Prayer and Growth ~ Laura Henderson

We have been enjoying our study on Fridays about being Instruments in the Redeemer's Hands.  Laura Henderson wrote some of her thoughts after a recent week:

How does one pray and grow?  I think it must begin with understanding God loves you.  We
can come to him with every detail of our life.  “…casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.” (1 Peter 5:7)  It doesn’t just say, “only the big anxieties”, but “all”. Why is this important? When you love someone, you want to share everything with that person. Your struggles, your thoughts, your joys… He cares about every detail in your life.  “But even the hairs of your head are all numbered.”  (Matthew 10:30)  Understanding God cares about the little things in our lives frees us to walk with him in our prayer life more intimately.  “You do not have, because you do not ask.” (James 4:2)  He didn’t have to make us pray.  God is always giving to us despite our lack of prayers, but He says, we are to ask of Him.  And in regards to some things in life, we will not receive them if we don’t ask of Him.  Why?  He knows everything, why do we have to talk to Him about it?  I am sure there are many reasons God designed prayer, but one common sense reason we see is that is how you have a relationship.  You must talk with someone to know them and love them. He wants us to come to Him. “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” (Matthew 11:28) “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink… ‘out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’” "John 7:37, 38"

Ask yourself: if you went to a counselor to talk about your difficulties, would you speak more honestly and delve more deeply with him then you would in prayer with the Lord? He desires us to be alone with Him and to pour our heart out to Him. And when you do, you will see that you have not come to a hard, unfeeling rock that hasn’t heard your prayers, but to a mighty God who came in the soft wind to Elijah, and He will never fail you. 

So I will end where I began: God’s love for us.  I love how David describes his soul with the Lord. “But I have calmed and quieted my soul, like a weaned child with its mother; like a weaned child is my soul within me." (Psalm 131:2)  I have a one-year-old daughter and when I rock her to bed, she melts in my arms.  She will look up at me with a big smile on her face then close her eyes, cuddle closer, and fall asleep.  I’m in absolute heaven.  I love it.  And it makes me think of the Lord’s love for us.  He loves me so much more than I could love my daughter.  So throughout my day, I am resting in Him for little and big things, such as: Lord please give me joy, I need your strength to handle today because I’m tired, change me to be humble, help Charlotte sleep through the night….

Prayer draws us to God, shows us our dependence, and gives peace that can’t be found anywhere else.

Our Desire to be "Instruments in the Redeemer's Hands"

We had a very enjoyable Women's Brunch a couple of Saturdays ago to Kick-Off our Fall Semester.  We ate some delicious food:

listened to some announcements about various retreats and things coming up:

and visited with sweet friends:

One thing that seems to be on all our hearts is purposing to build close and God-glorifying relationships with each other.  God doesn't want us to live isolated, lonely lives; He created us to live in loving unity!  And even though that can be really hard to do, it is something that we are committed to working at and growing in because we know that we will reap much joy if we do.  One way that we intentionally practiced doing this at the Kick Off was by having some questions on the tables to help jump-start us into conversations beyond the the TERRIBLE TEXAS HEAT that is nearly killing us all.  The questions were:
1. What is your favorite bible passage and why?
2. Is there something about you that you would like or need your church sisters to know about you?
3. What is something that you are personally praying about?
4. Is there an area or circumstance where you need love to be shown to you and how would that best be done?5. Have you found a women who is a "hidden treasure" at Redeemer?  Someone who has been a specific encouragement or friend to you that you think other women should really get to know?

We are looking forward to starting our Ladies Study this week and plan to go through Instruments in the Redeemer's Hands which is a unique study developed by Paul Tripp. He was formerly part of the Christian Counseling and Educational Foundation (CCEF) staff and this book serves as a distilled version of his seminary lectures on the topic. Think of this study as a counterpart to "How People Change" which, despite its title, really deals with various components or dynamics of change in a persons life. Now, the Instruments study actually helps a person learn basics to engaging their own hearts and others lives in a beneficial way. The basic breakdown of Love, Know, Speak, Do, is fleshed out in great detail to give guidelines and parameters that make the methodology of change in a person's life a little more accessible.

We will be being led by Karen Lindwall Bourg who is the Founder of RHEMA Counseling Associates where she also serves as a Licensed Professional Counselor. Karen's counsel is passionately committed to ministering the Word of God in such a way that all of life is illuminated by its eternal truths. Her counsel rests on the wisdom of God, which lends itself to our study through Instruments in the Redeemer's Hands. 

Our hope is that this study will help equip and train us in moving from a desire to help others in need, to actually doing so in a Christ-centered way. Karen's expertise combined with Paul Tripp's material is an excellent combination in learning how to live out the Christian life in relationship with others.

And we can't wait! :-)