps us. How to pray teaches us, he's our guide. But here's the main thing about prayer is this. When you are praying, you are praying for the aligning of our heart to God's will. This is what it's all about. This is not my will, but your will be done. We are praying to say, Lord, whatever this situation is, I need to know what your heart is on this.

What decision do I need to make that's actually gonna keep me on the track of fulfilling your will for my life? I don't wanna get to the end of my life and go, gee, I built a wonderful thing, but none of it was what you wanted me to do. 'cause there's nothing in it Then for him. He's only interested in what actually builds kingdom.

So you never wanna settle for a lesser life. Don't do it. Just don't do it. Don't do it. And particularly in if, in relationships, if you can try and remember this, when you are praying for someone, don't pray what you think they need because that's manipulation. You pray, God, what is your will for them. Mm Lord, I just ask that you would speak to them, you would bring discernment to them, you would reveal to them so you've got their best interest at heart, not what you want.

And it's the same for ourselves. We automatically, we look at everything that's going on and we pray what we think we need right now, and then it all goes south. Now. It's a very good example of, of the difference between the head prayer and the heart prayer. And it's from a, a movie, I dunno, some of you might have seen, it's a pretty old movie now called Bruce Almighty.

I got a photo of Bruce on my I here. So, so here, here's, lemme give the backstory. Has anyone not seen Bruce Almighty? Oh, there's a few of you haven't. Okay. So Bruce is a self-obsessed, classical narcissist, cares about nobody by himself, and wants his own way on everything. He's destroyed relationship with his girl.

Grace. Uh, God's been trying to get his attention, uh, and trying to do, do some numbers on him. Uh, Morgan's playing the part of God in this, uh, anyway, he. He finally surrenders to God. Uh, but he surrenders, kneeling down on a road on the middle of a highway, and he gets hit by a truck. And so he's just arrived in the sea and he goes, am I dead?

And Morgan says, well, you can't kneel down in the middle of a highway and live to talk about it. Bruce, you know, like, uh. So then, and then he pulls out these, now these are his little PREA beads that he threw away in one of his big tantrums in the movie. He threw it out in the room and he's just, he's abusing God and he's going, the only person around here that's not doing a job is you, and he's really, he's losing it.

So anyway, God's brought it back and says to Bruce, I want you to pray. And Bruce is looking at this thing. He goes, so I want you to pray, son, pray. And this is, this is Bruce's first prayer. Lord, feed the hungry, bring peace to all mankind. And he looks at God and God goes, well, that's great if you want to be Miss America.

And he says to him, what do you really care about? And it's a really poignant scene where this, the, the cinematographer is brilliant on catching the expressions. And he goes very brisco's, kind of very reflective. And he said, grace, grace. And God says to him, so you want her back? And it goes quiet again.

And it's so well shot. And he says this and it catches God by surprise. He goes, no, I don't want it back. I want her to be happy no matter what that means for the first time, he's actually praying something inspired by God that cares about someone else and not a selfish prayer, and he goes, I want her to find someone who will treat her with all the love she deserve from me.

He's acknowledging his failures in the space, and there's no guy in, it's just genuinely pouring at his heart. And he goes, I want her to meet someone who will see her always as I do now through your eyes. Head prayer wants to be like Miss America,

spirit led prayer is sacrificial. It wants the best for the other person and even the best for ourselves. And Morgan is playing. God goes now. Now that's a prayer. And he goes, yeah, that is. And he goes, that's good. Good bird

prayer inspired by the Holy Spirit. That's what makes the difference because it's, it's us acknowledging, Lord, I don't want my will for me and I don't want their will for them, but I want your will for them. 'cause that's how they step into their internal purpose. I'm gonna go a little bit later, but, but I do want Anita to come up because Anita's been traveling with someone and, and she's been, had a difficult kind of journey, but she wrote some things to Anita about prayer and so maybe you could just share that.

She said I could read the testimony, so sorry to be looking down and reading, but if you just wanna close your eyes and listen to her story, it's pretty, um, powerful. So, uh. When before I spoke last week, I messaged a few people and asked for their relationship with prayer and what that looked like, and this is what she wrote.

Uh, below is a reflection of the change I felt in seeking the Lord, reflecting on the role of prayer in our life and viewing prayer as a part of relationship with him rather than a duty or a chore. Discussions I have with God have always been regular and frequent. I have always been someone who prays and talks to God as I'm an overthinker and love my words.

Journaling to God allows me to process and hear him, but at times it felt like I would reach out to God as a duty or an act of obedience to ensure I was connecting with him each day. Sort of like doing my bit as a Christian as we are told to prayer at times in the past could feel like I was trying to get.

Something or do the right thing? Not always, but more regularly than not During a season when my whole world fell apart, I was hit with a change and began wrestling with God to understand why things happened. Initially, I thought if I prayed enough, it would fix my pain and it would be taken away. I believe that God would make things right and fix my world in a physical sense.

Little did I know that he wanted relationship with me and to shift my heart, God cares more about our character than what we are doing. Slowly, God shifted my heart and taught me patience through visions and people. He showed me the power of sitting in his presence in prayer. He told me to wait and sit.

He sent people to pray with me. He sent people from far away to give me things I needed. They were complete strangers. The Lord sought me. Everything in my life had changed and the only thing I had left the same was him. I began to crumble and the only place I felt any sense of peace or hope was during prayer.

Prayer became my safety. I would just open my phone and write my thoughts to God with tears down my face. Dear God, I need you more than ever. Were often the words my prayers would start with. I would say scriptures over and over and just pray that God was with me and would con and I could continue to breathe and trust in him.

God, why do you allow pain? I wrestled with him. The wrestling turned to praise and speaking life and scripture over my heart. It became my lifeline. A close Christian colleague would pray and speak in tongues with me. Each time I became hysterical with anxiety, prayer, and hymns would be the only way that I could calm.

The only moments I was okay was during prayer. Prayer filled more than half my day as my physical world felt unbearable. It was a season of learning to depend on God. God showed me in this season that prayer is our connection. Prayer is a time that God can enter our heart and shift our mindset and life.

It's a time that we can connect on a deeper level with the Holy Spirit and tap into that strength. This season showed me that the power of God's spirit and what Jesus did for us, we really fight spiritual realms and he did overcome the world. Prayer is a time that God can share his love for us. It's a time God shows us his visions and his plans for us, and a time when we can rebuke the darkness and speak life.

If we miss out on this time and skip it, we begin to. Think we write our own lives and we lose that connection. He's waiting to commune with us. God writes our plans and God's thoughts are higher than ours. God wants our devotion and relationship in prayer because he loves us so much. He doesn't want us to come to him with an attitude or a chore.

He's our lifeline in times of need, but also joy and peace in times of happiness. And he yearns for us to mature and seek him in all the seasons. I look back on the six months of isolation with God. I used to cry out why God? And now I sit and know that he has taught me to depend only on him and show me the true power of prayer in my relationship with him.

The power of prayer is remarkable. His spirit leads and overcomes anything in this world, and I've seen it firsthand. I encourage you to come to God authentically with an open heart and consistently he can handle your wrestling. Each prayer and tear. In those six months that I cried, God has perfectly picked and healed me with those.

I see his goodness all around, even in the pain, he has turned what the enemy meant for evil, for good. Prayer truly is more than an act or a duty of obedience. It's a, it's a connection to the maker of the universe. It's a lifeline to peace, uh, a piece that nothing in this world can give us. Mm-hmm.

Sometimes you don't know Jesus is all you need till Jesus is all you got. Yeah. And sometimes we have to get to that space. But this is, this is all about that. Peeling back. Peeling back of all the things that you've believed or all the things that you've trusted in. Now there was an, it was an interesting point that, that came outta that and that was about the gift of tongues.

I don't have to time to go into that, uh, other than to say if you're reading, there are actually three outworkings of the gift of tongues. One is the one at Pentecost, which is when they spoke known languages and people heard them speaking the languages. So they didn't, that, that was a supernatural thing where they spoke a language they never learned.

There was that one. Then there's a one that's called, um, it, it's really the same as prophecy. When someone declares something like thus sayeth the Lord, sometimes you get a prophetic, a word that'll come in tongues. But if that happens, then you've gotta pause and you've gotta wait until there is an interpretation.

And that with the interpretation is equivalent of prophecy. The third one is, the one that Anita was talking about then, is that when you do not want know what to pray, the gift of tongues within. So you learn how to pray in this heavenly language. That's the one for, for everybody who wants it. I mean, you know, I, I think everyone should, Paul said, I wish everybody spoke in tongues.

But the fact that he said, I wish everybody did means that not everyone did. But he doesn't beat anybody up about it. He said, I just wish you did. 'cause he obviously felt like there was a dynamic in the relationship between us and the Holy Spirit, that that gift really, really does help him. So that's the one that's for our personal private prayer language.

Um, like Paul, Paul says, I speak in tongues more than you all. I would speak in tongues more than you all. Because of the fact is that as a leader, and when you're leading a a, a church, you, you cannot let human concern be dictating what's going on. So therefore, I have to spend a lot of time praying in the spirit that's called praying in the spirit.

So what I'll do is I get Anita that we did a series on this, Anita, maybe you can put a link in with the, goes out during the week so the people can have a look at it. So it's about a spirit led conversation, guys. It's about making space, making space to sit at Jesus' feet. Because sometimes people when, when they hear this, sometimes people say, well, what about if I get it wrong?

What about if I come up with something completely wacko? And I do hear some completely wacko kind of things at times. And I said, well, the thing that creates your safety is where we started. If you sit regularly at Jesus' feet. Reading the scriptures through. So allowing the Holy Spirit to speak to you, they become the guardrails.

So if something comes to you and it's kind of outside everything, the way that Jesus thinks and does things, dismiss it, toss it out. It's not right 'cause God will never contradict his worth. So that's, that's the safety guardrails alongside it. So you make space, make space for the conversation. Let it be a spirit led conversation.

'cause we don't really know what to pray for ourselves. We don't really know. We're only praying for what we think with our intellect in this small season of life. We don't know the big picture, so I'm hoping that you'll just see this more and more and just realize it's just about aligning our hearts, our hearts with God's will for our life.

And God's will for the life of the others that are in our world. That's what we're trying to do because he's got the big picture. He knows the beginning from the end. It says he even knows the hes on your head. Now, some for others, some of us, that's a declining number, you know, but he knows that kinda level of intimacy and he invites us to just get involved.

So who's got the um, who's got the gift? What's it say inside the gift of all the. I haven't even seen this yet. So

what, to the girls

at the end of all that dysfunction, this is the message at the bottom. He is always here, and I always have been, and I'll never leave you and I will never forsake you

underneath. Underneath the layers. That's the core. He's saying to you right now, I'm here. I'm here. I always have been through every season. All you had to do was just acknowledge, just invite me into the conversation. And your younger ones. If you learn this quicker, you may not have some of the layers.

That we've had to plow through because we just didn't know and didn't understand. It can be way different for you guys and I'm so excited for our, our little ones. 'cause I see these little ones now and I'm watching them grow and their relationship with God is so natural and it's so, it's so powerful and it's, it's like they're not encumbered by all this stuff that we were encumbered by.

So maybe. Maybe an old dog. Can you learn new tricks? What do you reckon, Dave? Old dogs learn new tricks. I think they can learn new tricks. They can if they wanna learn new tricks. Let's pray together. Father, I just thank you for this series. It's only, it's very simple and it's, but it's very poignant because it's getting to the basics of us trusting you and learning to walk with you, to be, to be engaged in the spirit, to be tapped into the vines so that your life force is flowing through us to help us understand every.

Every season of our life and how all those seasons go together and you are leading us and you're guiding us, and the Holy Spirit is prompting us for your will across all the seasons. Lord, would you just take us and enable us to just sit in this and make us great witnesses for you Everywhere that we go, we should look different.

We should have a different spirit about us. We should have a different heart. Everything should just feel different. And when we step into a room, it should be like light piercing, darkness. There's a Holy Spirit. Would you continue to lead us, lead us in this, and help us realize it's just our hearts being aligned to your will for our life and our friends.