The Word for today:
Psalms 61 & 62


Mark this: Psalm 62:8--
Trust in him at all times;
Pour out your hearts to him.


I and my family are blessed in about a zillion ways that I know of--and, I suspect, in a zillion ways I'm unaware of.

One of our great blessings is that we go to a real Bible church. It's not too big and it's not too small. It's just right.

We have musicians who sing/play real Bible songs, old and new, with Spirit-driven giftedness. We have Sunday school teachers who tell real Bible stories to the kids, loving them to pieces as they do.

Adult Sunday school classes are short on worldly philosophy and long on Jesus, the real Jesus-- not the movie Jesus but the biblical Jesus: the lamb slain from the foundation of the world; the creator of the universe; the sinless Son of God, born of a virgin, who performed miracles, taught the precepts of his kingdom, and died on the cross to save us from our sins; who rose from the dead; who lives forever to keep us saved; who will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead; whose kingdom will never end.

We have a youth pastor who delights in life, carrying a big red Bible in a banana box wherever he goes. You read that correctly. He carries his big Bible in a banana box--along with sundry other items he'll be needing that day--like candy, shoestrings, a measuring cup. (How the rest of us manage to get through the day without a measuring cup is hard for him to fathom.) Best of all, my teenage sons note that he not only carries the Bible, but opens it often and avidly, and teaches from it with reverence, enthusiasm, and skill.

We have a senior pastor who does the heavy lifting--lifting all our spirits as he lifts up Jesus. He boils complex things down for us so we can understand. Right now he is teaching us that prayer is not just about asking for things all the time. Prayer is about connecting with God, it's about expressing your heart to God, it's about a relationship with God in the making.

Yesterday he taught the acronym ACTS--a pattern that's been proven to activate more well-rounded prayer:
Adoration (praise)
Confession
Thanksgiving
Supplication (the "asking" part of prayer).

Then he reminded us that the Psalms are the Bible's prayer book. Between the lines of the Psalms we can feel the passion, power, and personality of prayer. We can see the relationship between God and David grow before our very eyes as David pours out his heart in prayer.

I don't know who you are or where you are. But wherever you happen to be, find a real Bible church with real Bible teachers and pastors, who pray real Bible prayers to God the Father through the real Jesus, the biblical Jesus, in the power of the Holy Spirit--the Spirit which infuses the prayers of the Psalms.

Sit outside in the parking lot on a Sunday morning. Are they carrying Bibles through those doors? If not, go home. If they are, go inside. Are they referring to those Bibles in Sunday school and in the sermon?

And if, while you're surveying the scene, you see a man carrying a big red Bible in a banana box, then look no further. You've found a real Bible church!

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