At Grace Fellowship Church we’ve been praying for something big and we’ve been praying it for quite some time. We want a meeting place of our own. It’s not that there is anything inherently wrong with the school we meet in now, but more that we can foresee how our own building would be beneficial…
It is the Lord’s delight to give us what we ask of Him in prayer. Like David, we should all pray, “O God, hear my prayer; give ear to the words of my mouth” (Psalm 54:2). If Christians did not believe in the efficacy of prayer, there would be no reason for us to ask…
I went looking this morning for a prayer for Mother’s Day. I guess the Puritans didn’t celebrate Mother’s Day (wasn’t Hallmark around back then?) but I did find this prayer for the family in The Valley of Vision. It is called simply “Family.” O SOVEREIGN LORD,Thou art the Creator-Father of all men, for thou hast…
Last Saturday I shared a prayer for the Lord’s Day Eve. Like that one, today’s prayer is also drawn from that collection of Puritan prayers The Valley of Vision. This prayer is meant for the Lord’s Day and is a perfect way to begin Sunday looking to the Lord of that day. O Lord, My…
In the tradition I grew up in, Saturday was considered a prelude to Sunday. It was a day of preparation for the Lord’s Day to come. I recently read a biography of theologian John Murray and enjoyed reading about how he understood the day in the same way (which makes good sense since he was…
This book is deja vu times two (or three). It took some doing, but here is how I understand the history of this book. In 2000, Crossway published When You Pray: Making the Lord’s Prayer Your Own and then, in 2002 they published a hardcover abridgment of this book and titled it The Prayer of…
As George Whitefield sailed from his native England to Georgia where he was to be a missionary, he ministered to those on board the ship. Here is an excerpt from his journal where he discusses a ministry encounter with a particularly willful child: Had a good instance of the benefit of breaking children’s wills betimes.…
I was going to post this review on the weekend, but then John Piper messed everything up. He posted an article at the Desiring God web site that fit very well with it, so I thought I’d link to his article and then post the review. This is, without a doubt, one of the best…
Thank you. Just over a week ago I asked that you would pray for me. I asked that God would allow me opportunity both to work (and thus make money to support my family) and to find time to finish up my book in what is going to be a very busy six to eight…
This is probably another one of those articles that discusses something everyone else already knows and has already thought about, but for which I am a bit late to the party. I’m not necessarily the sharpest knife in the drawer and sometimes you need to give me a little extra time to figure these things…
Prayer Answered: R. Albert Mohler Jr., president of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, was moved out of intensive care and into a private room at Baptist Hospital East this afternoon and continues to improve following complications from abdominal surgery that was performed Dec. 28. Russell D. Moore, dean of the School of Theology and senior…
This was just posted on Dr. Mohler’s blog: Dr. Mohler’s health has sustained a setback. Over the past 36 hours Dr. Mohler has suffered from unrelenting pain. This unusual degree of pain signaled concern for the attending physicians and prompted additional tests this afternoon. In the past hour these tests have revealed that Dr. Mohler…
Last night our church gathered, divided into small groups, and went door-to-door in the neighborhood surrounding the school in which we meet. We went caroling and delivering copies of a book and an invitation to our Christmas Eve service to each of the homes in the immediate area. On the whole our efforts were well-received.…
When I was a child my parents explained to me how important it is to make time every day for reading the Bible and praying. Wanting to please them, and knowing it was the right thing to do, I began to have a brief period of devotions each day before bed. I do not remember…
“As a husband, I know it is my responsibility to pray for my wife. Often, though, I do not know the words to use, and I end up feeling that my prayers for her could be more effective. From marriage counseling and pastoral experience, I have met many men who share the same concern. The…
Having just read a book about prayer, and having sought recently to increase the presence of prayer in my life, I turned a few days ago to the topic of persistence in prayer. I soon found something I had written about this in the past and thought I would share it with you today, hoping…
I don’t envy the man who writes a book on prayer, for I can’t think of too many topics that have been written about more extensively than this. There are many spiritual classics dealing with the topic and surely an author must wonder if anything he writes can contribute to the discussion. New to the…
Not too long ago I began to pray that God would teach me to pray. A bit of an odd request, is it not? Obviously I already knew something about prayer if I was praying about it in the first place, but my concern was that despite my prayer habits, which are sometimes good and…
Not too long ago I began to pray that God would teach me to pray. A bit of an odd request, is it not? Obviously I already knew something about prayer if I was praying about it in the first place, but my concern was that despite my prayer habits, which are sometimes good and…
When you pray, petitioning God for something, do you really expect results? Do you pray as one who is already defeated, expecting before you even pray that God will not grant your prayer? Or do you pray with confidence that God hears and answers prayer? Acts 12 contains a wonderful story that shows how even…