CrossPoint Community News 1/6/2023

Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

       Welcome to 2023! Last year may not have ended the way you wanted, but the Lord is still faithful and just. He is still at work in your life blessing you and providing opportunities for you to be a blessing. But more on that in another update.
       Today, we consider how we are doing with the practice of prayer. We have every reason to expect our Father in Heaven to give us the best gift – Himself (cf. Luke 11:11-13). But in giving us the best gift, we also can expect to obtain all other things needful for life, joy, love, peace, etc. The question is, do you expect our Father in Heaven to give good gifts.
       There are reasons you might have to suspect that our Father in Heaven will not provide what is right and good. Perhaps your circumstances have been difficult or traumatic. Our life experiences are fraught with problems due to sin, but they don’t change God’s character. Our Father is eager to hear and answer our prayers, so long as we are not harboring sin (cf. Prov. 15:8, 9, 29). Perhaps you don’t know God well. You think wrongly about God. Or you think of prayer as a chore to be suffered through rather than an opportunity to talk with your loving Father.
       For all of these problems, we need the help of God himself, in the personal presence and power of God the Holy Spirit. Andrew Murray, in “With Christ in the School of Prayer”, explains that the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of:
1. Grace (Heb. 10:29), who reveals and imparts all of the grace there is in Jesus
2. Faith (2 Cor. 4:13), who teaches us to begin, go on, and increase in believing
3. Adoption (Rom. 8:15) and assurance (1 Thess. 1:5) who witness that we are God’s children and inspires our confiding in Him and our confident “Abba, Father”
4. Truth (John 14:17, 15:26, 16:13; 1 John 4:6) who leads us to accept each word of God in truth
5. Prayer (cf. Rom. 8:26, Eph. 2:2, 6:18) through whom we speak with the Father so that we may be heard.
6. Judgment (Is. 4:4, 28:6; John 16:8-11) who searches out hearts and convicts us of sin
7. Holiness (Rom. 1:4) who manifests and communicates the Father’s holy presence within us.
8. Power (Luke 24:49, Acts 1:8) who makes us testify boldly and work effectively in the Father’s service
9. Glory (1 Peter 4:14), who is the pledge of our inheritance and prepares us for the glory to come.
Which of the above (if not all of them!) do you need in 2023?

       Please continue to pray for the nation of Ukraine. Here is a suggested list of prayers if you are at a loss for words in how to pray: https://send.org/story/hh_pray_for_ukraine. Thank you for kneeling on behalf of the people of Ukraine and Russia, and taking a stand (or a knee in prayer) against the forces of darkness in this present age.
       Finally, I will be out of town this weekend attending a funeral for a family member. God Bless richly you as you encounter him this weekend!