Chatting (verb); to converse in a familiar or informal manner.

Before we talk about chatting and prayer let us look at this amazing verse;

Revelation 21:5 says, He [Jesus] will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the former things have passed away.

This is the hope we have inside us, growing on a daily basis. We believe that one day Jesus will return and all will be right with the world.

Daily Prayer

Have you ever noted what you pray for through the day? How many of your prayers relate to ‘fixing’ problems with the war zone we currently live in?

Just this last two weeks alone there have been news items that have broken my heart, Orlando and just yesterday the murder of Jo Cox are just two examples of evil in our world. We witness on a daily basis the world crying out for the releasing of the truth revealed in Revelation 21.

We are called to pray Heaven to Earth and we need to do so. We pray for those hurting and we weep with those that weep at this time. 

In amongst all the madness we see, hear and are touched by, I have been thinking about what happens when Jesus comes back?

NO more!

When Jesus comes and rules and reigns over everything – what will we pray about? There will be no more pain, no more suffering and certainly no hideous display of arrogance that is the current political madness of the EU referrendum.

Senseless tragedies like the Orlando Shootings or the murder of Jo Cox will no longer be, the Prince of Peace will rule over His creation. Peace will reign and of that type of government there will be no end.

Jesus will final shout, NO MORE and his reign will come into being.

Chatting Today

So, what if we starting chatting with Jesus about some of the day to day stuff in our lives more? What if we as part of our daily walk with Him actively set out to talk about certain conversations?

This may feel odd at first, but I would encourage you to give it a go.

I’ve listed a few questions that you might like to use to start chatting with Jesus. See what God has to say about these things and my encouragement to you would be to mix praying for Heaven to invade Earth and these day to day conversations with Jesus. It’s all about relationship – we talk about Christianity being different because it’s not a religion; it’s a relationship, so let’s live like it really is.

Let’s start chatting with Jesus.

Into the regular conversations we have with Jesus, we will move from simply coming to God when something goes bad. We will already be talking with Him, praying through our day. As a result it will become natural for us to talk about the news that comes our way and to pray in light of our deepening relationship with the Prince of Peace.

I’d love to hear you thoughts, so please leave a comment or drop me an email at steve (at) prayerful.info.

I pray you will have an amazing week with Jesus, chatting and listening to one another.

Now, Go have an adventure,

Be blessed,

Steve

1. When was the last time you told Jesus about something you’d love to do? Try it today and see what he says.
2. Talk to Jesus about one of your friends, give three reasons why they are your friends. How does Jesus see them?
3. Make a list of everything you talk to your wife/husband/kids/colleagues/friends about – how many of these conversations could you talk to Jesus about? Try some.
4. Tell him the funniest thing about your day?
5. Tell him about the saddest part of your day?
6. Ask Jesus what He thinks about you?

The post Chatting with Jesus… appeared first on PrayerFuel.

9-5 No more

Those who keep statistics tell us that we are as a people far busier than at any previous time in history. Just recently I went to see an production of the Musical 9-5 based on the 1980’s hit movie set around the same time. Where people worked 9-5, that was it. You clocked in at 9 and you clocked out at 5.

I don’t no many people if any, who just work those golden 9-5 hours. Our working patterns have shifted, the world in which we live is now 24/7 and yet there are eight words in Psalm 46 that we must pay attention to.

Being Still

Through Psalm 46:10 God encourages us to,

“Be still and know that I am God”

If, we choose to believe that the Bible still has relevance in today’s world then we need to take this verse seriously. I believe even in today’s world we can hold to the truth in this verse and find a source of life and hope as a result. The how will involve a bit of planning and a trick or two but I know that the results are worth it.

Be before Do

We know we are all busy, we all have to-do lists, appointments, goals, TV we want to catch up on etc. and most of this is good. But, we are in danger of missing out on part of our deeper calling in life; to be connected to the Living God. We were made for relationship with Him.

We are made in His image.

He cares for Us.

Jesus died for Us.

We are now seated in Heavenly places because of it.

We need to remind ourselves of these truths on a daily basis. These will remind us that we are, as the cliche declares, human beings – not human doings. We need to Be before we ever Do.

The Better thing

As we learn to just Be with God for Him alone, we find rest, we find peace; our very souls are restored. From this position we can do. I believe this is what Jesus points to in the classic Mary/Martha story, of course being busy is important but sitting at the feet of Jesus, learning to quite our mind/soul/heat before Him is the better thing. (Luke 10:38-42)

Time for silence

I know that some will be reading this with either a deep sense of guilt or just a big HOW do I do this? So, let me pick up on both. If you feel guilty that you don’t do this, that somehow you are not a ‘good’ Christian because you don’t have time for Jesus – please take a moment and reject that! Seriously, please do not feel guilty – but do use those stirrings to step into something new and this is how. Schedule some time for Space with God to be silent and let him love you.

A few questions…

Let me, if I may ask you a few questions. What do you do if you put on your calendars/in your diaries a meeting or an appointment? Say for the Dentist? or the car being MOT’d? As a general rule we keep it. Saying Yes to something means we say No to something else. What if we treated our time with God like an actual appointment – in the diary/on the calender – 7am: Time with Jesus (or whatever time works for you and Him)?

Would that work?

It has for me. I am moving to having more reminders in my calender for each day to remind me to be still before God, to connect with Heaven and know that I am loved by my Father.

Try it over this weekend. Set your phone or alarm to remind you to have a period of silence and be still before God. Find a place where you can be silent for a few moments. Invite Holy Spirit into that moment and wait on God. No requests. No words. Just let your heart be still before Him.

A slight issue…

You may find that at this moment your brain does what it was created to do and uses the silence to remind you of the 5,000,000,000,000,000,000 things you need to get done. To combat this, take a pen and some paper with you and list the things that you remember. After you jot down each one centre your thinking on Jesus again. Repeat this process as many times as needed. Let us discipline ourselves to seek His voice. Let us rest in a time of silence.

A.W Tozer sums it up like this:

A closed mouth before God and a silent heart are indispensable for the reception of certain kinds of truth. No man is qualified to speak who has not first listened.

My prayer is that we all learn to listen to the heart of God and from this we can speak truth, life and hope to those around us who so desperately need to hear the voice of Jesus.

Now, Go have an adventure!

Let us know how you get on in the comment section and if you think this has been useful and may be of some use to others please share using the buttons below.

Thank you and be blessed,

Steve

The post Why you need to set a side time for silence… appeared first on PrayerFuel.

Hello fellow Prayer learners,  do you ever feel like you just don’t pray very effectively? We pray…but we just don’t feel like we’ve achieved or covered everything. If so, this is a post for you…and for me.

Problems…I got one…

One of the biggest problems I have found in my adventures in prayer is that there is just SO much that I could pray for. My wife, my children, my family, my neighbours, my church, my job, my colleagues, my friends, my money, my holiday, my….well you get the idea.

Let alone the nation, the government and how often should one pray for the Queen? Or do we leave that for the Anglican’s to pick up on a Sunday?! It has often left me overwhelmed and underprayed. I cover the bases, but to quote Tim Hughes, “There must be more than this”.

Changing Direction

Have you ever felt like that? I know how you feel, I’ve been there and I decided to do something about it. I needed to change my direction from a course of overwhelm-ville and into a place where intercession ran with the river of peace.

It can be, and I believe has some spiritual help from he who shall remain nameless, hard to know what to pray for. If our enemy can keep us in the, “there is just SO much to pray for” then we won’t pray and if we don’t pray God’s will is hindered on Earth. I believe there is a way forward; it involves conversations with Jesus and buckets.

My Solution – Buckets

A bucket, as I’m sure you know, has many uses. But, it’s primary use is to carry something, be it water, stones, sand or just a heap of tools you haven’t put away yet…(you do that as well?!..shame on you)

So, how do buckets help us to pray?

Well, before we get to the solution let us take a quick look at a verse in the New Testament. It’s from Acts 1:8 where Jesus gives His last instructions to His disciples.

Here’s the knowledge you need: you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you. And you will be My witnesses, first here in Jerusalem, then beyond to Judea and Samaria, and finally to the farthest places on earth

Acts 1:8 THE VOICE

This verse has many uses in terms of mission, but I believe it can help us break down the overwhelming task of intercessory prayer. Let’s take a closer look.

Section by Section

The first thing to note for our use today is the three distinct areas that Jesus highlights. Each one is a little further away from the centre and gives us a great framework for our prayer times. If we use these three highlighted areas we get three categories from which we can pray.

1. Jerusalem – was their home, their neighbourhood, their workplace
2. Judea & Sumera – was their local district, their county, their country, their place of government
3. Ends of the world – was their end of the world!

I hope you can see how we can use these to shape our prayer times. We need three ‘buckets’ to fill up with topics, people, places and nations. I would love it for you as you finish this post to grab a pen and paper, write the Titles of the three buckets – NEIGHBOURHOOD – LOCAL AREA – NATIONS, invite Holy Spirit (key to witnessing and key to prayer!) and then ask Jesus to show you who you should put in each area.

Asking Jesus to Fill you Up

Just before you do – please take a moment and read that last sentence again – find out who you should pray for. Prayer is our way of connecting with the Living God. He has plans, assignments and things to show us that are just for us. Our prayer lives need to be moulded by this truth. As I accepted, that I don’t need to pray for everything, just the stuff Jesus highlighted for my buckets a whole burden was lifted and I pray with a new found freedom. 

Creating a Bucket

How you create your buckets is up to you and how you work. Some people I know use Evernote and create digital notebooks for each bucket. They then fill each one up with names, web articles, websites to help them pray. Some go old school and use Paper and a Pen, maybe you journal already and you can set up buckets with sections in your journal.

What I use…

I use a little app called PrayerMate, which you can find in Google’s and Apples App Stores. I load it up with my buckets and who God has asked me to pray for and then it generates a prayer list for the day. So, as part of my ongoing daily prayer, I set aside time to intercede for those God has asked me to. It has been a real answer to my prayers! I am not connected with PrayerMate in any way but just love using it – I love it so much I will be giving away a free web lesson on the app and how you can set it up in this bucket setting to help fuel your prayers.

If you are interested in being a part of this web lesson  please sign up using this link – SIGN UP and we will send you link video on Friday 9th June direct to your inbox. We will not be showing this video on this page or on our social media sites.

This video will only be available to those who sign up before Wednesday 8th June or those who are already Platinum members.

This lesson will teach you how to set up the app – how to use the bucket system with it and then how to develop your own prayer strategy with Jesus. 

I hope you can join us for this free web lesson on how to use this amazing app and buckets. If you are not a technology fan I would still love for you to join us as you will get a taste for how the bucket system works and how you can implement it into your prayer life.

Thanks for reading, please feel free to share this post with someone you know who may also feel overwhelmed with what to pray for.

Now, go have an adventure.

Be blessed,

Steve

p.s. you can SIGN UP for the free web lesson here as well

The post Want to pray more effectively?….you need a bucket or three! appeared first on PrayerFuel.

But, as we approach holiday season and book recommendations start filling Facebook and other media, let me give you a list of ten books that have helped and shaped my prayer life in the past few years.

I hope they help you as much as they have me. If you would like to review one or more books for the whole of the Prayer Fuel community, please drop me an email at steve@prayerfuel.info with a review of the book and how it helped you…we look forward to seeing your reviews and will post a few  on this blog in due course.

Enjoy your weekend.

Now, go have an adventure.

Be blessed,

Steve

1. God on Mute, Pete Greig

A raw and honest book dealing with unanswered prayer when it’s your prayers, your wife that’s ill and your life has been turned upside down. Looking through the lens of Jesus and the journey from Maundy Thursday to Easter Sunday. I cannot recommend this book highly enough. If you only buy one book from this list. Let it be this one.

2. Praying the Bible – The Pathway to Spirituality, Wesley & Stacey Campbell

A great book on the power and importance of praying scripture, it comes with a outline to introduce the main sections of scripture with plenty of examples to get you started. There is also a follow up book with more scriptural prayers.

3. Prayer – Richard Foster

A classic on prayer, an extensive overview of the full breadth of prayer. Reflections on the different styles, proponents and history of many of the Mothers and Fathers of Prayer. Almost a must for every bookshelf!

4. Take Our Moments & Our Days – Anabaptist Prayer Book

I came across this book a bit by random, but it has been a great resource to help build a framework into my days. It follows a simple and yet deep structure each day, working through themes to help fuel your prayers.

5. Seeing is Believing, Greg Boyd

A superb book on how to set your imagination free and use it during your prayer times. Another one that I recommend to people a lot.

6. God of the Possible, Greg Boyd

Not a prayer book or even a book specifically on prayer – but a life changing book in my walk with Jesus. A book that explores how much prayer can change things.

7. Psalms – Passion Translation, Brain Simmons

Much has already been said about the brilliance of the Passion Translation – I believe that the Passion Translation is a great addition to our exploration of God’s word and the Psalms really is the pinnacle of this series. The new exploration of language can add huge amounts to your prayer life. I recommend getting this in Paperback and using it as a prayer devotion that goes with you.

8. Circle Maker, Mark Batterson

I love this book! So many stories. So many quotable pages. So many tips, hints and help about how to persevere in Intercessory Prayer. Get this book!

9. Face to Face with God, Bill Johnson

A bit of a classic already from Bill Johnson, another book exploring how we communicate with God and how when we encounter the Living God Face to Face we will always leave changed.

10. The Cross & The Prodigal, Kenneth E. Bailey

This book is an in-depth look at Luke 15 and the three ‘lost parables’ – the lost sheep, coin and son. It looks at the very heart of the gospel and will leave you in utter worship of what God has done through Jesus!

Final Thoughts…

If you fancy one of these books in physical form, may I encourage you where possible to use your local Christian book retailer. Many will order books for you if they don’t have them in stock.

Also, what are the books that have helped you pray? Leave a comment below..and if you think this list would be helpful for others, please feel free to share it around using the links below.

The post 10 books that have helped my prayer life appeared first on PrayerFuel.

Their answer will probably be along the lines of…use scripture as your basis.

But, how in real practical terms to we actually learn to use scripture to fuel our prayers. Do you just put Father God at the start of a section of scripture and then say Amen at the end?

That can work in some contexts but if you took something like Father God, you said, Let there be light and there was light. Amen (Genesis 1:3 NIV). It sort of works, but just telling God what He has said is not desperately going to help us learn to pray.

Below I will give you my framework for converting a Psalm into a Prayer and lay out why you need to do it. Psalms are often the easiest place to start as by their nature they are songs/prayers designed for individual and corporate use for engaging with God.

But, how do we get a Psalm in our Bibles into a prayer we can use?

Acronym = Psalm Framework

Acronyms are a great way of remembering a framework to remember and use on a regular basis. We remember the Acronym as a short breakdown of a longer system that enables us to pray more thoughtfully, powerfully and effectively. So, with that in mind. I offer you FRIES.

Find – Read – Identify – Edit – Say

Let’s be honest – everyone loves fries and what better to use a well-loved word to help us create a way for turning Psalms into real usable prayers.

1. Find a Psalm – this can be your favourite Psalm or a random Psalm to start off with. You may like to start at Psalm 1 and work your way all the way through to Psalm 150 as a challenge. For this worked example, we are going to use Psalm 15.
2. Read the Psalm – this bit seems a bit obvious, but take your time to read the Psalm through a few times. Maybe repeat a line that catches your attention. Soak in the Psalm
3. Identify the theme and key verses – invite Holy Spirit to highlight the theme and verses that are for you in this moment. You may like to highlight your Bible, print it out, write it out in your journal or use the highlight tools in your app or Kindle.
4. Edit the Psalm – we are not looking to rewrite scripture for our own goals- but creating a new prayer from the inspire word of God. We are creating a fresh prayer for use in our community.When you are at this stage it might be worth noting if you are editing the prayer into a two-part prayer with a call and response theme. This will help you in your creative process.
5. Say the Prayer – again, possibly a bit obvious. But, we need to use our scripture-infused prayer to help us and our communities pray. Be brave and show someone your prayer – even better post it in the comment section below.

Here is my example using Psalm 15:

Psalm 15 as a Prayer

Father God, today we choose to lead blameless lives and do what is right, speaking the truth from sincere hearts. We choose to speak life over our friends and family. 

We choose to live generously, wisely and aware of your presence.

We thank you that as we do in the power of your life-giving Holy Spirit; we will stand firm on the rock that is Jesus and live in your presence.  In Jesus’ mighty name and for His glory we ask. Amen

Final Thoughts

So, there you have it a simple framework for turning any Psalm into a Prayer. As you work your way through the Psalms you will find yourself wrestling with the whole range of human emotion. You will give yourself plenty of prayer fuel to see you through any season of life.

As we learn to turn Psalms into prayers we will also find that as we read or study other portions of scripture, we will find ourselves having conversational prayers with Jesus as a result. We will start praying the Bible and seeing the God of Wonders move mightily as a result.

Let me know how you get on,

Now, go have an adventure.

Be blessed,

Steve

The post How to turn a Psalm into a Prayer in 5 easy steps…and why you need to do it. appeared first on PrayerFuel.

Well, I’m here today to help unpack a collect and how I believe it can help us all form intercessory prayers.

Boldness before the Throne

Do you ever find yourself starting a prayer out loud with a very bold start, knowing where you are about to go and then all of a sudden something changes. Perhaps someone ‘amens’ a bit of your prayer you weren’t expecting or perhaps your tummy rumbles at just the wrong moment. Suddenly your mind goes blank and you start repeating the same phrase wondering if you can get out of this prayer cul-de-sac.

You trip over your words and now the sweats come…help Lord.

Then you remember the off ramp…in Jesus’ name. Amen!

Phew…..made it…just…I don’t think anyone noticed.

Using the Ancient Paths

Now, what I’m about to share won’t eliminate this happening and we will still pray things out loud that make sense in our heads but don’t sound great out loud – like praying for the invisible church.

Which I did famously at one of our small group evenings. I knew what I meant. I was asking God to move through all gatherings of Christians not just Sunday ‘visible’ church moments…but my prayer for the invisible church caused so much confusion and laughter that the prayer time was well and truly concluded.

Learning about collects will not remove the random moments of our brains, but I do believe they give us a brilliant framework to help breathe freshness to our corporate prayer times and will help others learn to pray with you.

Let’s take a collect from the Anglican Prayer Book from the 12th Sunday after Trinity.

Let us pray;

 

A time of silence to be kept

 

God of constant mercy;

who sent your Son to save us:

remind us of your goodness;

increase your grace within us;

that our thankfulness may grow,

through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen

A Framework Examined

The collect can be broken into four parts – with each part reinforcing community and the importance of praying together in unity. Each part is as important as any other.

• The Invitation

It seems quite simple doesn’t it? Let us pray… that’s just something we say isn’t it? But, this is the invitation. This is the starter. This is the moment we engage with Heaven. The collect is about gathering (collecting) the thoughts of the community and praying together as a response to our individual prayers.

Therefore, the invitation is key, let us (the body of Christ) pray. There is a different dynamic when the Bride of Christ prays as one body, a greater sense of God’s presence and wonder. A joint faith. A realisation we are in this together, seeking God together for those around us.

• The Silence

This is the heart of the collect – it is in the silence that we individually pray, we collect our thoughts around the theme of that particular collect. We meditate on the scriptures the Holy Spirit brings to mind; we stay in the present – knowing God loves us.

Silence is so important to our prayer lives and I feel we often underestimate it and its importance. I will be writing on the importance of silence very soon.

• The Collect

The collect is then said as a bringing together or summation of the individual prayers prayer. In the traditional liturgy, the leader will say the prayer as a way of articulating the silent prayers of the church. But, it works equally well when said together as a community of believers.

• The Amen

The community responds with an AMEN – so be it. We have prayed individual and now we agree with this prayer together. The collect is not so much vain repetition but carefully thought out reflection and response. Which actually builds in time for the work of the Holy Spirit and for us to respond as a community, not hinder it.

The Collect Examined

We have looked at the part of the service where the collect would be. Let’s have a look at how they are constructed and this has been incredibly freeing in my own prayer life and I believe it will be in yours.

• Address

This is simply who we are speaking to, in our example, God is addressed as “God of constant mercy”

• An attribute, quality of God or something He has done

This generally is linked in with the theme of the collect, in our example above we read, “who sent your Son to save us: “

• The petition

What we are asking of God. “remind us of your goodness, increase your grace within us”

• The reason or expected result

Why we want that prayer to be answered. “that our thankfulness may grow”

• Conclusion

The Christ centred conclusion, “through Jesus Christ our Lord.”

• Amen

As it says! So be it!

Ancient Paths to New Life

I believe this framework can open up new ways of praying. Especially in encouraging others to pray. I believe they can be important parts of our times of corporate prayer. But, also, I am also finding great use in jotting down my own collect style prayers as part of my prayer time.

They help shape our focus, they help remind us of who God is, they help us think what we are actually asking for and why we want it.

As a result, my times of prayer have become more refined, more fruitful as my mind wanders less.

They also lead to more content-filled prayers – we think a little, speak less but with more purpose and wait on God more. I for one am all for that.

Everyday Prayer

I am also finding that they are helping in the constant prayer as well. As I am staying mindful of Jesus, praying for the people I meet or in the same coffee shop as me, my prayers are fed from my collected thoughts on that subject.

I am praying God’s blessing on them knowing that we serve and follow a God who is rich in mercy and is for us not against us.

My encouragement to you would be to give it a go, write a collect and maybe even share it with your community this week.

You know what is going on in your community – try to put that into a prayer that collects your thoughts and bring it as a corporate offering. To aid you I’ve put together a worksheet for individual or group use, which you can download here – PrayerFuel-CollectWorksheet

Let us end with a collect to use in your week;

Dear Lord God and Father, our creator and sustainer. Grant that we will walk rooted and built up in Christ, that we may live with thanksgiving in our hearts. In the name of Jesus our risen saviour. Amen

Grace and peace,

Now, go have an adventure.

Steve

Please feel free to share this post using the buttons below…

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THE ALARM GOES OFF! Beeeeeeep!

We all have the same feeling don’t we?

Is it really morning? again!? But, I only just fell asleep. It can’t be time to start the day…make it go away.

This is not an advertisement for coffee rather a way to start your day that leads to a more positive, fruitful day.

First thought…

One of the lines in the amazing hymn, “Be thou my vision”, says, “Thou my best Thought, by day or by night” and recently I was thinking about his song and I miss sang it in my head so it became, Thou my first thought, by day and at night and it stopped me right in my tracks. First thought…what if Jesus became our first thought in the day.

We so often wake up to a quick check of the clock/window to see if it really is morning? Then when we face the inevitable, our brains kick into gear and we’re off, greeting the kids, wrestling with the kettle and finding simple tasks like remembering where the fridge is difficult to do. Then while the kettle boils and children are separated, the to-do lists start flying through our minds. Not only the working day; things like I really must sort that shelf in the fridge or make sure the children tidy their Lego away properly (as I stand on another brick in the back room!) fill our minds.

There are also, some staggering statistics flying around that would suggest most of us pick up our phones and check our twitter or Facebook feeds before even speaking to our spouses!

What if there was another way to start the day? 

What if we could make Jesus our first thought by day and by night?

Real life…

You may be thinking, well that is just how life is, mornings are often hard work, how can I possible focus on Jesus first thing? I believe we can train ourselves to think about Jesus and I believe it is the calling of all who follow Jesus.

Think about this for a moment.

Each moment we have is the only moment we have. The rest is history and the future isn’t here yet.

We have this moment and this moment alone, so it is imperative that we learn to harness these moments. What if we made it a priority to make Jesus our first thought of the day?

I would make one suggestion that I believe will help transform your prayer life….put some kind of reminder next to your alarm clock.

It may be a Bible, it may be a post-it note with the word Jesus on it, it may be to set a reminder alarm on your phone as your alarm clock – with a scripture or perhaps a phrase.

When you see it, take a breath and remember your creator.

Remember your Lord and Saviour, Give thanks for a new day and say Good morning Jesus; now the day has started.

Doing this won’t remove the madness that mornings bring; of lost jumpers, school runs, forgotten phones and fridge shelf sorting. But, I guarantee you this – starting with Jesus will never be a bad thing to do.

Have a great week, let us know how you get on or how you make Jesus your first thought in the comment section and Go, have and adventure!

Be blessed,

Steve

Please feel free to share this post with someone today…

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