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A Morning View From the Patio

You may or may not know that the United Methodist Church is famous for two things, committee meetings and carry-in dinners! Praise God for the dinners! I used to be the Lay Leader of the church I attended and the Lay Leader is a part of most of the committees in the church. That is a lot of meetings. Most often I greatly preferred of the food.
One Sunday the pastor delivered a sermon where he did a parody of the church leaders using their title and not their name and what the person in the position might say in the moment. When he said and the Lay Leader said, "Why don't we just stop and pray? Have we prayed over this yet? Perhaps praying first and seekGod would be important before moving forward?" Following the sermon I thought, "If I am labeled as a praying leader seeking the heart of God in everything, even if praying is seen as overkill, then I think I am alright."
After reading Ephesians 3 this morning, I was slapped onside my spiritual noggin. I have spent too much time acting and reacting in my humanness to what I see, hear and perhaps even fear. I have lived within my human shortcomings and not in the powerful gift of the connection to the Holy Spirit in the gift of prayer. Yes, I do pray each day. I pray for the people under my umbrella of responsibility as staff, parishioner and the blessing of God's presence in your life. I pray for the requests sent to us and personally written to or requested of me. I pray before writing the Morning View and before each time I speak to you on Tuesday's and Sunday.
But friends, I have fallen short, I have not been deeply praying through my personal emotions and convictions. I have allowed statements I see, read and hear eat at my spirit. Do not get me wrong, I have prayed. What I have not done is deeply passionately connect to the depth of the available presence of the Holy Spirit in my life, take up my cross, surrender myself and throw myself at the feet of God. I have not been the repetitive, perhaps obnoxious, Lay Leader that was chirping about prayer, prayer, prayer and more prayer deeply seeking the heart of God.
So, I stop and share this prayer of Paul to the Ephesians with you!
“My response is to get down on my knees before the Father, this magnificent Father who parcels out all heaven and earth. I ask him to strengthen you by his Spirit—not a brute strength but a glorious inner strength—that Christ will live in you as you open the door and invite him in. And I ask him that with both feet planted firmly on love, you’ll be able to take in with all followers of Jesus the extravagant dimensions of Christ’s love. Reach out and experience the breadth! Test its length! Plumb the depths! Rise to the heights! Live full lives, full in the fullness of God.
God can do anything, you know—far more than you could ever imagine or guess or request in your wildest dreams! He does it not by pushing us around but by working within us, his Spirit deeply and gently within us.”  - Ephesians 3:14-21
Peace,
PB

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