Biblical Teaching on Prayer
James 4:3
When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.
Pondering Point
We would never ask God to answer prayers for selfish motives, would we? We would never mask our sinful pleasures in a cloak of religious language or form, would we?
Lord, unmask our motives that we might dedicate ourselves to your pleasure first – first and foremost. Next week we will spend more time defining what a servant-disciple is and does, but for this week, we simply take stock of our attitude toward being available to serve others rather than ourselves.
Prayer
Father God, as we spend the next month focused on being servant-oriented disciples, I boldly ask that You show me where I am acting in self-serving ways. Where my attitude needs to undergo more change, I pray that You bring it in Jesus’ name. Amen.
Journal Prompt: write about the
above prayer:
Where are you acting in self-
serving ways?
Where does your attitude need
to undergo more changes?
John 17:6-19
The
Great Sending
Word of the Day
John 17:6-19
Jesus Prays for His Disciples
6 “I have revealed you to those whom you gave me out of the world. They were yours; you gave them to me and they have obeyed your word. 7 Now they know that everything you have given me comes from you. 8 For I gave them the words you gave me and they accepted them. They knew with certainty that I came from you, and they believed that you sent me. 9 I pray for them. I am not praying for the world, but for those you have given me, for they are yours. 10 All I have is yours, and all you have is mine. And glory has come to me through them. 11 I will remain in the world no longer, but they are still in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them by the power of your name, the name you gave me, so that they may be one as we are one. 12 While I was with them, I protected them and kept them safe by that name you gave me. None has been lost except the one doomed to destruction so that Scripture would be fulfilled.
13 “I am coming to you now, but I say these things while I am still in the world, so that they may have the full measure of my joy within them. 14 I have given them your word and the world has hated them, for they are not of the world any more than I am of the world. 15 My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one. 16 They are not of the world, even as I am not of it. 17 Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth. 18 As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world. 19 For them I sanctify myself, that they too may be truly sanctified.