Yesterday morning our prayer pastor Geannine LeBude was our speaker. Below is the introduction to her sermon.
Habakkuk 1-3
In January I shared about our gaze. And how our gaze on Jesus needed to be unobstructed and without prejudges. We looked at how our expectations and definitions of situations in our lives can interfere with us seeing the truth of the matter and how it can often cloud what we see and believe about Jesus. As we read through the story of Lazarus we compared the perspectives of Martha and Mary against Jesus’ perspective and concluded we often do not see the big picture or the situation from God’s point of view
Today I want to expand on this topic and move from us looking at our own lives and look at how our gaze can obstruct our call to intercession for Burlington. I want to discuss unanswered prayers again, but from a larger point of view because I believe this is the place we struggle the most.
God has called us to intercede and serve this community. He has shared his heart with us by giving us scripture promises for Burlington. He has opened doors and closed doors for ways to serve the residents of this city. We know that God is capable of saving Burlington in just one moment. We also know it is His hearts desire that none would perish. God chooses His sons and daughters to bring His Glory to the earth realm. He desires for us to join Him in His work of redemption.
This work, however, can become difficult and even disappointing. We get very excited about the promises that God has spoken, but we often get bogged down by the amount of time it is taking for us to really see a change.
We go to God praying all of the promises He has given us for Burlington believing that He hears us and conclude He will answer quickly and to our satisfaction. God often does not answer in what we consider a timely manner and He often does not answer in our opinions. In unanswered prayers our faith is often challenged, we begin to feel disappointed and we do not know what to do with the disappointment and often we then become discouraged. Discouragement is a huge faith killer. Discouragement is often what makes us feel weary in well doing.
Abie shared in December about going into the secret place to pray because that is where the Father is. He stated that we go to the secret place in order to seek God heart, because once we know His heart we can accept what we do not understand about His actions. I believe seeking God’s heart is the key to life and the goal of prayer and the cure to disappointment, discouragement and confusion. However, we must also let go of what we believe God’s heart will look like through circumstance and situations.
Today we are going to look at the book of Habakkuk. Habakkuk was interceding for Judah and he became overwhelmed with the condition of the nation and in turn questioned God’s actions and motives.