Sermons

Good morning. It's great to be with you. And it's good to see you all. It's always a privilege to be at Trinity and to open the Word of God with a church that loves the Scriptures and holds them in high regard. And there's no place I'd rather be in the summer than Dallas and 445 BC. So, this is a great combination.

So, will you open your Bibles as we continue our study in the book of Nehemiah? This is our second installation in the book of Nehemiah. And Pastor Andrew did a superb job setting us up on last Sunday, introducing us to this incredible, instructive manual about God building His people up. And as we enter back into this book, I'm reminded of what Pastor Andrew said last week.

I mean, he showed us that this is the ideal place to think about a building project. And I'm causing some serious humming. I think maybe it doesn't, when Andrew preaches, it doesn't do that. So, if I do this, does that, it does, it worked. Look, that was it. That was the issue. So, I'm just going to stay down here. I'm just, it's totally fine. The weather's great down here, Matt, you should try it. I mean, this is incredible. Just kind of ducked down, folks. What was I saying? Nehemiah.

What struck me about what Andrew said last week was that this isn't about bricks and mortar, swords, this isn't about just walls and gates being restored, this is about a people being restored. And that's what's so remarkable and so transcendent about this book, is it's a reclamation project, but not merely of the physical city, it's a reclamation project of God's people in their vitality and spirituality. And as you move through the book of Nehemiah, you see that becomes the focus. Not the walls, not the opposition, not even leadership principles and dynamics, but really the work that only God can do in the heart and soul of his people.

And so that's exactly what's in our focus here in Nehemiah chapter one. And my assignment is verses 4 through 11. So will you stand with me and we'll read Nehemiah 1, 4 through 11. And let's attend to the Word of God. It says this.

(Scripture reading) "As soon as I heard these words, I sat down and wept and mourned for days. And I continued fasting and praying before the God of heaven. And I said, “oh Lord God of heaven, the great and awesome God who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments. Let your ear be attentive and your eyes open to hear the prayer of your servant that I now pray before you day and night for the people of Israel and your servants, confessing the sins of the people of Israel, which we have sinned against you. Even I and my father's house have sinned. We have acted very corruptly against you and have not kept the commandments, the statutes, and the rules that you commanded your servant Moses. Remember the word that you commanded your servant Moses saying, ‘if you are unfaithful, I will scatter you among the peoples. But if you return to me and keep my commandments and do them, though your outcasts are in the uttermost parts of heaven, from there I will gather them and bring them to the place that I have chosen to make my name dwell there. ‘

They are your servants and your people, whom you have redeemed by your great power and by your strong hand. Oh Lord, let your ear be attentive to the prayer of your servant and to the prayer of your servants who delight to fear your name and give success to your servant today and grant him mercy in the sight of this man. Now, I was cupbearer to the king.”” (End)

This is the word of the living God. May he write it indelibly in our hearts this morning by His Spirit, we ask. In the matchless name of Jesus, amen.

You may be seated.

When faced with bad news, some people panic. Some respond with anger. Some respond by making a plan. Some respond by finding someone to blame. Nehemiah, faced with devastating news in verses one through four, the gates of Jerusalem are burned, the walls are in ruins. The rebuilding project that had shown so much hope with the restoration of the temple under the ministry of Ezra 12 years prior was not going so well anymore. The favor they had previously enjoyed with King Artaxerxes had come to an end in Ezra chapter four, and now, after a report from his brothers, Nehemiah responds, not by making a plan, not by finding someone to blame, not with panic, not with leadership.

How Nehemiah responds is instructive for us because Nehemiah is immediately drawn in his heart and soul to the necessity of prayer. When he hears that Jerusalem's walls are broken down, that her gates are burned with fire, that God's people are in distress and reproach. And before he talks to the king, before he dares approach the king of Persia and make his requests, before he organizes a project, before he recruits workers, before he surveys the walls, before he will rise up against opposition, before he will encourage people, Nehemiah prays. And that's what's most remarkable about Nehemiah chapter one.

We live in a world that prizes action above all else, getting things done, fixing problems, making a plan, building a team. Yet the first picture we learn in the book of Nehemiah is not about his great building skills or his incredible leadership or the reforms that he will champion alongside of the ministry of Ezra. But what we see is what we must see when faced with trouble and what we see in every great spiritual leader.

We see a man on his knees, a man on his knees. The first thing Nehemiah teaches us about rebuilding is that before God's servants ever stand before a man, they must kneel before God. And what a prayer is unfolding before us. It's such a privilege to be granted access to this man's heart before God. The Holy Spirit knew that we needed to hear the shape and contour of Nehemiah's prayer so that our own prayers, when we're faced with crisis and trouble and danger, would learn the grooves and shapes and direction of a prayer like Nehemiah's prayer. It's a prayer of a man burdened. Burdened by a heart, grieved by the situation before him.

And before we meet Nehemiah's incredible Godly leadership dynamics, we see him as a praying servant. It's really the first step of every leader. The first step of every child of God when faced with a dilemma. And whether that dilemma is on the national scope of Ezra 4 where the king says, no more rebuilding. The wall project is done. You don't need walls to protect yourself because you are our vassal. You don't get to be protected.

This burdens Nehemiah's heart to such an extent that he knows he's God's servant and he knows he must pray. And so, in these verses we see a prayer in crisis. We see a man who has so much to do that he knows he first must pray. It shows his need, it shows his dependency, it's a real look into the authenticity of Nehemiah as a confessor and a pleader, as one trusting and seeking. And it forms for us a model prayer that shows us what to do before the work begins. And that's the title of our message today from Nehemiah chapter one verses four through 11, before the work begins. Let's examine Nehemiah's prayer and see what we can learn about trusting God in the face of crisis. What we can learn about before we put our hands to the plow, how we should seek the throne of heaven.

And this is obviously, light work for a preacher because any sermon on prayer is always gonna be super convicting to everybody, right? I mean, you hear a sermon on prayer, you're like, yeah, I'm not, yeah, guilty. But what I love about this section is it's not hammering you on you don't pray enough. Instead, it's helping you. It's showing you why you need to pray. It's motivating our prayers and shaping our prayers and their content so that when the moment comes of real crisis and trouble, we can engage heaven in like manner. It's what I love about this prayer. I see five aspects of Nehemiah's prayer, and we'll cover them pretty quickly, but I think it'll really expose the shape and scope of how important it is for a people before they do anything else to pray.

So first off, what happens here? Let's call him a burdened servant. A burdened servant prays by, number one, a burdened servant prays by, number one, seeking God first, in verse four. Seeking God first, in verse four. Before he has his, dangerous conversation with King Artaxerxes in chapter two, he has a far more significant conversation to his God. Look at verse four. Coming off of trouble and shame, the devastating news that the walls of Jerusalem are broken down and she's defenseless, he hears these words, verse four, “And I sat down and wept and mourned for days. And I continued fasting and praying before the God of heaven.”

He seeks God first. We've heard the phrase, it's your last resort, right? When you have no other options, what do you do? Well, Nehemiah shows us that prayer is not his last resort. Prayer is his first resort. It's his instinctual movement. And I think that helps us at a baseline level establish exactly what prayer is. In John Calvin's Institutes, he has a section on prayer that's excellent. And in it, he provides a remarkably simple definition of prayer. He calls prayer, “the chief exercise of our faith.”

“The chief exercise of our faith.” In other words, what does faith most commonly look like? How does it show itself? What is the greatest and first evidence of a person who has faith in God? And Calvin would say the chief exercise of faith is, in fact, prayer.

Because faith seeks an outlet. Faith seeks an expression. Faith exercises itself by engagement with God, which acknowledges our dependence on God, our need for God. Our running to God shows where our priorities are. The fact that we are going to speak to the unseen one and pour out our burdens on him as our first resort shows us that prayer is something that flows from faith. Nehemiah hears devastating news, and he's obviously burdened by this news. His compatriots, his brothers are in trouble, and what is most important is what he does with the burden of his heart.

He does not first formulate a plan. He does not first gather support. He doesn't draft a proposal. He doesn't approach the king. There's so much that he could do and will do. He'll bear arms. He'll pick up a trowel and a sword. He will fight. He will plead with urgency. He'll delegate. He'll withstand opposition. He'll lead. He'll work. He'll encourage. He'll resist. But first, he'll pray. That's his first move.

That's the chief exercise of his faith and ours. Faith isn't merely believing truths and doctrines about God. Faith instinctually runs to God, runs to God. J.C. Ryle says it this way. He says, "prayer is as natural to spiritual life as breathing is to a newborn baby." The first cry of the newborn believer is prayer. When Bishop Ryle describes prayer as the sign of Christian life, it convicts us about our prayerlessness, but it should reinforce the reality that to the believer, there should be nothing more native nothing more natural than prayer. Every burden, every worry, every concern, every dilemma, though solvable on a human level, though faceable in practical realities, ought to first be brought to God in prayer.

Nehemiah's heart is crushed. He sits down and weeps and mourns for days. He refuses to eat so that he can devote himself to prayer, so that his hunger for food will be representative and replacing a hunger for God's work and Word and fellowship and answer and assistance and help, and he prays to the God of heaven. It takes him from the citadel of Susa to the throne of grace. And his crushed heart, because of the condition of Jerusalem, is now moving instinctually towards not self-reliance, but heaven's answer. His burden drives him to God in prayer. He seeks God first because prayer is the chief exercise of faith. What else does a burdened servant pray by? Well, a burdened servant prays by seeking God first, and second, a burdened servant prays by trusting God's greatness, verses five and six.

Trusting God's greatness and these are beautiful verses, look at verse five, "and I said, oh Yahweh God of heaven. The great and awesome God who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments. Let your ear be attentive and your eyes open to hear the prayer of your servant that I now pray before you day and night for the people of Israel, your servants."

How great is God? Well, the answer is He's greater than your troubles. Look at the word in verse three in the prior paragraph. The report his brothers give him is the remnant there in the province who has survived the exile is in what kind of trouble? Great trouble. Hebrew word “gadol,” big, great, huge trouble, huge shame, big problems. And so, who does Nehemiah speak to?

He speaks to a great God, an awesome God. Nehemiah understands that he can cast all his cares on God because God's capacity to handle and receive and carry these burdens is far greater than the extent and scope of the problems. That is such a core truth about who God is and who are we. Not only are we seen in contrast to God here because God is great, verse five. His power is great, verse 10.

But the only other word that's repeated as much as this thematic and significant word of greatness is a constant repetition of a very plain word in Hebrew, “ebed.” It means servant. And it appears over and over again in this passage to a point of potential redundancy so that we wouldn't miss how great God is and exactly who we are compared to that. How does Nehemiah view himself? Verse six. “May your eyes be opened to hear the prayer of your servant.”

And who are the people of Israel? Verse six later, the people of Israel, your servants. And who are they in verse seven? Well, Nehemiah says, “you commanded your servant Moses.” Well, certainly Moses was many things, the giver of the law, the great preacher of Deuteronomy. But in this prayer, he's in the same position as Nehemiah and the people. He's a servant. Verse eight, your servant Moses, once again.

Verse 10, they are your servants. Verse 11, “oh Lord, let your ear be attentive to the prayer of your servant.” Verse 11, “to the prayer of your servants who delight to fear your name. To give success to your,” verse 11, “servant today and grant him mercy in the sight of this man.”

When we are seeing God rightly as great and greater than all our troubles, then we start to see ourself in the proper position before Him. We exist to serve Him. How important is that when we pray? It reminds us that God is not our genie. We rub the lamp and we get what we want from Him. Prayer could confuse you if your theology is wrong to think that God is there to do your bidding.

But by Nehemiah's repeated emphasis and self-identification as a slave, as a servant, as a bondservant of God. He is reminding himself and acknowledging before God that God is the great one and Nehemiah is simply here to serve. This is the posture of prayer. We are his humble servants. And though Nehemiah is about to make in chapter two a big ask, a large request from a powerful king, a potentate who could put an end to Nehemiah in an instant. Nehemiah now is talking to someone far greater and far more powerful, a great God, an awesome God, and he speaks to Him as his servant.

It's a powerful reminder of every true prayer and every true prayer. The reality that we can talk to God, that we can let our requests be known to God, reminds us of one of the most precious doctrines in all the Bible, and I don't even know if they have it in the systematic theology. I call it God's approachability. Right? You can go to Him.

Nehemiah shows that to us. His door is not cracked, it's wide open. And Nehemiah knows exactly where to go. His problems are great, so he goes to a great God, and he approaches Him not as God the one who will serve Nehemiah, though he has many needs, but he approaches Him as the servant. I love what Derek Kidner says here. Since Nehemiah's natural bent was for swift, decisive action. That's true, right? Nehemiah's natural bent is towards swift and decisive action. His behavior here is remarkable because it shows where his priorities lie.

What's he doing? He's seeking God and he's seeing God rightly. That's why a burdened servant is so committed to acknowledging the greatness and the character of God. That's why we're saying he's trusting in God's greatness. And his theology is on display here.

Verse five, “great and awesome God.” A God who is both vast and great and exalted and a God who is awesome, full of awe. I love the little phrase of Dale Ralph Davis. He says, “God is both scary and dependable. He's both awful, full of awe, and he is faithful, able to keep His promise and take care of His people.”

And all of this is built on the doctrine of God's approachability, the fact that you can talk to God. In fact, another structural marker of this text is an inclusion, right, bookends. Verse six has the same words as verse 11. Verse six says, “let your ear be attentive and your eyes open.” And then verse 11, he says, “let your ear be attentive.” It's that same marker bracketing his prayer with the doctrine of God's approachability.

Nehemiah understood what Jesus would later say, “come to me, all you who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” Nehemiah understood what Jesus would teach His disciples, that your father cares for you. And what father, when his son seeks bread, would give him a stone? So, 445 BC, Nehemiah knew something about prayer because it's something that was true of God in all eternity because it connects with His character.

He keeps covenant, verse five, “in steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments,” so he could say, “let your ear be attentive and your eyes open to hear the prayer of your servant that I now pray to you day and night for the people of Israel, your servants.”

He understands that his prayer has to rightly acknowledge who God is. It's why when Jesus teaches His disciples to pray, he opens with, “hallowed be thy name,” an acknowledgement of who God is, His holiness. J.I. Packer says, commenting on this Nehemiah passage, he calls this “the truest and purest kind of prayer.” What is the truest and purest kind of prayer? It's one that always seeks to clarify its own vision of who God is and to celebrate this reality in adoration. To clarify our vision of who God is. It's important you know who you're talking to. That's what prayer is all about.

And the reason it's instinctual for Nehemiah is because he has grown to know and love God, a God who knows His covenant and a God who's demonstrated His love. And so, Nehemiah responds in kind. A burdened servant's prayer is marked by first, seeking God, second, trusting God's greatness, and third, by owning his own sinfulness. By owning his own sinfulness, verses six and seven, right in the middle of verse six, look what Nehemiah prays. “I now pray before you day and night for the people of Israel, your servants, confessing the sins of the people of Israel.”

That's an easy prayer to pray because the people are in exile. The root cause of the discipline of God on this moment in history is because of their failure to keep His commandments. They're enduring a covenant curse according to Deuteronomy 40. That's what Ezra has revealed in the hearts of the people. They've gone far from God. They didn't obey God. They didn't honor His commandments. And now they're in a place where their sin has been exposed and is being disciplined and dealt with. And it's easy to confess the sins of the people of Israel. It's harder to say the next sentence, “which we have sinned against you.”

Nehemiah's in the citadel of Susa. He's the king's cupbearer. We don't know much about his background, but likely he is this younger generation, a generation younger than Ezra, at least by one generation, and he is serving in a position that probably he was groomed for his entire life. This young man was likely raised in servitude in the palace. He's never been to Jerusalem. That was his grandfather's. That was a prior generation that had been enduring this punishment. And it would be easy for someone in this position to say, how is this sin have anything to do with me? I'm from here. This is all I've ever known.

But because he understands the nature of covenantal love and faithfulness according to Yahweh's Word, he also understands the nature of covenantal unfaithfulness according to the sinfulness of his own heart. And so, he doesn't read the Bible stories and says, man, these people were so naughty. They're bad folks. Man, how could they mess up so much?

He hears the history of his own people and he says, well, that resonates with my own sinful heart. He owns it. Confessing the sins of the people of Israel, including himself as a fellow Israelite, which we have sinned against you. Is it not clear enough? What does he say next?

“Even I and my father's house have sinned. We have acted very corruptly against you and have not kept the commandments, the statutes and the rules.” A threefold way of talking about the entirety of God's law. We've broken it in every possible way. We have broken it. My Father's house, even I have broken it. That you commanded your servant Moses. He owns his sinfulness.

The girls at my house, which is my wife and daughters, I don't know why I call them the girls at my house, but that's where they live. They were reading a book last week that caught my attention. Working through this little book together, the name of the book is what caught my eye. The author's name is Shannon Popkin, and the name of the book reminded me of Texas a little bit because of the way it's phrased. The book's called "Kinda Judgy." That doesn't remind me of Texas, y'all aren't judgy, but just the kinda, kinda, kinda part, “Kinda Judgy.”

And so, it caught my eye and I asked them, what are you guys reading? And it's a neat little book that really highlights that reality we know from Luke 7. Simon the Pharisee watching the sinful woman weep at Jesus' feet. And what does he do? He immediately categorizes her. If this man were a prophet, he would know what kind of a woman this is. Remember that? Simon becomes judge and jury and prosecutor in the courtroom of his own mind.

And the problem is, this author goes on to teach, is that to judge rightly, which we are supposed to assess things, we are supposed to be discerning, we are supposed to be able to render proper judgment, but in order to do so, we need perfect wisdom, right? To have perfect judgment, you need perfect wisdom. You need all the evidence and all the authority to render a verdict. How many of you have that? Who has all the evidence, perfect wisdom, and all authority to render a verdict. Anybody? Only God.  Only Jesus has all authority to render a verdict, has all the evidence, and has all perfect wisdom. Only God has all three. We possess none of them perfectly. And the danger is is we can get kinda judgy, right? We can look at the sins of others far easier and quicker than we look at our own sin. And Nehemiah could have done the same thing.

He hears about Jerusalem's disgrace, the broken walls, the burned gates, the failures of generations before him, and he could have said, Lord, what is the matter with these people? Instead, he says, we have sinned. I and my Father's house have sinned. Nehemiah doesn't look at the ruins of Jerusalem and criticize them. He doesn't stand there with his arms folded going, that sounds broken for me for some reason. Can't make it, you know the one, tsk, tsk. He's not kind of judgy, he's kind of guilty. And he acknowledges it. He doesn't stand over the ruins as a critic; he kneels at the news of those ruins as a confessor.

And it goes back to what J.C. Ryle said, “the habit of prayer is one of the surest marks of a true Christian.” All the children of God on earth are alike in this respect. From the moment there's any life and reality about their religion, they pray. And just as the first sign of life in an infant when born into the world is the act of breathing, so the first act of men and women when they're born again is praying. And this is one of the most common marks of all the elect of God.

And our prayers are most often punctuated by our need for confession. Because we're bad and we do bad. And if your tendency, like mine, is to look at other people's sin before you look at your own, we're working on some kind of Phariseeism and it's dangerous. But Nehemiah beautifully owns his sin. Makes it clear that a burdened servant prays by owning his sinfulness.

Number four, a burdened servant pleads with God's promises, and this may be the most instructive part, verses eight through 10. He pleads according to God's promises. Verse eight, “remember the word that you commanded your servant Moses.” I love, I love when the prayers of the Bible, the Psalms do this all the time. Remind God of something. How forgetful is God?

He's not. He chooses to forget our sins. But there's not one thing that escapes God's catalog. He doesn't need to take any of those memory pills they sell on TV. He doesn't forget where his car keys are. But here the prayers of the Bible continue to say, oh God, remember. And it's not as if God forgot anything.

It's that God's servants understand that God's commitment and faithfulness is to His promises. And they don't see where these promises are going to come to fruition, and so they say, remember God, Your promises. Knowing that He very well remembers His promises, but understanding that the timing and fulfillment of those promises is something that is only belonging to God, and so they bring these promises out before them. Remember what You said to Moses, God. And Nehemiah quotes God to God.

Verse eight, “if you are unfaithful, I'll scatter you among the peoples. If you return to me and keep my commandments and do them, though your outcasts are in the uttermost parts of heaven, from there I will gather them and bring them to the place that I have chosen to make My name dwell there.” God, You promised. And here he's drawing on Deuteronomy 30. And when I manage my time better, second service, I'll go there and spend some time in Deuteronomy 30. You can just mark it down for your quiet time. But look at verses one through four when you get a chance.

It's a promise of judgment, repentance, and full restoration. That's what God promises. As He renders judgment on His people, He tells them a time of repentance will come. And with that repentance will come full scale restitution and rescue and redemption and forgiveness and it's all coming. And so, Nehemiah says, that's the promise and so can it happen now?

He doesn't know God's timeline. He doesn't know about the nature of Jeremiah's new covenant and all the blessings that will come from the work of the gospel and the cross and the Spirit. He doesn't understand all that was part of the fulfillment of God's full retrieval and restoration of His people in an ultimate sense, but he does what I'm an NBA fan, it's one of my flaws.

I call it the association. He does what the guys in the association say. Why not us? That's what they like to say. Why not us? Like why don't we win this series? Why not us? Nehemiah does a why not us. Why not us? Why can't we be the generation that repents truly and savingly and sees the blessing of God as he restores us and fulfills all His good promises?

I don't think Nehemiah is concerned about the eschatology of this thing and the exact charting of the timing of God's restoration of His people in the new covenant. What Nehemiah is concerned about is the burden he brings to the Lord and then the knowledge of the Scriptures that he has where he can read them back to God and say these are Your promises, we are Your servants, we are sinners just like they were. We're repenting right now, just as You told us to do, and You said, when we repent, we would be restored, so let's go. Why not us?

Kidner says it this way, “he knows the threats and promises of Scripture well enough to make a strong, not tentative plea.” And so, the question is, friend, do we know the threats and promises of Scripture well enough to make a strong, not tentative plea? Is your prayer life lacking vocabulary to communicate to God all that's in your heart? Then read your Bible more and pray the Scriptures to the God who spoke them to you. And when you do, you will have the vocabulary of threats and the glorious, beautiful promises of Scripture to know them well enough to make a strong, not a tentative plea. And you will hear the threats of God, and you will speak words of confession to Him and you will hear His glorious promises, and you will claim them as your own because you are His child too.

Why not us? Why not us? Nehemiah says boldly, you promised restoration to repentant, so we're repenting. Give us your favor, extend your great power, let your ear be attentive to us. And finally, after pleading God's promises, he will be trusting. The burdened servant prays by trusting God's placement. And this might be my favorite part. His servants delight to fear His name. They give success for your servant today. Grant him mercy in the sight of this man. This man, what a phrase, this man.

That's King Artaxerxes. The Persian kings could do all kinds of bad stuff to you. Read a history book about the Persian kings and watch them torture and kill their enemies without blinking an eye. And what's Nehemiah call him? This man, just a guy. He's not great god, he's just this man. And who is Nehemiah?

“I was cupbearer to the king.” A privileged position in an ancient realm where one of the closest servants to the king was the one who brought him his wine. Artaxerxes father, Xerxes, the first was killed in his bed chamber. And so, kingdoms were on high alert to those who could, on the inside of the kingdom, usurp or assassinate or kill. And so, the cupbearer was the most trusted position. Not a position any godly Jewish person would want, a defiling kind of position. I mean, working for the pagan kingdom and the pagan king. How did he get there? I'm sure Nehemiah could tell you a story, but this isn't the life he would have chosen for himself. Yes, it's a privileged position, but he's here in the very center of the nastiness of the Persian empire. A faithful Jew living in exile, serving a pagan king in a pagan empire, far from Jerusalem, far from the land of promise, yet all along, God was positioning his servant.

What looked like an unwanted assignment was actually divine preparation. What seemed like exile was in fact providence. What appeared to be a secular job for Nehemiah was a strategic calling. Like Esther, the book that really fits between Ezra and Nehemiah. Nehemiah is in this palace for such a time as this. He didn't know why he was in the palace when he first arrived there.

It's the only life he likely ever knew. But now he begins to see that God had placed him exactly where he needed to be. This is where prayer intersects with providence. This is where our requests to heaven's unseen throne start to come together with all the things we see and do not see in our practical lives. He says, “I was cupbearer to the king.” In other words, he has access. And it's gonna be the month of Shislev, verse one, all the way to the month of Nisan, three to four months, where it'll be Nehemiah's habit to pray and seek God, and trust God's greatness, and own his sinfulness, and plead His promises, and then ultimately to trust God's placement and get to work.

But before he does anything, before the work begins, and before we do anything, we ought to pray. I love that line from that hymn, “What a friend we have in Jesus. Have we troubles and temptations? Have we trials and temptations? Is there troubles anywhere? We should never be discouraged. Just take it to the Lord in prayer.”

(Prayer) Father, may that be the habit of every true Christian, may our instincts be to seek your face. Before we plan, before we work, before we put our hands to the plow, may we ask for Your blessing, confessing our sin, acknowledging your greatness, watching you meet our every need. Give us this grace, God, to come to Your throne of grace and watch You meet our needs. We humbly ask as your servants, amen. (End)

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