Week 1– ALIGN.
The focus of this week is on our personal preparation, Asking God to align our hearts with his, by asking Him to give us a heart for the lost. The focus is on removing barriers to intercession and asking God to replace our personal self-interest with a passion for the lost.
Read Ps 139 1-24. Pray asking God to search your heart and reveal to you anything that is a hindrance to doing His will. Act on what Father reveals.
Read Jas 1:6-7.and Gal 6:9 Note that unbelief and weariness are problems we need to tackle, and problems which God wants to deal with! We need to learn to persevere and press on in both prayer and faith. God wants to refresh and rejuvenate our spiritual passion, so we can live in the good of Mark 9:23 “if you believe, all things are possible”. Weariness causes us to give up, or to make half-hearted efforts, we need to stay fresh for the battle. Draw close to God and let Him refresh you ( Is 40:31.)
Even Jesus could not do what he wanted to when there was unbelief Mk 6:1-6. For this reason it is important that we act in faith, and ask God to help us address our own unbelief in this time of preparation. This requires honesty and integrity – we need to be real about where we are at – coupled with a genuine determination to move on with God. Joel 3:10 “Let the weak say I am strong”. Bear in mind God does not want to make us strong – He wants to be our strength.
God Can Turn Our Weakness Into Strength
Think about Abraham and Sarah believing God's promise for a son. What most people forget is that they didn't always walk in faith during the time they waited for Isaac. They wavered in their faith for receiving a son through Sarah -- so much so that they conceived a plan to try to fulfill the promises through Hagar, Sarah's maid. Ishmael was the result.
The New Testament states very clearly that it was because of Abraham and Sarah's great faith that God was able to fulfill the promise. Rom 4:17-22 As it is written: "I have made you a father of many nations." He is our father in the sight of God, in whom he believed--the God who gives life to the dead and calls things that are not as though they were. Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed and so became the father of many nations, just as it had been said to him, "So shall your offspring be." Without weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his body was as good as dead, since he was about a hundred years old,and that Sarah's womb was also dead. Yet he did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God, being fully persuaded that God had power to do what he had promised. This is why "it was credited to him as righteousness." Heb 11:11-12 By faith Abraham, even though he was past age, and Sarah herself was barren, was enabled to become a father because he considered him faithful who had made the promise. And so from this one man, and he as good as dead, came descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as countless as the sand on the seashore.
Rom 4:20 tells us that they" grew strong in faith". And here is the incredibly good news: They grew into this incredibly strong faith in a few short months, at which time Isaac was conceived. Twenty three years of waiting and times of unbelief were overcome in just a few months, something transpired to transform them from times of unbelief to the great faith spoken of in the New Testament.
If God could do this for them, He can do it for you! Surely we who live on this side of the Cross, with a "better covenant" and "better promises" Heb 8:6 :"But the ministry Jesus has received is as superior to theirs as the covenant of which he is mediator is superior to the old one, and it is founded on better promises."
You CAN rise to a new level of faith very quickly - Don't underestimate the power of Christ in you
Col 1:27:"To them God has chosen to make known among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory .Let the weak say, I am strong (Joel 3:10). See the unbelievers around you not as threats but as opportunities. They really can live and you can really believe it.
