Checking in
I wanted to touch base and let you know that I will be taking one more week away from the blog here at www.firstofallpray.com to spend a bit more time seeking God with fewer distractions.
It’s obvious that the world out there is in desperate need of prayer—whether any of them realize it or not! You and I are the ones called to that assignment—we are watchmen. As we seek God for those in our lives, those in the news, and folks all around the world—in short, for ALL men, for kings, and for all who are in authority (see 1 Timothy 2)—we can trust that He will hear from Heaven and act on behalf of those for whom we pray.
While you pray, be sensitive to any adjustments, corrections, or leadings from the Holy Spirit He may reveal for your own life—and then trust Him to help you as you yield to these things. You see, Habakkuk 2:1 states, “I will stand on my guard post and station myself on the rampart; and I will keep watch to see what He will speak to me, and how I may reply when I am reproved.” In other words, as you seek God on behalf of others—doing the job of the watchman—quite often He will also speak to your heart about you and your ways. This is not a cause for fear but for increase and growth as you receive intimate, personalized discipleship and mentoring from the Holy Spirit Himself.
Like the groundhog, I plan to emerge from underground and be back online February second. That’s when I intend to resume with the study of the Book of James. But will I see my shadow?
Enjoy God,
Dorothy
Read MorePressing on to know the Lord
So let us know, let us press on to know the LORD. His going forth is as certain as the dawn; And He will come to us like the rain, Like the spring rain watering the earth. Hosea 6:3
People all over the church world are taking time now at the beginning of the year to seek God for direction and wisdom, correction and clearer vision for their lives.
We are called to spend time with the Lord on a daily basis, but there are also seasons in which God draws His children into a more targeted, prolonged, and concentrated time of pressing in know Him on a deeper level.
When you press on something, you are focusing your energy, attention, and strength on that particular object. When you press on to know the Lord, you are focusing your energy, attention, and strength on Him and what He has said in His Word.
The fact that God will go forth is established. First, He will go forth in drawing near to you as you draw near to Him (see James 4:8). And then, He will watch over His Word as you place yourself in agreement with it to perform it (see Jeremiah 1:12). But in all of it, your primary focus as you press in is to know Him and to cooperate with His will in your life. The blessings and the promises that result from your concentrated time of seeking Him are gravy—good and glorious stuff, but the best part of pressing in is getting to know Him better.
In the dead of winter, what better endeavor can you pursue than to press in to know your God more intimately? Winter, as long as it seems to be, will be over soon enough. The ground will start teeming with life and the days will grow longer as the chill starts to fade away. And the rains will start falling—the warm spring rains which saturate the thirsty earth and pour out promise of new life, blessings, and more active days. As you press on to know the Lord now, in a concentrated way, He promises to send the rain in due season to your life—the rain of promise, blessing, and renewal. So let us know, let us press on to know the LORD.
I will be spending the next few weeks in a more focused way with the Lord, so I have decided to suspend my First of All Pray blog for this time period. As it stands now, I will return to the blog on Monday, January 26, 2015.
Be blessed, and take some time in your schedule to press on to know the Lord.
Dorothy
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First of all, give thanks—Part 1
First of all, then, I urge that entreaties and prayers, petitions and thanksgivings, be made on behalf of all men, for kings and all who are in authority, so that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and dignity. 1 Timothy 2:1-2
The rest of this week I will be posting excerpts from my book, First of All, Pray. Paul urged in 1 Timothy 2 that the people of God place prayer for others as a top priority in their lives. The giving of thanks is included in that list of “first of all” ways to pray.
Excerpt from Chapter 1:
Thanksgivings
“You may not think of thanksgiving in and of itself as a type of prayer, but it is. In fact, if you look at all the scriptures using this word, you can clearly see that thanksgiving is to be involved in everything you do. And because the plural for thanksgiving is used in 1 Timothy 2:1, you are to present unlimited thanksgivings to God.
“Philippians 4:6 states, ‘Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God’ (emphasis added). As you pray and supplicate about the stressful situations in your life, the Bible commands you to thank God as you pray. This addresses two very important truths about living life. The first truth has to do with life’s anxieties—no one is guaranteed a charmed, easy-going life. Your life will have its share of stress and conflict. If this were not the case, you wouldn’t find so many verses in the Bible about praying when difficult times arise. If you look at the condition of our nation and your stomach starts to churn with worry, the only healthy recourse is to pray. Pretending that nothing is wrong in order to protect yourself from anxiety will not bring the power of God on the scene. God made prayer available to you during your time here on earth in great part because of the prevalence of anxiety-causing conditions.” (Excerpt taken from pages 19-20; First of All, Pray: Prescription for a Nation in Crisis; © 2013–Dorothy Frick)
In American history, the first Thanksgiving followed a time of extreme hardships for those who celebrated it. The Pilgrims left their homeland in England, and then Holland, primarily to escape religious persecution. Of the 120 passengers who set sail in 1620, only 53 were still alive for the first Thanksgiving, November, 1621.
You would think that the exposure to the elements, disease, and death which stalked the group, wiping out half of their number, would shroud the rest of them with hopelessness and despair, but despite the harsh trials, these believers chose to thank God instead. They knew how to lift up their eyes from the daunting circumstances surrounding them to fix their gaze and adoration on the Lord and Savior who had never left them without comfort. Such was the caliber of the men and women who left their homes to secure for themselves a new homeland where they could be free to worship God as they saw fit. These dear souls, by their heartfelt love of God and perseverance, blazed a trail that the rest of us privileged to live here could follow.
You, also, may be facing extreme difficulty in your life. The region where I live is being battered by rage and an unnerving level of chaos and destruction. The nation itself is suffering under escalating levels of discord, disillusionment, and despair. Despite all that is going on around us, though, the witness of that little band of Pilgrims and their native guests has stood firm throughout the centuries ever since. Here is their message to you, alive in 2014:
Give thanks to the Lord. Give thanks, and do not cease to give thanks. Do not ask your circumstances, your body, your bank account, or the daily news if you should give thanks to God; give thanks, and when you are finished—give thanks!
Dorothy
Read MoreA safer walk during chaotic times
Late in 2009 or in early 2010, the Lord gave me an acrostic to help direct my prayer concerning the upswing of chaos I was sensing in the spiritual/political realm. It is called “SAFER”, and it is an outline I used to pray for the Church during those turbulent times just four or five years ago.
I was searching through my “stacks of stuff” this week for it, and discovered two other items as well that I want to post here before we begin again a verse-by-verse walk through the Book of James.
One of the items was a prayer I prayed for government leadership during the time I wrote the acrostic. I will post it on Monday. This prayer is extremely pointed and current. I am thankful I found it again.
Today, along with the acrostic, I will post the other find—a long-forgotten dream which I had in 1995. I’m glad I wrote it down back then; I believe it is illustrative of our nation and even some among the Church in these very strange times we have entered.
July 5, 1995 Dream
Since September 11, 2001, I have experienced the same sense of alarm and frustration I felt in the dream with what I’ve perceived as widespread nonchalance concerning the decay and apparent coup in our nation. Of course, evil men and women have always attempted to co-opt this nation, but the in-your-face flagrancy of their behavior has been incrementally notching up ever since that fateful late summer morning in 2001. And as I’ve spoken with people since then about the alarming trends in the U.S., so often I have felt “blown off” or redirected by others to listen instead, to this prophet or that teacher. And yet, I know what I’ve been seeing in my spirit. A strange presence has been nosing through the grate as the nation—and the Church—has been largely aloof, unconcerned, or even charmed or intrigued by the reptilian entity gaining access at ground level.
I believe God has been seeking to gain our attention about this looming chaos, and many of us have basically told Him, “Later, Lord. I’ve got other things to attend to.” Or perhaps some of us attempted to block such warnings due to the extreme discomfort they aroused. Maybe a lot of us rebuked fear when we should have—like the boy David—run to the fearsome thing with our “insignificant” slingshot of prayer to deal a blow from which that giant could not easily recover.
Every morning I pray or read the Word in my cozy prayer room or at my kitchen table overlooking my tree-lined backyard, I make it a point to thank God for one more day of comfort, beauty, and security. As I sip my coffee, I am grateful for the simple things that mean so much…especially if they were to be suddenly stripped away. I realize that America’s two hundred and thirty-eight year run of prosperity, peace, and safety has been the exception in history—not the norm. I recognize the enormous sacrifice of life, finance, and reputation of generations now gone which was invested to secure for us the freedom to live as we do today. And I recognize that untold hundreds of thousands of hours of agonizing prayer prior to our nation’s independence and in the two centuries since have been clocked by men and women of vision, passion, and commitment to their Lord and His call—many of whom were never known as great people—and yet great and mighty in God they were, nonetheless. And I am eternally grateful for each and every one of them.
My desire—whether we’re in the last generation or not—is to be available and equipped to pray big prayers: binding and loosing, moving and shaking, confronting and confounding those forces of darkness that defy the will and ways of the magnificent One by whom we are called. I long to see stability and sanity to reign once again, and for that to happen, God must first have His way. Therefore, I will—and I must—pray.
For the Church to have a SAFER walk in increasingly chaotic times, I pray for:
S haking [unto]
A wakening [and seeing the state of the world as it really is]
F orsaking [personal and private follies, vanities, lusts, and distractions]
E scaping [the grip of outward forces—operating through the fear of man—that seek to control our words, actions, and behaviors]
R etaking [ground through prayer in the name of Jesus and a right understanding of authority in Christ]
May you and I be found in Christ—doing His will and confidently trusting in Him—for whatever time remains to us on the face of the earth.
Dorothy
The end of all things is near; therefore, be of sound judgment and sober spirit for the purpose of prayer. 1 Peter 4:7, emphasis added
Be of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. 1 Peter 5:8, emphasis added
Read MorePrayer and a custodian
How do you know if you’re supposed to pray for a particular school or for the entire educational system itself? A rule of thumb I go by is to pray about whatever grabs your attention or interest or even arouses your anger. John Osteen, the father of Joel Osteen, wrote a book called The Divine Flow, in which he taught believers to recognize the flow of compassion within them for someone and then to follow that flow with prayer and/or action.
If you see kids walking to school and sense a tug of compassion, pray for them. As you pass a school, if it catches your attention, pray for the students and staff there. If you feel outraged at some of the news stories you hear or read concerning the educational system today, then pray. Let your life become one of standing in the gap before God on behalf of others. It’s really simpler than we have made it out to be—you don’t have to pray for hours and hours; just pray when your attention is drawn toward the subject, whether your feelings are positive or negative about the issue. As you do this, you will develop greater sensitivity to the leading of the Holy Spirit, and you will increase in your capacity to pray. And fruit will start growing.
If you pray for a school, those who study or work there will be touched by God—whether you see it or not. You may be surprised in eternity at all the fruit that will be piled up because you prayed.
When you sense the Lord prompting you to pray for seemingly random people, don’t discount a single life for whom you pray; God wants to pull that person out of their sin and use them to His glory.
An old Pentecostal woman prayed without ceasing for her step-daughter Pat who worked as a custodian in my school district. Pat had been running from God and was living a life of full-throttle sin. She started cleaning in my building when she was near the end of her rope. Every time I worked late, we would talk as she swept, dusted, and vacuumed the room, and I could tell she was hungry for God. I shared the Word with her; she told me about her step-mom and how she knew she was praying for her. It wasn’t long until Pat received Jesus as her Lord, and the lifestyle changes happened immediately. Gone were the ungodly romantic interests, gone was the alcohol, and tobacco left a little bit later. Pat was an astonishingly authentic new creation, and staff members, who liked her to start with, were drawn to her all the more.
She confided in me after she was saved that she was desperate to be baptized in the Holy Spirit. Her step-mom had told her she needed the Holy Ghost to live a life of power. With her step-mom on the family end and me on the school end, we talked and prayed and shared with her all that we knew. Still nothing. I told her to relax; enjoy God, worship and praise Him as she went about her way, and she would be filled with the Holy Spirit when she least expected it, sweetly and completely, with biblical evidence.
Not too long after that, one night as Pat was alone, cleaning my classroom, another Spirit-filled teacher stopped in to visit. As she and Pat prayed, Pat started speaking in other tongues. She was filled with the Holy Spirit and has remained filled ever since. And in my opinion, Pat became one of the boldest witnesses of Jesus that school has ever seen. The lives of teachers, secretaries, cooks, administrators, parents, and other custodians that have been touched by this one woman is an amazing thing.
So pray. Pray however you are led, because God will touch lives through your prayers in unexpected, interconnected ways. And if you pray for schools, don’t limit God—those prayers just might be the fuel God uses to pull a key individual out of darkness and to use him or her to further His work in this hour.
Keep on praying!
Dorothy
Read MoreFrom new age to new creature: One teacher’s story
In the early ‘80s, I was working in a rural elementary school just outside of the metropolitan area where I lived. I taught with a godly woman named Arlene, one of my early mentors. She and I would eat lunch together every day and pray for the students and other staff members—including a teacher named Connie.
Connie was the music teacher. She lived a Bohemian lifestyle—she embraced a New Age philosophy and was married to a Muslim from Afghanistan. The Methodist church in the town needed an organist, so they asked Connie if she would be available.
Connie loved music; she loved to play the piano and sing, so she accepted the position and became a fixture every Sunday morning at the Methodist church near the school. Her New Age leanings didn’t bother anyone at the church; and their doctrine didn’t step on the toes of her worldview, so they all made music together every Sunday morning in a tolerance-soaked, symbiotic relationship.
But one Sunday morning as Connie sat behind the organ, the unexpected happened. Sheepishly, and pulling at his collar, the minister of that little Methodist church stepped behind the pulpit, cleared his throat, and apologized to the congregation for what he was about to do.
“I am so sorry—I feel very uncomfortable right now—but I can’t shake this. I know we don’t do this here—I don’t like to make folks uncomfortable—but I’ve got to do something very unusual for this church.”
Connie had stopped playing the organ, and you could have heard a pin drop.
He continued, “Well, here goes. If anyone wants to come to the front to get a closer relationship with Jesus—please get out of your seat and come forward.”
Crickets.
And then, after a long, horribly awkward, tension-wrapped silence, Connie, gripped with conviction of her need for Christ, got up from behind the organ and came down to the front and knelt. She was the only one that morning who heeded the call, but as she bowed before the altar, the apologetic Methodist minister prayed for her, and she was gloriously saved.
And who do you think she told? That’s right—Arlene and me, who had been praying for her all along!
So is it a waste of your time to pray for educators who are entrenched in worldviews diametrically opposed to the gospel?
Just ask Connie.
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