What God is Saying

Sing to the LORD; praise his name. Each day proclaim the good news that he saves. Publish his glorious deeds among the nations. Tell everyone about the amazing things he does. — Psalm 96:2-3

Thursday, December 31, 2020

Praying in the New Year

When I think about prayer, I am reminded that God is faithful to us through all the seasons of our lives. He isn't a fair-weather God. He is an all-season Father. He is with us when life feels alive and full of color. He loves us when our lives feel drab and gray. He loves when life looms dark and foreboding. Our God is an all-season Father!

The Almighty, the Creator, our Abba Father, has known us, loved us, and been with us every moment from our conception through every up and down of life, and is still with us until now (Psalm 139). As his children by grace through faith, our Father has promised that nothing can separate us from his love for us in Christ Jesus (Romans 8:32-39). He will never leave us or forsake us, no matter how we may feel or what we deserve at any given moment, or what others around us do to us (Hebrews 13:5-6). He doesn't care if we are young or old, tired or energetic, male or female, rich or poor, light or dark-skinned, upper class, or homeless (Galatians 3:26-29).

Our God is the all-season and ever-listening Father. He is waiting for us to call out to him as our Abba Father (Romans 8:15-17). Because we are his children and filled with his Spirit, he listens to the groanings of our emotions too deep for words and hears them with love because of the intercession of the Holy Spirit (Romans 8:26-27).

That means our Father in heaven has given us the incredible gift of being able to pray in all seasons of life! Real... heart-level... in the trenches of despair and on the mountain tops of joy kinds of praying. And I hope just thinking about this kind of all-season prayer reality gives you as much breathtaking joy as experience my first real autumn in sixty-five years of living gave me! There is no place or time or situation that God is not available to hear your words and feel your heart's emotions in prayer.

After a year like 2020, and now dedicating ourselves to prayer for this New Year with New Hope, this is good news! The Father wants us to know he is listening, standing on tiptoe to hear from our hearts as we enter into this New Year in the shattered mess of our previous one. We have been given the gift of all-season prayer because we have a loving Father who is the all-season, grace-giving, always-listening God who loves us.


Taken from Pastor Phil Ware of verseoftheday.com

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