Prayer is ALWAYS necessary for the fruitful Christian life. How can we claim that ‘whatsoever we do in word or deed, we do all in the name of the the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him’ if we don’t even seek His council in prayer (Col 3:17)?
Prayer does say ‘when I can’t, God can.’
The greatest periods of growth in the Church have come during times of the heaviest persecution, and when we feel most content, our dependence upon God seems to us to be less.
Jesus didn’t say:
‘Blessed are the happy in spirit’
‘Blessed are they that rejoice’
‘Blessed are the mighty and proud’
‘Blessed are the satisfied’
(Mt 5:3-6)
Affliction drives us to prayer and our cries to God bring blessing to accomplish His will.
The video seems to make of prayer an instrumental value rather than a relationship with God.
Bill Bright, founder of Campus Crusade for Christ, used to answer his critics who said he put too much emphasis on evangelism and not enough on worship: if Christians were evangelizing, then worship would naturally arise, because they would praise to God for folks coming to Christ, plea to God for the salvation of friends and contacts, and spend time deep in God’s word in order to answer sincere questions of unbelievers.
I found what Bright said to be true in my experience evangelizing.
Nonetheless, I think that God calls us into a relationship with Him before He calls us into service for Him.
I think God calls us into a relationship with Him first and foremost, before service. And prayer is the vehicle for this relationship.
As for worship: Our worship is lit on fire by the truth of the gospel. I love how Paul just breaks out into worship/doxology in the middle of a bunch of doctrine (ex: Rom 11:33-36). We should do the same!!!
As for evangelism: Ditto. It’s lit on fire by our coming to terms with the gospel, in our own lives. We don’t need evangelism training & techniques, we just need to encounter the truth of the gospel. Then we won’t be able to help ourselves from ‘speaking about what we’ve seen and heard.’
In both cases, if we find ourselves lacking in zeal for worship or evangelism, the solution is not to try harder. The solution is to root ourselves more deeply in our relationship with Christ–through prayer, through Bible study–until we can remind ourselves of our identity and our glorious gospel.
Dan Masshardt
Prayer is ALWAYS necessary for the fruitful Christian life. How can we claim that ‘whatsoever we do in word or deed, we do all in the name of the the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him’ if we don’t even seek His council in prayer (Col 3:17)?
Prayer does say ‘when I can’t, God can.’
The greatest periods of growth in the Church have come during times of the heaviest persecution, and when we feel most content, our dependence upon God seems to us to be less.
Jesus didn’t say:
‘Blessed are the happy in spirit’
‘Blessed are they that rejoice’
‘Blessed are the mighty and proud’
‘Blessed are the satisfied’
(Mt 5:3-6)
Affliction drives us to prayer and our cries to God bring blessing to accomplish His will.
-Heb 11:1-3
The video seems to make of prayer an instrumental value rather than a relationship with God.
Bill Bright, founder of Campus Crusade for Christ, used to answer his critics who said he put too much emphasis on evangelism and not enough on worship: if Christians were evangelizing, then worship would naturally arise, because they would praise to God for folks coming to Christ, plea to God for the salvation of friends and contacts, and spend time deep in God’s word in order to answer sincere questions of unbelievers.
I found what Bright said to be true in my experience evangelizing.
Nonetheless, I think that God calls us into a relationship with Him before He calls us into service for Him.
I just wanted to say I agree with my dad!
I think God calls us into a relationship with Him first and foremost, before service. And prayer is the vehicle for this relationship.
As for worship: Our worship is lit on fire by the truth of the gospel. I love how Paul just breaks out into worship/doxology in the middle of a bunch of doctrine (ex: Rom 11:33-36). We should do the same!!!
As for evangelism: Ditto. It’s lit on fire by our coming to terms with the gospel, in our own lives. We don’t need evangelism training & techniques, we just need to encounter the truth of the gospel. Then we won’t be able to help ourselves from ‘speaking about what we’ve seen and heard.’
In both cases, if we find ourselves lacking in zeal for worship or evangelism, the solution is not to try harder. The solution is to root ourselves more deeply in our relationship with Christ–through prayer, through Bible study–until we can remind ourselves of our identity and our glorious gospel.