Prayer of my heart.

Father,

I come to You today with a heavy heart. I come on behalf of myself, my family, friends, church, community, city, state, nation and world. Lord, we are making a mighty mess of things. We fail to heed Your word and we wonder when we fall into calamity. We fail to love each other as You told us to and then we wonder at the violence and pain that we see around us. We fail to seek first Your kingdom and Your will for our lives and then we are amazed when our lives are hollow, empty shells with no value. Father, we yield to our own lusts and desires, turning a deaf ear to Your guidance and we wonder when things seem to come apart in our lives.
Lord, we have allowed ourselves to become afraid to speak the truth for fear of being called intolerant or bigots or accused of speaking hatred. We allow ourselves to sit silently while perversion, greed, and deception run rampant in our society. We choose for ourselves leaders who refuse to acknowledge your sovreign rule and who pass rules that are opposed to Your will.
Just as in the earliest days of humanity, we compare ourselves among ourselves to determine our "goodness" instead of admitting that we are in need of the Savior that You sent to us. Father we are indeed becoming a foolish people, declaring in our hearts and by our actions that there is no God.
Please forgive us.
Lord, you have shown time and time again that You are a just God, but also a compassionate God. Even though we deserve every  punishment that could possibly be meted out to us, I ask for forgiveness. Lord, I beg you to please draw us individually and corporately to You.
Those of us who have accepted Jesus as Lord and profess with our mouths and believe in our hearts that He is Lord, reignite the passion in our hearts to seek Your will. Help us Lord to find the courage and conviction to live Your will and speak Your words of truth and life to our dying world. Revive us, Your people, once again.
Those of us who have heard the Truth and have chosen to turn a deaf ear to it, please continue to soften those hearts and to put bold people in their paths that they might be saved. Lord inspire Your children to keep reaching out to the lost and confused. Help us to inspire our friends and neighbors to seek the Truth. Awaken us Lord before the enemy succeeds in lulling so many of us into complacency. Help us to set our hearts and minds on You once more.
Forgive us, Lord.
Use us Lord.
Help us to truly be Your people.
In the name of Your Son and my Savior, Jesus Christ, I ask these things.

Amen

How to change the world.

I look around me at the world today and I am saddened. I see people losing their faith in themselves, each other and in God. I see people whose sole goal in life seems to be pleasing themselves or collecting more things that they can possess. It seems to be ever more difficult to locate courtesy, honesty, honor and chivalry. Integrity- do we even know this word any more? No one is willing to accept responsibility for their actions or circumstances. There is always someone else out there to point the finger at. What happened to our nation?
I am reminded that the bible teaches that there is none righteous, no not one. Two thousand years from the time of that writing and it is still as true today. No, I am not pointing fingers, because I am just as guilty. I want what I want when I want it. I get annoyed when I don't get my way. I too find myself asking God, "When?" even though I know I should be saying, "In your timing, Lord, let Your will be done."

Here's the thing... instead of griping about how bad it is - and it is bad - maybe it's time to start doing something about it? What can we do in the face of what seems to be insurmountable ugliness? I suggest taking a tip from a source that many would consider unusual at best; Michael Jackson. The song The Man In The Mirror came out years ago, but is relevant today as much as it was then if not more so. The premise is simple: be the change that you want to see in the world.
Here's what it looks like. If you want to see more honesty in the world, deal honestly with others. You want to see integrity, display it. Be kind and courteous. BE an example of Christian love if you wish there were more of it being shown. If each of us starts where we live, where we work and where we play, I think we might start seeing it reciprocated. It might be a slow process and sometimes it might seem pointless, but is it ever pointless to do the right thing? Try it. If nothing else comes of it, you might be able to sleep a little better at night knowing that at least YOU have tried to make a difference.
That is my food for thought for the day.

Blessings,
Stan