Enjoy Jesus!

If you can't tell by looking at the amount of time that has passed between my most recent posts, my life is pretty much taken over by ministry. I serve as the Associational Prayer Coordinator of my local Southern Baptist association, overseeing the prayer ministry to over 100 churches in my area. I serve as the chair of the school board for my church's K4-12 Christian school. My husband is the minister of music at our church, so I sing on, and help him coordinate, the praise team, and handle most of the music secretary stuff. I just received word that a women's Bible study I wrote a couple of years ago is going to be published. And then, of course, there's home schooling my 3 youngest children and ministering to my family.

Everywhere I turn, there's another ministry that needs my attention. And guess what has suffered? Over the past few weeks, it's been my personal time with the Lord. To say it has been hit and miss would be generous. When I finally did set aside the time I needed for prayer, God showed me that I have been so wrapped up in serving Him and working for Him that I haven't taken the time to spend time with Him and enjoy Him.

What would my relationship with my husband and children be like if all I did was cook their meals, do their laundry, and meet all their other needs, but never sat down and talked with them or spent time having fun with them? I think, like my family, while God desires that I serve Him, He just wants me. Not what I can do for Him, not how hard I can work for Him. Me.

So, it's my prayer for you and for me that we will never get so wrapped up in working for the Lord that we lose sight of our first priority, which is to spend time with the Lord. It's our chief end to glorify Him, but also to enjoy Him forever. And forever starts now.

Pray for Revival

Therefore repent and return, so that your sins may be wiped away, in order that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord; Acts 3:19

Prostrate yourself before the Lord in humility and prayer:
But He gives a greater grace, therefore it says, "GOD IS OPPOSED TO THE PROUD, BUT GIVES GRACE TO THE HUMBLE.” James 4:6

Repent of known sin.
Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline; therefore be zealous and repent. Rev. 3:19

Ask God to reveal any hidden areas of sin in your life.
Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: And see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting. Ps. 139:23-24

Yearn for a deeper level of relationship with God.
O God, You are my God; I shall seek You earnestly; My soul thirsts for You, my flesh yearns for You, In a dry and weary land where there is no water. Ps. 63:1


Forsake complacency about your spiritual life.
You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart. Jer. 29:13

Obey everything God commands, even when it is hard, humbling, inconvenient, or costly.
Samuel said, "Has the LORD as much delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of the LORD? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed than the fat of rams. I Sam. 15:22

Request that God will unleash His Holy Spirit, empowering your life, and sweeping through your church.
If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him? Luke 11:13


Return to your First Love.
Therefore say to them, 'Thus says the LORD of hosts, "Return to Me," declares the LORD of hosts, that I may return to you," says the LORD of hosts. Zech. 1:3

Expect God to work mightily.
But as for me, I will watch expectantly for the LORD; I will wait for the God of my salvation; My God will hear me. Micah 7:7

View prayer as a high priority, just as Jesus did.
But Jesus Himself would often slip away to the wilderness and pray. Luke 5:16

Invite others to pray with you for revival.
They were continually devoting themselves to the apostles' teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Acts 2:42

Voraciously desire that God be glorified.
Be exalted above the heavens, O God; Let Your glory be above all the earth. Ps. 57:5

Agree with God about His desires for your life and your church.
Then Moses came and recounted to the people all the words of the LORD and all the ordinances; and all the people answered with one voice and said, "All the words which the LORD has spoken we will do!" Ex. 24:3

Lift up the name of Jesus.
And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to Myself. John 12:32

Revive Us Again

Thirty three per cent of clergy and thirty six per cent of laymen
report having visited a sexually explicit web site.
Christianity Today survey, August 2000


The divorce rate of born-again Christians (32%)
is higher than that of atheists and agnostics (30%).
Barna Research Group 2008

Twenty per cent of women who have abortions are born-again or Evangelical Christians.
The Alan Guttmacher Institute, 1996

We rarely find substantial differences between
the moral behavior of Christians and non-Christians.
George Barna, Founder, Barna Research Group


You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt has become tasteless,

how can it be made salty again?
It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out
and trampled under foot by men.
Jesus, Matthew 5:13

Once upon a time, when I was a little girl, my parents took my sister and me to visit some of our elder relatives. For the evening meal, the lady of the house set a beautiful, formal table, complete with lovely crystal salt cellars at each place.

Having attended approximately zero formal dinners in my decade-long, paper plate existence, I had never seen a salt cellar. Since it happened to be sitting next to my goblet of unsweetened iced tea, I presumed it was my own personal sugar bowl.

I was puzzled as to why the spoon was so tiny, but forged ahead in an attempt to sweeten my tea with spoonful after spoonful…of salt. After one swig, I realized my mistake, but to maintain decorum, I did my best to eat my meal while taking an occasional small sip of the tea-flavored salt water. It was a long dinner.

I have never been so thirsty for a fresh drink of water before—or since—that moment.

We, the body of Christ, are supposed to be salt. Look around. How are we doing? By and large, instead of the church making the world thirsty for the Living Water, we have become so worldly ourselves that we are in danger of losing our savor altogether.

The Western church, the American church, the local church, maybe even your church—is in desperate need of revival. Not a revival meeting. Revival.

Revival is not a special event to win the lost. It is a time when God’s people, both individually and corporately, humble themselves, cry out to God in repentance and return to a fresh, empowered, obedient love relationship with Him.

Aren’t you tired of seeing statistics like the ones at the beginning of this article? Tired of the church having so little impact on a lost and dying world? Tired of simply going through the motions in your spiritual life and at church? Have you ever, as I have, taken a step back, looked at your walk and your worship, and said, “There’s got to be more to the Christian life than this”?

There is more. Much more. God desires that we have a full, exciting, vibrant, dynamic relationship with Him. But it’s going to cost us. It will cost our pride, our time, our repentance, our obedience, and our priority. It will require that we become dissatisfied and uncomfortable with the status quo of complacency.

I think we’re up for the challenge.

Turn away my eyes from looking at vanity, and revive me in Your ways.
Psalm 119:37

Want Revival? Pray for Your Pastor

Pastoring a church is like joining the Peace Corps: It's not just a job, it's an adventure. The natives can be restless and shooting fiery darts at them, the air conditioning unit keeps breaking and the plumbing backs up, sometimes clans are at war with each other, there's a jungle of paperwork to navigate, and meeting after meeting after meeting to attend. And they've got to do it all without offending anyone, somehow squeezing in time to prepare a couple of sermons and Bible studies every week, visit people in the hospital, and still spend time with their wives and children. But they do it because they love our Lord, and wouldn't do anything else.

Our pastors need our prayer and encouragement. But what does praying for our pastors have to do with revival?

Praying for our pastors is one of the most important keys to revival. Most of the time, when churches experience revival, it is because the pastor has experienced revival in his own life and then leads his church to begin repenting, praying, and returning to a right relationship with God. Usually, revival begins with the pastor.

Additionally, when churches experience revival, the pastor's job is made exponentially easier. He is no longer discouraged by preaching to hearts of stone, but exhilarated by preaching to those who seek to worship God in spirit and in truth and who hunger and thirst for righteousness. His congregation witnesses to the lost, reaches out to those in need, beats down his office door wanting to know how they can serve. They allow him to ditch his extraneous busy work in favor of studying God's word and spending time in prayer. Revival makes pastoring a joy.

So pray for your pastor. Get everybody else in your church praying for your pastor. And, hey, throw in the minister of music, youth, education, etc., too. You might just find that the more the sheep pray for the shepherd, the better the flock becomes.

And that's not a baa-aaa-aaa-d thing. :0)