Breaking bitter bonds

A decade ago, I realized I had never forgiven a boy who ridiculed me - a new kid - outside our grade 8 classroom with all the other boys watching.

Compared to what others have faced, it seems trivial to me now.  But it affected me for the rest of my high school days, causing me to withdraw from the other boys.

So, I decided to forgive him - and others - as part of a church study group on healing prayer.  Nothing spectacular happened, but it was important for me to jettison this bitter burden.

Forgiveness is hard, but unforgiveness can be crippling.  It can affect our spiritual lives and sometimes our physical and emotional lives.

Christ calls on us to forgive others, drawing a direct link between our relationship with God and our willingness to forgive (Matthew 6:14-15).  Failure to forgive does not mean we are separated from God, but I believe it means we have ourselves created an obstacle in our relationship with the Lord.

I have read stories of dramatic healings - emotional and physical - when people have forgiven others.  It can even transform families.

In her book When You Don't Know What To Pray, Linda Evans Shepherd tells how forgiveness brought a large family into the kingdom of God.

The family of 10 children suffered through violence and alcoholism as they grew up.

Then, one of them - Victoria - became a believer.  The rest ignored her spiritual change and she died from cancer not too long afterwards.  She deeply desired for the rest of her family to become followers of Christ.

A little later, one of her sisters - Marie - became a Christian and started praying for her parents and all of her brothers and sisters.  While she was praying, she would recall hurts she had suffered at the hands of these family members.

"Each time that happened, Marie asked God to help her forgive that hurt," Shepherd writes.

This took years.  As she prayed for each family member, she gradually forgave each for past hurts.

When she had finished this process, she invited the whole family to dinner at a restaurant.  She was surprised when all of them came.

Then, she invited them all to come to a church meeting where the preacher presented the good news of Jesus Christ.  All but one came that evening and committed their lives to Jesus.

Of course, there is no guarantee that forgiving someone will lead to such wonderful results.

But Jesus knew what he was talking about when he urged us to forgive.

When we forgive others, we are doing what God has done for us.

Do you exist?

A surefire way to find out whether God exists is to ask him, says Anthony DeStephano.

God is sure to answer "Yes" - in some way, says DeStephano, author of Ten Prayers God Always Says Yes To.

Of course, you have to really want to know.  If you have already decided he doesn't exist, you'll probably miss his answer.

DeStephano wrote his book to assure us that we can be certain the Lord will say "Yes" to prayers that align with God's own wishes and plans.

He acknowledges that there are many prayers God says "No" to.

"Like a good father, he is not concerned about gratifying our every wish.  Instead, he is concerned about only one thing: our ultimate good, which boils down to whether or not we make it to heaven."

So every prayer we make is evaluated according to that long-term goal.  He says "yes or no based on what he knows will happen to us in the future as a result of that decision".

Yet we can be sure that God wants to say "Yes" to prayers that will lead to "certain spiritual favours and graces that are always good for us and that we need all the time".

One of these, of course, is faith.

We can spend a lot of time exploring arguments about God's existence, but that will not lead to faith.  Faith is a gift of God.

Faith in God - in Jesus' sacrifice on the cross for us - is the stepping stone to a whole new life with boundless hope and possibility.  It answers questions like "What will happen after I die?" and "Why do I exist?"

Sometimes, too, believers have intellectual doubts and need confirmation that God is real.

Getting tied up in philosophical arguments about God's existence won't get us far.  That's because God is alive and all we have to do is ask him.  He will show us.

DeStephano says it's highly unlikely that he will suddenly appear before us and speak to us.  Although, he has sent angels supernaturally to speak to people in the Bible and even in modern times.

Instead, God is looking for us to trust him when he is invisible as a keystone to a growing faith.

"Very simply, God will give you a sign of his presence - a real, genuine, bona fide sign," the author writes. "The exact nature of this sign will be up to him, of course . . .  But you can be sure that it will be something out of the ordinary."

By "out of the ordinary", DeStephano says it may be profound or as simple as a conversation with someone that the Lord impresses on your heart as something from God.

Perhaps it is escaping a close call with death without a scratch.  Or, an unexpected solution to a problem that you could not have predicted.  Or, conquering a personal evil in your life.

"There will be a growing conviction in your mind and in your heart that there must have been some other force at work.  And more important, there will be a growing conviction of the presence of this force."

The Bible makes clear that prayer is important simply because God wants a close relationship with us.  He loves us and wants to help us.

We just have to ask the right questions and keep our eyes and ears open for the answers.

A lifestyle of praise

A visiting preacher at our church recently urged us to aim at spending 80 per cent of our prayer times in praising God.

For most of us, that's a daunting goal.

And many of us will also wonder: "What about my prayer requests?  Aren't they important?"

Yes, they are.  But perhaps God can deal with some of those prayer needs while we are exalting him.

Terry Law, author of The Power of Praise and Worship, says that he has found praising God has changed him and changed the lives of other people, too.  He declares that a "lifestyle of praise" is not only possible, but desirable.

Decades ago, Law's wife died in a traffic accident while he was out of the country touring with a Christian band called "Living Sound".  He was left with three young children and a bitter heart.

He was angry with God and decided he would give up his music career. But a talk with friend and mentor Oral Roberts ultimately changed his mind and his future.

Roberts, who had suffered loss in his own life, urged him to praise the Lord.  Law objected, but did as Roberts suggested.  He felt nothing as he praised God until a couple of hours later, he broke down in tears and felt an inner release.  He found himself rejoicing in the Lord.

He returned to leading the band, but with a new vigour and purpose.  His praise band toured eastern European Communist countries and huge crowds - many of them young people - turned out.  People were healed during the services and many became believers - even young Communists.

Law later moved into other areas of ministry, but continues to stress the importance of praising God. Law says that, along with changing our own outlook on life, praising God:

• Silences the evil one (Psalm 8:1-2);
• Lifts our spirits (Isaiah 61:3);
• Leads us into celebrating Christ's triumph over the dark forces through his death and resurrection (2 Corinthians 2:14);
• Prepares us for miracles (Psalm 50:23); and
• Brings revelation - or spiritual knowledge that we would not have otherwise (Psalm 22 speaks of Jesus' agonies on the cross hundreds of years before they happened).

As other writers note, praise need not be restricted to our regular prayer times.  We can praise God at any time of the day - at home, at work, in school, at play.

We can look up the various names for God in the Bible - the Lord as Creator, Almighty, Peace, Shepherd, Healer, Provider and more - using them as a launching pad to reflection and praise.

And something I have started doing is using simple objects in my everyday world to prompt thoughts of the Lord - who he is and what he has done for me.  For instance, standing in the shower in the morning reminds me that the Lord is pouring out his goodness and his love upon me.

Or, we can sit silently before him, adoring him and then speaking words of thanks and praise.

Praising God pleases the Lord and draws us closer to him.  And it renews us.

Praying for the nations

You can touch the world through prayer.  Do you believe that?

Prayer warrior and missionary leader Wesley Duewel believed it.

In his book Touch the World Through Prayer, Duewel writes that prayer is key to world evangelization.

"The task of world evangelization is primarily dependent on witness and prayer.  Prayer must prepare the way for evangelization.  Prayer must saturate and cover the work of evangelization."

Yet most of us - myself included - tend to put the world beyond our doors out of our minds.

Like many Christians, I pray mostly for myself, my family and my friends with a nod to the needs of our church and our city.  It's natural because I know those needs best.

But what about God's designs for this world?

Jesus spelled this out clearly in Matthew 28:19 where he told his followers: "Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit."

We call this "The Great Commission" - our mandate to go out and reach others for Jesus so that they will become fully devoted followers of Christ.

Jesus told us to pray for people to go out and harvest those who are ready right now to give their lives to the Lord.  Yet that is not top-of-mind in most of our churches.

I have prayed - and continue to pray - for friends who do not know Jesus.  Once in a while, I share something of my faith with them.

But Duewel has a wider vision.

"You can have a thrilling role in reaping God's harvest.  Only a small percentage of God's people are involved in seed-sowing, watering, cultivating, and preparing more harvesters, yet all of us could participate on a deeper level than we have ever dreamed.  If you are willing, prayer offers you a way to be significantly involved in world harvest."

Duewel says this does not absolve us of sharing Christ with others as opportunities arise.

But God works through prayer.  He responds to our prayers and his kingdom is advanced through prayer.

Duewel says we can pray for people who are involved in evangelism and he gives examples of people in other parts of the world who prayed for him daily.  As well, we can pray for God to move in places far from us in other parts of the world.  We can pray for people to believe in Jesus; for protection of young churches; and for God to influence world leaders to change their attitudes toward persecuted believers.

Lack of prayer for the world is a serious issue.

God says in Ezekiel 22 that he looked for someone to build the wall of righteousness in the land and stand in the gap for God's people.  But he found no one and was obliged to judge the people of God.

"Standing in the gap" is a metaphor for prayer on behalf of a people.

I have found some useful on-line guides to praying for other nations.

The organization 24-7 Prayer International has some suggestions on how we can pray for the world at https://www.24-7prayer.com/blog/2693/how-do-i-pray-for-the-world.

And Operation World has very useful background information on many nations including population, religious affiliation, Christian presence, and items for prayer.  This is available on-line at: www.operation world.org.

We have a great task before us.