Sunday Mornings | Prayer | Part 1

Thank you for listening to the Kelowna Christian Center podcast.

Our desire is that today's message will be fresh and encouraging to you.

For more information on KCC and how to connect, visit us at KCC.net.

How many of you have been entering in and uh joining us on our 21 days of prayer?

You guys have been a part of our 21 days of prayer.

This has been on Facebook, Instagram.

We're seven days in towards our 21 days, uh closing on January 21st, which is a Sunday, and it's gonna be an awesome time in church on that day.

Uh I like to point your attention to a scripture that I'm sure you all know, and for many of you, I'm sure that this is like your your uh point scripture.

Um, the one of the first ones, perhaps you've you've memorized, you've read, you've recited, you've seen it on plaques, you've seen it on walls, uh, you know, see it on people's posts.

Matthew 6.33 says this seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you.

There is a principle of firsts, priority.

How many of you have priorities in your life right now?

You've got priorities.

Family, food, you know, the basics.

We've all got priorities.

And uh our priority starting New Year, January 2018, is to make sure that we pray first.

That no matter what the situation we may be addressing, we don't try and go into that situation with our own strength.

But we go to that situation praying first.

We get up, we pray first.

We're faced with a confrontation, we pray first.

We get into an argument, we stop, we pray first.

We ask the Lord, where to go?

What should I do?

Where do I put my money?

Where do I where do I push forward?

I pray first.

I put God first.

The scripture says if we seek first his kingdom and his ways of doing things, his righteousness, everything else will be added unto us.

That's a good promise.

Uh just to make that point, uh a few years ago, uh, before I was born, so a lot of years ago, um, there was a flight of uh one of the major airlines from New York to Miami, and the crew began to make their descent.

And for all of those of you who like don't like flying, the story isn't gonna be good for you, okay?

And just a spoiler, plug your ears if you have to.

But they were about to make their landing preparations, and they noticed that the light, which indicates that the landing gear was down, did not come on.

So the light that indicates that the landing gear, the wheels, you know, that connect you to the ground safely, did not come on.

And so the captain instructed the engineer to get a new bulb.

And he began to work on the light trying to get it to come on.

And the co-pilot who was supposed to be landing the plane also got preoccupied with the little light, and he and the captain together began to thump and to pound on the light trying to get it to come on.

Well, in the meantime, no one thought to stop the landing, no one stopped to manually drop the landing gear, and the crew was focusing on a faulty light bulb, the plane crashed over the Everglades.

101 people, crew, passengers lost their lives.

All because it was one of the worst crashes in that point in time in history.

Happened just before 1973 on December 29th, and the plane crashed for one reason.

The crew had the wrong priority.

They were working on the bulb and not on what was going to land the plane, what was going to connect the plane to the ground safely.

First things need to be first.

It's a matter sometimes of life or death.

What you put first in your life matters.

The scripture says in Haggai, it goes back where Jesus is actually talking about one of the what the prophets were saying, and one of the prophets, Haggai, his the whole book, he's a minor prophet in scripture.

The whole book is actually him telling the Israelite people to put God first, to give God the supreme place in your life.

That God would have supremacy in your life.

That God would not just be uh a moment in time on a Sunday afternoon, that God would not just be a time that you address them and connect with them before you eat, that God would be not just uh like a plaque at your door that says, as for me and my house we will serve the Lord.

Now it's where it stops.

But that God would have supremacy in your life.

So we're prone as people to actually put ourselves above God.

We're prone to actually think about ourselves.

Now, I'm not gonna ask you your priorities this year.

I'm not gonna ask you your resolutions this year, but how many of you made some?

Some you didn't tell anyone about.

How many of you raised, you made some of those priorities, the ones that it's between me and God, people.

It's between me and God.

You just don't want to be held accountable for them.

Write them down, post them up.

But all these priorities and a list of of the most the most common priorities, the most common resolutions are resolutions that are self-prone.

They're resolutions like losing weight.

No one in here has put that on, right?

After Christmas season and all the cookies and candy and chocolate.

Losing weight, managing money better, making more money, taking better care of yourself and your physical physique.

These are things that are common resolutions that people have, but they should, even though they're really good, like I want you to be good with your money, I want you to look good, okay?

I want you to treat your families well, but they shouldn't come first.

Money, physical physique will not lead to true happiness apart from God.

First things need to be first.

Now, I was privileged to uh have grown up close with uh grandfathers who who had priorities.

They're uh since passed away, but I had grandfathers who lived a lifestyle where they put God first.

And you knew that they put God first because they had a lifestyle of prayer.

I believe prayer was the secret to them living long, having meaningful lives.

They carried the heart of God for for God, they carried a heart for God, they carried a heart for people, they were compassionate, they were loving, they were generous.

They literally took on the heart of God themselves.

They were great examples for me.

They were connected first heavenward.

The scripture says if you put your focus on things above, then the things of earth grow dim, right?

That all of a sudden a lot of things on earth don't seem to matter when your attention is on God.

When you're looking at God first, a lot of things in life don't really seem to have that type of attraction to you.

Hebrews says it this way: focus our eyes, your eyes on Jesus, who is the author and finisher of our faith.

There's supposed to be this focus, this attention on Jesus.

And with the promise attached to it, Isaiah says this you'll be kept in perfect peace, all who trust in you, all who have their thoughts fixed upon you.

This word fixed, focused, actually means to have like a like a laser pointer that's that's gone down to its its focal point where you ever play with uh uh magnifying glasses before?

How many of you ever did that?

You know, you you started fires.

How many of you started fires with your magnifying glass?

Like, that's what the magnifying glass was for.

You could look at things and be like, oh, that's cool.

Now I'm gonna start a fire because I can do this.

We used to do that all the time.

It was good fun.

If you looked at my grandfather's bookshelves, their books were about reading.

Uh the books that they read were about prayer and a lifestyle of prayer.

They they were books that helped uh support their relationship and their connection to God.

And I just went through a lot of my grandfather's material, a lot of his books he kind of had passed on to me, and I was sorting them.

And all of them, they're different than the books that we get today.

The books we get today have been replaced with self-analysis, self-assessment.

Get to know yourself ever so better, and you'll discover your gifts, your talents, your about, you'll discover about yourself.

And if you look to answers within, you'll get happy.

If you find your own genetic behaviors that you're prone to, your psychology, your uh, your all the all this assessment that's internal, if you find out about that, then you'll prove successful and you'll get better.

Instead of actually saying, you know what, Lord, and this is what David said, he said, search me, God, test me, God, know my heart, and know my anxious thoughts, see if there's any offensive way in me and lead me in the way everlasting.

You see, instead of us having to really look at ourselves and become better ourselves, instead lean on God and lean on him to actually teach you and help you see how he created you to be and who he created you to be by finding his will for your life.

So there are a lot of questions about how you go about doing this.

How you go about asking God to search you, knowing your heart, how you go about asking God to test you, how you go about asking God to actually communicate to you what those anxious ways are, what those ways are that need to be re uh realigned.

So, what is prayer?

And I think it's a hard thing for us to do sometimes is to actually like ask these questions because as Christians we should already know it by default.

It's like, what is prayer?

Well, it's kind of like the staple.

If you're a Christian, you should know a few things: scripture and prayer, loving one another.

These things are like the basic parts about who we are, and yet a lot of us don't really understand what truly prayer is.

Now, if you grew up in a church like I did, and for a long time there's very uh basic answers.

What's prayer?

Well, it's a connection to God, it's communication with God.

But when you learn from Jesus, prayer is actually has a deeper truth connected to it.

Prayer is a lot more significant than just talking to God.

It's a dialogue, it's a connection to something that's holy, it's a uh it's an understanding and a revelation that occurs that you had no idea of before it would have ever existed in terms of your thoughts, your dreams, the ways you, the ways you operate, the ways you think.

Um Jesus' disciples who lived with him, who saw Jesus pray, they even went to God and they had the same request.

Luke 11, 1 and 2 says this.

One day Jesus was praying in a certain place, and when he finished, one of his disciples said to him, Lord, teach us to pray, just as John taught his disciples how to pray.

And he said to them, When you pray, say this.

And he goes on to tell them how to pray.

In other words, the disciples were even having to go to Jesus saying, Jesus, you need to teach us how to pray.

Just like John's disciples went to John and said, Teach us how to pray.

In the same way, I need to find out, God, teach me how to pray.

Jesus, teach me how to pray, so that I don't fall into a way of prayer that may not have significance and may not have power behind it.

So many times do we think we shouldn't ask these questions.

They're dumb questions.

This is not a dumb question.

I'm gonna put you at ease here today.

This may be your first time in church, and you were like, I don't know how to pray.

How do you do this like the cross thing?

When do you do it?

How I don't know the scripture.

I remember being in a church uh for a wedding, uh, a united church, and they all stood up at one point.

I have like I've grown up in church, and I had no idea what to do.

I stood up and then they started reciting this prayer from the their book of prayers, and I just I I felt so uncomfortable because I didn't know.

I just started to pray in the spirit.

Shula ba ba ka la ba dare.

No, I didn't, but I could have.

And but the thing is, I began to pray like I didn't know how people pray.

They're all different assortments of prayer.

Is it a book we follow?

Do we prayer only the prayers of Jesus?

Do you pray only scriptural prayers that Jesus prayed in scripture?

How do we pray?

Is it a long intro?

Is it a short intro?

Is it emphasis in your voice?

Do you pray loud?

Do you pray soft?

Do you quite pray in a whisper?

Do you pray in your head?

How many of you pray in your head?

I pray in my head all the time.

That's good.

I'm glad there's more of us prayer, head prayering people out there.

Many times we have to ask these questions.

So, Jesus answered his disciples, and what's great about this answer is that Jesus didn't just boil down the answer to uh it's communication with God.

Prayer is just talking to God.

Jesus' answer was a little bit more descriptive with a little bit more oomph.

It had some reality, it had some bite behind it.

So I'd like to start with sharing you a few things you should do before you pray.

So this is what Jesus said.

Prayer starts actually before you pray.

So before you pray, Matthew chapter 6 is when Jesus talks about it.

Matthew 6 · chapter mention

Verse 5.

When you pray, he says this, don't be like hypocrites, for they love to pray, standing in the synagogues, on the street corners, to be seen by other people.

Truly I tell you, they've received the reward in full.

But when you pray, go into your room, close the door, pray to your father who is in heaven, who is unseen.

Then your father who sees what is done in secret will reward you.

So this is what you do before you pray.

You go get a place to pray.

How many of you have a place to pray?

You've got your place.

I know it's like that seat is perfectly formed to your butt.

You know, it's just like, yes, Jesus, I'm here.

Um, you've got your chair.

My grandfathers, I knew where they prayed.

I knew where they took their time to pray.

They get a place.

You need to get a place when you pray.

When you study the New Testament, you realize that Jesus would withdraw himself from the crowd.

The scripture says he would go to the mountains.

Amen.

Thank you, Jesus, for going to the mountains.

Like, I'm just gonna tell my wife, I need to go to the mountains, honey.

I just gotta get out there and just pray.

But he would go to the mountains, he would go to a certain place to pray.

And I'm not telling you that, you know, no matter where you're at, you just you can't find a place to pray, or you can't pray everywhere and anywhere, but I'm saying this.

It's a point of making a time with God.

Finding that place to pray is saying, you know, I'm going to separate this time to actually have a time of prayer with God between Him and I.

Unless you make time for God, uh, you won't have that time for God.

So you got to make that time, you gotta have that place of prayer.

So uh this has to be a priority.

Like, where are you going to find that place where you pray?

Um finding it and not making it a public display, not make it it, it has to be private, and it starts private between you and God.

So church should not be the only place you pray.

Being around God will never be a substitute for being alone with God.

So we can't just pray in a place where we're around God.

We want to be in a place where we're alone with God.

Now, I find it difficult to find places where I'm just plain and simply alone.

I'm a father of three and a husband of one, and a friend of many, an example to you know, but you know what?

I find it hard finding just a place to pray, a place where I'm alone.

So I I enjoy praying to tell you the truth.

I enjoy going outside to shovel the driveway.

I enjoy finding that place where I'm I'm pushing along more.

And I'll tell you, I walk around with my my phone, and and the Lord begins to say things to me, and I begin to like record them right where I'm at.

I I learned that from a young age when I actually uh had a paper out, and we lived out in East Kelowna out in the orchards, and it was in that kind of a route where my first paper that I would deliver on my paper out was like three kilometers away, and I'd have to ride my bike all the way.

Well, I'll tell you, that time alone with God was a time that I actually developed a really close relationship with God.

In times when I was working, it was doing mundane, routine work.

Don't ever despise just ironing.

Make ironing like a spiritual time.

Don't despise picking weeds, don't despise just dusting or washing dishes.

You know what?

I find a place in my house where I'm alone is when I'm washing dishes because none of my kids want to help.

They're like, hey, anyone got some time?

And they're like, no, they're in their room.

We'll just read the Bible in our room, dad.

All right.

And they're gonna, and I find that time right there and then where I can engage with God.

Another time I like to spend time with God is when I'm at the gym.

You can tell that's really working right now, right?

But when I'm at the gym, I put my headphones on, my earbuds in, and I just, if it's on the treadmill or it's going through a simple routine, I'm just spending that time thinking about what God is saying to me.

And I love those moments of time.

If you don't make time for God, you won't have any time for God.

So get your place.

Find that place, find that time and consecrate it with God.

Matthew chapter 6 says this too.

Matthew 6 · chapter mention

When you pray, don't keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words.

Do not be like them, for your father knows what you see before you ask him.

So, number two, go get to the point.

Get to the point.

You know what babbling is?

I was prepping my message yesterday, and I was at a coffee shop, and I was just I have this corner that's generally pretty quiet.

And I had someone come and sit right next to me, just pull up a chair, like right next to me.

And for an hour, it I learned what babbling was.

It was just like it was just going, going, going, and it was about nothing.

It was just the Babbleon.

Get that?

Thank you, Jesus.

But it took, I think sometimes when we go to prayer, we think it's about our eloquence, it's about great vocabulary, it's about a tremendous intro and a crescendo.

And prayer is supposed to look a certain way when really, if you look at Jesus, Jesus is saying, don't use this babbling, don't use rhetoric.

Get to the point.

And sometimes it's just a challenge just to get to the point.

So I start my prayer thanking God, and then I just get to the point.

Because you know what?

It's about authenticity with Christ.

It's about being who you're supposed to be, who you really are, and actually showing Him who you really are.

So it's not about fancy words or fancy uh, you know, intros.

It's about just talking to God the way your heart just is meaning to express.

Believe it or not, there's no formula to talking to God.

Like there might be like in China or in Africa or around the world in Mexico, we just need to talk to God.

There's no structure that's supposed to or formula that we're supposed to or pattern that we're supposed to follow.

Uh this prayer, when we get to the point, is if you go through scripture and you read the prayers of Jesus, they were actually very Twitter-worthy.

Low characters.

They just were prayers to God, and I like what Smith Wigglesworth said.

He said, I rarely go, like, I rarely prayer more pray more than five minutes, but I rarely go more than five minutes without prayer.

You take that time when you're living in that lifestyle, just talking to God about things that you may be facing and going through.

And what really helped me was in Bible school, we learned uh in, I think it was Pastor Norm's class, uh, we learned about how to journal with God, how to ask a question and then wait for the response and then write that question down, what you believe God's response would be.

And after a while, I got to the place where I could be asking questions, and I just, it was too tiring for me to keep up with writing, and I would just go on with the dialogue.

And you can get to that place where you're just constantly in that, and the scripture calls it this a habitation of prayer, a lifestyle, a house of prayer.

You're living in that place of prayer.

So before you pray, you find a place.

Before you pray, know what you're trying to get to, like know the point you're trying to get to.

Set aside time, make it a priority.

So then Jesus started saying this.

And he said this, and we in church mostly refer to this as the Lord's Prayer.

Um, but it wasn't necessarily a script that Jesus was teaching us to pray.

It was more of a, hey, if you want to know how to pray, uh, let me teach you about prayer.

And he began to show us this uh this scripture, and he starts with this six points.

It starts with number one, our father who art in heaven.

And today we began to pray for Sean, and the first thing I did was I went to our father, and I connected with God relationally.

I said, Okay, God, you love us as a father, and you see us as sons.

And so, Father, I come to you as a as a son who who know you know my heart.

You know that a friend of mine is sick and ill.

I ask you, Father, for healing.

And I go to the Father because I connect with him on that relational level.

And Romans 8:15 says this the spirit you receive does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again.

Romans 8:15

The spirit you receive brought about adoption for sonship.

And this the sonship is by which we call out to God abba father.

So all of you can call out to God and call him father.

Father God.

I love it when my kids call me dad.

Dad, dad, it's like a blessing to me.

Dad, they define their relationship with me in the same way when we say that to our father, it defines that same relationship with him.

Dad, this is what I'm going through.

Dad, this is these are my needs.

Dad, this is the challenge that I'm facing.

Dad, how are you today?

My, you know, when you talk to him, it comes from a relational point.

Jesus did not come to establish religion, a structure.

Jesus came, and even through this first verse, he came to establish a relationship between God and men.

This relationship is really all that matters.

The church, the building, the walls, the structure is secondary to the relationship that we have with God.

This relationship we can carry anywhere we go, overseas, for as long as we want.

It's the relationship God doesn't leave us, He's related to us.

We've been made heirs of God, we've been made part of the family of God.

I'm an inheritor of the things that are my dad's.

And he says that healing is the children's bread.

So thank you, Father, for healing.

And I trust him today for that healing.

So our prayer has to start out with having that relational connection with God.

Number two, hallowed, hallowed, holy be your name.

And this is where we declare his greatness.

Jesus said, after you announce him, you connect with him relationally, you announce how great he is.

This is why when we come to church in the morning, we come into his presence with what?

Thanksgiving.

And into his courts with praise.

Praise is saying, Whoa, God, how great you are.

God, you're awesome.

God, you're, you know, we just declare how great God is.

David said this, I will bless the Lord with all my soul.

All that is within me.

When he enters into prayer, he just erupts with praise.

He erupts with declaring how great God is.

So sometimes we need to tell our body to do this.

I will bless the Lord.

Oh my soul.

Because sometimes we don't see where the blessings are.

We actually have to say, I'm going to stop and I'm just going to declare the goodness and the greatness of God.

Even doesn't matter what situation I'm in.

So before we praise God, before we pray to God, uh, we we praise God.

Before we petition God, we praise Him.

We declare how great He is.

So we need to do this in our spirit.

And uh it doesn't matter what the situation may look like.

It may situation may look bad, but we go in declaring the righteousness and the power of God, no matter what the scenario, what the situation.

And sometimes people don't understand that.

They think you're just walking in like an ignorance.

When you walk into a space that's in trauma, but you walk into it with the knowledge of who God is, and you bring God's peace into turmoil.

You bring God's healing and provision into places where there is lack.

You bring it with you, because unless you have it with you, it's not the situation isn't going to change.

You bring God, you bring God's joy into a place of grief and into a place of anxiety and depression.

That's where you bring the joy of the Lord, and that's where it erupts.

Hallowed, holy is your name.

We establish this honor before we move into the request.

I love that because it's like, you know, Natalie, you're such a great wife.

You're so great.

You're awesome, and all your ways are so good, babe.

It's just like, you're awesome.

And I'm gonna ask you if I can go away for a few days.

It's like you've been such a great mom.

You know, you establish that honor.

You know, God, you're good.

God, you're awesome.

You're holy, is your name.

Your name is everything.

Your name is Jesus.

You're our provider, you're our healer, you're our redeemer, past, present, future.

You are our provider, you're our sustainer.

You announce who He is.

And then you can make that request.

You know, God, you're our provider.

So, Father, today I thank you for every finance that comes into our account today.

It may be blessed and it may multiply for every need that we may have.

You go in, you enter into prayer with the knowledge of who you're praying to.

Number three, scripture says this Jesus taught us to pray, Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

And this may be the tough part that we pray because we can find that place to pray.

We can establish our our the greatness of God and our connection to God, but it comes down to a place where we when we actually have to submit our will to God is where things change a little bit.

We connect with God in all these ways, but submitting our will can be tough at times.

Because we came out of the womb wanting what we want.

And uh we start with wanting what we want and we try to convince everyone else to give us what we want.

That's what we do.

And it's not how prayer works.

Prayer is not about God turning to you, it's about you turning to God.

It's not about turning God's God's, you know, the funnel from God towards us.

It's about saying, God, we want to turn to you.

Your will be done, your your kingdom come today.

So submitting to God is about praying his agenda before praying your own agenda.

You pray his agenda before you even start praying your own your own will.

So, what is God's agenda?

We know that God wants the lost to be found.

When's the last time you prayed that the lost would be found?

We know that scripture tells us when we pray, we should pray for our leaders, pray for those who are in authority over us.

When's the last time we've prayed for our leaders?

When's the last time we've prayed for those who are in authority over us?

We know the scripture tells us to pray for wisdom, pray for clarity.

When's the last time we've prayed for wisdom and clarity?

Or are we too self-absorbed into our own will?

I feel sometimes when you talk about prayer, you're reminded about prayer.

It's like going to the dentist and they're asking you, have you flossed?

And you're like, Yes.

No, I am a sinner in the hands of an angry dentist.

Am I like, I'm just like, I'm in that place.

It's like, have you been flossing regularly?

Well, kinda, you know, it's it's it's really hard.

I don't like put my fingers in my mouth.

No excuses.

Floss.

No excuses.

Sometimes the scripture's very clear.

Pray without ceasing.

No excuses.

Pray.

Pray.

Pray.

Seek first God's kingdom.

Pray at all times.

Pray petition.

Pray in thanksgiving.

Pray intercessory within intercession.

Pray.

Pray.

Pray.

It's tough.

Even Jesus, when he prayed, he had to submit his own will to the Father.

And the scripture tells us in the Garden of Gethsemane, he prayed and it was like the sweat fell off his brow.

The scripture says, like drops of blood.

He says he was in anguish.

And it was he was in challenge when he was praying because he was submitting his will to God's will, the Father's will.

You pray his agenda first, and you pray your agenda next.

Number four, give us this day our daily bread.

And this is about depending on him for everything.

When Jesus is referring, uh referencing this, he's actually going back to the time when the Hebrew people were out of Egypt and they were into the desert and they were wandering around in the desert, and God began to feed them, and he began to feed them with what was called manna.

And the word manna means what is it?

Because no one had seen it before.

What is this?

But all we knew about manna was like fluff, it was like white, fluffy stuff that was on the ground every morning, and people would come and they would collect it, and you could eat it, and it would sustain you, and it was really good, and it was manna.

That's all manna was.

But there was a problem with manna.

Mana could not be stored, manna could not be held overnight, manna could not sustain you.

For every day you needed new manna.

Every day you needed new bread.

You couldn't live off of the bread of yesterday.

You needed bread for today.

And this, I feel like sometimes we live with the bread of yesterday.

And we're like, oh, the way church was done back then, or the way church used to be, or the way my time with God was back then, and you're living on the bread of yesterday instead of living on the bread of today.

What is the bread today?

What is your daily bread?

Because it's that bread that will actually sustain you.

It's that bread that you can depend on for everything.

And so when you're around people, I'll tell you, it's such a refreshing place to be when you're around people who have fresh bread.

Like this holiday season, um, my my wife's grandma came in from uh the hat.

Was it medicine hat?

The hat, she likes to refer to it.

And she she finds her way over here, and the first thing she does is she gets in the kitchen and she starts baking.

And God help her, it's amazing.

It's like the wisdom of the ages has fallen, and everything she makes is just good.

It's great.

And it's like the whole family gets together and lives on that fresh bread.

And we need that fresh bread sustaining us, causing us to come together, to live together, challenge each other.

What is God doing?

Not yesterday, but today.

Now, God has something for you now.

You need his daily bread today.

If you're going through something right now that you've gone through before in the past, the past solution is not your solution for the now.

You need God's solution for the now.

If you try and do it, yeah, and that's the word of the Lord to someone in this room today.

You've been leaning on the solutions of yesterday, and God's giving you a solution for today.

If you keep doing it the way you used to do it, you're gonna end up spinning your tires.

But to make progress, you need to hear God's word for you today.

So you need to search it, you need to go out, and you need to find that fresh bread.

Lean on it today.

Number five, forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.

This is where we get grace and we give grace.

How many of you have been forgiven?

Ten times over, a hundred times over.

Grace, grace, grace.

First John says this you confess your sins.

If you confess, he's faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.

We need to walk into the light, and I'll tell you this today, that sometimes our own progress is going to be hindered by people who we haven't yet forgiven.

And we need to look at our lives and just say, in order to get grace, I need to give grace.

And either in order to get strength from God, I need to be able to release and forgive others who may have hurt me.

Now, forgiveness, it's not about everything becoming right in the moment.

Jesus on the cross, he forgave the world.

Not everything was made right.

The world didn't come to him and ask, you know, there wasn't reconciliation yet with the world.

There wasn't peace with the world.

But Jesus forgave the world, and by forgiving the world, what you're doing essentially is you're absorbing the pain.

You're absorbing the hurt, you're asking that forgiveness, and you're taking it on yourself, and that's where the Lord has that grace to be able to cover you and carry you.

Lastly, and I don't want you to go into these 21, these next 14 days of prayer just without any tools here.

These are tools to help you.

But lastly, uh, this is where we we lean, where the scripture says, lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.

For thine is the power, yours is the power and the glory forever and ever and ever and ever and ever.

Amen.

The last thing we do is we present our requests to God.

God is not too big for the smallest request and not too small for the biggest request.

Whether it's big or small, he's able.

And this is what's great about God is it doesn't matter what your request is, he's capable.

If it's healing, he's capable.

If it's the small things, he's capable.

He knows all the big, moving pieces globally throughout time.

He knows how to do that, and he knows every hair and freckle on you.

He knows every detail about you.

So God says, make your requests known to me.

In prayer, make your requests made known unto me.

I like what Jeremiah says about this.

He says, Sovereign Lord, you've made the heavens and the earth by your great power and outstretched arm.

Say this with me: nothing is too hard for you.

Do you believe that today?

Nothing is too hard for you.

Would you stand on your feet with me this morning?

As we close, I just want to uh to take some time and I just want to read this through together with this now on your heart, this now in your mind.

We put our trust in him, we we lean on him today, and uh I just want you to read this prayer together with me.

Would you put it on the screens?

Let's say it together Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done.

On earth as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors.

And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.

For yours is the power and the glory forever.

Amen.

Amen.

Father, we thank you today that we are not alone and nothing is too difficult for you.

Nothing is impossible for you.

We thank you, Lord, that anyone in this place today who does not even know God, Lord, you want to make yourself known to them today.

You want to know them in a way that's closed.

And we ask, Lord, as we take, you said that as we take steps towards you, you'll take steps towards us.

And as we said even last week that you took the journey of a million miles, but you leave that last step unto us.

We thank you, Lord, that we have the privilege to connect with you in this deep, deep, intimate way.

And we thank you for it today in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Let's give them a round of applause.

Amen.

Well, I hope you guys feel encouraged to pray.

We're starting the day with prayer, we're starting the week with prayer, and as a church, we're gonna pray.

Amen.

As a church, are we going to pray?

Amen.

I believe it's so imperative.

I believe that it's not something that's just cliche that we're doing.

We're not just praying because it's the new year and that's what churches are supposed to do.

That this actually is a time ordained by God where we can start to see miracles happen in our church, in our lives, in our own families, and our finances as we gather together and as one body, just pray.

So that's awesome.

If you're new here, we just want to welcome you.

I hope you feel at home and welcome.

We just want to get to know you.

So you're gonna find this card on the back of your seat or the front of your seat.

If you could fill it out for us, just put a little bit of info, bring it to the people in the back.

We would love to get to know you, and then they're gonna buy you a coffee.

And it is cold outside, people, so the coffee is worth it.

Fill it out.

Let us get to know you because we believe that in this church nobody does life alone, and we don't want you doing it alone either, all right?

So fill it out.

We're gonna get our tithes and offerings ready.

We have a unique opportunity today in our church.

We say over and over again that we're family, and sometimes family means people come and they join and they're new and we're excited.

But unfortunately, sometimes family also means people leave and they go away.

And I'm fine, guys, I'm fine with it.

But today we have an opportunity to celebrate two of our exciting leaders in the church that are going away for a while, I believe.

They will come back in Jesus' name.

But we're gonna honor Moana and Kara if you guys want to come up here.

Give them a hand as they come up.

Moana and Kara are two wonderful, beautiful, amazing, talented leaders in our church, all the way up, all the way up.

We love them.

They're leaving us for a bit.

We're sad.

Brian's gonna talk for a minute.

Um, one of the hardest things as a leader is to it sounds really bad that I say it like this, but you see people succeed, and it's really hard because you know that they may leave.

But you invest your time and the effort and you pray with and you pray for, and you watch them grow and mature.

Uh, when I left years and years ago, Moana was this big, and then when I come back here, she's the worship leader at this church, and I've just gotten to know uh I yeah, I know it's Kara, but this is the thing.

I called her Karen for like three weeks, and not one youth leader corrected me.

Not one.

Thanks, guys.

Appreciate that.

And then she corrected me and I felt like a jerk.

But we have the opportunity this morning.

I've just I actually went to some of their friends and the leaders, and I asked, give me one word to describe each one of them.

And there's a lot of uh of duplicates.

But I'm gonna just read this is for Kara.

So they said this about you.

They said she is faithful, she is selfless, she's hardworking, kind, outgoing, caring, and generous.

She's been here for just a little bit of time compared to some others.

Give her a hand.

But she serves this house faithfully and has for a long time, for the as long as she's been here.

It's been fantastic to watch her grow and mature.

She's actually moving from here and going to Ontario.

No, no booze, no booze.

It's just Ontario.

We're praying that she's gonna come back.

Amen.

Moana is heading to Australia, and I asked the same question some of her friends and the family in this house, and this is what they said about her.

She's passionate, she's kind, she's loving, she's generous, she's a servant, she's heartwarming, she has the heart for worship, and she's gifted.

The thing about this is that yes, it's bittersweet as a leader to watch people grow, mature, and but they that's this is the price we pay, is they leave, but we want them to come back.

But this is the other thing is that it's more important that we see God move in their life and who they are, and God take them to what God has for them than the position that they play at church.

Way more important to see God in them and them moving in their what their calling is than what the position they serve here.

They're gonna leave holes in this church.

But God will fill those.

So I'm gonna call out Pastor Brody and Pastor Malachi, if he's around here, and Pastor Brody's gonna pray.

I just want you to extend your hands to these two as we honor them as they go, and we wait for them to come back.

I'd love to pray, but I know uh Malachi has been uh serving with them on the on the youth team for the last little while, and I might just pray afterwards, but I just want Malachi to lead out.

Let's stretch our hands to them if you could, and just from where you're at, just connect.

God, we just pray for these two, Kara and Wana.

God, we just thank you so much for bringing them to this place.

Uh you you brought them here for a reason, for a for a time, um, and now you're sending them out.

God, we're not we're not losing them.

We're not we're not uh sending them away, but you are sending them.

And that's the most important thing, that you would send them to these places, God, that you would you would bless Kara in her new job.

God, you would you would cause her to change the atmosphere in her work, just with the atmosphere that she she walks with, that that she would change atmospheres and she would she would change hearts with how she she treats people and how how kind and and giving and generous she is with the love of Christ that you've put in there.

And from Wana, God, I pray that that as she goes to Australia, as as she goes to to learn from uh Hillsong, God, that you would just place in her something deeper.

God, you've already you've already put in her a deep heart of worship, but God, you would dig deeper in her.

And God, we just we just thank you for these two.

They are servants in the house, and God, we just thank you for for calling them and sending them.

In Jesus' name as a church, we pray.

Amen.

Father, I just pray today for the anointing to rest upon them, Lord, that they would know your presence with them, Lord, wherever they're at, that they would know that your love, your love for them is real, and that your your uh your desire for them is to grow and to mature into the full, into the full light of who they're called to be.

And so we thank you, Lord, for favor.

And we thank you, Lord, that it would follow them wherever they're at, Lord, even if it's across the ocean, Lord, that there would be favor resting on them.

In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.

Amen.

Give him a hand.

We love them.

Make sure you hug on them, love on them, bless them before they leave.

Man, I'm so thankful just for the community that we have, for the family we have.

I'm thankful for Moana and Kara.

And if you took one minute to hear their stories, I promise you it would blow you away.

Like sitting with Kara over the past few years has been amazing to see the growth in that girl.

Guys.

I love these people.

Kara came to us and she was working at Costco, came to Jojo's funeral where we believe that lives are gonna get saved and redeemed and healed.

And Kara came and has served faithfully in our house, has grown, has been a leader in our youth.

Like, who does that, people?

Gets up, she'll work at like three in the morning and come to church and be like more bubbly than I am, and it's awesome.

And my God, Moana, I'm not even sorry.

I love these people, and we need to celebrate the people that are in our church because you don't even know the hours that Moana has put in year after year, day after day, because she loves this house, she loves God, she loves worship, and if it breaks her, and if it takes all the time in the world, she's down for it.

Like, you have no idea how many times I've been like, Moana, have you slept at all?

In a week, in a month, in a year, have you slept?

Could you go to sleep?

And she doesn't even care because she loves this place and this house and like would debate going across the world for the most amazing opportunity because, like, well, what if my church back home needs me?

Like, who thinks about that?

And like, guys, we're not just sending random people away.

We're not just like, go have a nice life.

We're sending, we're actually sending, not just letting them go, we're sending our family with all the faith and all the support in the world, knowing that Australia, oh man, does not know what's coming.

Australia is getting our best, that Ontario is getting our best, that we're expecting for them, we're praying for them, we're believing with them that God's gonna do greater things in them than we can imagine.

Amen.

So we're gonna invite the ushers up at this time.

All right.

God, I just thank you for who you are.

God, I thank you that even as we started today praying for family that's in dire situations, God, and we're ending on sending more family that's a part of our house.

God, I thank you that in your economy, God, we're all family.

We're all in this together.

God, we can celebrate with those who are celebrating, we can mourn with those who are mourning, God, and we can pray in the midst of it all.

And I thank you for that encouragement again today, God, just to realign our hearts back, realign our lives back to the prayer, to coming before you, God, knowing that you have bigger plans than we know, knowing that you're still on the throne, and knowing that you're gonna do great works in the lives of every single person here, God.

And I pray that as we sow financially right now, God, that it would be so much more than financial.

It would be a same thing that we're trusting you, God, at the start of the year.

We're trusting you with our lives, we're trusting you with our finances, we're trusting you with the people that are family in this house, and we believe that we will see you get all the glory and all the praise in Jesus' name.

Everybody said.