Perhaps you've heard of the "Boundaries" book series: Boundaries in Marriage, Boundaries with Children, and simply Boundaries. I read the Boundaries book on parenting years ago. I can highly recommend it.
As far as I know though, Cloud and Townsend have not yet written a book on boundaries in prayer. Hmmmm. Wonder why that would be. Is it possible that there are no boundaries in prayer? According to Henri Nouwen (one of my favorite authors on prayer), there aren't. I read that little tidbit in my morning reading yesterday. An hour or so later, I checked my email to find that a friend had forwarded to me a devotional thought-for-the-day on the same topic.
I John 5: “14 This is the confidence which we have before Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. 15 And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests which we have asked from Him.” The key to answered prayer seems to lie in the words, "if we ask anything according to His will." Right. How the heck are we supposed to know what His will is?
The answer to that question, I believe, is pivotal to living our lives on earth as Christ-followers. That answer is painfully simple and even more painfully difficult to do: we have to listen, and we can only do that when we keep the eyes of our hearts set on Him rather than on everything around us.
My day-job has had me swimming in stress the past ten months. Last week, we took a family vacation and went swimming in the Oil-Spill coast. Back at work now, I find I prefer the oil-spill to this, but I realized this morning that my focus has been on the tar balls surrounding me at work and on my efforts to clean them up. The second I realized this and set my focus back on God, my soul was doing the breast-stroke in that peace that passes understanding.
He takes me back time and time again to those words of Paul, "I have learned to be content whatever my circumstances" (Philip 4:11). What does that have to do with the lack of boundaries in prayer? Everything. When we pray for our circumstances to change, we put limits on God. Our focus is on the ground, on what is directly surrounding us. We seek immediate relief and nothing more. God's heart for us goes far beyond that. He has bigger prayers in mind for us. Much bigger. Often, what He has in mind seems impossibly bigger. He wants us to be able to say with Paul: "I have learned the secret of being content whatever my circumstances."
Go ahead, give it a try. Raise your head. Lift up your eyes. Focus on God, not your situation. Pray prayers that will effect you for eternity rather than just this moment. Let's see what God does. I dare you.
As far as I know though, Cloud and Townsend have not yet written a book on boundaries in prayer. Hmmmm. Wonder why that would be. Is it possible that there are no boundaries in prayer? According to Henri Nouwen (one of my favorite authors on prayer), there aren't. I read that little tidbit in my morning reading yesterday. An hour or so later, I checked my email to find that a friend had forwarded to me a devotional thought-for-the-day on the same topic.
I John 5: “14 This is the confidence which we have before Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. 15 And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests which we have asked from Him.” The key to answered prayer seems to lie in the words, "if we ask anything according to His will." Right. How the heck are we supposed to know what His will is?
The answer to that question, I believe, is pivotal to living our lives on earth as Christ-followers. That answer is painfully simple and even more painfully difficult to do: we have to listen, and we can only do that when we keep the eyes of our hearts set on Him rather than on everything around us.
My day-job has had me swimming in stress the past ten months. Last week, we took a family vacation and went swimming in the Oil-Spill coast. Back at work now, I find I prefer the oil-spill to this, but I realized this morning that my focus has been on the tar balls surrounding me at work and on my efforts to clean them up. The second I realized this and set my focus back on God, my soul was doing the breast-stroke in that peace that passes understanding.
He takes me back time and time again to those words of Paul, "I have learned to be content whatever my circumstances" (Philip 4:11). What does that have to do with the lack of boundaries in prayer? Everything. When we pray for our circumstances to change, we put limits on God. Our focus is on the ground, on what is directly surrounding us. We seek immediate relief and nothing more. God's heart for us goes far beyond that. He has bigger prayers in mind for us. Much bigger. Often, what He has in mind seems impossibly bigger. He wants us to be able to say with Paul: "I have learned the secret of being content whatever my circumstances."
Go ahead, give it a try. Raise your head. Lift up your eyes. Focus on God, not your situation. Pray prayers that will effect you for eternity rather than just this moment. Let's see what God does. I dare you.
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