Prayer is powerful but it doesn't always come easy.  Sometimes the patience required of us in prayer can be difficult to achieve.  We know God loves us and we believe in His presence in our lives, yet we struggle with our faith at times and can easily become discouraged. 

Here is an excerpt from our book, "Strength For The Weary, Finding Grace in Times of Trial" that can lift our spirits and encourage us to take another look at our prayers, and at ourselves ...

"It's important to continually evaluate our prayer intentions to see if they are God-centered.  We are called to pray with faith. It's not easy to keep a positive attitude all the time but our general mindset should be one of believing that things will get better and God will make a way.  We must have hope in order to activate faith. 

We should be less concerned with defining exactly what the answer to our prayer will look like, and more concerned with believing that whatever the answer is will be the right one.  Let's give God room to surprise us, and find our peace in knowing He will make the best situation work out for us.  As long as it comes from God, we will have the right answer."

I hope this excerpt brings hope and leads us to ask some reflective questions today such as  ...

Am I praying with faith or just with words?  Am I truly seeking God's perfect plan for my life, or maybe some quick and easier version?  Am I honest with God in prayer, admitting my discouragement and allowing His healing love to enter into my heart?  Am I growing in my relationship with God? Whatever your question is, The Lord is listening.  He really does hear you.  He has heard every prayer you've ever said.  He hasn't forgotten. 

Let's turn to Him in prayer now, even for just a moment, and present ourselves to God.  Let's cast our cares upon Him, for He cares for us (1 Peter 5:7).  Let's come to Christ just as we are, trusting in His infinite wisdom, and confident in His unfailing and unconditional love for us.

God knows our hearts.  He truly does know what is best for us and for everyone in our lives.  He knows how to answer our prayers.  He is the answer to our prayers. 

May He Bless you and everyone near and dear to you in a new way, today!

"God knows everything in our life that has led us here.  He knows every scrape and cut.  He knows every wound and want. He knows every anxious thought and painful memory.  He knows every tear that has fallen from our eyes, and He knows we think He could have prevented them. 

We sometimes put on a pretty face when we come to prayer time, when truthfully we are angry or disappointed with God.  We say we are  ready to turn our hearts over to the Lord and surrender our lives to Him, when really, we don't completely trust Him. 

This might be tough to admit, especially for Christians with great faith. But we're human beings, with weaknesses and limitations, and it's pride to think our spiritual life is perfect.  We are always in need of greater faith, trust and confidence in God. 

Since we have feelings and experiences that aren't always pleasant we shouldn't try to hide this from God in prayer. As we develop the practice of silent prayer in our lives we will grow in faith and learn to trust God more and more.  It will become easier as we let our guard down and allow God to love the real us, unpleasant feelings and all. We don't have to wear our false image on our sleeve in prayer.  God knows how we really feel. We are here to be healed, not to be perfect."

(This is an excerpt from our latest book, "Silent Prayer: Be Still and Know That I Am God" which can be found on our Amazon page).

May God Bless you, and everyone near and dear to you, In Jesus' name.

The New Heaven and the New Earth:

“Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth.  The former heaven and the former earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.  I also saw the holy city, a new Jerusalem, coming down out of Heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.  I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, ‘Behold, God’s dwelling is with the human race.  He will dwell with them and they will be His people, and God Himself will always be with them, as their God.  He will wipe every tear from their eyes and there shall be no more death or mourning, wailing or pain, for the  old order has passed away.’

The One who sat on the throne said, ‘Behold, I make all things new.’  Then He said, ‘Write these words down, for they are trustworthy and true.’  He said to me, ‘They are accomplished.  I Am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end.  To the thirsty I will give a gift from the spring of life-giving water.  The victor will inherit these gifts, and I shall be His God, and He will be My Son’”  (Rev 21:1-7).

New Life awaits us, now.  Even in this very moment, we can turn our lives over to Jesus Christ, The Son of God, and receive the graces He won for us on The Cross.  We can renew and restore our relationship with Him, by allowing His Spirit to breathe new life into us.  Let’s open our hearts today to The One who loves us, to The One who heals us, to The One who forgives us and makes all things new!

God is with His people.  He has never abandoned us, and He never will!  Happy Easter!

“Worthy is The Lamb that was slain to receive power and riches, wisdom and strength, honor and glory and blessing” (Rev 5:12). 

Our Lord’s passion and death was prophesied in Isaiah 53, "God’s Suffering Servant."  Today, on Good Friday, our Lord walks this walk.  Let’s walk it with Him, as we read the scripture passage in its entirety ...

“Who has believed our message, and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?  He grew up before Him like a tender shoot, and like a root out of dry ground. He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to Him, nothing in His appearance that we should desire Him.  He was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering, and familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces, He was despised, and we held Him in low esteem. 

Surely He took up our pain and bore our suffering, yet we considered Him punished by God, stricken by Him, and afflicted.  But He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities. The punishment that brought us peace was on Him, and by His wounds we are healed.

We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way, and The Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all. 

He was oppressed and afflicted, yet He did not open his mouth.  He was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before its shearers is silent, so He did not open his mouth. By oppression and judgment He was taken away. Yet who of His generation protested?

For He was cut off from the land of the living, for the transgression of my people He was punished. 

He was assigned a grave with the wicked and with the rich in His death, though He had done no violence, nor was any deceit in His mouth. 

Yet it was The Lord’s Will to crush Him and cause Him to suffer, and though The Lord makes His life an offering for sin, He will see his offspring and prolong his days, and The Will of the Lord will prosper in His hand.  After He has suffered, He will see the light of life and be satisfied.

By His knowledge my righteous servant will justify many, and He will bear their iniquities. Therefore I will give Him a portion among the great, and He will divide the spoils with the strong, because He poured out His life unto death, and was numbered with the transgressors.

For He bore the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors"  (Isaiah 53).

This Scripture predicts the manner by which we shall all be saved, through the suffering of The Son of God.  This is not the way we would expect God to come to us, as one of us, born into this world, taking His Divine nature and uniting it fully to our human nature.  But He did. 

God became man in the person of Jesus Christ, who took upon Himself the sins of the world.  Because of the actions of Adam and Eve, who disobeyed God's command, sin and death entered the world. Mankind rejected the paradise God created for us, and now lives in a sinful nature, in a sinful world.  With sin comes suffering.  We were unable to right this wrong.  So God sent His Son to make up for our sinfulness.  Jesus came to conquer sin and death by taking our sins upon Himself.  He bore the punishment that really belongs to each one of us.  He made up for what humanity lacked, and through Christ, all who believe in Him can receive the grace He won for us on The Cross, the gift of eternal life.  Why did He do this?  Because He Loves us.  God is Love, and God Loves what He has created.  He loves each one of us - to death.  And if you were the only person on earth, He would have done it all the same .. just for you. 

Jesus died so that we may live, forever in Heaven. We need a Savior.  We needed a Savior then, and we need a Savior now.  Sin is still a choice to us, in fact it's everywhere, but through Christ we can reject that choice, reject sin and choose Heaven through the Cross of Christ, by receiving Jesus into our lives.  

Today our personal relationship with God can grow significantly if we open our hearts and reflect on what He did for each of us.  Let's pray and ask God for the grace to understand this better, and to become more loving, even in our own sufferings. 

With gratitude for the life of Christ, as we meditate on His suffering and death, lets remind ourselves that He did it "for me."  He didn't just do this for someone else.  He did it for you. We can truthfully say "He bore my sins, my weaknesses, my guilt, my punishment .. so that I don't have too."  We receive the benefit of His death when we accept Him as the center of our life. Let's finally let go of our old way of living, and start living for Christ, in a New Way, Today.