Home>
Ministries>
The Pastor Nathaniel's Blog>
The Pastor's Blog Archives>
Pastor's Blog Archives. 2020>
Pastor's Blog October 1, 2020
"The Privilege of Prayer V"
{Scroll over scripture reference to read the scripture or reference.
We finally come to the end of Ellen's chapter on prayer in "Steps to Christ," which means we come to her final three principles on a life of "prevailing prayer" (66; 1977 edition). Ellen has listed ten prayer principles so far, and her last three are probably the most surprising - primarily because most Christians tend to consider these principles as more conducive to a church service than to a believer's prayer life.
The eleventh principle for a life of prevailing prayer is to "think of God as often as we have evidence of His care for us" and to "keep Him ever in our thoughts" and "delight to talk of Him and to praise Him" (71). This sounds like quite a tall order, but really Ellen is describing the practice of "contemplating" God - basically, thinking about him and being thankful for having him in our lives. We think often of friends, goals, and personal interests, and they tend to rank high on our scales of importance; if this is true of temporal things, how much more must this be true of heavenly things (71)! Only as we see God as our Friend and Lover, will we want to spend time thinking about him and loving him more than those other things that are important to us (71-72).
Twelfth, "we need to praise God more" (72). It's completely appropriate to ask God to meet our needs; given the goodness, kindness, and love of God in always blessing us, however, it is just as important to praise and thank him for the goodness, kindness, and love that is shown to us (72).
Finally, it is vitally important for each of us to make our whole life one that worships God (72). Such worship doesn't consist only in corporate worship with other believers in a church service, but also includes serving and obeying God with rejoicing and cheerfulness, living lives of service to others, sharing with others the beauty and joy of the redemption and relationship we have with God and each other, thinking much about Jesus and his cross and the glories of the salvation we have through his death and resurrection, and endeavoring to unite our worship with that of the angels through singing and music (72-73). Worship, too, is an act of prayer AND service, and it is a benefit to us to pray to God by worshiping and obeying him.
Friends, a life of prevailing prayer is one of God's special gifts to you.
(*) Steps to Christ, Chapter 11— The Privilege of Prayer, 1977 edition
God Bless.
Pastor Nathaniel Gamble
