Blogging is SCARY!!!!

My husband Shawn actually was the one who brought this to my attention, He said, “That is so great that now you are blogging! Everyone gets to see you spiritually naked as they read about your prayer life.” “AAAAAHHHHHHHH!” No other words can describe how I felt. A friend was sharing with me that she read the blog so far and it was what people needed, something tangible and honest about prayer, something specific. I told her that it was so embarrassing that she read the blog. I shared how I am scared everyday of this prayer ministry thing. I shared that I have this very real fear of man. I am always thinking, “What will others think of me if I say or do this? I am not as spiritual or as qualified as they are. I need to learn from them, who am I? I’m no one. Please make me invisible God, don’t tell me I have to get on stage and speak about what is going on with prayer AGAIN!!” But I also have this very real fear of God that is greater than the fear of man so I force myself to be obedient. I know 1st hand of what it feels like to put yourself out there, of how nonspiritual you really are in your walk with God. Like when my relationship is slipping with God and needs to be more, that I need to make more time for intimacy with Him, I need to include Him in everything, that I left Him out and was of in the midst of ungodliness… then He reminds me that He is still there and He wants to be included in everything.

Why do I have this fear of God? That is a whole separate blog that I feel I need to share of how God spoke to me through a live vision in the middle of the night….but another day…

That is why it is so important for you who are reading this and doing these prayer challenges to share your testimony so we can learn from How God spoke to you and used you. I am only 1 person, Carrie is only 1 person, but it takes everyone working together for the advancement of His Kingdom to make a difference.

It makes me sick to my stomach to step out and “take off my fig leaf” (another Shawnism) while writing this blog entry, but why do I do it? I am scared every step of the way. If it was up to me I would not even do this blog at all, it is way out of my comfort zone. My friend said that people need to hear about the insecurities of prayer and how we let God lead us…

I’ve heard God speak many things to me many different ways. God 1st started speaking to me about this blog through our Elder and Webmaster Paul McKrickard. I did not even realize it was God. I was putting things together for the Prayer Ministry for Paul to add to the FLC Website and I asked him a long time ago to add a web page for testimonies. I thought that we all need to hear testimonies; that it is through testimonies that inspire me so I am sure it will be of great value to others. Paul suggested we get a blog going for this. Then we could update it at our leisure and add testimonies as often as we wanted as I was also concerned about the extra work it would add to his busy schedule. This was probably about 1 year ago. I added the blog suggestion to a list of ideas of things to do in the future for the prayer ministry but never gave it much more thought.

Recently this blog thought kept coming back. It was getting to be like the only thought that kept coming to my brain. It was hounding me day and night and when I would try to think about something else, the thought would turn back to this blog. SO I said okay God, I know this is you telling me this is what I need to focus on next and at our last meeting we really discussed it. I was also thinking about a way of equipping others through some sort of ongoing school of prayer where we allowed opportunity for people to take immediate action to get results in prayer. (I am a very take action/get results oriented person). I was also thinking that we both need to share personal experiences (very real) of specifically how our prayer lives take form. I am probably not a great example but I thought to myself that if we put it out there, others will not be afraid to put their testimonies out there. We must lead by example.

These ideas were rolling around in my head for some time. Carrie & I meet on a monthly basis and hash out written goals for the prayer ministry and what we will focus on each month. So at our last meeting Carrie & I were discussing the blog, we put the 2 together and thought, "Wow!" We got super excited and were coming up with other ideas about the blog and how it can really be a great tool to use for prayer!!! I thanked Paul for suggesting the blog and told him that God used him and how excited we were about it as I asked him to link it to FLC web page after 1st sharing the vision getting the okay from Pastor Freddy.

“Don’t be scared, just give us your testimony” How is God speaking to you? prayer@freedomlifechurch.com

Prayer Challenge #1 Hearing God’s Voice…

It’s funny how God is moving FLC. The women are talking about Hearing Gods Voice, we are posting this Hearing God’s Voice Prayer Challenge based on the #1 thing people wanted to know the answer to when it comes to prayer (see entire results below), AND another lady I spoke to has been dealing with Hearing God’s voice in her household! How amazing, so listen up FLC, God is speaking to us that He wants to speak to us!!!

You may do the following as often or little as you like over the next few weeks: (and if you are seasoned pro at this, then please send in some of your testimonies of how God spoke to you or regularly speaks to you, we can all learn from others real experiences)

1-Ask God about something that you have desired to know the answer to. Then take time with a journal or paper and pen and be still in His presence. Ask Him to speak to you; then be quiet. Write down thoughts as they come to you.

2-You can play what Pastor Freddy calls “Bible Roulette” and ask God to speak to you, then just open your bible and the first part that sticks out to you, hang on to it, you may also have to read a few passages down and then something sticks out to you. I have done this but learned from my husband to do it 3 times in one sitting and WOW…all 3 are usually about the same theme.

3-Take notice of your surroundings, what jumps out at you as you read magazines, newspapers, billboards, etc… and always listen carefully for what God is telling you through others who may not even know they are being used by God to speak into your life.

Please let us know the outcome & submit testimonies to prayer@freedomlifechurch.com so others can be encouraged by you! We will post them here and the Interface Bulletin Board.

-Tara

Hearing God's Voice

Someone once told me that God gives us children to parallel our relationship with Him and I believe it now; especially regarding our prayer life. God speaks to us and we ignore Him. He tells us in the Word that He requires us to grow (1 Peter 2:2) and to desire the milk of His Word. How can we pray effectively if we do not know His promises; if we do not read His Word?

My 24 month old son has a one track mind sometimes. I want him to listen to me but he wants to run around and pick up items that could be dangerous or climbs the outside of the banister about half-way up my staircase. I catch him and tell him that it is dangerous and say, let’s play with these blocks instead but he thinks he is having so much fun and this thing he is doing for the moment brings him so much happiness, then I take him down. He starts a tantrum screaming kicking and rolling on the floor and I am trying to calm him down to explain that hanging off the banister can cause him much harm, but he keeps screaming and throwing a fit. He does not want to listen to me. I keep trying to explain but the only things he can hear are his own screams. Then I let myself get angry at him, because he jumps up and tries to keep climbing up the banister, so I pull him down and yell back to him, “You know better, you’re old enough to know the rules, so you’re going to get a spanking & time out if you do it again!” So he proceeds to get a spanking. I am furious now and put him in time out. Then he cries and calms down and cries for me to come get him and forgive him, give him a big hug and love him. Now he wants to listen.

Listening is a huge part of prayer, [2 ears 1 mouth :)] and I am embarrassed to admit that the listening part of my life was nonexistent in the beginning because I did not even crack open my Bible for about the 1st year of being a believer.

This must be how God feels about us! He is screaming at us, telling us to get down from the banister (stop worrying, you are old enough now that you should have read that in your bible by now Phil 4:4-9 & Matthew 6:25) and play with those blocks instead (read His Word so you do not have to worry). He is trying to talk to us; and people make the strangest comments to us out of nowhere that we do not even notice God is screaming at us through them because we are not paying attention to Him or reading His Word to know that is Him, or ignoring Him! We continue doing that one thing that is causing us to not listen to God or grow in our relationship with him, we won’t make time for him or include Him in our day in our worries and fears, He is dying to give us the answer and then He must get angry and at us and would love to be able to grab us and throw us in time out. Instead I can imagine He is saying, “You’ve been a believer for this long now…You are old enough now, it’s time to grow up and know where to find the answer, it’s in the Word, stop worrying, it’s in the word about no worrying, how about walk by faith not by sight?” Then we mess it up and we look back and think, “Ohhhhh, that was you trying to guide me, I should have listened to you God”. Realize that we did not listen, and now we just want to do the right thing and search for His voice for His will.

Like when Malachi has calmed down he says “I ‘torry’ mommy”. I always feel this love and forgiveness toward him like I wish I did not have to punish him.

God is always even more merciful to us when we decide to grow up…when are we going to start listening? How do we hear God’s voice? I just heard God’s voice with this whole analogy while taking a shower, I was thinking about how mad I was, then it came to me and it was like I could hear God in my spirit, (not audibly) speaking this whole post to me.

On September 8th, I will post a prayer Challenge on Hearing God's Voice.
About 2 years ago during the summer, Interface Prayer Ministry took a prayer survey and one of the questions we asked was:

What would you like to learn about when it comes to Prayer?


I have posted the results here (of about 50 participants) to show that the #1 thing people want to know more about when it comes to prayer is....



How to listen to God's voice/listening/responses

8

Types of prayer

2

All there is

2

How prayer works

2

Sermons

2

In general

1

Why people don't do it more

1

Use of scripture

1

Praying in the offense

1

How to pray

1

Building my faith

1

Not begging/repeating

1

How to practice types of prayer

1

Understand the answers to prayers

1

Different ways to pray and involve others

1

Interceding

1

To be Humble and to listen

1

Patience, open heart and mind

1

To pray without ceasing

1