Happy Day After Christmas!

Hi Everyone!

And a "Happy Day After Christmas" to you!  What?  You mean no one has ever wished you a "Happy Day After Christmas" before?  Then let me be the first one!  My wonderful son introduced me to this very beautiful song, and I felt the message was so beautiful that I wanted to share it with you all as well.

I hope you had a good Christmas--spent with loved ones.  Our family had a wonderful time joining another family from our church and visiting at a local nursing home.  We sang LOTS of Christmas songs, read two Christmas stories, put on a skit, played instruments, and finally passed out paper snowflakes that my eleven year old daughter had spent the earlier part of the week making for them.  The patients LOVED the paper snowflakes, so I am so happy we had that idea of making them so we could leave a little something with each person.  :)  We had a WONDERFUL time, and hope we can join in next year and do the same thing again.

We have just a few more days left of this calendar year.  It is a good time to give some thought of how your past year has gone, and what you may be able to change in order to grow closer to Jesus in the year to come.  Our world is a huge mess.  But our God is a huge Savior!

~Susan

How to Organize Your Prayer Life--Part 8

Hi Everyone!

Welcome back!  We are at the end of our class on how to organize your prayer life--yet in reality we are only at the very beginning.  What you "get" out of your Prayer Binder is going to depend upon what you "put" into it and the time you spend with your Creator.  Make your Prayer Binder work for YOU.  If you do not have an area in your life that someone else does, don't put that as a topic in your binder.  Think about your own life, and the people God has put into it.  Personalize your binder to fit YOUR life!  After you have worked with your binder for a couple weeks, change anything that is not working for you.  Rearrange your topics, change your categories, do whatever you need to in order to make it work for you.

Suggestions for personalizing your binder:

~Make your binder attractive, so it will be something that you will love to pick up and spend time with.  Give it a pretty cover--or if you are into photography, what about taking a special picture of something that appeals to you and printing that out for your cover!

~Include pictures of people that you are praying for.  Those family pictures that often come with Christmas cards can be a good source of photos. :)

~If you are praying for little ones, trace around their precious little hands to look at as you place them in the secure hands of our Savior!

~Keep a couple note cards tucked inside your Prayer Binder so you can write out a quick note of encouragement for a person you have prayed for.

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I would like to share with you a longer quote this time.  In our church class I printed this out and passed it to each class member so they could keep it in their Prayer Binder and refer to it from time to time.  I found this to be a VERY good read--it goes along so very perfectly for when I get busy and I don't have enough time to pray!

Important Things Take Time

     "It's correct to say that anything that is truly important to you will require your time and attention.  And praying for your spouse and children is definitely a top priority.  Think about it:  Your children are your flesh and blood.  They are closer to you than anyone else, other than your spouse.  That means you should be willing to give up some of the time you spend on secondary things so you have more time for the primary thing--praying for your marriage partner and your children.
     Prayer requires time.  And if your immediate response is that you're too busy to pray, then you need to somehow, somewhere, free up some time to carry out this priority.  The Bible refers to this trade-off of lesser things for the greater things as 'redeeming the time' (Ephesians 5:16).  When it comes to you and your children, God has given you an allotted "season" of time with your children under your roof.  It will truly fly by!  That's why you must make the most of your time with them.
     Here's a quick exercise you can go through almost every day:  Think about how much time you spend each day watching the news, or sports, or a favorite program or two, or even The Weather Channel.  Or consider the amount of time you put into exercising, surfing the Internet, going on Facebook, or emailing friends and associates and taking care of your personal business.  When you add up all this daily expenditure of your minutes and hours, you'll realize that you definitely have time for prayer--especially prayer for each family member's life and soul."

By Jim George

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Wasn't that a good and sober reminder?  Definitely something to spend some time seriously thinking about. . .

And just a few more closing thoughts for you as you set off on your own Prayer Journal experience.  Here are two more quotes that I have collected.  They are very precious to me, as they speak of how much Jesus loves me!

"As an earthly shepherd knows his sheep, so does the divine Shepherd know His flock that are scattered throughout the world.  'Ye My flock, the flock of My pasture, are men, and I am your God, saith the Lord God.'  Jesus says, 'I have called thee by thy name; thou art Mine.'  'I have graven thee upon the palms of My hands.' Ezek. 34:31; Isaiah 43:1; 49:16

Jesus knows us individually, and is touched with the feeling of our infirmities.  He knows us all by name.  He knows the very house in which we live, the name of each occupant.  He has at ties given directions to His servants to go to a certain street in a certain city, to such a house, to find one of His sheep."

Desire of Ages p. 479 Ellen G. White
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And my last one:

"Every soul is as fully known to Jesus as if he were the only one for whom the Saviour died.  The distress of every one touches His heart.  The cry for aid reaches His ear.

Desire of Ages p. 480 Ellen G. White

Thank you for joining me on this series!  I pray that it has been a blessing to you, as learning this method has been for me!

Please share in the comments things you have found or collected or discovered that has blessed you in this method of organizing your prayer life! :)

~Susan

How to Organize your Prayer Life--Part 7

Welcome Back!

Today brings us to the very last post where I share about creating the sections of a Prayer Journal to help organize your prayer life.  I do hope this has been helpful to you!

We have two more sections left in our weekly tabs--at least we have two more if you are doing like I do and having weekly tabs just for the week days.  If you are making seven tabs in your weekly section you may have a couple more.

Our last two sections, sections four and five, or Thursday and Friday, are saved for our Leaders.  This may be church leaders, both local as well as in the Conferences, church members could be prayed for here, teachers--both Sabbath school/Sunday school teachers as well as school teachers in our church schools, colleges, and public schools.  Look around you--there are leaders everywhere!

Missionaries also fit well here--is there a special mission family you are helping to support?  If so, put them and their mission needs in your Prayer Binder!  Don't have a mission family to pray for?  Find one in the Adventist Frontiers Mission magazine!

Find a missionary family here!

And last but not least, what about praying for our Government leaders, and the President of our country?  It is easy to complain about them--but praying for the will do far more good!

And of COURSE we have to have some Bible verses to go along with our sections on leaders!

"You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.'  But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven.  For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.  For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have?  Do not even the tax collectors do the same?  And if you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others?  Do not even the Gentiles do the same?"
Matthew 5:43-47

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And then some quotes from other Christian books:

"Cultivate the habit of speaking well of others. . . When tempted to complain of what someone has said or done, praise something in that person's life or character."
Ministry of Healing p. 492 Ellen G. White

"Because of the wrong actions of those in positions of trust, do not let envious feelings fill your heart.  They are to be judged according to the deeds done in the body.  You only need to pity and pray for them.  The Lord knows every dishonest transaction, and will award them according as their work shall be.  The Lord rewards every unselfish action.  Pray with heart and soul and voice. 'O God, impress more deeply upon my mind and heart the exceeding great and precious promises, that I may not in my duty and work fail or be discouraged, but perfect holiness in thy fear.'"
Letter 178, 1899, p. 9 (November 6, 1899)  Ellen G. White

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So there you have it--the last sections in our Prayer Journal are now assigned.  So think about the leaders you know, and the leaders who you feel impressed to pray for, and start pages for them in these sections!

And your assignment--come back and share in the comments what leaders you have felt impressed to pray for.  Are you praying for your children's teachers?  Are you praying for our government?  Sharing will help give others ideas!

We will have one more post in our Prayer Journal series, so come back next week for our wrap up!

Have a beautiful week praying--talking with your Best Friend!

~Susan