praying for kids

Opportunities to Pray, Because Fear is NOT the Way!

~ Bev Parker ~ Leave a comment

Yay for the abundance of “opportunities to pray” all day!  

When our daughter Hannah was targeted for abortion – doc said I’d die otherwise – I said to my husband John, “You know what this is?  This is an opportunity to pray.”

When she was in intensive care at birth (36 units of Pitocin) there it was again, an opportunity to pray.  What else could we do?  Praise God for things we can’t possibly fix!

I didn’t die, Hannah came home the next day with me, instead of staying in ICU the forecasted “minimum two weeks”, and she is an extremely lovely, fit and healthy 24-year-old today.

I taught her by example, even from the womb, that fear is not the way.

Psalm 139:13,14 – For You formed my inward parts; You covered me in my mother’s womb.  I will praise You for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Marvelous are Your works and that my soul knows very well.

“Father, Anoint Us as Parents.”

~ Bev Parker ~ Leave a comment

When the kids were growing up John and I prayed this daily:  Father, anoint us as parents.  

But even though I vehemently disagreed with the idea that kids are adults at eighteen, that our job is finished, somewhere along the way I started acting like I believed that rot.  Somewhere, for some reason, we stopped praying that powerful prayer.

Sure we still prayed for our kids, sure we were still very available, but we thought, what?  That they no longer needed parenting anointed by God, that we no longer needed His help, that the battle was over and won?

The words began whispering themselves to me a few weeks back:  Pray for anointed parenting.  Finally, last night, after listening to my kids’ conversation and seeing the evidence of needed peace in their hearts, I said to John, “We need to pray for anointing as parents again.”  He immediately agreed and we IMMEDIATELY did it.

NEVER, EVER, EVER WAIT TO PRAY.  Do it then and there, or that very important opportunity will escape.

You may be asking, “What is this anointed parenting stuff?”  This is parenting with the power and wisdom of God Himself, wherein your child’s heart is revealed, and the words coming out of your mouth are words of life, rather than words of nonsense and destruction.

After listening to the prideful disdain for others coming out of my child’s mouth last night, and keeping still until I prayed, I received revelation about what’s really going on in his mind.  Rather than being aggravated with him, my heart became very tender toward him.  Rather than being afraid of the tendencies I see him learning toward, I became warlike in my desire to fight for and with him.

I began to strategize.  I went to the Word and then got on my knees, and I realized something:  I haven’t been showing the humility necessary to get his attention.  I haven’t been humble enough to realize that apart from Him, I can do nothing.

I can sense the Holy Spirit ordering my thoughts, cleansing my heart, and strengthening me for the task at hand.  It’s exciting.  The call to battle of motherhood is a continual call and a continual battle, and in Him, we win.

Amen.

Lifting Burdens via Intercessory Prayer

~ Bev Parker ~ Leave a comment

 

praying-young-man

I was asked to pray for someone last night and I just couldn’t do it, not with any faith and fervor.  I awoke at 2:00 a.m. burdened for this person, but not in a good way.  It might be more accurate to say I was aggravated with them.

As I prayed about it I realized that intercessory prayer is not to be undertaken before there is personal heart maintenance.  Otherwise, the intercessor simply takes on the burden of the other person, rather than assisting them in giving that burden to Jesus, who can not only take it, but do away with it!

So, practically what does that mean?  It means seeing what the Word says about love, and about every single person.  It means asking God for His take, how He sees it, what He wants done in this person’s life.

Then come the revelations, the prayers of faith that build more faith, and the return to where we start:  apart from Him, I can do (pray) nothing, and with Him all things (prayers) are possible.

He’s the only Way to go.