Formation Prayer: Freestyle

“Now Moses was a very humble man.” Numbers 12:3

Surfing and skiing allow a freedom that is exhilarating. The combination of the two in freestyle skiing appears to be a more dangerous kind of freedom. A freedom that is very fragile. Sadly, the recent death of top Canadian freestyle skier, Sarah Burke, was a reminder of how fragile this freedom can be. Burke died from injuries sustained from a crash during a training session when a routine maneuver went slightly off course.

In matters of human maturity and spiritual development, freedom is expressed in reverencing objective truth. Yet our secular culture has a different point of view. Freedom in our culture is often understood as the right to do what I want to do without restrictions. This is a dangerous freedom. Real freedom is submitting to God’s moral law. More than this, it is a love of God’s law. Freedom is living in the desire to do good always and thus this person could say, “Love God and do as you please”. A kind of free-style held within safe constraints!

The Bible portrays the person who is fully alive as the one who has pursued this kind of spiritual freedom. To be fully free is to want only the Father’s will rather than the assertion of my will. This entails humility, the kind of humility that makes prayer strong. In practical terms, the taming of the tongue has been recognized as a principle avenue in strengthening humility - cultivating silence, avoiding frivolous talk, and using plain simple speech. To answer gently and endure with patience both taunts and injuries are all ways a temperance or self mastery can be performed in order to develop humility.

Day of Prayer for Life

“Arise, Lord! Lift up your hand, O God. Do not forget the helpless.” Ps 10:12

As a nation we join with other Christians in repentance today. We remember the anniversary of the Supreme Court decision in January of 1973 that turned our nation toward a selfish holocaust that has allowed for the death of more than 50,000,000 children. The number is beyond comprehension and is crushingly depressing.  In the light of this fact we turn and pray; “Jesus, Lord of Life, forgive us as a nation! Restore us, dear Lord, so that mother’s hearts would be softened and seeking an abortion would become totally unthinkable by us all”. May God's grace and mercy be poured out on us today.

Formation Prayer: Step it Up

“How great is the love the Father has lavished on us.” 1 John 3:1

The movie, “The Way”, showed in Kearney for a brief period in the Fall of 2011. It was a stirring portrayal of a small group of back-packers, each bearing personal pain, but finding themselves banded together and headed for the same destination in the beautiful ancient countryside of Spain. The surprise is not that this unlikely group reach their destination but they reach it and are changed people - more real, more emotionally whole, and more focused. Down through the ages men and women have sought a deeper experience of spiritual transformation. Today we will consider one approach to achieving this goal.

Some goals seem too lofty and too high unless they are broken down into a series of steps. One ancient church writer encouraged four steps or phases that would help people achieve their goal of transformation into the image of Christ. Each step was designed to follow the other like mounting a stair. The first focuses on considering and living more fully in the great love God has for us who are sinners, the second centers on the life of Christ and the attractiveness of this life, the third on the necessity to die to our plans or the world’s agenda in order to really live to God, the fourth focuses on the joy of following the risen Savior in the power of the Spirit.

The four steps take us through God’s salvation plan, contemplating the life, death and resurrection of Christ our Savior in the context of letting God love us. In many ways these are the themes of the great spiritual revivals or awakenings down through history; but, like any great revival they must start with individuals prayerfully humbling themselves and considering the life of Christ.

Formation Prayer: River of Life

“Everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself, just as he(God) is pure.” 1 Jn 3:3

Christmas and New Year often are accompanied by reunions and family get-togethers. Some of you may have experienced these words over the festive season: “Nice to see you again. You haven’t changed a bit”. Though these words may be offered as a compliment in contrast to aging, imagine if this was a parting comment summing up the totality of our life stage. It would be very disappointing.

Did you make a New Year’s resolution? Maybe it included a desire to grow more like Christ; this is the quest for “Christian formation”. As we take our inspiration from Richard Foster’s book, “Prayer – Finding the Heart’s True Home”, we will now spend the next weeks looking into this subject of Formation Prayer.

How does prayer move us closer to God? How does prayer stifle our lust for worldliness and self-centeredness? How does prayer encourage the fruit of the Spirit – love, joy, peace, . . . (Gal 5:22)? There is an active and passive side to this process of formation and we must see prayer as a work we do that enables this movement almost like a river that acts as a means of ferrying vital cargo back and forth from one shore to another. Prayer is a river of life.

Aging is part of life but the fact that we resist it and find it hard to accept is a proof, to some degree, that we are made for eternity. We were made for heaven and holiness is God’s plan and our prayer as we await for this destination.

The Rule of our King in 2012

“Praise be to his glorious name forever; may the whole earth be filled with his glory.” Psalm 72:19

Psalm 72 is a royal Psalm that includes a prayer for the messianic kingship of David’s dynasty. At one level it is a reference to Isreal’s kingship and at another, a prophecy about the Kings of Kings – Jesus Christ. With it’s petition and praise we see the divine standards that are so powerfully fulfilled in the life of Christ. He became the realization of God’s intended revelation to which this Psalm alludes.

What is the hallmark of this kingly reign? The Psalm answers with the clarion call to practical “righteousness” and “justice” lived out by the king: “He will defend the afflicted among the people and save the children of the needy” (v.4). Specifically, our King represents God’s concern for the oppressed – the destitute, the vulnerable, the disadvantaged, the social outcasts. Those who are often treated as second class citizens are under God’s close and caring watch. It is his “pity” that motivates Him to action – sympathy moves to empathy. The King loves them and values their lives.

In Nebraska, when the womb is no longer the safest place in the world for a developing infant you can bet God, our King, is concerned. Examine the Psalmist's words that reveal God’s heart: “He will take pity on the weak and needy and save the needy from death . . . for precious is their blood in his sight” (v.13-14). May this entry into the new year be a time to prayerfully realign our allegiance to our King and may we pray “Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven”. Let us be part of extending His rule of righteousness and justice from the womb to the tomb in 2012.