Praying for the Ones that Pray for Us

Delegates from congregations of the people called Methodist will be gathering for a big gathering next month in Portland, Oregon.    That gathering is called General Conference, and people will be there from around the world.      The meeting, which takes place only every 4 years, will be a time of discussion on what we believe and what we do as the people called Methodist.    One of the things that the people called Methodist are asked to do in these days in anticipation of that gathering is to be in prayer.    Yesterday was the date that the people called Methodists in our area were asked to be in prayer for that gathering.    Prayer is one of the things that I believe people of faith do well.    We pray as we begin our worship and we pray when we end our worship.   It is quite common in many churches I have participated in for churches to solicit prayer petitions and prayers of praise.    Many churches have prayer meetings on their weekly list of activities.    Some churches send out prayer requests via phone calls or via e mail.   The  church prays often and prays well.

In these days, the people called Methodist are asked to pray for their beloved church.   It got me to thinking:   Do we regularly pray for the Ones that pray for us?      Most people are quick and quite glad  for the Church to pray for them, but  do we take time to pray for the Church--  for its leadership, its mission, and its ministry?        There are times the church has failed to be the “body of Christ” and was quite deserving of the criticism that came its way.   While the Church serves a Savior who is without sin, its members are simply people saved from sin by grace.  Are we as  quick to offer prayers of thanksgiving to God for the church when it does that which is good, right, and holy as we are to offer criticism?

I know not whether you who are reading this are regularly involved in a church or not.    Whether you are involved in a church and whatever that denomination that church might be , I encourage you to pray for the church.    I believe that prayer works, and that the church that so willingly prays for us needs us to pray for it.     Let me end by sharing part of a  prayer of Jesus for his disciples found in John 17: 17-25:

¹⁷ “Sanctify them by the truth. Your word is truth. ¹⁸ Just as you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. ¹⁹ It is for their sakes that I sanctify myself, so that they, too, may be sanctified by the truth.²⁰ I ask not only on behalf of these men,^[g] but also on behalf of those who will believe in me through their message, ²¹ so that they may all be one. Just as you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be one^[h] in us, so that the world may believe that you sent me. ²² “I have given them the glory that you gave me, so that they may be one, just as we are one. ²³ I am in them, and you are in me. May they be completely one, so that the world may know that you sent me and that you have loved them as you loved me. ²⁴ Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am and to see my glory, which you gave me because you loved me before the creation of the world.   ²⁵ “Righteous Father, the world has never known you. Yet I have known you, and these men have known that you sent me. ²⁶ I made your name known to them, and will continue to make it known, so that the love you have for me^[i] may be in them and I myself may be in them.”                                                                           -     Pastor Randy Wall

 Prayer:   Living God, I thank you for your church, the body of Christ.  Bless its leaders and members to be your hands and feet in the world;  through Christ our Lord. Amen.