Friday, September 24, 2010 40 Days of Prayer & Impact: 16 Days to Launch

Today, there are 16 DAYS before the Encounter Grand Opening on 10-10-10. We are asking you to join us in what God is doing in these last 40 days.

Pray with us. Act with us. Imagine the impact we could have in Helena if each one of us is individually involved in making Helena a better place. Imagine the lives that could be touched. Imagine how the spiritual landscape of our community could be changed even BEFORE the grand opening.

May His Will Be Done

Today, we are looking at Matthew 6:8-13 ...

"This, then, is how you should pray: "'Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

Today is all about of prayer. I wasn't prepared for it, I didn't see it coming, but it is a day of prayer. This morning, I met with four ladies from Tennessee who have come to Helena specifically to pray for Encounter and our Grand Opening on 10-10-10. More accurately, they are praying for spiritual strongholds to be destroyed. They are praying for broken families and broken lives to be restored through Jesus.

So naturally, my mind is focused today on how to pray. When Jesus demonstrated for the disciples how to pray in this passage, He started with the most difficult part of prayer, "YOUR kingdom come, YOUR will be done." Too often, we have difficulty praying for His will to be done. Too often, we are praying for OUR will, OUR requests, and OUR needs. Our prayer times become a hurried wish list sent up to God, when instead they should be times to listen.

Prayer is a two-way conversation focused on God's will.

TODAY'S PRAYER

Today, let us go into prayer with an open agenda. Let us enter into this conversation with God, first listening to what He would say to us, rather than making our requests reflecting our kingdom. It sounds simple, but spend your first few minutes of prayer with God in silence. And then He will set the agenda based on His kingdom.

TODAY'S IMPACT

Your impact today is an outgrowth of Jesus' prayer. If we pray like Jesus, then we are asking for His Kingdom to come. We are asking for His will right now, right here on earth. And the best place for His Kingdom to come is through us. It is through us that our hurting, lonely, and broken neighbors will see the ways of God's Kingdom. So share the Kingdom today. Do something for someone that doesn't make sense to the ways of this world, something for someone that least deserves it, something that shows another a "glimpse" of the Kingdom of God. As Jesus said in Matthew 10:8, "Give freely as you have received."

This is the core, the raw essence of who we are at Encounter. We invite you to be a part of something greater than yourself. We invite you to step out of the boat. Come belong with a group of people discovering with what it means to follow Jesus in the context of real life. No more secondhand faith.

Got questions? What to find out more? You're invited to some personal conversation over coffee. Click here to find out more.