I don’t really make New Year resolutions, but I certainly take time during the year to reassess where I am and where God wants me to be. The beginning of a new year is a great time to look at how God wants to grow you in the days ahead.
One of the things I have resolved to do is to pray for life change. All we have to do is look around to see the tremendous needs in our world. Though we are at the most prosperous point in history, we are poor and needy.
Would you resolve with me to pray for life change? Another way to describe this is to pray for repentance and revival.
I intend to pray for revival, that the wind of God’s Spirit would blow over our land bringing repentance and a desire to hear from God.
What would revival look like? Obviously, we would see people saved in larger numbers than before. We would see people who have not had any interest in God open to understanding and obeying Him.
But revival would do more for God’s people than for those who are lost without God. In the revival in Wales more than 100 years ago, people’s behaviors changed. Taverns closed and police officers had nothing to do because of the change in behavior. My favorite story had to do with the mules in the mines. They refused to work because they didn’t understand the miner’s commands without profane language.
I intend to pray for life change in the people around me, that God would touch their hearts and lives.
But more than anything else, I intend to pray for life change for me. I want to please God in all I do. I want the words of my mouth and the thoughts of my mind to be pleasing to Him (Psalm 19:14).
When we change, God will use us to help others change as well. Real revival will begin with God’s people who are attentive to His word and open to His direction.
May God bless us this year with life change.
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4 Responses
That’s a great story about the mules. Was it from a book? It reminds me of a time when I was a young chap when I was being taught how to plow a mule by my cousin who was a little older than me. He was all hooked up and had the reins and was ready but the mule would not pull. He began using profanity and screaming at the mule so loud that Granny Pearl (his grandmother and actually a great aunt to me) came from the house to see what was wrong.She told my cousin to calm down and just talk quietly to the mule. His response was “Granny, that mule hasn’t heard thunder in thirty years”. Same could be so for us in that we shut God out and won’t listen. Thanks pastor.
May we assess the spirit we possess in Light of God’s Gifts to each of us and our “Portion of Faith.” May we seek to place words in the context they belong for the purpose they are intended to serve. May we see the Heart of others with God’s Eyes.
Blessings
Dear Waylon,
Thank you so much for “Praying For Change”, and for “When we change, God will use us to help others change as well.” in particular. I was reminded of a recent insight of my own from Nehemiah 1:1, “The words of Nehemiah…..”. Like Nehemiah, my words (which begin as thoughts) should be so steeped in God’s Word that they will be THE words others need to hear. Thanks for your commitment to prayer for change in all our lives.
Thank you. It’s good to hear from you and I especially appreciate your reading my thoughts.