Prayer Often Grows Out of Brokenness

Today marks our final day of A Praying Church seminar at church. It thrills me to think on how this may catapult us as a church to greater and greater dependence upon the Lord in both our lives and the ministry. We are learning that prayer isn’t just a discipline for “good Christians” to do. It is a regular reminder of our need of Him in our lives!
 
Last week I met with a friend from church and he was reflecting on the past year of his life. God had taken him on a massive journey of… hard. He had been stripped of everything he had been fairly comfortable with in his life. It was at the bottom though that he saw the Lord most magnificently work and move. He found the Lord strengthen him and carry him through the hardships and loneliness. His prayer life became so much more personal and real.
 
I know that has been very true in my own life. I can give specific times where I was humbled before the Lord (maybe more specifically “by the Lord”) and I came to Him in brokenness. It was there, in the brokenness, that my prayer life became much more significant. It was there that God made changes in my life, and I desperately needed Him! It is usually in the bottom of the valley that I grow closest to the Lord. I become more… dependent. I need Him, and without Him I am finished!
 
How have you seen the Lord work in your life and when have you noticed your own prayer life grow?
 
I will close with a quote from an author I have been so deeply impacted by over the years, Jerry Bridges. “How can we grow in a conscious sense of dependence on Christ? Through the discipline of prayer. Prayer is the tangible expression of our dependence. We may think we're dependent on Christ, but if our prayer life is meager or perfunctory, we thereby deny it. We're in effect saying we can handle our spiritual life through self-discipline and our innate goodness. Or perhaps we're not even committed to the pursuit of holiness.”
 
I hope you will call out to the Lord in your own place of neediness. The Psalms can help you – they are loaded with individual psalms of, “I need You, Lord! Don’t be silent!” He’s our refuge. Let’s go to Him.
 
 
Held By His Abundant Grace,
 
 Pastor John