Praying For the President

Pastor Rick Warren from Saddleback Church, CA offers the invocation prayer for President Obama at the 2009 inauguration.
Praise the Lord for sanity and godliness and righteousness on that dais this morning.

Sometimes I can surface occasionally from the self-centeredness of my obsession with myself and my pain, fear, and self-pity in an alcoholic marriage to pay attention to monumental things around me. the inauguration of our 44th President was certainly one of those!

And I REALLY don't mean to be catty (I really don't), but how nonsensical was this poem? Can you say "through the looking glass" anyone? As soon as I can get Rush Limbaugh's parody of this speech, I will post it... love him or hate him, it was HYSTERICAL!

Drummer's Perspective

Don't you love it when your kids are in a really good place for a few minutes?

With an alcoholic parent in a dysfunctional home, it is easy to focus on all the things we do WRONG.  I love those moments when you get it bask in a moment of "right".

18 year old Drummer came home last night on an utter high on God.  

He'd had kind of a "mountain top" conversation with"E" (an ex-girlfriend  and now best friend, but they still love each other).  They had talked about God and the Gospel and forgiveness and love and many other passionate, intense, life-changing things that young, idealistic teens talk about.

He was SO in love with the Gospel he was near exploding.  He was saying that this is all he wants to live for... he can't live and NOT tell people about the gospel of Jesus Christ.  He wants to be a Missionary (Cambodia?).  

He told me he prays for me, when he remembers.  I told him I pray for him.  He said "I know, Mom" with such assurance and confidence.  I felt so guilty because I do NOT pray for him with the regularity and faithfulness with which I should.  I am a flaky pray-er (at best) and yet he believes that (of course) his Mom is devotedly praying often for him.  He said he feels safe and protected in our home.  He told me that he believes that all 4 of them are doing good because of the stable, consistent, steady influence I have been in their lives during Mr. M's tough time and long drinking bouts.

He had (just last night, not always - for example, when he is on restriction for not turning in an English assignment or coming home after curfew) such a sweet and loving perspective on me and Lord knows I WANT that!!!  I want my kids to love & respect me and to see how hard I have tried to give them stability and consistency.

But on the other hand, I know that kids need stability and reliability so they will tend to put that on me more because they NEED it to be on me than because I was really that great.  With Mr. M off the deep end, they NEED me to be the steady one... it is more about their need than the reality.  Even though I have worked hard to BE stale & steady for them, I know that I have my own dysfunction and have contributed to our family "dance" in my own special ways and I want my kids to feel permission to SEE the yuck in me.  I don't PREFER this... I don't want them to see any bad in me, I want them to only see my best moments & intentions.  But by living there, I am denying them mental health & truth.

Devotion James 5:6

Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective. 

James 5:16

It can be difficult to admit our flaws, faults, fears, and failures even to ourselves. There can be pain in looking at the truth of our motives and actions. We share personal information and call it a ‘prayer request’. What motivated us to do that? We can tell ourselves it is thoughtfulness or that we were just concerned. Much tougher to admit it was because we wanted to look like we had the inside scoop or simply because we wanted to impress our friends with a juicy story. Yuck!

A friend does something wrong or hurtful and we don’t confront them because we don’t want to “make waves”. Why not? If we are honest with ourselves, might it be because we are more concerned with them liking us than anything else?

If we can get up the courage to be honest with ourselves, we can then bring these things to our Heavenly Father. We can humbly ask Him to remove our shortcomings.

These are important and valuable steps, but this is not the final step. We need to share our ‘yuck’ with other people. We don’t necessarily have to share our greatest character defect or secret sin right out the gate. Start small. Open up about little things first. Test the waters. We might very well find that when we share our darker side, we become more accessible and more likeable. Then in this opening up, in this confession, we will be healed. Little by little we will become whole.

Devotion 4:6-7

“Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”- Philippians 4:6-7

PEACE. We all want peace. Peace and quiet, peace of mind, peace on earth, keeping the peace, making peace, peace offerings, and even 'rest in peace'. The thought of peace probably resonates with us as human beings because God designed us to long for His peace. 

And Scripture tells us how to get it.

Think of all the things you are thankful for. We can start with the basics: the fact that our hearts beat, our lungs breathe, and our brains think. Work our way up from there: Trees. Clouds. Snow flakes. The beach. Ocean. Babies. Music. Then get personal: My best friend, my job, cream soda, my little brother. When we function from a place of gratitude, we can’t help but begin to see things in a better, more hopeful light. We come “glass half full” kinds of people.

It is in this spirit we are told to come ask God for what we need. We don’t need to be stressed. We don’t need to wonder if He hears. We don’t need to be afraid. We can just come to Him with thankful hearts and ask Him and trust that He knows what we need and what is best for us. When we do this, His peace – a peace we can’t even begin to understand – will protect us.

Then it all comes full circle. When we come to Him with a grateful heart, we will be given His peace to guard our hearts. When we have His peace dwelling in us, we will not need to be anxious and worried. When we are filled with peace and we are not anxious and worried, we will be even more able to focus on our gratitude for who God is and what He has given us and done for us. We can then approach God in prayer with a peaceful heart filled with thanks.