Purposeful Prayer & More

For most of my life here in the West, I’ve been surrounded by peace, not persecution. And I never really thought too much about what it might look like to suffer for my faith. One day, a number of months ago, as I thought about my own spiritual weaknesses, I started praying that God would prepare me...

Can you imagine what would happen if there was continual humbling of heart and supplication for the out-pouring of the Holy Spirit 24 hours a day for a whole month? During the month of December there will be 48 half hour sessions of earnest prayer 24 hours a day for the whole month!

As a nurse with many years of experience, I have sat at the bedside of dying patients. More than once, I was in the presence of families of faith who hoped that something miraculous would happen for their loved ones. They prayed. They waited. They couldn’t see that hidden from their perception Jesus was working out something deeper, richer, and more miraculous than they could imagine.

To my surprise, despite the appearance and reality of all the weeds, I was able to harvest a huge garbage bag full of various beautiful vegetables! It was so much more than I had expected. I just had to look past the weeds. When I brought everything inside and began cooking dinner, emotion overtook me as God spoke to my heart and reminded...

“Praying Hyde” had such an all-consuming burden for the salvation of souls that he would not stop praying until God brought another soul, and then another, to the truth. At one time, he was convicted that he needed to pray for at least one soul a day for the following year. It was an extraordinary prayer challenge, and some even mocked his goal . . .

To his shock Dr. Chartiable felt cold, hard metal pressed against the back of his head and heard a strange voice command him to, “Freeze!” A burglar had found his way into the church. The burglar’s gun was now bearing down on the elder’s skull. Dr. Charitable, who has a quiet spirit and is a man of few words, fell to his knees and started to pray.

I don't know about anyone else, but I am finding it increasingly difficult to exercise patience. The older I get, the less patience I seem to possess. This became glaringly obvious while taking on the task of writing this article.

I am on a journey. It started as a desire to have more time and fewer “things.” I read some books, signed up for a blog, leafed through some magazines, and began viewing my home with a more critical eye asking, “Does this bring me...

Do you struggle having strong faith in the times in which we are living? I know I sometimes do. In fact, this past year, I’ve been on a bit of a roller coaster of faith versus my circumstances. Yes, I admit, the things I’ve been teaching and preaching about for years have been challenged in a new way in my own life, and I’ve often had to cry out, “Lord, give me strength to get through this trial!”

Danny threw an aerial map at me and shouted, “Find a place to land!” I looked at the map which was nothing like a road map and saw nothing that looked familiar. My stomach went into my throat as I put the map down and looked out the window, eagle-eyed, trying to find something in all the farmland below that might possibly be a small airfield. Over in the far distance I spotted…

My map reading adventures began when I was proclaimed the navigator on road trips. Barely able to read, my mom taught me to follow the map route she had shown me on the map so that I could tell her the number or name on the next road we needed to take.

One day my husband walked into the house with architect plans to transform the house into a four-bedroom colonial. I was scared. We would have to move out while the work was being done. We were planning to start homeschooling our six-year-old twins within the year; I felt like I needed...