HOW ARE YOU PRAYING?

By: Shade’ Brunson

Matthew 6:5-13 (New International Version)

Prayer

⁵“And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. ⁶But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. ⁷And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. ⁸Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.

⁹“This, then, is how you should pray:
” ‘Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
¹⁰your kingdom come,
your will be done
on earth as it is in heaven.
¹¹Give us today our daily bread.
¹²Forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.
¹³And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from the evil one.^[a]‘

Times in this world are getting harder.  People are losing their jobs, homes, and families left and right.  With times getting harder, you may ask how on earth are we ever to survive?  Well, I have the answer for you.  It is called prayer. Prayer, (Grk: proseuchomai, pronounced pros-yoo’-ka-my), means to pray to God, supplicate, worship, make prayer, or commune with God.  It is through prayer that we establish a relationship with God.

Matthew 6 is a good scripture that is the foundation for learning how to pray.  It was a scripture that Jesus used to teach the disciples how to pray.  It  teaches us that as we pray to God, we should enter the prayer with praise, ask God to allow his will to be done, ask him to forgive us for our sins and for others, to help us flee from temptations, and to finish the prayer with praise and thanksgiving.  God loves doing things for his children.  By starting our prayer with a little praise, it sets the atmosphere for Him to bless us.  Praise is incense to his nostrils.  Secondly, we constantly need to ask God for forgiveness, and to teach us how to forgive others.  It is in prayer that we can do this.  In order for God to forgive us, and our prayer to be effective, we need to have things in right standing with one another.  We can’t come to God asking him to bless us if we have bitterness in our hearts against our brother or sister.  Thirdly, the scripture teaches us to pray to God for protection, and to help us resist the devil’s temptations.  God gives us the power, especially in our prayer to resist the devil.  The enemy has to flee, when we command him to go in Jesus’ name.  Lastly, after we have prayed, we need to thank God for who He is, and for what he has done.  We need to offer Him praise to complete the prayer.

There are many ways to pray to God such: worship, confession, thanksgiving and others.  Many people believe that when praying to the Father, you have to sound very proper and approach Him with a “holy thou art attitude in order for him to listen.  This is not true.  God wants us to be genuine and sincere when we pray.  How do you talk to your best friend?  I hope that you can talk to them in a down to earth manner, and not an uptight one.  Just as you would be comfortable talking to your best friend, God wants the same through prayer.  It is all about relationship with God.  Of course, we need to reverence God and respect Him when we pray, but still be real at the same time, expressing our true feelings and emotions.  A great man of God in the bible who can teach us how to pray is David.  David was a man after God’s own heart.  He messed up at times, but knew how to pray to God for forgiveness and comfort.  A great example of his prayer can be found in Psalms 141:

Psalm 141

A psalm of David.

¹ O LORD, I call to you; come quickly to me.
Hear my voice when I call to you.

² May my prayer be set before you like incense;
may the lifting up of my hands be like the evening sacrifice.

³ Set a guard over my mouth, O LORD;
keep watch over the door of my lips.

⁴ Let not my heart be drawn to what is evil,
to take part in wicked deeds
with men who are evildoers;
let me not eat of their delicacies.

⁵ Let a righteous man ^[a] strike me—it is a kindness;
let him rebuke me—it is oil on my head.
My head will not refuse it.
Yet my prayer is ever against the deeds of evildoers;

⁶ their rulers will be thrown down from the cliffs,
and the wicked will learn that my words were well spoken.

⁷ They will say, “As one plows and breaks up the earth,
so our bones have been scattered at the mouth of the grave. ^[b] “

⁸ But my eyes are fixed on you, O Sovereign LORD;
in you I take refuge—do not give me over to death.

⁹ Keep me from the snares they have laid for me,
from the traps set by evildoers.

¹⁰ Let the wicked fall into their own nets,
while I pass by in safety.

In this devotion, I have summed up what prayer is and how to pray effectively.  If any of part of this devotion has touched your life in any way, and you feel that you need prayer.  Please pray this simple prayer below:

Dear Heavenly Father,

I thank you for this day.  I thank you for your love, grace, and favor.  Lord, I realize that I haven’t been praying as much as I should, and would love if you would teach me how to pray.  Please help me to be genuine in my prayer life.  Help me to pray like David.  Please forgive me Father for any sins that I may have committed, and please teach me how to live my life according to your will.

In Jesus’ name,

Amen

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Wait

By: Shade’ Brunson

Isaiah 40:31 states,
“But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength;
they shall mount up with wings as EAGLES they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint”

So many of us have been praying to God asking for him to do something in our lives, and are becoming frustrated because it feels like prayers are going unheard. The truth is, God hears your prayers and he is working on your behalf. He just wants you to WAIT like the scripture says above. Waiting doesn’t mean sitting around doing nothing. Waiting means having faith and continue living your everyday lives trusting God that what you have been praying for will come to past. You have to trust God, but also be preparing and making room for that blessing. For example, if it is a new home you want, you have to prepare by making sure your money is right.  You have to go out looking for that home you want claiming that it will be yours. If it is healing you want, you have to prepare your body for healing by eating right, working out right, and claiming that healing will come to past. As you speak it, believe it without any doubt, because doubt will cancel out the blessing.

If it is a new relationship you want, you need to be preparing yourself first making sure that everything you want in your mate, you have already within yourselves. If you are praying for a husband or wife that is in shape, you need to be getting yourself in shape. If you want your mate to be financially stable, you need to be preparing yourself to be financially stable. This is all part of the waiting process. As you wait and are making the necessary steps that show you have faith, God will intercede and bless you. As you are waiting, you also need to get your mindset right. Having a negative thought life will not be profitable for the next stage of blessing that you are about to enter. God will not bless negative people. He wants people who are faithful and doubtless. I pray that this message brings light to some of the things you may be dealing with. God has been speaking these things to me and wants 2010 to be the best year yet, but he needs his people to corporate and trust him.

I found this poem on the internet by Russel Kelfer that sums up a little of what God has been speaking to me. I love you all and have a blessed day

Wait

by Russell Kelfer

Desperately, helplessly, longingly, I cried; Quietly, patiently, lovingly, God replied. I pled and I wept for a clue to my fate…and the Master so gently said, “Wait.”

“Wait? You say wait?” my indignant reply. “Lord, I need answers, I need to know why! Is Your hand shortened? Or have You not heard? By faith I have asked, and I’m claiming Your word.

My future and all to which I relate hangs in the balance and You tell me to “Wait?” I’m needing a ‘yes’, a go-ahead sign. Or even a ‘no’, to which I’ll resign.

You promised, dear Lord, that if we believe, We need but to ask, and we shall receive. Lord, I’ve been asking, and this is my cry: I’m weary of asking! I need a reply.

Then quietly, softly, I learned of my fate as my Master replied again, “Wait.” So I slumped in my chair, defeated and taut, and grumbled to God, “So, I’m waiting…for what?”

He seemed then to kneel, and His eyes met with mine…and He tenderly said, “I could give you a sign. I could shake the heavens and darken the sun. I could raise the dead and cause mountains to run.

I could give all you seek and pleased you would be. You’d have what you want, but you wouldn’t know Me. You’d not know the depth of My love for each saint. You’d not know the Power that I give to the faint.

You’d not learn to see through the clouds of despair; you’d not learn to trust just by knowing I’m there. You’d not know the joy of resting in Me when darkness and silence are all you can see.

You’d never experience the fullness of love when the peace of My spirit descends like a dove. You would know that I give, and I save, for a start, but you’d not know the depth of the beat of My heart.

The glow of My comfort late into the night, the faith that I give when you walk without sight. The depth that’s beyond getting just what you ask from an infinite God who makes what you have last.

You’d never know should your pain quickly flee, what it means that My grace is sufficient for thee. Yes, your dearest dreams overnight would come true, but oh, the loss if I lost what I’m doing in you.

So, be silent, my child, and in time you will see that the greatest of gifts is to truly know Me. And though oft My answers seem terribly late, My most precious answer of all is still ‘WAIT’.”

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THE RIGHT ONE

This was very inspirational to me. It has made me want to wait for the absolute best that God has called me to have. I pray that those of you who are single and are waiting for the right one, please don’t faint. God will send the right one in due season and his timing. Please be patient, because it is worth it I pray that God will bless each of you with that right one. Remember, if you are single, Jesus can be your Right one in your life right now. Enjoy

THE RIGHT ONE

First we must allow our Heavenly Father to do the picking. And second,
the decision for a mate must be made on a spiritual and intellectual basis before
it’s made on an emotional one.

“What about love? Shouldn’t that be the third? you ask. No, and I’ll tell you why.
“The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?
(Jeremiah 17:9).

The heart is willful and is driven by its own agenda. It does not consider things
rationally and intelligently it just loves to love! Therefore you have to point it
in the right direction: “Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring
of life” (Proverbs 4:23).

Whenever you meet a man, you need to get clearance from God, check out his
attributes, and then allow your heart to engage.

Dating exists not for mating; it exists for collecting data. I believe that the
biblical design would be friendship, courtship and then marriage.

Friendship is two people walking together in agreement and accountability, learning
and growing together.

Courtship follows the mutual agreement to commit to one another exclusively – it is
the decisive turning toward the agreed-upon goal of the marriage altar. It is a
period of laying a foundation and preparing your life together after marriage.

But dating? Well, if you do date, use the time wisely to gather these facts.

1. Check out the fabric. Is the person mate material? Does this man have an intimate
relationship with the Father through Jesus Christ? Does he care what God thinks
about his behavior? Is he accountable to God as well as another co-laborer in the
faith? Accountability is an important factor. It is imperative to maintaining a
committed relationship. Is your potential spouse a member of the same family – the
family of God?

You need to have common interests and values and agree on the essentials of living
day to day. You have a similar spiritual walk. You eat the same spiritual diet. You
enjoy a lot of similar things. You have like interests, like goals in life, like
opinions on basic life issues.

You have had like experiences in your background. Though there is some truth to the
idiom that opposites attract, like-minded folks fare better together.

Furthermore, does he want to get married? If you want to be married and your
dreamboat isn’t interested, don’t waste your time.

Remember, women fall in love and get married. Men decide to get married
and then look for a wife. Note the difference in order. So if a guy says he’s not
looking for anything serious, take his words seriously. If he’s not going in your
direction, get off the bus and wait for the right one.

2. Does this man want you? Is he pursuing you? The man who is right for you will
pursue you, and God’s hand in the relationship will be clear. No guessing, no
fleeces, no dead ends.

Scripture says: “He who finds a wife finds what is good and receives favor from the
Lord” (Proverbs 18:22).

Note -who finds whom? THE MAN FINDS THE WIFE. From the beginning of time, God has
transported men and women across the world in order to put them together.

At the RIGHT TIME, He will bring that man on the scene and he will find
you.? In God’s perfect design, the man is the one who recognizes his mate. Adam has
no problem recognizing that Eve was his missing rib. You do not need to
strategically place yourself anywhere You don’t have to help a guy out because he’s
shy!

Men will do whatever they have to do to get what they truly want. The man in your
life should recognize you as the pearl of great price in his life and be willing to
do whatever he must in order to gain your hand. If he is passive about gaining your
affections, take it as a sign that he is not interested.

Many a woman’s mother has suggested that it is a good idea to marry a man who loves
you more than you love him. As cold as that sounds, it actually might be scriptural
if you stop to think about it: “We love him because he first loved us” (1 John
4:19). Until then, take the ultimate chill pill. You don’t need a bunch of men in
your life to make you feel all right about yourself.

You need only one man – your man, the one God has selected to select you? And trust
me, the right man at the wrong time can be just as awful as the wrong man at any
time. So trust God’s timing in this. He is the ultimate matchmaker.

?Relax, sit pretty and allow yourself to be found. Again – WAIT until the man voices
his intentions. He should take the lead in establishing the relationship. You may
have an inkling that he is the one, but God will use the man to set the tone of the
relationship. Allow him the opportunity to woo you – this is your first
act of submission. Jesus set the standard for all men to follow. They should love us
first. And they should lead the relationship.

3. The man in your life should not desire to move into your house, only into your
heart. A man who prepares for your future has made his intentions clear. A man who
is husband material has the means to take care of a wife. He is a responsible human
being who understands he needs to have something to offer. In short, a man should
have the means to be a suitable lover for you

4. Check out his buddies. Everyone knows birds of the same feather flock together,
yet most women fail to see the connection between a man and his friends. A man’s
pals tell you a lot about the person that you haven’t seen yet. They reveal things
about the guy’s character that might be hidden when he is on good behavior. Everyone
knows how to put his best foot forward. Don’t stay focused on the foot, check out
the rest of the body!

5. Check out his relationship with his mother. How does he treat her? This is your
preview of how he will treat you. There are lots of men who, because of a negative
relationship with their mothers, really don’t like women, yet say they do.?
Unresolved issues between mother and son continue between husband and wife.

6. Remember that a man’s family reveals the cloth from which he’s cut. Take note and
decide whether you want your future with the man in your life to look like his
present family situation.

7. Check out the patterns of his life. Do you see repeated cycles of drama in his
personal kingdom? Broken relationships? Problems in making commitments –including
the job market? Mood swings? Is a problem always someone else’s fault? Does he
embrace responsibility or shirk it? Does he keep his promises? Is he a man of good
reputation? Remember all garments look wonderful hanging in the store, but with
wear, some begin to unravel.? Give yourself time and space to check out the man in
your life. Time will always reveal whether or not he is made of the right stuff

8. Does this man have a vision for his life? Is he running with that
vision?Remember, God decided Adam needed help once Adam got busy DOING his
assignment. As we saw Adam, a man doesn’t need help until he is busy doing what he
was created and called to do. Is the man in your life guided by sense of destiny and
purpose, or does he just allow life to happen around him? A man who is not certain
of his mission can be a most miserable person – and you’ll be miserable too if you
know where YOU want to go in life.

A man who has vision is not intimidated by a woman whose mission statement is clear.
He will be your best ally, cheerleader and assistant because he wants you both to
make it! A man who cannot be supportive of your achievements because he is
floundering in a sea of uncertainty over his own life is not a healthy partner to
have and to hold forever.

Creating dependencies or feelings of obligation is not the way to get the best out
of your man. Somewhere along the way, he will resent you and flee from the
smothering burden of obligation he associates you with. You want a man who is firmly
anchored in his identity in Christ.

Remember, we are looking for a man who will be priest and leader of his home. His
first instinct should be to want to cover you, redeem you, and provide for you. Your
job is to decide if this is the man God has ordained for you to complement.

9. Complimentary. Do your talents and gifts complement his? Do his gifts, compliment
yours? What about your temperaments? Do you see the two of you as an effective team
capable of bringing blessing to the lives of those around you? Do? your futures
mesh? Can you coordinate your gifts in an attractive and effective way?

This is why knowing your purpose is so important. Make sure your hearts beat for
mutual causes. When I go shopping I always consider the fabric, the fit and what I
already have in my closet. Will my next purchase be a complimentary addition to what
I already have? If I find that I am going to have to buy shoes and matching
accessories to go with a new outfit, I leave it right on the rack. It is too
expensive a proposition. . If the man you meet makes you feel that you need to
completely reinvent yourself, something is wrong

This is where I ask you to consider the relationship in terms of cost. Is this
relationship expensive spiritually, emotional or physically? Does your longing for a
mate make you willing to forfeit who you are in the process? Or does he see you as
the gift that you are? The man in your life should consider you a rare find, a
priceless jewel-because of you he is getting ready to get blessed big-time! Any
relationship that causes you to feel unworthy, unlovely, unacceptable, undesirable
or that you have to work for love, is too expensive!

God has called the man to cover, protect and provide not only materially for a
woman, but emotionally and spiritually as well. You should be richer in mind, body
and spirit for your union with the man of your dreams. The man in your life should
make rich deposits into your heart and spirit, not withdrawals.

10. Does he have a healthy love and acceptance of himself? Make sure the man in your
life has taken time to heal from past relationships and has made peace with himself.
How he cares for himself is how he will care for you.

A man’s relationship with God is crucial here.. His love for himself will only be as
strong as his love for God. This is not something that you can impart. You cannot be
his savior or teacher. That is out of spiritual order. In his rightful place as your
personal priest, he should be leading you to a richer relationship with Christ

If he is causing you to compromise your faith and destabilize your walk,if he is
leading you into sexual sin or causing you? to be distracted from your commitment to
God, the relationship is too expensive. Offending the Lover of your soul, who
promises you eternal love, is too high a fare to pay for a ride that has a limited
run. If you and your man can’t soar in the Spirit, when the force of your love for
another is tested by the pull or gravity of the world, your union will not be able
to survive.

So you decide. How much is your life worth? How much is your love worth?You will be
able to accept only what you believe you deserve. God himself calculated the worth
of your love and decided it was worth His life. He now pledges you His love for
eternity. Yes, Jesus sets the example for all others to follow when He paid a ransom
for His bride. Should you expect less from a mortal man? Throughout the Biblical
age, men were willing to pay the cost for what they truly desired. The truth of the
matter is, everyone knows that anything worth having, costs and no one gets a ride
in this life for free.

Our Prayer:

Dear Heavenly Father,
I confess that I have not always been as careful as I should’ve been with my heart.
From time to time, my desire for love has caused me to leave my heart in the wrong
hands. I now commit my heart into Your hands for safekeeping.

Please help me to stop being so impulsive with what you deem so precious. As I learn
to celebrate Your love for me, let me learn from Your example what a bridegroom
should really be like. Help me to never settle? for less than what you desire for me
As I embrace You as the Lover of my soul, keep my affections in the haven of Your
own heart. As I rest in Your love, make me more discriminating of those who approach
me.

I ask that You take over this area of my life.. Keep me from those You know would
hurt my heart. I invite You to set a hedge around me and keep me from all who would
draw me into unfruitful relationships until the day you present me to the mate that
You have selected for me.. Grant me the discernment to recognize him as he
recognizes me. Cleanse me from the temptation to typecast the men I meet according
to what I see. Help me to trust in Your knowledge and lean not on my own
understanding. I know that You know what is best for me; therefore I yield to Your
choice. In Jesus Name. Amen.

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Deuteronomy 28 (New International Version)

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I’m Too Blessed To Be Stressed,
Too Anointed To Be Disappointed

I refuse to be discouraged,
to be sad or to cry.
I refuse to be downhearted
and here’s the reason why:

I have a God who is almighty;
who is sovereign and supreme;
I have a God who loves me,
and I am on His team.

He is all wise and powerful;
Jesus is His Name;
though everything else is changeable,
My God remains the same.

I refuse to be defeated!
My eyes are on my GOD!
He has promised to be with me,
as through this life I trod.

I am looking past my circumstances,
to Heaven’s throne above.
My prayers have reached the heart of God.
I am resting in His Love.

I give thanks to Him in everything.
My eyes are on His face.
The battle is His; the victory is mine;
He will help me win the race!

I repeat, “I’M TOO BLESSED TO BE STRESSED!

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I just wanted to say hi to everyone.  I personally want to thank everyone for visiting  Be Inspired, and pray that it will be a blessing to you.  I am excited to be apart of this ministy.  I love each and everyone of you, but most importantly, Jesus Loves You.  Have a victorious day in the Lord. 

Love,

Shade’

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