Prayers: Don’t Trust The Heart, Yet You Need The Heart

04 Nov Prayers: Don’t Trust The Heart, Yet You Need The Heart

Posted at 11:22h in English Service by

Preacher Huijun - 9 January 2016

Practically Enter Into New Progress

It is another new year. We just bid farewell to 2015 and now we are at 2016, a new year. Have you ever felt that, despite wanting to start anew all over again in this new year, certain things just continue to follow us and weigh us down in life? In Isaiah 43, God said, "forgot the former things, do not dwell on the past. See I am doing a new thing!.. do you not perceive it?" Why is it that we're always unable to have a breakthrough in the old failures, old problems and old mindset; and why is it that we are unable to see the new things that God claims He's doing? The answer could be very simple. We could be still putting the new wine into the old wineskins. We could still be holding onto our fixated mindset about people and things, the condemnation we have programmed into ourselves that guarantees failure and inferiority , the beliefs that magnify our weakness more than the omnipotence of Christ the Savior. We could be so used to holding onto them, to the point of making them absolute and truth in our lives. As a result, we do not see the new things that God's doing, because we are so "trapped and locked" in our own fixated assumptions. Yet, God is doing a new thing even when we're holding onto our "old" because His promise stands forever, and His mercies and grace are new every morning! Since God gives us new grace, rather than drowning ourselves in the voices of the Evil that we will still be the same, start taking practical actions by putting our lives into new wineskins today! God is giving us new grace, new mercy, new heart, new doors, new challenges, new tests this year. Believe, and start praying deeper in His promise so that we begin doing, confirming and living in the promise of God in the daily fields He sends us today!

Related Topics: Healing, Regeneration & Sanctification | More Messages from Preacher Huijun

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Prayers: Don’t Trust The Heart, Yet You Need The Heart


We no doubt know the importance of prayer. Yet in reality, prayer could be the hardest thing to do in our Christian life. And the reason is probably because our hearts doesn’t seem to draw close to God in prayer. We felt more like engaging in a ritual than prayer often times. So the problem at heart is THE HEART. How do we overcome the problem of the heart then?

 Verses to read:
<Jeremiah 17:9> <Mark 7:20-21><James 4:7-10><James 4:1-2,4>

Introduction:

“Pray in the spirit with all kinds of prayers in all occasion” <Eph 6:18>.

  • Yet, prayer is by far one of the most difficult spiritual exercise in most Christian lives. Few enjoyed prayer becoz they could not draw near to God.
  • In prayer, our heart lies at the center of the problem.
  • Should we trust our heart? Yet without the heart, how to pray?
  • The Lord is near to the broken-hearted, and HE saves the contrite in spirit <Ps 34:18>.

1. The Gospel reveals the nature of the Heart.

1) Its deceitful above all else <Jer 17:9>.

  • It creates its own truth, even about God.
  • People who believes in the wrong gospel are NOT praying, even though they are.
  • What is the fundamental gospel truths?
    – SIN (against God)
    – Salvation (through Faith in Christ alone)
    – To live in pursuit of God and the Kingdom

2) So there must first be a renewal of the heart

  • heart of stone to a heart of flesh <Eze 36:26>.

3) Yet, the heart is always prone to spiritual attacks.

  • Prone to the enemies lies (temptations, accusations, worries of life, feel abandoned by God, etc)

2. How to draw near to God, despite spiritual attacks?

1) Know our spiritual enemy – The Devil

  • He works through:
    (1) Our sinful desires
    (2) The World
    (3) Haughtiness, proudness

2) Yet God showed us MORE GRACE! <v6>

  • My dear children, I write this to you so that you will not sin. But if anybody does sin, we have an advocate with the Father—Jesus Christ, the Righteous One. <1 John 2:1>
  • If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. <1 John 1:9>

3) Act of True Confession <v8>

  • (1) Wash your hands, you sinners
  • (2) Purify your hearts, you double-minded

4) Grieve, mourn and wail… <v9>

5) Humble yourself before the Lord and he will lift you up. <v10>

Reflection:

1) What is the greatest obstacle in your prayer life?

2) How do you usually deal with a “no heart to pray” situation?

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Pastor Vincent Choo
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Vincent serves as the President of The Blessed Run Church. He is also the Senior Pastor of The Life Church and Missions (Singapore) and is an ardent missionary to the Chinese World. He currently lives in Singapore with his wife, Qiufen, and has three kids, Mary, David, and Caleb.

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