Draw near to God and He will draw near to you James 4:8

We live in volatile times. Our stomachs churn within us whether we are parents worrying for children or pastors for our congregations. Many of struggle to sleep or to eat and to function as complete human beings in abundant life. All manner of crisis and tragedy can strike at any given time. Anyone can be upset by the cross around my neck, or the cross that is imprinted on my heart. Aasia Bibi remains locked in a prison cell. Disease and dirty water malign every story we hear of. Rumours are rife and many are victims of unjust laws and being hated for the sake of Christ. Others live with scars of the past and some are alone, waiting for a friend, a teacher and a counselor.

How often we can get wrapped up in the despair of the tale of suffering and persecution. Yet here we are at the cusp of the journey from Acsension Thursday through Pentesoct Sunday, able as a Church, you in your small corner and I in mine, to medicate on the enormity of the promise that bears the promise ‘God is with us’.

Come, let us use this time to thank our Lord that by the death of Jesus on the cross we have direct access into the presence of the Father, who longs for us to come and spend time with Him. For this truth us far richer and more beautiful, more nourishing and edifying that the story of persecution and suffering in isolated. That story bears no rich crimson healing if allowed to over grow without the shadow of Christ’s cross over it.

Today, Christ is interceding for His Church at the right hand of the Father. Set aside some time to consider the incredible access we have to be able to Him in interceding for ourselves and our Church. Think about the Holy Spirit, ushering you into His presence and making a place for you to enter that inner sanctum where Father, Son and Holy Spirit commune. Such is our privilege, such is our delight.

Pray that:

God may do a new and deep work of great and exciting magnitude within our spirits and our churches.

God may make us continually bold for the Gospel

God may fill us with courage that helps us set our faces like flint in the face of persecution that nothing may deceive us that we are separated from the love God
-we may come each day with open minds and hearts to receive all that God would speak into our lives through His Holy Spirit;

We may be released from the preoccupation of victimhood into the freedom and lightness of victory in Christ

We may be filled with sincere love for our neighbor

we may become more Christ-like and reflect His light in our daily Christian walk;

our hearts may be prepared through this season of prayer to seek the fullness of the Holy Spirit;

-we would desire relentlessly to know the mind of God in all our ministries and when planning new Parish activities;
may God change us from an inward-looking Parish to one looking out, reaching out and going forth.

For those in prison who have no one to visit them and pray with them or read the scriptures to them. May they experience the fullness of the Spirit of God as He reveals the face of Christ and the Glory of God to them in their loneliness.

May we demonstrate in genuine love our care for others and share Jesus with them;

Pray that we may glorify God in everything- even for the suffering that comes for loving Him. For friends, weeping endures for the night but joy cometh in the morning.

Often the drudgery of this journey leaves us parched. Come fill us Lord Jesus.

By Corinne Nathaniel | May 24th, 2017