Today, we're going to take a posture of peace
by letting peace author our prayers.
Hi, I'm Lindsay VanZale.
Posture is a podcast that serves a short,
audible fist bump to remind you that God is in everything.
Together, we're gonna be emboldened
to take a daily posture of perfect peace.
We've been in Romans chapter eight before together,
and I wanna take us back there today
because this is such a rich chapter.
In Romans chapter eight, verses 26 and 27, it says,
"'Likewise, the Spirit helps us in our weakness,
"'for we do not know what to pray for as we ought,
"'but the Spirit himself intercedes for us
"'with groanings too deep for words.
"'And he who searches hearts
"'knows what is the mind of the Spirit
"'because the Spirit intercedes for the saints
"'according to the will of God.'"
And then we can jump down into verse 34.
It's a verse we've covered in a previous episode.
You may remember, who is to condemn?
Christ Jesus is the one who died.
More than that, who was raised,
who is at the right hand of God
and is also interceding for us.
Now, I touched on this a little bit last week in episode 45.
You have a divine prayer team.
Both Jesus and the Holy Spirit
are praying for you and with you today.
Now, admittedly, I was not always aware of this truth.
In fact, I've been on a very precious journey,
even recently, unlearning some old prayer habits
and some things I thought I knew about prayer.
And my devotional life has shifted
from just praying for an answer
to praying with the answer.
And this beautiful truth about prayer
was illuminated to me by one of my spiritual mentors.
His name is Graham Cooke.
And Graham wrote a book called Crafted Prayer,
The Joy of Always Getting Your Prayers Answered.
How about that for a title?
And it's not a very thick book,
which I find super encouraging.
I highly recommend this book.
It'll change your prayer life.
I will leave a link to it
in the description of this episode
if you're interested in checking it out.
I hope you do.
In this book, Graham encourages a different way
to think about prayer, a different way to see prayer
through the lens of this, what he calls,
brilliant partnership that we have with God.
And in fact, next week,
Graham and I will be having a conversation on Facebook
about this brilliant partnership.
We're gonna be talking about God's empowering presence in us
and it's what Graham calls three plus me,
which I just love.
I will be sharing details
for how you can join that conversation
on Posture's Facebook page later this week,
facebook.com forward slash Posture podcast.
There you'll find the link
on how you can join in on that conversation.
But today's thought based on Romans eight,
here's what I want us to be thinking about.
While you're shut in, locked down,
self-isolated due to this pandemic,
what if, what if you're not ever actually alone
or without access to a ministry team?
What if instead you have the best prayer team ever
already living inside of you?
According to Romans eight, you do.
And true confession,
here's what I wanted us to talk about prayer today,
because I have found myself in this season
with this pandemic, starting to feel weighed down
by all of the prayer requests that are coming at me
and are surrounding me.
I mean, anytime I jump on social media,
my newsfeed is just filled with real need
and so many prayer requests from my community
all over the world.
I'm sure you're experiencing the same thing.
And I realized I was feeling weighed down.
I was even feeling burned out on prayer
because all of my prayers were a reaction
to the problems being presented
instead of a response to the answer who is already present.
I also realized this,
I realized I was praying as if I was praying alone,
as if I was carrying the sole responsibility
of concocting an ideal situational outcome
for the person I was praying for.
And then I was striving to find the right words
and feelings to conjure up that outcome.
And let me just tell you from my own experience,
that kind of prayer will burn you out real quick
because desperation causes an identity crisis in us.
We forget who we are and whose we are,
and we forget who we are with.
And we can let go of our peace
in those moments of desperation
and instead produce prayers from our own strength.
So I had to step up.
I had to step away from quickly throwing up prayers that were birthed from my own panic
and desperation or fear about a situation, and instead I'm now learning to make the starting
point of all of my prayers be thanksgiving to God.
Because I was being pushed into prayer by the urgency of the need, and therefore my
prayers were being birthed from all of the head noise, all of the chaos and thoughts
about the circumstance, instead of being birthed from the peace in my spirit.
Thanksgiving reminds me what I can expect, because thanksgiving disrupts hopelessness
because it causes an awareness in us of where our hope actually lies, which is not in a
specific situational outcome, no, our hope lies in a living God who is always magnificent
no matter the situation.
I cannot trust the ever-changing circumstances and facts that are swirling around me, but
I can always trust my never-changing God.
So every prayer, every burden of a need, every request, I start with thanking God for who
He is.
By the way, this doesn't change God or move God, it changes me.
It aligns me with the truth.
And so then it's from that place of thanksgiving and trust where the panic of the circumstance
loses its grip on my heart and my mind, I become aware of the presence of the Prince
of Peace himself, and then it's with a sound mind.
I am then able to ask my divine prayer team, what are you praying about this situation?
And then I pray that.
Prayer is not a last resort, and it's not our sole responsibility.
We are in partnership with Jesus and the Holy Spirit in every prayer that we pray.
So today, try it.
Don't focus on praying for an answer.
Pray with the answer.
Start your prayers today with thanksgiving to God.
Thank Him first for who He is.
Don't allow panic or desperation to dictate your prayers.
Instead, allow your prayers and your peace to dictate the silencing of all fears and
unbelief.
Today, let peace author your prayers.
The promise of perfect peace is found in Isaiah 26.3.
And in Hebrew, it is shalom shalom, meaning complete wholeness.
Nothing missing, nothing broken.
This is who you are in Jesus.
Let's declare this together.
Today, I am kept in perfect peace.
With my whole heart, I trust the Lord.
I am strong.
I am victorious.
I am whole.
Remember friend, you are a living testimony of Jesus' ultimate win.
Not because of anything you did, but because of what He did for you.
With every step you take today, you're putting Jesus' victory on display and Satan's defeat
on replay.