Yes­ter­day, we were encour­aged to per­sist in prayer with con­fi­dence that God will answer us because he is good and always keeps his word to his chil­dren. You can lis­ten (or lis­ten again) to the ser­mon here.

Here are a few quotes from the mes­sage that you can con­tinue to med­i­tate on as you apply the mes­sage this week:

“Some­times a fail­ure to per­sist in prayer proves that we were not seri­ous about our request in the first place.  At other times God wants us to per­sist in prayer in order to strengthen our faith in him.  Faith would never grow if all prayers were answered imme­di­ately” (Don­ald Whit­ney, Spir­i­tual Dis­ci­plines for the Chris­t­ian Life, 81).

“The great fault of the chil­dren of God is, they do not con­tinue in prayer; they do not go on pray­ing; they do not per­se­vere.  If they desire any­thing for God’s glory, they should pray until they get it” (Roger Steer, George Muller:  Delighted in God!, 310)

“There­fore, broth­ers, since we have con­fi­dence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and liv­ing way that he opened for us through the cur­tain, that is, through his flesh, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assur­ance of faith, with our hearts sprin­kled clean from an evil con­science and our bod­ies washed with pure water” (Hebrews 10:19–22).

Enjoy and pur­sue God’s grace this week.  He delights to give it to those who ask!

This evening we will study con­sider Jesus’ call to per­sis­tent, con­fi­dent prayer in Matthew 7:7–12.  Far too often, we don’t per­sist in prayer and lack con­fi­dence in prayer because we do not under­stand God’s nature or believe his promises.  God is good, and he gives good gifts to his chil­dren.  He always keeps his Word, and he has promised that those who ask, seek, and knock for grace will receive it.  We hope to see you tonight at 5 pm!

A few weeks ago, we stud­ied Matthew 6:25–34 and learned that we are to exer­cise cal­cu­lated trust in God.  He has promised to meet all of our needs!  On Thurs­day, Justin Tay­lor posted Scrip­tural evi­dence that we should never be anx­ious.  I encour­age you to read through the Scrip­tures he posts, believe God’s promises, and by grace deter­mine to live the truth of the Word.

Last night we were chal­lenged to judge right­eously, which mean our judg­ments must be made with grace, truth, and dis­cern­ment.  We must judge with grace, because we have received grace our­selves and are in con­tin­ual need of God’s grace.  We must judge with truth, because God’s peo­ple are called to make judg­ments based on his per­fect, objec­tive stan­dard, not our own slid­ing, sub­jec­tive stan­dards.  And finally, we must judge with dis­cern­ment, as the Scrip­ture says, “Answer not a fool accord­ing to his folly, lest you be like him your­self” (Prv. 26:4).

I encour­age you to watch your­self care­fully this week.  Are you enter­tain­ing thoughts toward other believ­ers or unbe­liev­ers that are harsh and crit­i­cal, or thoughts filled with grace, truth, and dis­cern­ment?  Ask God for help to apply this mes­sage, that we might build up the church and be God’s instru­ments to share the good news of Jesus with unbelievers.