The scripture for today, April 12, is Colossians 4:12 as found in the New Testament of the Bible:

“He is always wrestling in prayer for you.”

Do you have fast-food prayers? Drive in, ask for something for yourself, and drive out two minutes later?

How about trying gourmet prayers ~ where you gather many ingredients, not just one? They take longer, but are very special and rewarding.

Your menu is your prayer list. People on your list don’t even have to be people who know personally. They can be from the newspaper, teachers at a local school, government officials, your neighbors, your congregation. List people by name. Pray for them by name.

Then tell these people you are praying for them. You may think you’ll get some strange looks, but mostly, even from the unreligious, you will get a smile and a whispered thank you. Some will actually reply, “No one before has ever told me they were praying for me.” After awhile, you will begin receiving word from some of them, “I am praying for you too.”

Prayer is wonderful. It is most wonderful when it centers, not on yourself, but on struggling in prayer for others.

One by one you will begin seeing amazing answers in the lives of those you pray for. And that’s a promise!

The scripture for today, April 11, is Exodus 4:11 as found in the Old Testament of the Bible:

“Who gave man his mouth? Who makes him deaf or mute? Who gives him sight or makes him blind? Is it not I, the Lord?”

This is a dynamic verse, for it helps answer questions of, “If God is so good, why did he allow me/my relative to become deaf/blind?”. God gives each of us an assignment in life. Everyone has something to overcome. The challenge is for us to do it with the smile of faith on our lips.

Paul said in 2nd Corinthians 12:10, “For Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses ….For when I am weak, then I am strong!” If God did not believe you or your relative or friend could handle your affliction, he would not allow you to have it. It’s almost as if the more affliction you have, the more faith God is showing in you. And the more we have to rely on God, the more faith we can show in God.

After all, 2nd Corinthians 6:1 says we are workers together with God. This is your assignment. What a privilege!

The scripture for today, April 10, is Zechariah 4:10 as found in the Old Testament of the Bible:

We tend admire big things ~ big buildings, big empires, big trees, big causes. Sometimes it is difficult to remember that those things started out small.

Have you been wanting to accomplish something big? All buildings started out with one board or one stone. All empires started out with one person. All big trees started out as one seed. All big causes started out with one dream.

Perhaps your desire in life started out small, but stayed small. Doesn’t mean it will always be small. It may become big years from now, or even in someone else’s lifetime. Don’t despise what you have now.

Or, if you have been putting off trying to do something big for a long time, make today the day of your beginning. Let no one despise your day of small things.

The scripture for today, April 4, is Psalm 4:4 as found in the Old Testament of the Bible:

This seems like an impossibility. After all, when people get angry, don’t they lash out at other people? And yell and call them names? And show their temper? Maybe even throw a few things? After all, that’s the only way to get across to the other person that you are really
angry.

Not so. If a child, for instance, does what s/he was just told not to do, we became angry. Angry at the dangerous consequence of their action. Angry at not doing something to make that child a better person.

We can choose to lash out at the child wildly so that our emotions mask our words. Or we can choose to talk calmly and explain the dangers that child was put in because of that action, or the missed opportunities. We can even punish a child without losing our temper. We can calmly but firmly tell them what their punishment is.

It is the same way with adults. If we lose our temper and shoot daggers with our eyes and rant and rave, all these things distract people from our words. Aren’t our words of explanation more important than the emotionalism and yelling? If we were hurt, just say so. If they hurt themselves, just say so.

While we’re at it, not all words help. Name calling does not help. Name calling is done when we choose not to explain how we feel. Name calling locks the other person in and sets them up for future failures between us and them. Losing our temper during anger gets us off the issue and into sin.

Let us try to remain calm and then explain the problem in tones that the person who has angered us can truly listen to and learn from. If we have trouble doing this, practice when we’re alone. It will come to us in the right way. It will teach us to remain calm when we’re are angry. When we are angry, we must not sin.