A Prayer For Every Day

Lord, we hear the questions, “Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord?” and “Who shall stand in His holy place?” – and we say, ‘This is too much for us.' We thank You, Lord, that there is Good News for us. There is One who has ascended the hill of the Lord. There is One who stand in Your holy place. Jesus has ascended the hill of the Lord. Jesus stands in Your holy place. He has ascended Your holy hill – for us. He stands in Your holy place – for us. He has “received blessing from You” – for us (Psalm 24:3-5). When , Lord, we come to worship You, help us to come in the Name of Jesus: Just as I am, without one plea but that Thy blood was shed for me … ”

Lord, You speak to us. Help us to speak to You. You're speaking. Are we listening? You're listening to us. Are we speaking to You? Your Word to us is the call of love. You tell us that You love us. You're calling us to love You. May our words (and our life) be our response to Your love - "loving Him who first loved me."

We thank You, Lord, that our determined enemy - Satan - is Your defeated enemy. To us, the devil seems so powerful. In Your eyes, He is defeated - defeated by Jesus, our crucified Saviour and risen Lord. Jesus has triumphed over Satan. He has won the victory for us (1 John 3:8; Hebrews 2:14-15). Lord, Your Word says, "Resist the devil and he will flee from you" (James 5:7). Will he really flee from us? He flees from Jesus - but, surely, not from us? Have we not forgotten something? - Jesus won the victory for us. He gives His victory to us. Help us to resist the devil - in the victorious Name of Jesus. He will flee from us. Why? Because Jesus is Lord over Satan. It's not us he's fleeing from. It's Jesus. When the devil comes 'knocking on our door', help us to send Jesus to the door - and send him packing!

We thank You, Lord, that Your beloved Son, Jesus Christ, "died for our sins" and was "raised" from death for us (1 Corinthians 15:3-4). Help us to rejoice in "the Good News" (1 Corinthians 15:1) of our Saviour. Help us to hear Your great declaration concerning Jesus - "This is My beloved Son with whom I am well pleased" (Matthew 3:17). Help each of us to say of Jesus - "This is my beloved Saviour with whom I am well pleased."

Lord, help us never to think, “We are blessed because we are obedient.” Help us always to say, “We are blessed because You love us and Jesus died for us.” Your love for us, Jesus’ death for us:  This is where the blessing comes from – and it’s where our obedience comes from! We think of Your great love for us. We think of Jesus, crucified for us.  We say, “Lord, You love me. Help me to love You.” We say, “Jesus, You died for me. Help me to live for You.” This is how Your blessing comes to us – You show us how much You love us, You put Your love into our hearts, the obedience grows stronger – and so does the blessing!

"Love is as strong as death ... It burns like a blazing fire, like a mighty flame. Many waters cannot quench love, neither can floods drown it" (Song of Solomon 7:6-7). We thank You, Lord, that Your love is the greatest love of all: "Nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Romans 8:38-39). We can never earn Your love: "If a man offered for love all the wealth of his house, it would be utterly scorned" (Song of Solomon 8:7). Your love is always Your gift to us. May Your love burn, in our hearts, "like a blazing fire, like a mighty flame" - a fire that burns up our dross, a refining fire that purifies us, a flame that burns for Your glory.

Lord, You're calling us to grow in Christ. You're calling us to be changed - changed in our way of thinking, changed in our way of living. You're calling us to be less self-centred - and more centred on You. May there be less doing our own thing - and more following Jesus, less living in the weakness of the flesh - and more living in the power of the Spirit.

We thank You, Lord, that Jesus, Your Son, has taken our sin upon Himself. We thank You that He brings Your salvation to us. With Jesus as our Saviour, we cannot remain the same as we were before we met Him. Jesus changes us. He makes us new. Help us, Lord, to live in the power of this new life which Jesus gives to us. Help us to live in His power - the power of His love.

Lord, we are, so often, dragged down to the world's way of living. Again and again, we fail to respond to "the upward call of God in Christ Jesus" (Philippians 3:14). We fail to rise to the challenge of walking with You on "the high way of holiness" (Isaiah 35:8). When we rejoice in Your gift of forgiveness, help us, also, to choose the way of holiness. Far too often, Lord, we keep our distance from You. You're calling us into a closer walk with You - but we draw back from You. You're seeking to change us - but we're quite content to stay the way we are. Forgive us, Lord, and deliver us from our self-centredness. Make us the kind of people that You want us to become.

Lord, we thank You for Your Word. You have spoken to us. You are still speaking to us. It's Your Word that leads us on into Your future. Help us to listen to what You are saying to us, to build our lives on Your Word, to let Your Word flow out from us, to bring blessing to many.

“With his mouth the godless man would destroy his neighbour” (Proverbs 11:9). Lord, this is straight talking – from Your holy Word. We need to hear this kind of thing. It keeps us on the right track. It keeps us from going off the rails. When, Lord, we’re tempted to speak words that will hurt other people, help us remember Your Word to us: “The tongue is a fire … With it we bless the Lord and Father, and with it we curse men … this ought not to be so” (James 3:6-10). Help us, Lord, to keep quiet – or end up saying, I wish I had never said that – It’s better to ‘put a zip on it’ than to ‘put our foot in it.’ When we have nothing good to say, help us to say nothing at all.

Lord, You call us to belong to You. This is wonderful. It makes our hearts glad. You also call us to serve You. We're not to remain what we were before we became Your redeemed people. We're to be renewed - "beholding the glory of the Lord, we are being changed into His likeness from one degree of glory to another" (2 Corinthians 3:18).

We thank You, Lord, that You love us. We thank You that You have done great things for us. We think of Your great love. We think of all that You have done for us - and we say, "To God be the glory."

“Hezekiah trusted in the Lord” (2 Kings  18:5). Josiah did “according to the law of Moses” (2 Kings 23:25). Help us, Lord, to trust and obey. Give us faith – faith that changes the way we live, faith that leads to obedience.

By Your grace, Lord, You call us to be Your soldiers and servants. Help us not to be "fearful and fainthearted" (Deuteronomy 19:19). Help us to be "good soldiers of Jesus Christ" (2 Timothy 2:3). When we hear your challenging question: "Who is on the Lord's side?", may we give our committed answer: "By Thy call of mercy, by Thy grace divine, we are on the Lord's side; Saviour, we are Thine."