Strength in Prayer – Progressing to Breakthrough - Purity 938

To see today's photo, go to mt4christ.org or follow me, M.t. Clark, on Facebook or Twitter. Good morning. Today's photo of a young woman fishing in waters that reflect the glory of heaven above comes to us from former emergency room nurse and emerging Christian writer Jennifer Schreiner, who shared this photo of an outing with her daughter on social media back on July 31st, 2022. I met Jennifer at my local church during a Christian doctrines class and discovered that she not only had a keen eye for capturing scenes that give God glory from his creation, uh, she also has a deep desire to encourage Christian women in following the Lord. Jennifer's mission is to support, equip, and encourage Christian women. You can follow her on Facebook with a link to her ministry page that I'm sharing on the blog today, or you can just go to jennschreiner.com, uh, where you will find her blog, a collection of Bible verses from the different seasons of life she has compiled, and, uh, other free resources such as lessons Jennifer has created and free printable scripture art prints. Um, well, it's Wednesday again, and because of my participation in the Prayer Together prayer event, or Pray Together prayer event, uh, the days are long, but But the week seems to be flying by. However, paradoxically, I haven't been worn down by the full days because I believe I am being restored and empowered by the Lord because my days have been filled with prayer. Last night, the event moved to Grace Chapel and the United— the United Body of Christ came together to share communion and to pray for our children, their schools, their teachers and administrators, and ended with prayers for our Christian leaders. As much as we are petitioning the Lord with prayer in these specific areas for others, I feel that the Lord is also using these sessions to cause us all to— uh, cause us all— call us all to personal repentance as these sessions bring our faith to the forefront of our attention. We believe in God. We believe in the power of prayer, and so we are drawing close to him and to others in the body of Christ through our gathering. If you are local to the Capital District, I'm sharing the link to this week's prayer— pray together prayer event. Consider it my invitation to come and see what the Lord may do in this event. Tonight we will be praying at Faith Church in Rexford. Near Rexford, or yeah. And it is my prayer that even more Christians will come out in unity to pray. Personally, I've been blessed— I am being blessed by this event and by my decision to use, well, to go through, uh, the 30 Days to Resilient program on the One Minute Pause app, as these concentrated efforts to be in prayer and meditation seems to be renewing my convictions, building up my spirit, and preparing me for the new prayer ministry training I'll be— begin next week, and the next round of the Freedom in Christ course I will begin facilitating at the end of the month. Sometimes we can begin the new year overwhelmed by the idea that it is all— it is starting all over again, or by the unfinished business that wasn't resolved. But when we draw close to the Lord in prayer and repentance, we can draw on his strength and wisdom to assist us in another year's journey. 2023 seems to be full of potential thus far, as I am excited by the new opportunities to grow and to serve the Lord, and am hopeful to prog— uh, progress to breakthrough status with a few areas that have carried over from the past. Because it is hump day, and because I have been up and down the mountain of yo-yo dieting for most of my life, I am seeking to break the chains and shift the paradigms regarding food once and for all. My pattern seems to be of literal gains and losses with the ebb and flow of discipline and compromise. History reveals that I keep fighting over the same ground as complacency and passivity leads to surrendering the progress that was so hard fought for. I seem to be— I seem to get to a certain place and just stop. I have success, but then I hit a wall. I make progress, but I don't break through. As someone who has overcome other addictions and had genuine success with help— my health at times, it is frustrating to be in a Romans 7 situation with this body of death. This flesh. I joined the Swipe Up to See My Video V-Shred program, and although I feel stronger from the workouts, my diet over the holidays, uh, was way too festive and mindless. And now I have to go back to the drawing board again in terms of being mindful and intentional and disciplined of what I eat. And thus I am confessing it all here. I want this year to be the year that I have the breakthrough. I want to have the same success over food that I have with my former addictions. So things might get a little crazy, things might get— may get a little extreme, but that really is a matter of opinion. The indulgent society of mediocrity and comfort foods discourages what works. It speaks of moderation and balance, but in truth, it opens the door to complacency, passivity, and failure. Hard truth: moderation doesn't work for the addict. Ask me how I know. I know this from experience, but because of the pressures of the— of an indulgent society and the personal weaknesses to want to indulge the flesh, I have ignored the wisdom of it. There are some extreme things an addict needs to do to be set free and to stay free. We are not like the rest, and actually the vast majority of people live in bondage or ignorance, so we don't want to be like the rest. Addicts need to eliminate, not moderate, the things that trip them up. They need to make the wise choice to say an emphatic and eternal no to the things they have discovered that cause them to fail. Me, I am currently doing the smoke the whole carton thing at my place down, down by the river when it comes to food. I bought a bunch of food items that I shouldn't have, um, for my adult children to enjoy in my absence during my recent holiday break, but they didn't eat them. Granted, they didn't ask for them, but this stronghold of not wanting to waste food or money kicked in. Which caused me to eat what I shouldn't have as a sort of punishment for both wasting the money and buying the food. So this morning, I'm happy, ashamed, and embarrassed to report that all the holiday food is gone. Sometimes you have to hit rock bottom to start your way back up. So I am drawing on the strength that the Lord is giving me with my increased emphasis on prayer and I'm going to pour it into being disciplined in this battle of the flesh. It is my intention to resist the world, the flesh, and the devil, and take this year and use it to overcome and to get to a place that I have been— I have— that I have never been before, to accomplish a— to accomplish a healthy lifestyle that will result in the elimination of my sleep apnea machine. This was my goal over the last 2 years, and it is my intention to try to get 'er done and break on through to the other side like I have never done before. So rather than surrender to failure, I'm going to keep walking and talking with God in prayer to draw on his strength, guidance, and wisdom to overcome and to not fall into those old familiar traps that would cause cause me to slip and fall again. I believe in prayer. I believe that God can help us. So if you are facing new and old— or old struggles this year, let me encourage you to lean on the Lord and to help you progress beyond progress and find the breakthrough and victory that he has for you. Uh, today's Bible verse comes to us from the New Living Translation Bible Promise Book for Men, and it's— this morning's verse is Ephesians 3:16, and it says, I pray from this glorious— from his glorious unlimited resources, he will empower you with inner strength through his Spirit. Today's Bible verse really kicks off the new intention quite nicely. God has unlimited resources to empower us with inner strength through his Spirit. If we need strength, we get it from God, and today's verse tells us how: prayer. So let's pray to God, abide in him, and keep praying for the inner strength that he has for us that will cause us to do the impossible in our lives. As always, I invite all to go to M.t. Clark.org, uh, to, where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk. Today we continue from sharing, uh, sharing from A.W. Pink's The Sovereignty of God, and, uh, we're continuing to share from chapter 3, uh, which is, uh, The Sovereignty of God and Administration. And today, uh, A.W. Pink shares, uh, the section on God Governs Irrational Creatures. And I'm not sure if that's pointed at me or not. We'll have to read, read that resource to see if we're the irrational creatures that A.W. Pink's talking about. So go to mtforchrist.org and you'll see who those irrational creatures are at the end of today's blog post. Well, it's another day in the kingdom, and I'm happy to say, you know, that we can begin again. Um, every day we can, you know, um, we make mistakes, we fall down, but we get back up and we keep walking towards God. Um, half of, half of the battle I've discovered is believing you've been set free and, you know, learning from your mistakes. And not giving in to the things that trip you up. So, so I've made some, you know, I might be beating myself up, but I think I deserve it a little bit, uh, in terms of, you know, you know better, and so let's do better. And that's what we're going to do, but we're going to draw on the Lord to give us the strength and wisdom to do that and try to remain focused and present and our lives with what we do behaviorally by drawing close to God spiritually. It's worked before, so we just have to stay, you know, resolved to win. And so we're going to give it a shot. Unfortunately, it doesn't happen overnight, so it's going to have to be an ongoing thing. And I've had success, and we're going to have to have some more of it, because it's, you know, it's more or less back to the drawing board. So, but I am hopeful because when I confess my sins, God is faithful to forgive us and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. And so, thus we confess and we renounce the lies of the enemy. And affirm the truth that no one and nothing can stop us from being the people that God created us to be, and he will help us to become it if we follow him. So let's follow him. As always, we encourage people who don't know what it's like to be free in Christ. You know, I, I, you know, you might say, whoa, M.t. Clark, it doesn't sound like you're too free in Christ. Well, in terms of food, that's a common struggle for many people. However, I'm gonna not just lay down in it, I'm gonna try to overcome it. And I've overcome other things— drugs, alcohol, sexual addiction— so we'll take care of this food thing too. We'll give it to the Lord and see what he has to say. You know, let's do this. And I've had success before, so it's just a matter of staying on course and then pushing through, not giving up, not calling it a holiday or a vacation and, you know, throwing your wisdom and knowledge all on the ground. It's just a matter of staying, staying true to the intention to change and stay free. So we're going to do that. And so if you need that teaching, if you're struggling in one or many of these areas, It can benefit greatly from the, uh, the teachings of Dr. Neil Anderson that I've shared from his books Victory Over the Darkness, The Bondage Breaker, and Freedom in Christ that are available on our, on our podcast and our YouTube channel. Also, uh, we, we've done a study on discipleship from Dietrich Bonhoeffer's Discipleship, and we've done various Bible studies with topical Bible studies with Arthur and Susanna Sincotti that are all on the podcast and the YouTube channel as well. So, um, just like Jennifer Schreiner, we like to encourage Christians to follow the Lord, um, and so we, we want to— we try to provide, you know, useful resources, uh, for that, for that, uh, for that purpose, to build you up in your faith and to encourage you in your walk, uh, with God. So, uh, well, I do have to work today, so, uh, let's pray. Um, I have a busy day today, um, a full day of work, uh, and prayer later tonight. So we'll get her done. And actually, I have like a, uh, medical appointment, and I have, uh, there's a Zoom conference in the middle of the day. So we'll, we'll see, um, how what happens. But we're gonna try to stay true to follow the Lord, stay aware, and keep walking and talking with God as we go. So let's pray. Lord God, Heavenly Father, thank you for another day in your kingdom. Lord, we thank you so much for what you've done in our lives and what you're doing currently through the prayer sessions that we're having through these 4 United Churches in the Capital District. And, you know, what you're doing personally in our lives, you're convicting our hearts to walk in the way we should go. And Lord, we just, we just ask for your strength and guidance to help us in that. And Lord, so we also ask for you to come alongside the people who might be listening or reading these messages, um, Lord, that you would bless them and come alongside their prayer request and encourage them as they go. And Lord, as always, we pray for you to go before us, open our eyes to the things you want us to see, and guide our path and the way we should go. That's all we want to do, Lord. And because of all we've received from you, and because of our love for you, we just want to represent you in your kingdom. So please, we ask for your help. In Jesus' name, amen.