Pray in Confidence

Posted on by Tanner Royalty

Other than being caught in traffic, or the occasional Doctor’s appointment we spend fewer and fewer hours each day waiting. Waiting is “old fashioned.”

In this day and age everything is so instant. In fact, they are so instant that I think many of us have forgotten the art of waiting. Everyone wants everything instantly, and I think it has changed the way many Christians today view God.

We pray to God and expect immediate results, but most of the time, that’s just not how it works! God has His own timing. We may want something right away, but God needs us to wait until the timing is right. While this often doesn’t make sense in our minds, God sees the bigger picture and knows what we need and when we need it.

This expectation for instant gratification has left many Christians frustrated and doubting the goodness of God, or whether or not God hears their prayers and can do anything “for” them. I think that instead of becoming disgruntled when God doesn’t provide right away, we need to have a mindset that allows us to be patient and trust in the perfect plans of God. I must admit that for me personally this is hard to do.

Maybe you’re praying for companionship, healing, or help and see no results headed down the pipeline. I have felt this way! In fact, I feel this way a lot! I pray and pray, asking God for something I want so desperately and nothing seems to happen. This is incredibly frustrating. Despite this, I encourage all of us not to lose hope or give up on God. He has a plan. It may not be your plan, but it’s a perfect plan.

Psalm 27:14 says,

Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord.

How do you trust in times of waiting? How do you pray in times of waiting?

Let me ask you… when you pray, petitioning God for something, do you really expect results? Do you pray as one who is already defeated just because you feel as if the timing is off, expecting before you even pray that God will not answer your prayer? Or do you pray with confidence that God hears and answers prayer, and that His timing is perfect?

Acts 12 contains a wonderful story that shows how even the giants of the faith and the pillars of the church had trouble putting their confidence in God through prayer. In that chapter we read about Peter’s arrest and imprisonment by King Herod. Having just had James the brother of John put to death, and seeing that this pleased the Jews, Herod sent his soldiers to arrest Peter and put him in prison, intending on having him killed after the Passover. We read in verse five “earnest prayer for him was made to God by the church.” The churches prayers for Peter were constant!

The point is clear in this passage that God’s people were praying with great zeal, great emotion, and great sincerity, asking God to save the life of their beloved brother.

While the people were on the other side of town praying for Peter, God saw fit to rescue him. He sent an angel to Peter who led him from the prison and to the gate of the city. Peter seems to have believed this was a dream, for verse 11 says,

When Peter came to himself, he said, “Now I am sure that the Lord has sent his angel and rescued me from the hand of Herod and from all that the Jewish people were expecting.”

He immediately went to the house of Mary, the mother of John, knowing that the church at Jerusalem would be gathered there. He no doubt realized that they would be gathered together to pray for him.

But what happens next is interesting… as Peter knocked at the door of the gate of the house of Mary, a girl named Rhoda came to answer. When she recognized Peter’s voice, because of her gladness she did not open the gate, but ran in and announced that Peter stood before the gate. But all those that had gathered together to pray didn’t believe her.

Acts 12:12-17 says,

When he realized this, he went to the house of Mary, the mother of John whose other name was Mark, where many were gathered together and were praying. And when he knocked at the door of the gateway, a servant girl named Rhoda came to answer. Recognizing Peter’s voice, in her joy she did not open the gate but ran in and reported that Peter was standing at the gate. They said to her, “You are out of your mind.” But she kept insisting that it was so, and they kept saying, “It is his angel!” But Peter continued knocking, and when they opened, they saw him and were amazed. But motioning to them with his hand to be silent, he described to them how the Lord had brought him out of the prison. And he said, “Tell these things to James and to the brothers.” Then he departed and went to another place.

Do you see what happened there? Believers who had been with Jesus and had learned from His disciples were gathered together to pray for Peter. These were people who should have had great faith, in fact many of them had seen great miracles, yet when they heard that their prayers had been answered they did not believe it! You can almost imagine them snarling to the poor servant girl “You’re crazy! It can’t be Peter! He’s in prison and we’re busy praying that God will save him!” The situation is almost comical, isn’t it?

You have to ask yourself, is there any purpose in praying if you do not really believe God is capable of answering prayer? Why pray if you do not believe that God is willing to hear your prayer? God is not only capable of answering prayer, but He is also willing to answer prayer!

Pray to God with your expectations set high. Exercise faith through prayer, trusting that God hears your petition. God may not answer your request at the time you expect or in the way you expect, but trust that He will answer.

Sometimes it seems that our answers can’t come fast enough.

It is easy to lose hope while waiting on God, but we have to hold on to the hope that God will give us what we need in His perfect timing. It is this God-given hope that will get us through the days of unanswered prayers. So while it would be easy to lose hope and give up on God, don’t! God has a plan.

He has always had a plan. 

Take a deep breath and keep praying in confidence. Pray for peace, and hope, and above all, patience to deal with the sorrows of this life and the things we want to be fixed right away. Some things take time. So take heart and wait on Him.

 

 

 

The Importance of Community

Posted on by Tanner Royalty

Have you ever felt alone?

Now think about when God first formed Adam from the dust, he was the only human on the planet! Like literally the only one! Can you imagine having the Earth all to yourself? Can you imagine how lonely he must have felt?

But it didn’t last long. God said it wasn’t good for man to be alone!

Genesis 2:18-20 says,

Then the Lord God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.” Now out of the ground the Lord God had formed every beast of the field and every bird of the heavens and brought them to the man to see what he would call them. And whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name. The man gave names to all livestock and to the birds of the heavens and to every beast of the field. But for Adam there was not found a helper fit for him.

God decided to give Adam some company so He created Eve, and that was the first little community the world ever saw!

Fast-forward to now… 7.4 billion people later, it sure doesn’t look lonely. But, how does it feel? Do you always feel connected or at times do you still feel alone?

People are everywhere! Even so, it’s easy to get so wrapped up in our own lives that we don’t take the time to really get to know others. We might mingle between worship songs or catch up in the break room at work, but that probably isn’t real, authentic community.

Here’s the deal: It’s important to spend time alone with God, soaking up His Word. But He didn’t intend for us to live in isolation. He specifically designed us to crave and thrive in relationship with others. We’re our best selves when we’re experiencing life’s highs and lows with other believers. That means everyone, whether you’re single or married, needs community.

Don’t take it from me though! The Bible has a lot to say about this topic! Here are three quick reasons the Bible says community is necessary.

1) Community is Encouraging.

Galatians 6:2 says,

Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.

Being in community gives you the chance to be around people at different stages of their faith journey, and to literally bear their burdens alongside of them and fulfill the challenge issued in the verse above out of Galatians.

What I find awesome about community is it really reveals that everyone has something to teach, and also everyone has something to learn. In fact, close-knit church community creates the ideal environment to be a Barnabas (friend), pursue a Paul (teacher), or train a Timothy (student).

If this idea is foreign to you then check out a different post of mine here: https://tannerroyalty.com/2016/02/03/essential-relationships-to-cultivate-as-a-believer/

What it comes down to is lifting each other up, learning from one another, and being the friend each of us needs.

That is exactly how Hebrews describes community in chapter 10 verses 24-25,

And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.

Psalm 133:1 says,

Behold, how good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell in unity!

2) Community attracts the Holy Spirit.

Matthew 18:20 promises,

For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them.

The Bible says the Holy Spirit is present whenever believers gather together! A great example of this was the early church of Acts, which made a habit of meeting together, eating together, and worshiping together. As a result they impacted those around them!

Acts 2:46-47 says,

And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.

Being in church on Sundays is definitely important. But if you want to be a Christ follower, be one every day in the context of all your communities. That’s where you’ll see ministry happen.

3) Community fosters love.

We’ve probably all been to a wedding where the officiant recited the familiar words of 1 Corinthians 13, which ends with, “And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.”

Paul held love above all else in his letter to the Corinthians. And he did the same with his letter to the Colossians in chapter 3 verses 13-14,

Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.

Community is life-giving and essential to following Christ. Scripture says that’s because we’re better together than we are alone.

Romans 12:4–5 says,

For as in one body we have many members, and the members do not all have the same function, so we, though many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another.

It can be hard for some of us to commit to community, especially if we’re guarded or prefer solitude. But community is God’s desire for us, and a sign of a mature faith. Because at the end of the day, when we grow in our relationships with others, we’re growing in relationship with Him!