Oct 30, 2020 Your Weekend Prayers – Words of Grace – October 30, 2020
In the spring of 2018, Grace Community Church voted to build a new building for worship and ministry. In the fall of that same year, we entered the Future Grace Three Giving Campaign. In the summer of 2019, we broke ground and construction began. Now we are ready to move in.
On November 15 we will hold our first worship service in the new Worship Hall. We are grateful to God for this provision. And, we are grateful to each person who has contributed to this project in prayer, money, and service.
So, what’s the first thing I am calling us to do as we approach November 15? Pray!
This weekend, pray with me from 2 Corinthians 4:15: “As grace extends to more and more people, thanksgiving will increase, and God will be glorified.”
First, pray that grace will extend to more and more people. The purpose of this building, and all of the buildings at Grace, is to gather people to hear the word of God and to grow in the grace of Christ. The purpose of expanding our buildings is for more people to know and love Christ.
The vision for the building is that today, and for generations to come, people will be saved and discipled in the faith.
The kingdom of God is expanding, growing, and including more and more people. Local churches are being planted and are growing. Buildings are not the kingdom or the church, they are tools used to build up people.
Ask the Father, in the name of the Son, with the help of the Holy Spirit, to extend his grace to more and more people in this new building. Name the names of people who need his grace. Pray for the generations to come who will gather in this building. Pray big. Pray for one hundred years of ministry ahead.
Second, pray that thanksgiving will increase. Thanksgiving to God is the evidence of his grace in the heart of people. We want God to be praised, honored, proclaimed, loved, obeyed, and enjoyed. The great need of our city is for people who give thanks to God. The greatest state of existence is the one in which God is praised. Joy in God increases in proportion to his grace being experienced by people. Imagine what the increase of joy and thanksgiving to God would be like in our congregation, in our city, and in your life.
Can a building really contribute to the increase of thanksgiving to God? If that building is the gathering place of God’s people, then yes. If that building is the place where young people hear the gospel and are saved, then yes. If that building is where songs are sung in worship of the triune God, then yes. Pray for it.
Third, pray for God’s glory. Stop, drop, and pray. Pray with your eyes open while you drive. Use the time for prayer as you wait in the line to vote. Take a walk or sit in your favorite chair to pray. This weekend, let your every breath be a prayer that sounds like this, “Not to us, O LORD, not to us, but to your name give glory (Psalm 115).”
-Scott