Transforming Lives Through Prayer and Blessings

Here are the selected quotes from the sermon transcript:

"Church, today as we prepare to hear God's Word, we do want to take a moment and just remember, celebrate our veterans. And so if you are a veteran here today, please stand where you are. Go ahead, please stand. Look around the room. Yeah, please give God a praise offering. Thank you for your service. We are able to worship each and every Sunday. We're able to live into the freedom. We hold so dear, able to hold elections and peaceful transitions of power. And the list goes on and on because of what our men and women who serve this great country with their time and their sacrifice. And so thank you." [00:25:54] (58 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


"Today we start a new series entitled prayer evangelism uh actually it's entitled prayer evangelism and we're going to be talking about prayer evangelism titled uh transform our world but it is about prayer evangelism we are called as christians to help god to help jesus transform our world uh and whether we like that man or not we don't have a choice either we believe or we don't and if we believe then there are certain things that jesus calls us in our faith to do to live out our faith to do to live out our faith to do to live out our faith to do to live out our faith our lives as christians in this world prayer evangelism is pretty simple overall i'm although i'm going to be talking about it for three weeks i could talk about it probably for three months but in short it is talking to god about our neighbors before we talk about god to our neighbors right so talking to god about our neighbors before we talk about god to our neighbors before we talk to our neighbors about god uh and so uh that's in short what it is uh it's uh allowing god to work in and through us uh to bring about his will for all people and for the world asbury church as a global methodist church one of our main concerns is to help save the lost to help reach out to the disenfranchised uh... to be able to help help point the way to jesus and help all people come into a relationship with jesus and live that out and so over these next few weeks we'll talk about transform the world our scripture today as we start the series and in this series we're gonna uh... go over four steps on how we can use the concept the idea of prayer evangelism to live out our call to transform the world and so we'll start today by speaking blessings speaking blessing to others our scripture this morning comes from luke chapter ten i'll be reading verses five through nine uh... and in this passage jesus is sending al his disciples but also seventy we're told not just the twelve that he had chosen but those who were following him" [00:27:56] (154 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


"Friends, as we live out our Christian faith, you and I are created as ordinary men and women. We are created as ordinary humans. We are created as human beings to be together in this collective that God has created on this earth. And we are called to do great things. We may feel little, like Pioneer 10. We may feel like we don't have much value, like an 8 -watt transmitter. But in essence, you and I are so important to God. I want you to hear that today. If you don't hear anything else, you and I are so important to God that He desires a relationship with us. He created us for that for all eternity." [00:37:28] (51 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


"But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's special possession, that you may declare the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His wonderful life. We are a chosen people, you and I, a royal priesthood. You and I are ministers. We are priests. It's not just that Pastor Jonathan, that Pastor Andy, that we are ministers, that we are priests. You are ministers. You are priests. I want you to do something for a minute. I want you to say this. I am a minister. Great. Come on up here. No, I'm just kidding. No, I'm a minister. We are a minister. We are all ministers in the kingdom of God. And that is a great thing. He calls us. He created us to be that royal priesthood to go out in the world and to make a difference, to transform our world." [00:38:40] (63 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


"Proverbs chapter 16, verse 24 says, gracious words are a honeycomb, sweet to the soul and healing to the bones, right? Gracious words, words of blessing, words of peace are a sweet thing to the hearer's ears, right? They speak to the soul. They encourage the person they're spoken to. And they help to really get in there and can be even healing to an individual. And so we're called to speak peace and blessing into others." [00:40:49] (43 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


"Along with this speaking blessing is, to begin, to begin praying for those who are around us. And how we want to pray is not, Lord, change them, ah, condemn them, ah, convince. We want to pray that they would find benefit from God's promises, right? If we know that they are unchurched, that they've told us they don't believe, or we sense that maybe their faith is just spoken and not lived out, right? One of the things we can do is pray, God's promises to come true in their life, right? Lord, please, I'll just pick on Ted, because Ted, he's already a strong Christian, but we could say, Lord, please bless Ted. Help him come to know you so his sins are wiped away and he has eternal life. Lord, please bless Ted, Jeremiah 29, 11, and help not bring him, protect him from harm, help him prosper, give him a hope, and a future with you for all eternity." [00:46:53] (66 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


"Why is this so important? 2 Corinthians 4, verse 4, The God of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers so that they cannot see the light of the gospel that displays the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. Now, notice the little G's and the big G's, right? 2 Corinthians 4, verse 4, uh the god of this age was satan was the evil one uh referred to in paul's day and so he was using everyday vernacular uh to talk about satan and the evil one and he what he's saying is the evil one blinds the that those who don't believe from seeing the kingdom it's why if you've ever tried to witness someone and you've ever tried to share your faith and you've gotten rejected or it's falling on deaf ears and what happens when we do that is then satan's working on us because then we're like i'm not good at this i'm not gonna do it anymore right or oh that was so embarrassing and it didn't have any success right uh and what it really is is that the evil one is blocking the eyes and the ears of that individual you're talking to and the way that we begin to penetrate that that hardness that uh the the wall that is put up we begin to penetrate that with words of blessing and peace for all those around us in acts chapter 26 verses 17 and 18 uh it says i will rescue you this is jesus talking i will rescue you from your own people and from the gentiles jesus called paul to this and paul was telling the people hey this is for all of us right i'll rescue you from non -believers i am sending you to them to open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light from the power of satan to god so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and place among those who are sanctified by faith in me if we're going to begin to have a chance to transform the world we've got to build relationship and trust with the world and that's where speaking blessing into people's lives comes into play it's something we can do driving our car by houses that we drive it's something we can do sitting in the next cubicle from our co -workers it's something we can do sitting in the back or in front of the classroom to pray for our class right and our teachers for that matter uh it's something we can do sitting in the back or in front of the classroom it is something or if you're teaching you can pray over the class right uh it's something that we can do uh in our families uh we've all got thanksgiving coming up real soon we're going to be with 40 other people uh it is rare that a family has 40 other people who are truly uh believing active in their faith christians and so we've got opportunity even in our own families to pray for our families and we're going to be with 40 other people and we're going to be with 40 to speak blessing into family members maybe even some who have ruffled our feathers or maybe we've ruffled their feathers in the past and we can speak words of kindness words of blessing we can pray uh to ourselves blessings over them that that god's promises would be revealed and lived out and come to fruition in their lives friends may we not take this responsibility" [00:48:10] (0 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


"possibility lightly. May we look at every opportunity as an opportunity to begin to transform the world. Every person, whether they live in our neighborhood, whether they're around our Christmas table, whether they are co -workers, whether they're people we see in the grocery store or our favorite restaurants on a regular basis, may we seek to speak words of blessing into their lives. It's a first step to help bring about transformation, to help us be able to shine the light of Christ into others' lives." [00:51:32] (40 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)


"Friends, remember, we are a royal priesthood. Say it again. I am a minister. May we go out and speak words of blessing to others. Amen. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, thank you for your amazing, never -ending love for us. We thank you, Lord, that you have transformed our lives. That you love us so much that you have not looked at what we've done, but through faith, you've wiped the slate clean, and you strengthen us through the power of your Holy Spirit so we can be all that we can be for you." [00:55:11] (48 seconds) (Download raw clip | Download cropped clip)