Prayer

A testimony from Cassie Sasser:

Oh give thanks to the LORD, for he is good,
for his steadfast love endures forever! 
Let the redeemed of the LORD say so, 
whom he has redeemed from trouble. (Ps 107:1-2)

Each time Phil and I venture out it is an adventure. We have learned to try to be prepared for a myriad of things that might happen. Our most essential preparation is prayer.

On April 18th, we were on our way to our grandson August’s baseball game. We were already late because we had first gone to the wrong field.…

Yesterday (Saturday, January 14, 2023) I participated in the MLK Unity March in downtown Apex. It began at the historic Apex First Baptist Church on Salem St. and then proceeded through the downtown to the Apex Town Hall. This is the third year of the event, and in each of the celebrations I have offered one of the prayers. It has been a great representation of the city's government (Mayor Jacques Gilbert, Police Chief Jason Armstrong), local pastors, and Christians from various churches. I continue to be encouraged by the direction of the event. 

This is the prayer I spoke: 

Daniel did a great job on May 22nd in his sermon titled, "A Heart for God Among the Nations." He discussed what it meant to be a "world Christian". This is a believer with a heart for the gospel to go into all the nations. One of the ways that we can cultivate that type of heart for the nations is through prayer.

Jesus told us to pray that his kingdom would come on earth as it is in heaven. It should be our heart's desire for that to take place throughout the world. As we pray for…

On the night before D-Day, June 6, 1944, Dwight D. Eisenhower distributed a message to the troops involved in the invasion:

You are about to embark upon the Great Crusade, toward which we have striven these many months. The eyes of the world are upon you. The hope and prayers of liberty-loving people everywhere march with you. In company with our brave Allies and brothers-in-arms on other Fronts, you will bring about the destruction of the German war machine, the elimination of Nazi tyranny over the oppressed peoples of Europe, and security for ourselves in a free world….I have…

This coming church year one of the areas that the elders want the church to focus on is the area of corporate prayer. That’s why we’ve set aside quarterly times for the whole church to gather and pray (the first one is Aug 26th). We can also pray together in our home groups and in our homes. How often our devotional prayers are characterized by coldness or unbelief or just going through the motions. Praying with others is often a means of grace in that we are called to be more engaged more alert and more in faith than when we are praying by ourselves.

Our God is a God who answers prayer. Sometimes He says, "Yes, immediately," like He did with my hearing. But, sometimes He says, "No." And sometimes He says, "Wait, be patient. Trust my way, my timing." Yet I can still say, "Praise God," even then because I have learned that somehow the slower healing process, and even the "no's", are for His glory and for my good as I have seen again and again with the PTSD. Our God is a God who hears our cries and answers our prayers, always.

Here is the 7-day prayer guide we distributed last Sunday as part of Sanctity of Life Sunday. Contact Daniel Baker if you would be willing to (1) help organize or (2) participate in pro-life activities that our church does.

Mark Prater posted on the SG website the need for prayer as Hurricane Matthew makes its way to us. In particular he mentioned Cedric Moss, one of our SG pastors whose church is in Nassau in the Bahamas. Cedric told Mark that “Matthew is a most unusual hurricane. With other hurricanes, we’ve had a mixture of hurricane and tropical storm impact, but when you look at the forecast map, the entire Bahamas is in the red, meaning hurricane force winds. And Matthew is a Major Hurricane, with winds exceeding 110 mph.”

Cedric's prayer requests include:

Completing the Ugandan side of Josie’s adoption took just over five weeks. Eli and Esther returned to the U.S. after two weeks, and God taught me so much in the remaining three weeks about what it means for His strength to be made perfect in my weakness; His grace was completely sufficient for me - and for the rest of my family (2 Cor 12:9).

The rest of this story moves so much faster than the beginning, but now that I have the benefit of hindsight, I am clearly able to see God’s hand in the waiting.