Page 1 Page 2 Page 3 Page 4 Page 5 Page 6 Page 7 Page 8 Page 9 Page 10 Page 11 Page 12 Page 13 Page 14 Page 15 Page 16 Page 17 Page 18 Page 19 Page 20 Page 21 Page 22 Page 23 Page 24 Page 25 Page 26 Page 27 Page 2820 BOCNEWS.com OCTOBER 2016 Prayer: 'Howtodoit' "Then He came to the disciples and found them asleep, and said to Peter, "What? Could you not watch with Me one hour?" — Matthew 26:36-46 (NKJV) There are all sorts of methods by which we can approach prayer. There is not necessarily a wrong or right to prayer, but because this time spent with God is so personal, what works for me may not work for you, and vice-a-versa. This is not "THE HOWTODOIT," but "A HOWTODOIT" that I hope will serve as a building block from which you can develop your own method, and your own testimony, of "HOWTODOIT." Christians throughout the ages have found five kinds of things to say to God, five reasons to pray. The traditional names for them are ADORATION, CONFESSION, THANKSGIVING, INTERCESSION, AND PETITION, or A.C.T.I.P if you want to remember them that way. Should every prayer contain all five? Not necessarily. Any one is a good reason to pray, but all five are better. Think of prayer as a star that has five points. Each point is very simple yet significant, but we can pray endless variations on each one. First, ADORATION. It means worship, absolute respect. Adoration is acknowledging that God is God: unique, perfect, absolute, infinite, totally worthy of all our praise and all our love. Adoration is simply letting God know that you know who he is. Matthew 22:35-38 tells us that we are to love and reverence God with all our being, “Then one of them, a law- yer, asked Him a question, testing Him, and saying, "Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?” Jesus said to him, "'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.' "This is the first and great com- mandment.” Adoration is the expression of our love for God with all our whole heart and soul and mind and strength. Jesus tells us that this is his first and greatest commandment. There is much in the Scriptures, particularly in the Psalms, that speak to the praise of God. ■ ■ Psalm 27 declares, The Lord is my light and my salvation; Whom shall I fear? The Lord is the strength of my life; Of whom shall I be afraid? ■ ■ Psalm 34:1 declares, I will bless the Lord at all times; His praise shall continually be in my mouth. ■ ■ Psalm 103:1 declares, Bless the Lord, O my soul; And all that is within me, bless His holy name! There is enough in the Psalms that speaks to the praise and glory of God for us to daily read as an offering to God, as our prayer of adoration unto God. Second is CONFESSION. Simply letting God know that you know who you are. Confession is differ- ent from asking for forgiveness of sins. If we have given your lives to Christ we live in a continual state of forgiveness. Jesus is continually before the father making intercession for us. Christ’s sacrifice forgave us all of our sins and unrighteous- ness past, present, and future. As believers, when we come to God in prayer asking for forgiveness understand it is not to be saved. It is to be cleansed of impure and unholy thoughts, desires, and inten- tions that are inconsistent with who and whose we are. We need to ask God to give us a spiritual bath and clean all the garbage of the world off us. There are two mistakes to avoid here: having nothing to confess and having too much, having no conscience and worrying too much about sin. We all need confession, but it should be the shortest part of the five parts of prayer. Too much introspection is bad for the soul; we can get ingrown eyeballs. That’s why it is better to start with adoring God and forgetting yourself than to start with confessions of sins; we should look to God more and ourselves less. Confession ought to be like a rear view mirror. We ought to look back occasionally to see where we have come from, but continual looking back and not looking forward can cause us to have an accident. It can mess up our lives. Third, THANKSGIVING. Simply letting God know that you know what you have, counting your bless- ings. We can spend a lot of time on this one. God deserves to be thanked a lot. This sounds similar to adoration but differs. In adoration we love and adore God for what he is. In thanksgiving, we thank him for his gifts to us. Many of us in the midst of the crisis of life do not feel very thankful. There are some things going on in our lives that we do not feel very good about, some things that maybe we are not happy about. But in spite of our situation we can still believe God is working out all things for our good and choose to thank him. Neither faith nor thanksgiving depends on our feelings. By an act of our will we decide that in spite of our circumstances, in spite of how we feel we are going to thank God. Our circumstances should not determine our thankfulness. Fourth, INTERCESSION. Simply letting God know that you know he is the ultimate source of help for others. It is pray- ing for others. Prayer is the widest circle of influ- ence we have. It can encompass everything. It can make a difference to anything. Even if we do not see the results, we are assured that no prayer is unheard, unanswered, or unused. “More things are wrought through prayer than this world can dream of.” We can help save the world from a hospital bed or a wheel- chair. We can do more by prayer than by anything else. One of the greatest things pray- ing for one another does is effect healing; obviously in the realm of physical infirmities, but more so in the realm of personal relationships. Some of us are experiencing physical affliction because we are harboring hardness in our hearts towards someone else. • James 5:6 tells us, “Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed." • Jesus in Matthew 5:44 tells us, "But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you.” Finally, PETITION. Simply letting God now that you know that He is the ultimate source of supply for your needs and the needs of others. Why do we ask for anything from God? Doesn’t he know all our needs? God himself has commanded us to ask him for things. James 4:2-3 tells us, “You lust and do not have. You murder and covet and can- not obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures.” It’s like a father telling his children, come to me when you need lunch money. We do have needs, and God wants us to use them as another opportunity to come to him. God could have given us everything without us working for it, but he knew it was better for us to work for things. Prayer is work and involves faith to achieve any results. Our petitions to God ought to be with a sense of expectancy. Sometimes God does not give us a thing, even if it’s good for us, until we pray a lot for it. Maybe he sees that we need prayer even more than we need the things we pray for, just as the body needs exercise more than some of the food we may ask for. God wants us to persist in prayer. By Rev. Dr. William T. Golson William T. Golson There are two mistakes to avoid here: having nothing to confess and having too much, having no conscience and worrying too much about sin.