Moving Forward Through Prayer

Join Trey Overton, Mavric Herrera, and Sarah Howe as they reflect on Pastor Greg's Sunday sermon, continuing the Bible recap series. The church started reading the Bible chronologically together, and this sermon continued the series that dives deeper into the readings. During this episode, Trey, Mavric, and Sarah shared some insights into their reading and reflected on Greg's sermon, where he talked about the importance of prayer and its impact on your relationship with Christ. They also spent time talking about Greg's sermon on grace and how we can extend grace to others. This episode is packed and provides applicable ways believers can grow in their understanding of God's grace and how they can improve their prayer life. Trey, Mavric, and Sarah discussed different points within the reading last week, along with recapping the sermon that Greg provided on the topic. Join in and reflect with us as we discuss the sermon from First Baptist Church in Fort Smith, AR. 

Mavric Herrera - mherrera@fsfbc.org

Trey Overton - toverton@fsfbc.org

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Psalm 119.11 says that Scripture is a lamp for our feet and a light for our path. That means God gave us His Word to guide and equip us in practical ways as we walk through our everyday lives. Join us now for this episode of From Seat to Street, as our FBC staff and church members talk about how this week's Sunday morning message comes alive as we walk through the streets and moments of everyday life.

SPEAKER_04 0:29

Hey everyone, thanks for joining us. My name is Trey Overton, and I'm your host today, along with my good friend Maverick Herrera. Hello. Today we have a special guest, Miss Sarah Howe. Say hello, Sarah. Hello. She is a member here at First Baptist, and she is a part of our Chaffee plant team. So she works alongside me and Maverick out there. Um and she's been a member here at First Baptist for a while now.

SPEAKER_03 0:50

Um all my life.

SPEAKER_04 0:52

Your whole life. Okay, I didn't even know that. So that's pretty cool. Long time. Yeah. Extent. But hey. Since the nursery at First Baptist. That's pretty cool. Um, so if you need to know anything about First Baptist, it sounds like Sarah is the one to go to. So um, but she she is a blessing to work alongside at out out there at um at the Chaffee campus and is a big help, and she's been a big uh big part of the young adults' ministry too, doing some step Bible study out there. Um and anyways, so she does a lot of great things around here. Um and we're just gonna go ahead and dive straight into this. So we because we got a little bit to cover. I know that we did not do a podcast last week. Um, I had a sick kid at home and it just things didn't work out, and our schedules just didn't work out. So we're gonna try to cover, I don't know, I'm not gonna skip it. We're gonna try to cover both sermons in this podcast. So yeah, it's gonna be all packed. Yeah, so I hope everybody's packed, ready to go, got their seatbelts buckled um because we're we're jumping in. All right. So um I used driving, diet, swimming, um, yeah. So I used all that there. More than a minute and a half. All in that. That's um impressive. Anyway, so uh two weeks ago, brother Greg, we we we took communion um two Sundays ago, and he took that time to talk about the grace of God. He took that time to point to the gift of salvation through Christ. Um but he used he used a um a story in the Bible to kind of point to all of this. And if I can say the name right, it's Mephibosheth, right? So Mephibosheth. There it goes. So already, I did it once. Mephibosheth, you can't say it three times in a row. M-dog. M-dog. M-dog. Umphibosheth um was uh it's an interesting story about how David um showed grace to one of um Saul's grandkids, right? And normally this wouldn't have been done, right? All the line of the other king would have been killed and and whatever because you didn't want anything in that line to be uh take over one's kingship. But David shows grace and and even like gives him back the feels that were Saul's and all those things. And so um it's a pretty cool thing and a pretty cool picture of grace and and um it just kind of um and Greg did an awesome job of just of point using that story to point to the grace of God and the gift that is salvation through Christ. Um, and and I just want to take a second just to stop and talk about what exactly grace is. Brother Greg used it a bunch in his sermon. I mean, that's what his whole sermon was about. And I mean, the literally the title of his sermon was The Overwhelming Nature of God's Grace. Um, so let's just top for a second and let's just define that. What is grace?

SPEAKER_03 3:44

So I looked it up in the dictionary, and it says it's an attitude or willingness to grant favors or to make concessions. And that's what most people think about grace. We give grace before we eat, which is a blessing on our food. Uh sometimes our bills were given grace to pay it a little bit later, but that's not what this means. What this means is grace is God's riches at Christ's expense. And it's a totally different thing because we are given grace. And Mephibosheth was given grace because he was the grandson of Saul that was trying to kill David, and yet David honored him. He was lame, he could do nothing, he could not take care of himself, someone else had to. And we are all Mephiboshef because we can't take care of ourselves. We think we can, but we're lame, we're uh inadequate, and God has given us grace, just like Mephiboshev had grace at the king's table. He did not earn grace, he could not do anything for himself, and yet he was given grace because of who he was. And we're given grace because of who we are, which is a child of the real King Jesus, not the child of King Saul, but the child of Jesus. And that's what grace is in this story to us as Christians.

SPEAKER_04 5:26

Yeah. Yeah, I love the picture that uh that um Colossians paints of this in Colossians chapter one that says we are once uh we once belong to the domain of darkness, but we are transferred to the to the kingdom of light through this, you know, Christ. Let me let me go ahead. Actually, I'm gonna turn to that scripture um right now and just go ahead and read that.

SPEAKER_05 5:49

Um just because Again, that's a great perspective on um on grace as well, is because David also wanted to show grace to Mephibh. It's never gonna come out right. Um it's not a first try thing. Yeah, but he shows grace to Mephibosheth as also a way to honor King Saul. Because I feel like all throughout his time, you know, he had every right to go after Saul to fight back in the same way, but he always addressed him like as Lord my King, and he was always seeking ways to honor Saul. And so I also feel like there was a part of David's heart that was still, even after Saul's death, after he had won and was delivered from Saul, he still found a way to honor him through giving grace to his son. And it kind of shows it reminds us again the like how the Trinity is in a in a love story with itself, and like the the son wants to find a way to love the father and to honor the father, and the spirit wants to honor the son and the father, the father wants to love on the spirit and the son, and so it's just this beautiful image of the the perfect communion that the spirit has um with the Trinity and the Son and the Father.

SPEAKER_04 7:00

Yeah, I yeah, 100%. And I think that um when we when the picture we look at the picture of grace and and how we just we don't deserve any of it. I mean, like the Bible tells us we are we mean we're children of wrath, like we're we are um we are born into sin. Like we don't deserve anything but through God's grace, we have that, right? And and in Colossians 1, I'm just gonna read this verse. Colossians 1, 12 says, give thanks to the Father who has qualified you. Like we weren't qualified. We were we were children of wrath, right? We were children that we because of sin, like we had no inheritance, but he qualified us. It says, give thanks to the Father who qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light. And yeah, in light. In verse 13, it says, He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. And it's like we, you know, look at the pit this picture of grace, we didn't deserve it. I mean, we there's nothing about it that we deserved. Like, and I look at my life and all the sin that you know I deal with, and just like anybody else deals with, you know, because of that sin, I don't deserve it.

SPEAKER_03 8:14

And we can't earn it, we can't work for it.

SPEAKER_04 8:16

Well, there's nothing that we can do because of that. There's nothing we can do, nothing. But place our faith in the one who gives us the inheritance. And it's just it's a it's a beautiful picture. And this picture of Mephibosheth, ha, I did it. There you go. So this picture, let's see if I do it twice. This picture of Mephibosheth, ha ha. Um he it's a great picture that that David shows because he didn't have this inheritance. You know, because you know, because Saul Um did what he did and and and God took you know took away his his kingship and and gave it to David because of this, you know, Mephibosheth didn't have this inheritance, right? He lost that, he didn't have it, didn't have it, couldn't partake in. There's nothing that he could do at that point, but because David showed grace, now he could sit at his table. And that's what God does for us. And it's just a beautiful picture. How can we, you know, David showed grace here to Mephibosheth. He showed, and I'm just showing off now. But David showed grace here. How can we extend that same grace to others? Let's just, you know, practical ways that we can extend this same grace.

SPEAKER_03 9:27

I think um we show forgiveness. Um people that uh do not know the Lord are not willing to forgive. They're they like to hold grudges, they like to talk about people. And we as representatives of Jesus should be different. And we should show grace to those, the people that need grace, the ones that are hurting, the ones that um are in our path that we notice and know that there's something that needs to be done for them. But like we're talking about here, we cannot give God's grace. We can only be a reflection of God's grace, because uh God's grace required his salvation, uh, his sacrifice, his blood spilled on the cross for us, and we can't do that. It's been done once and for all, and he's the one that did it for us. So we can show a reflection, but but everyone that we know needs God's grace.

SPEAKER_04 10:36

No, I yeah, I agree. I agree.

SPEAKER_05 10:38

I think we can be um, you know, a great way to be gracious is not only in forgiveness and in because somebody owes something to us, um, but being gracious in the way of like doing something for someone even though they haven't done anything for us. You know, even though they're very undeserving of our love or our time or effort. Um, you know, maybe there's there's someone who in the family has just been nothing but cruel uh to you as ever ever since, but you still extend grace to them by showing them love, by showing them kindness and doing things for them, giving them favors, even though they don't they you don't owe them a thing. Um to me that's that's a great another another great image of grace and being just a gracious person, a person of grace. Yeah um it's not only just forgiving the debts that are owed to you, but like almost building a like a reversed debt to where um you know they don't owe you anything still, but it's like you're just you're doing things as if you owe them, you know, and you're just doing things for them as if that they are worth it, you know. And so showing that I think would be a good idea.

SPEAKER_03 11:44

Christ was a servant, yeah. And uh that's what we are also called to be. And um sometimes that's not easy. Sometimes all a lot of being a Christian is not easy, but that's what we're called to do. When we see a need or we see somebody, we are called to serve them.

SPEAKER_04 12:04

Yeah. Oh, 100%. And and we're called to take up our cross at the end of the day. I mean, and and we're we're talking about this perch perfect picture of grace that is Christ and what what he did for us. Um, and Christ calls us to pick up our cross and follow him daily. That means picking up our cross. And for those of you listening, if you've never heard that before, picking up our cross means that we die to ourselves daily, right? We pick up our cross and we follow him. We die to ourselves and we live for him. Like he is who we live for. And when we do that, we're extending grace to others because we're not putting ourselves first, we're putting them first. We're putting everybody else that we come in contact with first. Like, and that's just before ourselves. And that's what humility is. Humility is not not thinking less of ourselves, but it's thinking of ourselves less. It's it's putting ourselves in the back burner, it's it's putting them first. And that's how, I mean, as we pick up our cross and we follow Christ, that grace is going to come with it. Um, and and both of y'all kind of pointed to that, but it's it's it has nothing to do with what somebody deserves. None of us deserve grace. Nobody does. And I think another piece of that too is we we as Christians, and this is this is for those who are listening right now who are a follower of Christ, we have to stop expecting people who don't know Christ to act like they do. You know, they're not going to, right? It's not gonna be a natural, it's not natural for us as Christians to act like we know Christ, right? It's our natural, you know, we naturally want to be, we're natural sinners, right? Yeah, it's not natural, and and so uh somebody who doesn't know Christ and doesn't follow Christ for sure isn't gonna act like they know Christ, right? And so extending grace also comes with us understanding that we have to accept people where they are. We have to accept people where they are, whether they're a follower of Christ, whether they're not, we have to accept them where they are. And and it has nothing to do but what they can do, what they're doing now, or what they're going to do. It has to do deal every bit with we're serving Christ. And we're serving that person just like we're called to, just like the point you made. Like we're just we're called to serve. And it doesn't matter where they are in their life, you know, whoever it is, it's a friend, family member, acquaintance, somebody you meet, somebody you walk up on the street to, it doesn't matter. Um, we're called to serve that person.

SPEAKER_03 14:29

You know, I think forgiveness is a big part of grace. Oh, yeah. And uh one thing about forgiveness is you can forgive somebody that you feel has hurt you, but that feeling comes right back. And so you don't forgive that person who may have really hurt you deeply um once and it's done. You have to make a conscious effort to do it over and over and over because Satan's gonna bring that right back to you because when you don't forgive, he's won that battle. And our battle is for Jesus to live through us, and that's one of the ways. Just keep offering grace and forgiveness, which isn't easy. Like you said, it's not natural because we're human.

SPEAKER_04 15:19

Yeah, and I like to think of it as like a boomerang. You know, you watch those people, they take a boomerang and they throw it, and then that boomerang comes flying back at them. And you have to make the conscious decision to catch that boomerang and throw it back out there. Get rid of it again, get rid of it again. You have to let it go, you have to throw it out there, and you have to make that conscious decision over and over to not hold on to that, right? Um, and I think that's you know, that's a perfect example, just like you know, like you said, like to forgiveness is a big piece of that. Um we want to hold on to things. We do. And it's not even with a specific person, and then I'll just, you know, for me, it's sometimes it's it's um ideologies, right? Um political beliefs, um, whatever. You know, or or uh you you meet somebody, you know, who has a certain political belief or whatever, well, you just have it in your head that that person has hurt you because they believe a certain belief. Let's take abortion as one. Somebody that I firmly am against against abortion. You know, I think it's a biblical principle that you as a Christian have to understand, you know, believe in, but somebody who isn't a follower of Christ isn't gonna have that same opinion as me. And automatically when I come against them, I'm gonna have to forgive them. And it's not that they did anything wrong to me, it's not like they just intentionally hurt me. It's just this ideology, like I have to get over myself and understand that not everybody understands, believes that way, right? Um, and so I think sometimes extended grace is just there again, like you said, forgiveness. It's not always even forgiveness of somebody hurting you, it's forgiveness of um forgiveness goes way further than that. So that's a good point.

SPEAKER_03 16:59

You had asked um, what are some of the stumbling blocks that we have for for giving grace? And I think the biggest one is ourselves. Oh, yeah. That we get in the way and uh we allow ourselves to get in the way because we're proud and we want our way to be right, but that's not the way it should be. It's it's not for us to determine a lot of things. We have to give that to the Lord and know that He's gonna deal with things, but um and He gives grace to the people that you're talking about, He gives grace to us. He's a good God.

SPEAKER_04 17:38

Oh, for sure. And and I and I have to realize that I'm not the one that um throws the gavel down. You know, yeah, yeah, exactly. Thankfully, yes. I have to remember that. I'm not the one. You know, I'm I am not the one. I'm just the one that's supposed to serve. And um I have to remember that. Um so just for time's sake, we're gonna go ahead and move on to to the next uh sermon, you know. Um this sermon he he talked about grace and and hit some great great points on that. In his next sermon, this this sermon last week, he really drove home, Greg really drove home the principles of uh the importance of prayer, right? Um and he used the you know, we have that that theme for the church this year, which is forward. Um he used that theme to and in the title of this sermon in his sermon, and which is moving forward through prayer, right? Um and he said something that I think uh if if you were really listening, that it should have hit you hard, right? If you were really listening and paying attention, it should have hit you hard. Um, but he said that our our prayer life is a reflection of our relationship with Christ. Um, how is that accurate in your life?

SPEAKER_03 18:57

Um You know, so many times people will say, I'm gonna pray for you. Or on Facebook you see the prayer emoji. And so I think so many times prayer is trivialized. And when we say we're gonna pray for somebody, I had a Sunday school teacher at one point say, You're gonna forget because Satan's gonna let you forget. You stop right there and you pray for him right there. And that's a blessing to that person as well as you. But in my mind, prayer is not a to-do list for us to give God, it's not a list of what we want to ask for. It's like a relationship. And a relationship, um, just like Maverick, he was to call Hannah. He they that's how they get to know each other. They talk.

SPEAKER_02 19:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 19:54

And um that's how we are supposed to be with God. We're supposed to put a relationship with Him high, first in our life. And in doing that, we don't just sit down at night and say our prayers. It's something that's always on our mind. You know, you wake up in the morning, I take the dog out, and I say, Thank you for this beautiful day, Lord. But it's it's a continual conversation because that's what a relationship is with the Lord. And it's not just sitting down to say your prayers. Prayer is an attitude, it's the full relationship.

SPEAKER_04 20:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 20:37

Yeah. And make me think back to when Paul talks about praying without ceasing. That's exactly what he's talking about. It's like, okay, that doesn't mean you have to stop everything you're doing every day and make sure that you're talking to the Lord, but it's an awareness and a mindset that I'm I am literally walking with the Lord every day. He's right here beside me. Uh he's with us right now, and I can talk to him at any moment about what I'm facing, what I'm dealing with, my frustrations, little thoughts, you know. Um and so like I don't have to formulate my prayers. You know, that's another thing I love about understanding prayer is that I don't have to go to him with a perfect recipe of like what to say and have to just make sure I say this right so that it's actually heard and understood. It's like he just wants your heart. Um, and I can't remember exactly where it is, um but there's an illustration in the Bible where it talks about wringing out your heart. Almost like you're you're taking a rag that's soaked and uh squeezing it and twisting it. Like the Lord says to do this, to ring out your heart before the Lord, because he just wants what's in it. He just wants what's in it, so that he can deal with it with you. Um because he knows the depths of our hearts anyway. He knows exactly what we need to hear. He knows exactly the if I were to ask him, but you know, exactly how to fix this issue. He could give me the answer. But him and his wisdom, he allows us to deal with it more and to do it together.

SPEAKER_03 22:10

He wants us to ask him. He wants us to talk to him. Jay Harold Smith, who was a preacher here years ago, I wasn't here when he was, but he's a friend of the families. And um I heard him uh talk about prayer because my uncle asked him, he said, Okay, tell me about your prayer life and how do you do this? And Brother Harold says, Well, I sit down with a legal patent and I start writing. And I thought, you know, so many times when you sit down to pray, you fall asleep. But when you're sitting there, and I've done this before, don't do it near enough, but sit there with a legal pat and you write all of these down. As you're writing down, you're praying that. And uh that keeps you on track. And that um you know, you can look back at that legal pad weeks, months later and see prayers that were answered, prayers that are still going to be answered if you're praying with the Lord's concern and his will. And that's what we're supposed to do. That's what we're called to do, is pray in his will, knowing that the things that we're asking, he agrees with.

SPEAKER_04 23:22

Yeah. I think that um a big piece of that, I mean, going back to how our life is impacted by prayer, um, or even our relationship with Christ, I mean, if I go a period of time without talking to God, if I go a period of time without prayer, my body recognizes that. You know, my life is affected by that. You you know, just and this is just from personal experience, this is my testimony from it. But if I spend a uh amount of time without talking to God, I begin to become angry, anxiety will creep in. Um, I find myself being bitter. Um, I find myself desiring things of this world, um, sin creeps in. Um, all of these things are negative effects that happen when you do not spend time in prayer, period. And if you look at your life and you find yourself really high in anxiety, what's your prayer life like? If you if you are in are in a place your life where you just feel like you're bitter, how is your prayer life? Because if you're spending a good amount of time connected with Christ, um those He will take care of those things. And I'm not saying we're human. So like I'm not saying, you know, um you'll never have anxiety, you'll never have that's not what I'm saying at all. Um, but those levels definitely will go down. Um you'll you'll experience less he'll relieve that for you. Um and and those are automatic things that are reflection of my prayer life, you know, and are reflected reflection of my relationship with Christ. Um and and to your point, the more that I reflect on what he's done, you know, we've talked about that in this podcast multi multiple times, but how we can be ambassadors and and our testimony is evidence for his existence. I mean, we do the same thing in our prayer life. As we point to that, it's evidence of his existence, his working hand, his power, all of that. And then it gives us the encouragement to continue to pray more. I mean, it just it just it spirals and it's a domino effect and it goes down. And so um, and so all of that is affected by that. Um, so you brought up the legal pad thing, um, just writing something down, right? What are some other ways that practical ways that we can boost our prayer life? You know, for there's gonna be a lot of people listening now that that may just pray for a few minutes in the morning, may only pray a couple times a week or whatever, you know, that may need some help. What are some practical ways that they can boost their prayer life?

SPEAKER_03 26:01

You know, um prayer is submission to the Lord, it's submitting our desires and our needs to Him to take care of. And um part of prayer is the posture that we're praying. And if we're on our knees, we're submitting. And when we're really, really needing the Lord, we get on our knees. Yeah. Um I I mean, from personal experience, um, I don't get on my knees uh uh like I should, but uh that is a total, total submission. And uh that's where we really uh should strive to be.

SPEAKER_04 26:50

Yeah, yeah, completely submitted, I like that.

SPEAKER_05 26:53

Yeah, because what you're doing in that is you're you're you're you're taking your physical posture and aligning it with your inward posture. You know, because if we're submitting ourselves uh inwardly, then our our physical should reflect that as well. And you're just bringing your whole being into agreement with itself by by bringing in the physical aspect. Because our spirit uh and our souls are wrestling with something, and if we're sitting in the chair, you know, just like dead faced, it it can it can hinder, you know, it can it's definitely not getting in the way, blocking your prayers if you're not on your knees, but it is it it can bring you deeper, it can bring you to the depth that you're looking for uh when you're engaging your whole being that you were created for. Like you we were we were created for this, we were created to be in communion with the Lord. Um so when you bring in that physical aspect, I think it really helps. But something that also helps for me, and um, I don't know if this is too mystical or crazy or whatever, but um probably. But I mean I like to I like to see something, and so I light a candle in front of me um to remind me of the presence of the Lord, to remind me that just as just as literal as this candle is here with me and this flame, God is here with me too. Um and you know, he showed himself as a fire in the burning bush. So I really just like that imagery the most. And so I like just having a candle in front of me reminding me of the Lord's presence and its stillness. Does it have a specific scent? No, some of those are the things.

SPEAKER_03 28:24

I'll give Maverick candles for his birthday next time. There we go. There you go.

SPEAKER_05 28:28

My mom actually bought it. So it doesn't it be like cinnamon or like vanilla or something? No, it could be anything you want. Which whatever scent reminds you the most of the Lord. But um, my mom actually bought me some of these candles that burn in 30 minutes, and so that's also really helpful as a timing thing. So I don't have to have my phone on me for a timer or anything like that. I know it's gonna be 30 minutes whenever this candle's done burning. So um that's a good indication.

SPEAKER_01 28:53

Like interesting.

SPEAKER_05 28:53

Yeah, it's it's cool. It's cool.

SPEAKER_04 28:55

So it's a three-wick candle, does it give the prayer more power? Yeah, yeah. You got one of those like three-engine diameter candles, man. They're crazy. But yeah, so that's all that's pretty cool to do. Yeah, that helps me a lot. I I think uh have you ever seen the movie uh War Room?

SPEAKER_03 29:12

No.

SPEAKER_04 29:12

Yes. Okay, so like if you you need to go watch it, it's a great great movie. Um, but War Room, it kind of it gives a a I mean, this is I mean, of course, in the movie, the lady like has a closet that she has nothing in, like she cleans out this whole closet, there's no clothes or anything, and she has like post-it notes all over the wall, and she writes out her prayers and she says, you know, prayer is is, you know, we are in a spiritual battle. Sure. And prayer is how we fight this battle, right? And so we need to be, and just like colonels and everything else are strategic and battle and how they do it, our prayer life should reflect that as well. And so she has, you know, sticky notes and all this stuff over the walls, where how like specific prayers and specific things that she's been being praying, praying for so that the you know she can fight this battle, right? And it gives this and it does a cut, but but the thing I wanted to bring out on all that is that um there's there's two important things that this points to. Number one is that she puts away all distractions. So by like by clearing out this closet and and getting in here into a quiet place behind a closed door, she puts away all distractions. Um and for me right now that's tough because you know I've got two kids running around. I got a little three, you know, my my three-year-old Noah, he gets up at five o'clock in the morning, every morning, and he's just like, you know, it used to be great, he'd sleep in. No, he doesn't sleep in anymore. He gets up at five o'clock. So if I want to beat him and get up and have quiet time in the morning, I gotta get up at like four, which does not happen. So um I have to understand a yeah. So I have to be strategic about my time to get quiet. But um dependent on where, and I say all that say this, like depending on where you are in life, that could be more difficult than worse others are, you know. Um, but however that looks for you, if that means like whenever you get to work um and you're still in your vehicle, shut the radio off, your doors are shut, like spend a few minutes there and quiet. Like put your phone on silent, throw it in the seat, like give yourself some time to sit there alone, um, away from all distractions, put the phone away, everything, um, and give God your undivided attention. I think we'd be surprised, and this is me. Um, whenever I would spend time in prayer, I would have, you know, if my phone's in my pocket and it vibrates, maybe I'm not actually looking at it, but I felt it vibrate and it's got my attention then. Sure. You know, right. So, or my watch. My, you know, you don't even think about it like that's my my smartwatch, it all of a sudden vibrates. Well, now I'm looking at it, you know, and so every little thing pulls your attention away from what you're doing. And that's what, you know, the devil tries to do with getting us busy. So our in our prayer life, if we just put away all distractions, when you sit down and you talk to God, put away the phone, put it where you're not going to hear it, feel it vibrate, put the watch away, whatever it is that could pull your attention, and you would be surprised, like shocked on how much that little thing will affect your prayer life. To to not have anything pulling your mind away to you talked about falling asleep, like that it's a thing. Like you we have, but but coming to God and giving him our undivided attention um will affect how you know there again, how you pray, when you pray, what you pray, it will affect affect all of those things. Um the other thing that's that that that that did, you know, in that movie War Room, where she goes in there, she was very specific about her prayers. Um there again, she said in the movie, you know, we're in a spiritual battle and we have to take this battle seriously. Like it's a thing. You know, we have this book of Ephesians, you look at chapter five and six, and all of a sudden we're warriors putting on armor, right? So um we have to be strategic about how we pray, and in order to do that, we need to be specific. You know, um when we you made the point that we need to be praying for God's will. Right always. We need to be praying that God's will be done in our lives. What we need to be strategic on is and line, you know, God, line my heart up with yours. God, I don't just want your will to be done. I want my heart to desire your will and be in line with whatever your will is. Like so, whenever that happens, we're in tune and all of that lines up, right? And so everything that we do, everything that we pray, it's you know, if I sit down and I nonchalantly just have a blanket conversation with God, you know, it's it will be so much more effective if we sit down and we be be specific and strategic on how we pray so that God's will is not only done, because God's will is going to be done regardless. His will is gonna prevail.

SPEAKER_03 33:51

But we want to be a part of it.

SPEAKER_04 33:52

We want to be a part of it, we want to be in line with it, and we want to understand it, right? Right. And we want to and we want to be there while he's working. God, show me where you're working. God, show me what you're doing. God, put me in front of that person that you're dealing with their heart. And and the more that we do that, and the more that we're strategically praying those things, the more God's going to move in in such unbelievable ways. And so those are two big things, I think, when when when Greg started talking about prayer, that we can do put away the distractions, get in quiet, and then be strategic. You know, I think those are those are two big things. And if you're somebody that struggles right now, if you're like me and you've got kids running around the house and you're like, man, when am I going to find quiet time? It doesn't matter. The biggest thing is that it's not about it's about quality over quantity. I will say that. So if you only have three minutes to sit in your truck and quiet before you go into work, take that three minutes and shut it all off and give God that undivided attention. If all you've got is is 30 minutes after you put the kids to go to bed before you really need to go to bed and get some sleep, put the kids to bed, go in there, shut a door, get in quiet. Like it's all about quality. Get yourself an undivided attention with God and be strategic about your prayer. Um, I also want to just hit on this, we're running out of time, but I want to hit on this briefly. Greg made a point about how it's important to um believe what we pray. Let's talk about that for a minute. I mean, how important is it that we do that?

SPEAKER_03 35:28

Well, very important. Um, if we don't believe what we're praying, it's just idle words. And um as humans, we don't get it all. We can't get it all. And so, you know, my question when you asked that, I thought, well, do we really believe everything? And we want to, but we fall short. And uh the verse that came to my mind was the one in Mark 9, and it was the man that brought his um son that was um demon-possessed, and he asked him to heal the son, and Jesus said, Do you believe? And he said, Help my unbelief. And I think that's where we all are. We cannot completely believe because we cannot understand completely, but we have to strive to. And the Lord can help us believe more. Um yes, we have to believe what we pray, but we don't know how to pray exactly.

SPEAKER_04 36:35

Yeah, right. Well, and I think that's in that's why it's important too to to really spend time reflecting and being and how you can be strategic in your prayer. Because, and you made the point in the beginning when we started talking about this about the notebook, but when you keep that notebook and you begin to look over the answer prayer that God's done, the evidence is overwhelming. The evidence will will cause your belief, your unbelief to turn and to to understand his power, his hand, his his oversight, all of those things. Um, but you're right. I mean, it it it's it's so hard to even comprehend it.

SPEAKER_03 37:14

Like to understand like we're we have finite minds and God's everywhere, infinite. And that's we just don't have the luxury of understanding everything. But if we can trust him, that he understands everything and pray uh in his power and in his will, then um that's where we're supposed to be. He wants us to ask, he wants us to talk to him as a child talks to their father. Yeah. So that's that's important that we believe not just believe what we're praying, but that we believe in him.

SPEAKER_05 37:57

And Jesus says time and time again, I've I went up and looked to make sure, but um yeah, twice. Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it and it will be yours. Um and then again in Matthew, he says, and whatever you ask, ask in prayer, you will receive if you have faith. And so like both those ways, he's saying, like, also believe that you will receive it. That's right. You know, like how do we do that? That's that's always been the hard part for me. He says even at the same time, I must receive. Yeah. At the same time, I want to be, you know, we all want to be, I want to be realistic. I want to be, you know, like I need to be asking these things in uh with in like a manageable amount, you know. I don't want to overwhelm God. I don't want to give him too much to handle, you know, we gotta make it reasonable. Um but man, he says right there, like you have to believe that either well well for one, you know, we said aligning your heart with the Lord's. And so if you're asking for his will, like it's going to be given to you. And so you have to believe and have the confidence that you know your God and you have to you know who you're talking to, you know his character. And so when you're asking things in accordance with his character, like you can believe that those things are gonna come, that those are things that will you will receive those things. And so um I think for me a real struggle has been praying emboldened in faith, knowing that my God is going to at least answer. Um, and maybe not in the way that I'm looking at it. That's what I was gonna say.

SPEAKER_03 39:24

We may not understand how he answers it, yeah, but we have to have faith that he knows the best way to answer it. Yeah, I mean, for instance, um a friend that uh dying of cancer. And we pray for healing, we pray for and the Lord is going to heal, but it may not be in this lifetime. Right. And as I said, we have finite minds. We can't see the full picture, but he can, and he knows what's right for us, and we have to believe that.

SPEAKER_04 39:57

Well, I think that and there again, we sometimes we pray just with our our our perspective in mind, you know, like we're we're praying from our spec per perspective, and as we pray for God's, and this is your to your point, Maverick, um, as we pray for our will or God's will to be in line with our will and for our hearts to align, as that happens, our prayers will change, and it won't be about what we can get. It's not about it, won't be about what God can do for us. It's about how can we work with God to accomplish his purpose. That's what all of our prayers will be in line with that. As as our hearts align, as our wills align, and all that, that's what it'll be about. And when we're praying healing over somebody, it's not because they'll gonna get up and walk. It's gonna be so that God's power is shown and so that his glory is shown. And so, and then we're also praying, you know, and then it's also gonna be so that that person is served to the will of God and and and all of those things, and it's not about anything else, yeah. Right. And so um I think all of that will change and our perspective change. It's it's not about whether we believe God can do it, it's about our hearts aligning with his and recognizing the power of the Holy Spirit. I mean, and it really comes down to that.

SPEAKER_03 41:14

I think a lot of times people pray things um and then they say, Oh, the Lord has blessed me in this or blessed me with that. And generally they're material things or maybe relationships, uh, and that's all good. But I was listening to a sermon on the uh internet not long ago, and uh when we pray those things, when we think the Lord has blessed me so much, those aren't his blessings. His blessings are that he is with us through all of it. It's not that he got us out of it, it's that he was with us.

SPEAKER_02 41:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 41:56

And that we can depend on him and um he's he's gonna carry us through situations.

SPEAKER_04 42:04

That's the blessing. And that he chose somebody like me to show his power, and that he chose somebody like me to show his presence, that he chose somebody like me to to fulfill his purpose. Like that's that's the blessing. I mean, that's it. Yeah, like and how awesome is that? Like, who would want anything else? I mean, when you experience that, you don't want anything else. Yeah, you know, um, but anyways, we we we run out of time. So um, I just want to close with that. And and I think um I think if I just want to close with this. If if you're struggling with your prayer life, or you Craig said, you know, he made that comment about the reflection of your relationship with him as you know, prayer is a reflection of that. Um if you're struggling with that, um, and you have any questions or you want advice about your prayer life or anything like that, our emails are in the in the bio. So me and Mavericks, um, just reach out, ask any questions if you're curious about something or whatever, or you need prayer. Maybe you need help within that area, um, just give us, reach out. We'd love to connect with you. We'd love to help you. We'd love to pray over you and all of those things. We appreciate everybody for listening. If you haven't joined, you haven't um come visit us at the Chaffee Campus or downtown. I encourage you to do that as well. Um, and um once again, thank you for listening. We are out later.

SPEAKER_00 43:26

Thank you for joining us for this week's From Seat to Street Conversation. This podcast is the Ministry of First Baptist Church, Fort Smith. As a reminder, you can always listen to each of the messages we discussed here on our chapter and first sermon podcast each week. Thank you for listening.