Silas
Beloved of All
Your prayer reflects a heart that wants to see God restore what sin has broken, and we join you in bringing this man before the Lord in the name of Jesus, trusting that God hears when His children agree in prayer.
What you are asking for is at its core about relationship. God does not want a distant, ritual or merely legal connection with us. He invites us to know Him as Father, to pray Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name, and to walk with Him in close, loving fellowship. Jesus opened that way through the cross, where He suffered for all who believe, so that sin which separates us from God could be taken away and we could be brought near again.
Scripture shows that sin always separates. When hearts turn away to follow other desires, God speaks of it as unfaithfulness, like a marriage broken by adultery. That is why a false identity takes hold when a person leaves the narrow path to follow his own desires. Only in Christ is our true identity found. Through faith we die with Christ to the old way of trying to be right by the law, and we are joined to Him in a new covenant, married to Christ. That new relationship does not give freedom to indulge the flesh, it binds us with a greater law, the law of love. When we love Him, we no longer want what displeases the Father.
You prayed that God would break a stony heart and soften it. That is exactly what is needed. A hard heart cannot hear His voice or fear His holy name, but a soft heart can turn, can remember the love known at the beginning when faith was first alive and tender, and can return to Him with a whole heart. God has no pleasure in a half hearted or lukewarm walk. He calls us to turn and cry to Him, My Father, the guide of my youth, and to depart from evil.
You also prayed for separation from ungodly influences, including those in his household, and from controlling and harmful relationships. The Psalms teach that the blessed person does not walk in the counsel of the ungodly, but delights in the counsel of the Lord and meditates on it day and night. The way of the ungodly is like chaff driven by the wind and it will not stand, but the Lord knows the way of the righteous. If the vertical relationship with God is put right, every other relationship begins to come into right order, because our relationship with God is the axis on which all of life turns. When that center is right, a person can see clearly what is loving and what is destructive, what is of God and what is sinful and hateful, and can find the courage to step away from what endangers his soul and even his life.
We pray with you for deliverance in both senses Scripture speaks of. In Christ we are delivered even now from the hold the world and sin have on us as we walk in this world, and one day we will be delivered completely out of this world to be with Him. For this man, that means freedom from the power of sin, from deception about who he is, and from every influence that would keep him bound, blackmailed or controlled.
So we ask the Father to open his eyes to see himself as God sees him in Christ, to give him a soft and willing heart, to teach him the fear of the Lord which is to depart from evil, and to draw him into that intimate, loving fellowship where he learns how deeply he is loved and learns to love God in return. We ask that he would hear the Shepherd's voice, recognize the relationships and activities that are outside God's holy design for marriage and for purity, which is a lifelong covenant of one man and one woman with all sexual intimacy belonging within it, and that he would have the courage to leave the broad way and walk the narrow path that leads to life.
We also pray for you as you continue to intercede. Relationship comes before fellowship, and fellowship comes before effective prayer. As you abide in Him, your prayers carry weight. Keep lifting this man to the Father, asking that what God has declared to be true about belonging to Him would become real in his daily life, not as a burden of rules but as a joyful love that no longer wants to walk where the Father cannot go.
May the Lord give you peace as you trust Him with this life, and may He in His mercy grant repentance, healing and a restored walk with Jesus Christ, through whom alone we have salvation. Amen.
What you are asking for is at its core about relationship. God does not want a distant, ritual or merely legal connection with us. He invites us to know Him as Father, to pray Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name, and to walk with Him in close, loving fellowship. Jesus opened that way through the cross, where He suffered for all who believe, so that sin which separates us from God could be taken away and we could be brought near again.
Scripture shows that sin always separates. When hearts turn away to follow other desires, God speaks of it as unfaithfulness, like a marriage broken by adultery. That is why a false identity takes hold when a person leaves the narrow path to follow his own desires. Only in Christ is our true identity found. Through faith we die with Christ to the old way of trying to be right by the law, and we are joined to Him in a new covenant, married to Christ. That new relationship does not give freedom to indulge the flesh, it binds us with a greater law, the law of love. When we love Him, we no longer want what displeases the Father.
You prayed that God would break a stony heart and soften it. That is exactly what is needed. A hard heart cannot hear His voice or fear His holy name, but a soft heart can turn, can remember the love known at the beginning when faith was first alive and tender, and can return to Him with a whole heart. God has no pleasure in a half hearted or lukewarm walk. He calls us to turn and cry to Him, My Father, the guide of my youth, and to depart from evil.
You also prayed for separation from ungodly influences, including those in his household, and from controlling and harmful relationships. The Psalms teach that the blessed person does not walk in the counsel of the ungodly, but delights in the counsel of the Lord and meditates on it day and night. The way of the ungodly is like chaff driven by the wind and it will not stand, but the Lord knows the way of the righteous. If the vertical relationship with God is put right, every other relationship begins to come into right order, because our relationship with God is the axis on which all of life turns. When that center is right, a person can see clearly what is loving and what is destructive, what is of God and what is sinful and hateful, and can find the courage to step away from what endangers his soul and even his life.
We pray with you for deliverance in both senses Scripture speaks of. In Christ we are delivered even now from the hold the world and sin have on us as we walk in this world, and one day we will be delivered completely out of this world to be with Him. For this man, that means freedom from the power of sin, from deception about who he is, and from every influence that would keep him bound, blackmailed or controlled.
So we ask the Father to open his eyes to see himself as God sees him in Christ, to give him a soft and willing heart, to teach him the fear of the Lord which is to depart from evil, and to draw him into that intimate, loving fellowship where he learns how deeply he is loved and learns to love God in return. We ask that he would hear the Shepherd's voice, recognize the relationships and activities that are outside God's holy design for marriage and for purity, which is a lifelong covenant of one man and one woman with all sexual intimacy belonging within it, and that he would have the courage to leave the broad way and walk the narrow path that leads to life.
We also pray for you as you continue to intercede. Relationship comes before fellowship, and fellowship comes before effective prayer. As you abide in Him, your prayers carry weight. Keep lifting this man to the Father, asking that what God has declared to be true about belonging to Him would become real in his daily life, not as a burden of rules but as a joyful love that no longer wants to walk where the Father cannot go.
May the Lord give you peace as you trust Him with this life, and may He in His mercy grant repentance, healing and a restored walk with Jesus Christ, through whom alone we have salvation. Amen.
