Prayer and its' Power, (well really it's God's power)

POST #100!

Last Sunday, September the 7th, I went to my dad's church. There was a really great guest speaker. His topic was simple: Persistent Prayer, and he spoke from Luke 18:1-8.

Luke 18

The Parable of the Persistent Widow

1Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up. 2He said: "In a certain town there was a judge who neither feared God nor cared about men. 3And there was a widow in that town who kept coming to him with the plea, 'Grant me justice against my adversary.'
4"For some time he refused. But finally he said to himself, 'Even though I don't fear God or care about men, 5yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that she gets justice, so that she won't eventually wear me out with her coming!' "

6And the Lord said, "Listen to what the unjust judge says. 7And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? 8I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?"


I don't think he said anything I didn't already know but the way he put it revolutioned my thoughts. And since then I think I can honestly say that I have been praying more.

If you are a follower of Christ, tell me, are you sick of this generation that goes on without a prayer? I mean it's just as Scripture says, if a horrible judge like that described in the parable would grant a widow, the least of society, how much more would our good God answer the prayers of his people whom he loved enough to let his Son die for? Why are we not petitioning to him all the things we would like to have changed around us, more than just our trivial lives and needs?

I'll tell you friends, that widow was desperate, and we too need to be just as desperate! Desperate for our nations, and high schools, and so much more, our friends who don't know Jesus! Let's not sit around waiting for things to get better on their own, because they won't!

I'd like to be praying more for the girl who struggles with drugs and sometimes even cutting. And a friend's mom who needs to know that there's a lot more to Jesus than church (holds little importance at all!).

Does anyone want change? Does anyone want to unleash God's awesome power? Is anyone willing to spend time wrestling with God until we receive blessings? When the Son of Man comes back is He going to find a faith in his people that says we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us, if we are asking according to his will? Why are we, the body of Christ, not meeting together to spend hours weekly to simply pray persistently for justice to be done on earth?

Tell me.

Eyes

Connection.
Every person longs for it.
Can it be explained?
A world of people.
Diverse lives,
And diverse stories.
Love is more than a feeling,
But could a stranger
Love another stranger
If it were simply so?
Do we choose to love?
Do lives cross?
Is it possible that
Your close friend knows
How the stranger feels
Without knowing it?
What really happens when
The eyes of two
Strangers meet?

Written by the suggestion of DFS, hope you like!

Read Me

I wish I could put up something interesting to grab everyone's attention, but I really have nothing to say. Umm... there was the drama of one of my friends moving away for about two days and now she's back to stay. The first youth event was last night and we went bowling and I played decently.

My life is a bit boring at the moment. That not particularily a bad thing though. I have cousins visiting from BC at my house right now. They're 3 and 1 years old, I think. Cute kids... I've been a bit sick this past week but I'm almost better.

I'm gonna type up part of one of my very recent journals.

09.04.08:Hmm... how often is it that I turn to my journals to record the daily events of my life? I try to encorporate as often as I can my thoughts and feelings about those things, but alas, this is what they've become!

For once, I would like to write something that forces you to think about what you're reading. I don't really know how but I think I miught like to try.

A thought crossed my mind today as I say th the doctor's office's waiting room, I tried to get it on paper but my mom saw what I was doing and I lost appetite.

What happens when the eyes if two strangers meet? Eye contact is said to be a personal thing, so even if thtat glims only lasts a split second, have you not shared something personal with someone to whom you fing yourseld completely unfamiliar?

And another thing, does the colour pink mix with the Y chromosome? The idea is still new to me but being the artist that I am, I like it. Green isn't a clour only reserver for boys, and likewise, neither is pink for girls. My brother owns a pink shirt that he wears, but I wouldn't expect much from my dad for a long while yet!
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And feel free to just drop me a line any times...

If you want a great website to check out . There's all kinds of neat ideas, and it's added to frequently.

Bleeding Love

I absolutely love Leona Lewis's song Bleeding Love. I can't embed the music video here because the option was disabled for that video on youtube but you can watch it for yourself and interpret what you think she wrote the song about. But I'd like to just show you possibly a different perspective on that exact same song.

LYRICS:

Closed off from love, I didn't need the pain
Once or twice was enough and it was all in vain
Time starts to pass, before you know it you're frozen

This part (for me) is like distance from God and how nothing comes from that situation. And the less time you spend with God, the less it feels like his presence is with you until he almost becomes frozen.

But something happened for the very first time with you
My heart melted into the ground, found something true
And everyone's looking 'round, thinking I'm going crazy

Coming back to the relationship with God, falling in love with him because you can see the way things are truly supposed to be. And people who don't know that love think that it's crazy because they don't know.

But I don't care what they say, I'm in love with you
They try to pull me away but they don't know the truth
My heart's crippled by the vein that I keep on closing

The first two lines are self explanatory. The last line is when you choose to cut yourself off from God. Also, a vein is the stream of blood flowing to the heart, not away. And everyone knows you need blood to live.

You cut me open and I
Keep bleeding, keep, keep bleeding love
I keep bleeding, I keep, keep bleeding love
Keep bleeding, keep, keep bleeding love
You cut me open

In Ephesians 6, you can do a word study on the word sword and find that it's actually more of a scalpel used for operations. So "you cut me open" is like God changing us or pruning us to bear more fruit.

Trying hard not to hear but they talk so loud
Their piercing sounds fill my ears, try to fill me with doubt
Yet I know that the goal is to keep me from falling

Again, people who don't know God can say a lot of things about our faith to make us doubt because they don't believe themselves. But the goal is to just keep striving after Jesus.

But nothing's greater than the rush that comes with your embrace
And in this world of loneliness I see your face
Yet everyone around me thinks that I'm going crazy
Maybe, maybe

This part is pretty self explanatory. Embrace equals an embrace, maybe like the dream I've blogged about before. Or even just confirmation of his love towards us. God never leaves us alone even when we feel that we have no one. Crazy is the same thing as above.

But I don't care what they say, I'm in love with you
They try to pull me away but they don't know the truth
My heart's crippled by the vein that I keep on closing

You cut me open and I
Keep bleeding, keep, keep bleeding love
I keep bleeding, I keep, keep bleeding love
Keep bleeding, keep, keep bleeding love
You cut me open

And it's draining all of me
Oh, they find it hard to believe
I'll be wearing these scars for everyone to see

The cost of following after Jesus will demand everything you are and have. They find it hard to believe that it's worth it. The scars could go two ways. First scars could be the visible change in the way you live, even a physical change depending on a persons testimony. Or it could be living in a life that only takes pride in the scars of Christ.

I don't care what they say, I'm in love with you
They try to pull me away but they don't know the truth
My heart's crippled by the vein that I keep on closing

You cut me open and I
Keep bleeding, keep, keep bleeding love
I keep bleeding, I keep, keep bleeding love
Keep bleeding, keep, keep bleeding love

You cut me open and I
Keep bleeding, keep, keep bleeding love
I keep bleeding, I keep, keep bleeding love
Keep bleeding, keep, keep bleeding love

You cut me open and I
Keep bleeding, keep, keep bleeding love

That's all. I love it. If you didn't before, than maybe you will now.