Prayer

Signs of Needing Recovery

Signs of needing Recovery

  • Behavior that sabotages successful management of our lives
  • Feeling the necessity to shut down feelings and to keep everything inside. (As children we learned that expressing our own wants and needs resulted in rejection. This in turn fueled intense feelings of inadequacy. No matter how hard we tried things only got worse). When we express our needs we risk being rejected.
  • low self esteem

  • insecurity, anxiety
  • Trying to save face rather than to acknowledge reality and accept the consequences of our actions. Hiding from our true feelings by staying “busy.” By staying busy we allow ourselves to ignore our true feelings and thus deny them.
  • Tendency to isolate
  • Need to be approved of by others. Being loyal to others even when loyalty is not deserved or warranted.
  • Easily intimidated by others.
  • confusing pity with love
  • giving in to others rather than taking care of our own wants and needs.

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Ten Tips for Preventing Relapse

1) Formulate and stamp indelibly on your mind a mental picture of yourself as succeeding. Hold this picture tenaciously. Never permit it to fade. Your mind will seek to develop this picture. Never think of yourself as failing; never doubt the reality of the mental image. That is most dangerous, for the mind always tries to complete what it pictures. So always picture “success” no matter how badly things seem to be going at the moment.
For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he. Proverbs 23:6

2) Whenever a negative thought concerning your personal ability or strength come to mind, deliberately voice the words of God:
“Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness.”Isaiah 41:10

3) Do not build up obstacles in your imagination. Depreciate every so-called obstacle. Minimize them. Difficulties must be studied and efficiently dealt with to be eliminated, but they must be seen for only what they are. They must not be inflated by fear thoughts.
For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind. 2 Timothy 1:7

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It’s the Waiting in Recovery

Recently, I chatted with a young girl I’ve been mentoring. She’s currently in an eating disorder treatment facility- and fighting her treatment. She has flat out refused to eat, drink or take any medication. She’s been closely monitored, mainly due to a recent episode in which she swallowed glass.

Yes, you heard me right; she swallowed glass.

I asked her what brought this on and she responded she wanted to feel pain and she was tired of waiting for her recovery. I don’t think it has sunken in that recovery is very much a process, not an instant cure.

But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord. 2 Corinthians 3:18

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What Is Prayer?

Prayer, as defined in the NKJV Study Bible, is based on the Hebrew verb palal, as noted in God’s words to King Solomon when the Lord appeared to him the second time following Solomon’s dedication of the temple:

Then the Lord appeared to Solomon by night, and said to him: ‘I have heard your prayer, and have chosen this place for Myself as a house of sacrifice. When I shut up heaven and there is no rain, or command the locusts to devour the land, or send pestilence among My people, if My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and heal their land.

The word “pray,” as used above in , means “‘to intervene,’ ‘to interpose,’ ‘to arbitrate,’ or even ‘to judge.’ The Lord was asking His people to intercede for others in their prayers.” (NKJV Study Bible, Second Ed., p.671)

So, what does it mean “to intercede for others in prayer?” According to the NKJV Study Bible, based on the Greek words enteuxis and entugchano, translated “intercession,” this term refers to “the act of petitioning God or praying on behalf of another person or group. The sinful nature of this world separates human beings from God. It has always been necessary, therefore, for righteous individuals to go before God to seek reconciliation between Him and His fallen creation. The sacrifices and prayers of Old Testament priests were acts of intercession that point forward to the work of Christ. Christ is, of course, the greatest intercessor.” (NKJV Study Bible, Second Ed., p.1914)

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Nurtured by the Right Question

Wrong questions are the breeding ground of doubt, despair and unbelief. I know; I’ve asked the wrong questions for almost sixty years. But, in the midst of those questions mercy, grace, atonement and the answer burst its way into my darkened questions. Tell Me Why is the most foreboding of all wrong questions.

Don’t miss-hear me; questions are natural and a part of our God given DNA. But: to end up at Why? That wrong question is not a part of the likeness and image of God that we are all endowed with. It is the epitome of our fallen, darkened condition! So, how do we approach these unanswerable questions?

Before there are answers, there is a relationship you must have your heart opened to. There is a knowing that paves the way for sufficient answers. Here it comes! You must know that God’s plan is God; revealed in a “baby wrapped in old dirty clothes”, a Son of Man, a life lived exemplary for all generations, on a Cross-disfigured and murdered by His own and in an empty tomb. He is not a program, or an impersonal idea.

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Asking for Wisdom – How Are You Praying?

A verse that often comes to mind is James 1:5:

If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him.


When was the last time you asked for wisdom? I have been to a great many prayer meetings over the years, but I don’t recall hearing many prayers for wisdom. Either church folk are content to be stupid, or else they assume that they are wise.

The interesting thing is that no strings are attached to praying for wisdom. We are simply to pray in faith. At the same time, we are told how important wisdom is: “Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom” (Prov. 4:7). We are also told that wisdom is a blessing (Prov. 3:13); it is better than rubies and everything else (Prov. 8:11); it is the foundation of the good life (Prov. 24:3), and so on and on. Very obviously, God regards wisdom as necessary to the good life, and also promises to give it to all who ask for it.

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Why doesn’t God seem to answer my prayers?

Why doesn’t God seem to answer my prayers?

Often quoted is Psalm 37:4b, “and he will give you the desires of your heart.” This portion of the Scripture is often used to say that God will give you what you ask for. However, the first part of this verse-often unquoted-provides the true meaning behind it. Psalm 37:4, “Delight yourself in the Lord and he will grant you the desires of your heart.”

If you are taking pleasure in the things of God, and you want for yourself no more and no less than God’s will for you, then you can be confident that He will grant you your desires. But, when you mix your own desires and self-made plans into your prayers, God may not answer the way that you thought you wanted Him to. James 4:3 says, When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.

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Prayer when Powerless over Addictions & Dysfunctions

Dear Lord,
I am powerless over my addictions dysfunctions.
Grant me today, the ability to turn my troubles,
my will and my life over to your loving care.

I trust in you to completely restore my
brokenness into wholeness, insanity to saneness
willfulness into willingness and fear into courage.

Lighten my load and free me from all bondage
that I may walk through this day
in freedom and in peace.

In the name of Jesus I pray. Amen.

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When praying, my past sins come to mind. Does this mean I am unworthy to pray?

When praying, my past sins come to mind. Does this mean I am unworthy to pray?

No. God wants us to come to Him in humility and confess our sins to Him and then repent-turn away-from our sins. He does not want us to change and perfect ourselves and then go to Him. He wants us to go to Him so that He can help us change. The Bible says, “Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need” (Hebrews 4:16).

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When Prayers Seem Unanswered

This was written by an unknown Confederate soldier

I asked God for strength that I might achieve.
I was made weak, that I might learn humbly to obey.

I asked for help, that I might do greater things.
I was given infirmity, that I might do better things.

I asked for riches, that I might be happy.
I was given poverty, that I might be wise.

I asked for power, that I might have the praise of men.
I was given weakness, that I might feel the need of God.

I asked for all things, that I might enjoy life.
I was given life, that I might enjoy all things.

I got nothing that I asked for but everything I hoped for.
Almost despite myself, my unspoken prayers were answered.

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