Praise Church GrowthPraise Church has grown very rapidly over the last year. We have grown in congregation size, in maturity of the believers, in financial giving and in passion for serving the Lord. There are very clear signs that we will continue our growth. As we continue to grow we must continue to build on the sure foundation of Jesus Christ and His finished work of redemption that was done by His death on Calvary’s Cross. Our Christian faith is all about getting to know Jesus. He wants to spend time with us and wants us to spend time with Him! This is accomplished by prayer and daily communion with Him in His Word. The Holy Spirit is drawing us into our prayer closet to learn about God and His will for our lives. He desires relationship with us! Many Christian Ministries start off in the beginning as a God thing, but over time they get bigger and busier and neglect to lay the proper foundation of prayer. The building goes up so fast, but the foundation is weak! They do not even realize their weakness! They feel they no longer need God’s help, no longer need to hear His voice, no longer need to take the difficult road of waiting on Him: they become content, lukewarm and prayer-less. And the ministry continues to grow to higher heights, while the foundation crumbles. In response to this condition of dead lifeless Christianity Jesus said “many shall come to me in that day and say, Lord did we not do all kinds of wonderful things for you? “ Jesus does not even bother answering the cry of self righteousness, but replies “depart for me you that practice iniquity”, or another translation says “for the things you did were unauthorized” (Matt 7:21-27) So many people are doing things ”for God” that are “unauthorized”. The reason they are unauthorized is because they never spent time in prayer to find out what God wanted them to do, or to get permission for the things they went and did on their own. The end result is often disastrous, bringing alienation from God. You have to spend time with Jesus in prayer and in His Word to : 1) get revelation to know who He is 2) know who you are in Him 3) find His will for your life and 4) get the power to do His will. I am praying that the “desire” for prayer will come upon our church. The desire for prayer comes from the Holy Spirit. Once the Spirit of God comes on us, prayer is no longer a joyless task but an adventure in faith. Instead of our lives being focused on the busyness of self gratification, we become totally consumed with spending our time with the real Joy of our lives. When this foundational deep rooted life of prayer is in place, it matters not what storm blows, how much ministry activity goes on or how enormous the buildings and congregation get, it only matters that Jesus is carrying the load and steering the ship. We are just taking orders from our Captain and following our Commander-in-Chief. When our lives are built upon the solid rock of prayer and trusting in God, we can weather any storm! I feel the Lord is bringing our attention to growing our roots deeper and stronger rather than trying to grow bigger branches. As we grow the roots of our church deeper through prayer, fellowship with Jesus and dependence on God, the branches will automatically grow larger and bear life giving fruit. Let’s all continue to ask God’s Holy Spirit daily for a special heavenly desire to read His Word and to Pray! |