Introduction: pray all the time. Managing your relationships is a crucial key to success in life. Jesus is the lion and the lamb. He mastered how to be a lamb when he needed to and a lion when he needed to.
Discussion:
Your relationship with God and with men are vital and must be managed . It is important to consciously be aware of God.
Toxic relationships have to be eliminated. Imagine Jews still doubt Jesus’ virgin birth and even though they are his own. A healthy relationship thrives on communication.
God had angels, cherubims and seraphims and none of them where good enough to be friends with God ( BFF). We are not designed to live in isolation we are made for relationship first with God then with man. A problem shared is a problem halved and a merry joyous occasion shared is joy doubled they say.
Prayer is having a conversation with God. Scripture says pray all the time.
When we involve God in what we do, we are spending time with God as long as we are conscious of His presence. What ever you do, do it in the name of the Lord.
Brother Lawrence from a French monastery wrote the book “practicing the presence of God” He stated that Short open-ended conversational prayers are more effective than long-winded extensively complicated and convoluted prayer with no heart involvement.
Is 26:3 NKJV If you start thinking of God, your reward is peace of mind. The mind can stray we have to consciously drag it back to a focus on God.
In life 5% of the effect on our lives of negative challenges is from the challenge the other 95% is dependent on how we respond. 2 brothers raised by alcoholic father who beats up their mother, one grew up an alcoholic stating that’s all I ever saw, the other grew up never drank. The difference the 2nd child would not let life’s experiences mare his future.
We manage relationships with words.
Prayer is talking to God. He wants to be our friend. Essence of friendship is communication. Folks are still giving God the “silent treatment “
You can not “gas light” God by praising Him because you want some thing.
You become like who you hang around. Becoming Christ-like involves spending time with Him.
The best advantage of prayer is what it does in you not just what it does for you.
Prayer:
Lord help me to know you more and to live a life pleasing to you and to be a true friend
