At the Father's Feet by Pastor Paul

If you or I attempted to enter the Oval Office it would not go well!  The Secret Service would grab us or shoot us.  One way or another, we would be leaving quickly!  This picture of John John playing at the feet of his father tells a different story.  Imagine John John running all over the White House!  Can you imagine the Secret Service smiling and watching as the little boy in pajamas climbed over and under everything in sight?

Look at the smile on the Presidents face.  I suspect he is aware of the photographer about to make history.  He understands the glorious complexity of the moment.  The most powerful man in the world is working at the most prestigious desk in America while a little boy plays at his feet.

I doubt if John John was even aware of the moment.  He was just playing at the feet of his father.  He was doing what nobody else in the world could have done at that moment.  Why?  Because he was the fathers son, and that made all of the difference!

Listen to the words of Hebrews 4:14-16 (NLT) and marvel at the invitation we have been given!

14 So then, since we have a great High Priest who has entered heaven,
Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to what we believe.
15 This High Priest of ours understands our weaknesses,
for he faced all of the same testings we do, yet he did not sin.
16 So let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God.
There we will receive his mercy,
and we will find grace to help us when we need it most.

Because of the Blood of Jesus Christ we can call God our Father and enter His Heavenly Oval Office.  Just like John John we can come to Abba Father in our Pajamas and receive mercy and grace for all our needs.  We can play at His feet, and our coming will make Him smile!  WOW...

Our Father Which Art in Heaven--Linden Malki

We are so familiar with the phrase "Our Father in Heaven" that I never realized before that it is not found in the Old Testament--and it is in over 30 places in the New Testament. The closest I could find before Jesus is when Moses calls the Israelites "children of God" in Deuteronomy 14, and Isaiah, praising God in chapters 63 and 64, says "You are our Father..".

Jesus, on the other hand, constantly refers to God as Father, starting early in His minstry (and scandalizing the religious establishment). After all, God invented fathers! Think about our own fathers (or the fathers we may wish we had had) at their very best, loving us, teaching us, protecting us, providing for us, and all the other ways that they took care of us and gave us a good example to live up to. I think about how I wanted my own dad to approve of me and be pleased with the person I was growing up to be, and how I did not want to disappoint him. I remember my nephew and I knee-deep in a cold Montana creek learning how to cast a fly and land a trout. My brothers and I were blessed to learn basic building skills growing up as Dad's apprentices. And I remember Dad's constantly reaching out to people--Mom used to say that he could get anyone's life history in 20 minutes.

And then think about the magnitude of difference between our earthly fathers and our Creator. We read of Jesus' relationship with his Father, and are overwhelmed at his invitation to us to call God our Father. And even though we can sense the presence of God here, through His Spirit, He is not limited to our space. We hear talk of the God within us, and the God in Nature, but this image of God isn't anywhere nearly big enough. When Jesus said "Our Father, which art in Heaven", He is talking of a God who is greater than all of time and space, but still has the time to relate to each of us as the individual He created. He offers to enable us to become the person He created us to be if we are willing to follow His Son into His Presence.

(This is the beginning of a series on the Lord's Prayer)

SHUT UP!--Linden Malki

　
              Recently I was listening to a Christian radio call-in question and answer program, when a caller asked why God never answered his prayers. Asked for particulars, he said that he had asked God for things that would be easy for Him to just snap His fingers and do, but they didn't happen that way, and he couldn't figure out why not. We too often define prayer as "talking to God". I found myself wanting to say, "Do you ever just shut up and listen?"

Silence is a hard thing to learn. We have a tendency to talk too much. A long-time friend of ours, a successful salesman, told me once that silence is one of the most powerful tools in negotiating. When we stop talking, it unnerves the other person and they very often talk too much or make admissions just to fill the silence. I have had argumentative inlaws, and figured out that the best way of dealing with them was to say what I had to say as shortly and simply as possible, and then shut up. Often I would hear them weeks later using my point with someone else. I eventually learned to simply shut up and pray for the removal of the imp of Satan that was spewing nonsense into their ear. There is no other way to deal with some conversations! And some long-standing estrangements were eventually healed.

God Himself used that on me at one time. There was a situation in my own family that was very painful, and I was being a total pest, asking God to fix it. I finally got one of the several totally unmistakeable answers God has given me: "Shut up, lady, I will handle it!" So I did, and He did, on His own schedule. And I just recently found out that it was the person who was the major instigator of the problem who, without warning one day, had said what needed to be said to unravel the whole thing.

Silence in prayer can be learned. There is "silent prayer" that is simply us talking, just not out loud. Silent prayer that is truly listening is different. We sometimes get discouraged because when we stop talking and try to listen, all sorts of stuff runs through our brains. As a first step, we can take those things, hand them off to God, and wipe our mental walls clean, ready for God to write on. I have recently learned to use silence to give God space to fill; for Him to supply each word, one at a time. It works praying aloud, or as a meditation of my own. Some of us were at a retreat several years ago where we were given a Scripture passage and sent out into the woods individually for more than an hour of silent meditiation and prayer. The idea was scarier than the process; the time went faster than we anticipated, and I think we all grew in the process.

God speaks to us through His Word, through prayer, and through people. We need to quiet our minds and hearts and listen.

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