As our Bolivia church plant and the executive pastor search have on my heart, I have found myself praying for them, a LOT!!
This year marks the 40th anniversary of the book Celebration of Discipline by Richard Foster. I listen to a podcast - Renovare - by Richard’s son, Nathan Foster, where he has been highlighting a different discipline each month to mark the anniversary. The month of April was focused on prayer. Nathan had on different guests to talk about prayer, but the last episode was a Q&A he did with his father.
I love this quote by Richard Foster on that episode: “....in dealing with the subject of prayer, one of the biggest dangers is to talk about it and not do it.”
I remember memorizing Ephesians 6, and verse 18 stood out to me: “praying at all times, in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication” (ESV). That seemed to be contradictory, “with all prayer and supplication”... isn’t that the same thing?
So I asked God to show me what was meant by that. God, in His gracious way, did! He showed me that sometimes my prayers are prayers of thankfulness, praise, gut wrenching honesty cries out to Him, lifting up a loved one that has a need, lifting up a loved one when He puts them on my heart, or not knowing what to pray so allowing the Spirit himself to intercede for me with groanings too deep for words (Rom 8:26).
Suffice to say, there are a LOT of ways to pray.
I used to try and emulate how someone else would pray or to use their method of praying. Now I realize that God, in His creativity, has lots of ways for us to communicate to Him in prayer and graciously allows me to use all of them.
Let’s take the words of Richard Foster and pray, not just talk about it. But not just today, every day, all day long.
Updates
I gave you updates on the Bolivia church plant and the executive pastor (XP) search in the last staff journal I wrote. Here’s another quick update on both, plus some office news.
Bolivia church plant: I am elated to tell you that GCC sponsored 109 children from our Bolivia church plant, and over 200 total together with all four Grace network churches! My heart swells up when I think of so many lives being affected by our helping to build the church and sponsor children.
Executive pastor search: And… we had our top XP candidate and his wife visit GCC last weekend! We are all very excited about the possibility of this couple coming to be on staff here. I can’t share details at this time, but we are continuing to talk with them and will keep you updated. Please keep praying with us for both them and the search team.
Office news: In an effort to be good stewards of money and staff, the office will now be closed on Fridays. The new office hours are Monday through Thursday, 8am-12pm and 1-5pm.
Ministering together,
Janelle Paden
Office Manager