November 19, 2006
Rev. Terry D. Campbell
The Connection @ Bradley

ACTS of Praying
1 Thessalonians 5:16-18

“Be joyful always; ¹⁷pray continually; ¹⁸give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus.”

A pastor was upset with Ben Jones for sleeping during worship service. During the service, decides to get him. He says, “Now it’s time for prayer.” The loudly he says, “Ben Jones, will you lead?” Ben wakes up startled and says, “Preacher, it’s not my lead, I just dealt.”

Prayer—who can figure it out. But, Be joyful always? You would have to pray continually to do that! “Pray continually?” One would have to think about God throughout the day! “Give thanks in all circumstances?” No way! What does it mean? Let’s talk about some different ways of praying and through them let God speak to our hearts.

Adoration
Psalm 22:3 (NCV) –“You sit as the Holy One. The praises of Israel are your throne.” God inhabits or is present in the praises of His people. Every time we think about the greatness of God, focus our attention on honoring a quality of the most High God, we feel closer to God. We experience a bit of His glory. We open ourselves to being touched and blessed by the Divine One.

Adoration is important for closeness in a relationship. Think about some you care about and try to come up with specific things about them that you appreciate. Whether it is your husband or wife, child or parent, just in thinking about them and realizing that there are wonderful things about them that cause you to love them inspires deeper attachment.

When you move, you engage your brain for learning. Studies, for example, show that before taking a test, it is better to have autistic children to move in some way—clapping, walking, chewing gum, etc. And they will do better on the test or in the learning activity. Moving engages the brain, rather than letting it sleep in motionlessness.

Crayons—Big paper in Sanctuary, graffiti praise to God—names of God, phrases of praise, etc.

Confession
About eleven o’clock on Saturday night, as many people were preparing to turn out the lights, the lights in the community all went out by themselves. Air conditioners suddenly quit running. Houses all over were without power. It seemed strange tat this would happen on a night when there were no storms in the area. People wondered what had caused the power outage as their homes grew warm in the July heat and their patience grew thinner.
The power was off must of the night, and it was the next day before they found out what had caused the problem. A whole community had lost power for most of the night because a snake had gotten into the powerhouse and fouled things up.

If we experience a Christian life that is ineffective and without power, the problem is not that our God lacks power. The problem may be a snake in the powerhouse, something in our life, some debilitating sin that does not belong in the life of a Christian. We must be careful what we allow to creep into our lives.[vii] (If you don’t believe this can happen, a bug got into my parsonage air condition, between the contacts, died and cut off the air conditioner last summer.)

Confession affects our walk with God. Psalm 66:18 (NLT)-“If I had not confessed the sin in my heart, my Lord would not have listened.”

Confession affects our relationship with other people. If you believe you are always right and never make a mistake, other people will suffer. For example: 1 Peter 3:7 (NLT) –“In the same way, you husbands must give honor to your wives. Treat her with understanding as you live together. She may be weaker than you are, but she is your equal partner in God’s gift of new life. If you don’t treat her as you should, your prayers will not be heard.”

Confession is important for cleansing ourselves and keeping us on the right road! You will never be a better person if you never confess any wrong doing to God because you will never grow beyond the imperfect person and actions that you are today.

Mini Prayer walk. Go to one of the three station around the sanctuary. Receive a card to prompt them to confess. Start at different places in sanctuary. Music from “O Brother, Where Art Thou”—“Go Down to the River to Pray”

Thanksgiving
Little five-year-old Joey was thanking God for the food in his Bible class. “Dear God, thank you for my mommy, my daddy, my brother, my sister, grandfather, etc . . . and thank you for my teacher. And God, thank you for the animal crackers.”

Joey paused, and everyone began to squirm and get restless. We waited and waited, and finally his teacher quietly asked Joey if there was anything wrong. Joey slowly raised his head and in a very low whisper asked, “Are we going to have anything to drink?” His teacher said no and immediately he bowed his head and said, “Amen.”

This was not a ritualistic roll through prayer.[i]

It is important to seriously give heart felt thanks to God, not just to go through the motions. We need to stop and BE grateful.

Take a moment now and think. For what are you truly grateful this year? Are there things that are unique to this year for which you are grateful?

Everyone is going to take the piece of paper and “crayon” to make a turkey by tracing around their own hand. Then put in the finger things the top things for which you are thankful.

Supplication
The prayer of a righteous man or woman accomplishes much. Maxie Dunnham, “What if there are some things that God either cannot or will not do until people pray? It certainly explains why the Bible tells us so many times to pray. It may be one of the reasons why Jesus spent so much time out of His busy schedule alone with God and praying.

Prayer of asking God for help and intervention is called for in the Bible for many different situations. We are to Pray for our nations leaders and people, pray for the church, pray for those who you feel like are your enemies (It is hard to stay angry at those for whom you continually and seriously pray.). We are even to pray for our own needs (and our family’s). Jesus told us to pray, “Give us this day our daily bread.”

Please move again to one of our four supplication stations, get a card and pray, then move to the next one and repeat, until you have prayed at all four stations in the way you are instructed.

What will you do now?
Praying is your time of intimacy with God. Every relationship needs some praise, confession, thanksgiving and self-expression. While none of us can completely understand prayer, we know that through praying we draw close to the Lord and He infuses us again with His life presence. I challenge each of us to practice and experience of ALL the ACTS of praying. Amen.