Today’s Teaching

  Text: ‘Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of Him’ – 1 John 5:14-15 Thought: ‘Now this is the confidence that we have in Him’. Is that our experience? Praying with the confidence that it will be heard and answered? Jesus said, ‘If you ask anything in My name, I will do it’ – John 14:14.’Until now you have asked nothing in My name. Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full’ – John 16:24. What more encouragement do we need? So why is prayer all too often last on a Christian’s list of priorities? 1. The Need to Pray A ministers’ conference was discussing how much time should be spent in prayer each day. A famous evangelist astounded everyone by stating that he rarely spent thirty minutes in prayer. Then he added, “I rarely let thirty minutes go by without praying. That was the secret of his success, bringing God into every aspect of his life. The Bible instructs Christians to pray regularly; for Kings and ruling...

Text: God is not a man, so He does not lie. He is not human, so He does not change His mind. Has He ever spoken and failed to act? Has He ever promised and not carried it through? – Numbers 23:19 NLT. Thought: At long last we are settling into our new home after the sale of our previous house took nearly 12 months to complete. We had been let down by the promises of a prospective buyer who couldn’t deliver on what they had said. Now there was the small matter of having a phone line and Broadband installed. Our initial order with a network provider was met with an installation date for 5 weeks later! No amount of negotiation could bring it forward. It was frustrating sitting in the car on a cold, wet, windy day trying to pick up a WiFi signal in order to deal with urgent emails. We just had to wait! As that day neared, emails and texts began to arrive, “The engineer is coming”. Sure enough, on the set day he arrived but he was quickly gone, announcing there was a fault on the line and he did not have the equipment to rectify it. He left promising that it would...

Text: Therefore the Lord will wait, that He may be gracious; and therefore He will be exalted, that He may have mercy on you, for the Lord is a God of justice; blessed are all those who wait for him – Isaiah 30:18 Thought: 2013 was a frustrating year as we tried to put our planned move into operation. First indications seemed promising; a warm welcome from our intended church and a cash buyer within a week of marketing our property. Then came delay after delay from our buyers until they finally disappeared in August. Starting all over again, we finally accepted an offer in October. Every indication pointed to a pre-Christmas move but as time progressed it became clear this would not materialise. The continual feeling of ‘hopes dashed’ with each update became physically and spiritually draining. Facilitating our buyers by moving to rented accommodation added to our stress as available properties came and went. Now at last the end is in sight. There will be a last minute scramble but we are confident it will all be done on time. Waiting times can be ‘dangerous times’ as scripture reveals. Sarah gave up trying for a baby, encouraging Abraham to have one with Hagar – Genesis Ch 16....