The Trust in Asking for Prayers

The Trust in Asking for Prayers

                                       

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In our trusting God in our Seeking His Kingdom, we ask for prayers.  In believing the power that comes in prayers, we build our trust in God; in our patience we see and sometimes feel the results, and in those results, we build Trust and patience.

It is most pleasing to God that we ask others for prayers as it justifies the faith that He has put in us for Him.

To build our strength we would not buy a bicycle and let it sit and in the same manner we have to exercise our faith to build our greater use of it.  Asking for prayers is one way of excercising our faith and showing Trust.  In building greater Trust it is helpful to draw people of faith to our circle of friends.  Seek to find God's people in your life.  Drawing people of faith near to us, seeing them live in faith, seeing the results of their faith, helps to sustain our faith and increases our Trust in Him.  

No matter where we go and in all we do, we influence others.  Your influence of living life Trusting God is a blessing to those of Faith  and an example to those who do not exercise their faith.  

Pray for the Holy Spirt to fill you that your life in Trusting God will influence others to live in Faith and in Trusting God.

God is Good, All the Time
He is truly worthy of our Trust and our Patience.

Believe in God, Believe in Jesus' Salvation, and 
 Receive the Holy Spirit into your everyday life, and
    Pray often- every day.
      It will change your life in ways beyond your understanding.

Thanks Be to God

© lonnie coggins

Jesus Comforts His Disciples

John 14:1"Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me.

<< John 13:38John 14:1John 14:2 >>

Read John 14:1 in contextRead John 14View in parallelCompare Translations

Do Not Worry

John 6:25-33pp -- Lk 12:22-31

25"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes?26Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?27Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life ?28"And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin.29Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these.30If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?31So do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?'32For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them.33But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.34Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

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ldcoggins@gmail.com

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lonnie

Publication  0170

Three Behaviors to Trust, One Perfect Plan

Three Behaviors for Us to Trust
 is One Perfect Plan

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God in His Most Perfect Perfection Reveals to Us Three Behaviors 

    In His One Perfect Plan For Us:

       God Loves Us

          Jesus Saves Us

              The Holy Spirit Guides us

One of the best leadership lessons I taught as a middle school teacher was K.I.S.S. principle of leadership, living life, and relationships.

The kids loved it because of the acronym and what it meant- 
            Keep It Simple Stupid.  
I think they really liked the 'Stupid' part.

The truth of this principle lies in its Simplicity- As people, we tend to make life too complicated, value too much complexity, and think something is worth more if it has lots of options and costs more.   The truth is we overwork ourselves for labor saving devices, our stuff breaks more often because of complexity, and we often fail to understand and use all the options and complicated things we buy. For a greater Joy and Happiness in Life, we should seek to keep life simple. 

God in His wisdom did not make life very complicated for us.  The very things that keep the universe most perfect for us to survive are the simple constants mankind has discovered in God's creation.   

Gravity does not and has never changed, 

     the earth stays in orbit exactly as it should, 

        the Sun's temperature is exactly as it should be, 

           the moon's pull on the earth keeps our earth's axis just right,

            pi has never changed, and 

the list could continue to fill books.  These and other simple constants that God created keep our life predictable and simple.

But His Best predictable behaviors are what He does in His Glorious plan for us.   Our simple part is not what allows us to just survive, but in His plan for us, our simple Best behavior truly leads us to thrive.

Remember, God loves us, Jesus came to save us from ourselves, and the Holy Spirit is here to guide us.

So, Our Behavior, 

         Our Response, 

            our Best Behavior simply lies in Trusting God by

     Loving Him

        Believing In Jesus

            Accepting the Holy Spirit.

Jesus came because God loves us.  

   Jesus lived and died because He, Jesus, loves us.  and

      Jesus in His Resurrection gives us the Holy Spirit to guide us.

All we have to do is Simply Trust-

   Trust God, 

       Trust Jesus, and 

           Trust the In-filling* and Guidance of the Holy Spirit.

Trust-  Our Firewall to Temptation, 

               Our  Pathway to live Triumphantly in His Glory,
              and   Find our Testimony to Him from our daily living.

• John 14:1 NIV

  [Jesus Comforts His Disciples]
       "Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me."
  Read John 14 | View in parallel | Compare Translations

 Do not be confused, Keep It Simple:

Jesus said it, so, it simply is the Truth.

                  

Thanks Be to God

© lonnie coggins

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REFERENCES:

* The Great "In-filling" of the Holy Spirit
                  Click Here for more on the meaning of "Being Filled in the Spirit"
Acts 4:

3They seized Peter and John, and because it was evening, they put them in jail until the next day.4But many who heard the message believed, and the number of men grew to about five thousand.5The next day the rulers, elders and teachers of the law met in Jerusalem.6Annas the high priest was there, and so were Caiaphas, John, Alexander and the other men of the high priest's family.7They had Peter and John brought before them and began to question them: "By what power or what name did you do this?"8Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them: "Rulers and elders of the people!9If we are being called to account today for an act of kindness shown to a cripple and are asked how he was healed,10then know this, you and all the people of Israel: It is by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth,whom you crucified but whom God raised from the dead, that this man stands before you healed.11He is " 'the stone you builders rejected, which has become the capstone. '12Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved."13When they saw the courage of Peter and John and realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus.

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© Lonnie Coggins
ldcoggins@gmail.com

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Intro-
God really desires for us to know Him, to have a Personal Relationship with Him.  He makes it so easy to Trust Him in our daily living.   He does so much for us everyday keeping this universe in place so we have a perfect place to live, yet people do not seek Him and live not trusting Him.  Here are a few comments on our role in our Personal Relationship with Him.
http://lonnieadailythought.blogspot.com/2013/08/three-behaviors-to-trust-one-perfect.html

lonnie

Publication  00169

Prayer and Bad Habits

Prayer and Bad Habits


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• Matthew 14:23 NIV

  After he had dismissed them, he went up on a mountainside by himself to pray. When evening came, he was there alone,
  Read Matthew 14 | View in parallel | Compare Translations
  
  
  Jesus prayed and prayed often and we would do well to follow His example.  Prayer is our communication with God and Jesus, a mighty tool to help us in our daily lives, and a gift of God.  Best of all, in our prayers we further build our relationship with Him.
  
  
  Jesus being Jesus did not have any bad habits.  But, if He did, He would have prayed about them.
  
  
  We form habits in much of what we do.  The way we get up most mornings, our rituals for getting ready for bed, and in about everything we do, we seek to form habits and for good reason.  Habits makes it easy to get things done as we can do the everyday mundane things without having to think about them too much.  This forming of habits should also involve our devotional and prayer life as well.  Not that prayers should just be habitual, but doing things including Bible Study and prayer on a regular basis helps us to organize our time, insures consistency in what we do, and demonstrates what is important in our lives.
  
  
  But, in many of our habits there is a problem.  We form habits that are not good for us leading us to thoughts, things, and behaviors we should not do.  Some habits become sinful when the habits interfere with our relationship with God.  Our problem is our humanity.  
  
  In our humanity, we come to do things we like to do even knowing they are not good for us.  We keep telling ourselves "I have to kick these habits," but because we like the results of the habits we know many times we cannot 'kick it' by or through ourselves.  We have to have help.  Here is one suggestion if you are serious about purging or getting rid of a bad habit and especially a sinful habit.  This especially helps other avenues, even professional avenues we use to break bad habits.
  
  
  

  We must trust that God never asks more of us 

  than what we can do for ourselves 

  in conjunction of what He can do with and for us.
  
  
  Therefore, simply pray for the Holy Spirit to help you kick the bad and sinful habits. In all avenues of life add this to your processes.  If you are sincere in desiring to give up a habit and you pray daily for that habit to be removed, it will be done. In seeking to give up a habit: EVERY time thoughts, ideas, or the temptation of those habits come to your mind, IMMEDIATELY and without fail sincerely pray diligently for God through the Holy Spirit to remove them. In our greatest weaknesses, the Holy Spirit will lead us to our absolute strength. In addition, remember, Jesus set another example for Spiritual behavior in his desert temptations.  It is not recorded He prayed but in the stress of the devil on Him, He immediately quoted scripture (see Matthew 4)!
  
   Even in our habits and especially in our sinful habits honest authentic prayer helps us and works and for  two reasons.  First, just as good parents like to help their children, God wants to help us and it is through the Holy Spirit His help often comes.  Second,  it is hard if not impossible for us to be involved in sorry habits when we are focused in prayerful desire for those habits to be gone.  Our minds simply cannot do both- thankfully.  
  
  
  Pray often, everyday, especially where ever you find yourself with those bad habits creeping in. Even pray when you are driving, just do not close your eyes!  If something comes on the television that leads to sinful thoughts, turn off the tv and pray; if necessary, leave the room.  If you have things or objects that lead you to desire bad habits, pray and get rid of them.  But, above all, when thoughts we should not have, or these bad habits comes to mind or enter our lives, pray and pray and pray for them to be gone.  Again, use professional help if necessary, but add this to the process.  If prayer does not seem to be working, pray harder, more often, and be patient, but pray.
  
  
  One of the great consequences of this diligent praying is the significant results.  When we put forth the effort, a true righteous effort, and do not give up, results will come.  It is truly startling to one day realize, "Hey, I have not had thoughts in over a week of that bad habit I once loved to hate."  Then, thank God, feel great about answered prayer, and pray for the absence of sorry habitual thoughts and behaviors to be continued.
  
  
  When we see our prayers answered, our trust in God is magnified and we pray more often and most earnestly for our needs to be met.  In that, like a loving parent, God is most pleased with us.

Praying- it works.

Thanks Be to God
© lonnie coggins


                             

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You can print the message including this sharing message only for your friends and for non-profit.  You will have to copy and paste the message to a word processing document.   After you copy and paste add the following at the end of the message:

© Lonnie Coggins
ldcoggins@gmail.com

If you desire to use any of these messages in a For-Profit manner you must contact me (email) for permission.  Typically, I will most likely give permission.

Please email me if you find any broken links in this message.

lonnie

Publication  0168

Forgiving Others

Forgiving Others

                                       

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Sin is a part of our lives from the very beginning.  We may think we are pretty good.  The fact is, we maybe pretty, but 'good', only God is good. 

I once struggled with what we are taught in Psalm 51:5, see below.  Since God made us, how is it we are made sinful?  But, I do believe this is the inspired word of God, just as all of the Bible.  So, I have to seek to understand or at least think about its purpose.

There are other ways to look at the source of our sin, but one helpful way is to understand a purpose of our sinfulness we are born with.  It certainly seems we are born with a survival instinct and programmed with the desire, perhaps a selfish desire for self preservation, and according to Psalm 51:5, this begins at the time of conception.  Certainly, when we come into this world, we are crying, demanding, and maybe screaming with great desire for our needs to be met.  You might not want to consider this sin, but at some point very soon in our lives, our crying and demanding become selfish sinfulness if we are not taught differently.  The net result is the same- we are selfish sinful people, and we have to accept it, get over it, and seek to become the patient people God intends us to be.

From that moment of crying, we begin an education of leaning to be patient and forgiving if our whims, needs, and wants are not met in accordance with our time table or desire.  The problem is some people do not get a very good education and their cries, demands, and screams become not for just their needs but more so for their wants.  We all have to learn to fight the temptation to impatiently demand our wants and be patient in receiving our needs.  Herein lies much of our sin against others and God.  Self-centered demand of our wants inhibits our ability to form and maintain relationships;  in that, it affects our happiness and joy in life.

Learning to forgive others is perhaps, one of the hardest behaviors we do.  For most people, loving God is far easier than loving others, but, it is the command of Jesus that we do both- forgive and love.  But, best of all, Jesus is right and He showed us the way.  In His death on the cross He showed us love, in His life He demonstrated love, and in His resurrection, God verified the Truth of Jesus' love and His words.

Jesus' command to love others survives the "acid test" of living life.  In the western world, we live in a throw away society that goes by one acid test: 
               'IF something works, we keep it and use it; 
                if it does not work, we simply throw it away."

Loving others works for us and is truly good for us!

Loving others begins by forgiving them of their sins against us.  What others do against God is not so much our business,  
      our business is dealing with what others do against us.

In your everyday life, you would not pick up a 25 pound bag (say 10 kilos) of sand and carry it around on your back because it felt good and heavy, and then add to it.  Well, not forgiving others is worse.

Oh, sometimes we like to harbor our dislike for what others have done to us.  We even cultivate it by throwing it in their face from time to time dumping on them,  "Remember when you ..."  every time we can.  It supposedly makes us feel better to make them feel bad.

Very often, we are the most harmed by this behavior and become our own worst enemy.  This behavior of unforgiveness is like that bag of sand.  In many ways, it gets heavier and heavier and we eventually collapse under its weight.  And, then we do not understand why we feel depressed.  

The irony of that baggage is that many people might not remember events the way we think we remember them.  They just put the conflict behind them, or maybe they apologized and we were just too unforgiving to remember or accept the apology.  In these instances, the other person has put the whole incident behind them, and rightly or wrongly no longer considers the issue.  So, in our unforgiveness, we are the only ones who suffer, and can suffer greatly in our own self-inflicted depression.

Forgiving the sins of others-

     it works.  

Forgiving others works in that 

     it lightens the baggage of our burdens, 

     it removes our barriers to friendships and 
  best of all,

     it builds our relationship with God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit.

Jesus tells us to love and forgive others.

He really did know what was and is good for us and our eternity.

But, there is one more thing to consider:

     We have to learn to forgive ourselves and 
      that can be the hardest lesson of all.  

Ask God, He will forgive you,
      so move on from your sin by forgiving yourself.

Life is much more full of Joy 
       when there are no barriers 
           between you and your relationship with God.

Mark 11:25 NIV

• "And when you stand praying, if you hold anything against anyone, forgive him, so that your Father in heaven may forgive you your sins. "
  Read Mark 11 | View in parallel | Compare Translations
  
  

  John 20:23 NIV

  "If you forgive anyone his sins, they are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven."

  Read John 20 | View in parallel | Compare Translations

Thanks Be to God

© lonnie 

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You can print the message including this sharing message only with your friends and for non-profit.  You will have to copy and paste the message to a word processing document.   After you copy and paste add the following at the end of the message:

© Lonnie Coggins
ldcoggins@gmail.com

If you desire to use any of these messages in a For-Profit manner you must contact me (email) for permission.  Typically, I will most likely give permission.

lonnie coggins

author, editor

"A Daily Thought"

Psalm 51

1Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love; according to your great compassionblot out my transgressions.2Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.3For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me.4Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you are proved right when you speak and justified when you judge.5Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.6Surely you desire truth in the inner parts; you teach me wisdom in the inmost place.7Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean; wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.8Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones you have crushed rejoice.9Hide your face from my sins and blot out all my iniquity.10Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.11Do not cast me from your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me.12Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.13Then I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners will turn back to you.14Save me from bloodguilt, O God, the God who saves me, and my tongue will sing of your righteousness.15O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will declare your praise.16You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it; you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings.17The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.18In your good pleasure make Zion prosper; build up the walls of Jerusalem.19Then there will be righteous sacrifices, whole burnt offerings to delight you; then bulls will be offered on your altar.

<< Psalms 50Psalm 51Psalms 52 >>

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Publication 167