Episodes

October 19, 2022 - Inspired by J.C. Ryle's treatise on Prayer. We truncated our introduction for the last half of our October episodes. Our shorter introduction ends at the 3:18 mark if you would like to skip to that mark. This way, you have less to wade through. J.C. Ryle: “I know that much may go on in a man’s mind before he is brought to pray. He may have many convictions, desires, wishes, feelings, intentions, resolutions, hopes, and fears. But all these things are very uncertain evidence...

Through God’s word, we find: Awe, due God. Praise due God. Peace from God. Hope for salvation. Love and the knowledge our ways are before God. Shin Psalm 119:161-168 161 Princes persecute me without cause, But my heart stands in awe of Thy words. 162 I rejoice at Thy word, As one who finds great spoil. 163 I hate and despise falsehood, But I love Thy law. 164 Seven times a day I praise Thee, Because of Thy righteous ordinances. 165 Those who love Thy law have great peace, And nothing...

Educate/Encouragement Of exclamatory prayer, Rolland Hill said: "I like 'exclamatory' prayer; it reaches heaven before the devil can get a shot at it." Exclamatory prayer is those spontaneous moments we cry emphatically, a revelation from God, the realization of answered prayer, or even the rehearsal of praises to our God. It is not a prayer I had thought about much, but after some consideration, I realized these prayers are profound, keep our eyes on our Creator, Savior and Sustainer, and l...

Sincere/Encouragement God’s abundant life is learned through prayer. In the book "Devoted to God" by Sinclair Ferguson writes of God's perfect will: "The Lord is the Master of the jigsaw puzzle of our lives. The pieces may be strangely shaped; often we cannot see how they fit together; but eventually when the big picture is complete we will see that each piece was perfectly shaped. He leads us by ways we could not have guessed, into situations we never expected, to fulfill purposes we could n...

Instruction/Encouragement Trusting the Lord for His divine Providence. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, the eternal God, our Creator, Sustainer, our Savior, hears every prayer. Long or short, when we pour out our hearts to Him, He is our ever-present help in time of need. We see 8 word, 6 word, and even 3 word prayers can be most effective. Psalm 130:1-2 Out of the depths I have cried to Thee, O LORD. 2 Lord, hear my voice! Let Thine ears be attentive To the voice of my supplications. And sin...

Category - Exhortation We will see how and where I learned to say blessings before meals, why I avoided those prayers as much as possible, and why I felt like a hypocrite saying grace 95% of the time. Contemplating prayer before meals and exactly what that entailed, I came to the conviction that I broke every principle of prayer. What did Jesus say when He blessed the meals? There is a Jewish tradition, a formula for blessing meals. Acknowledging Baruch Atah Adonai (God who is ever blessed, ...

Category - Exhortation After a heartfelt review of our expected growth in prayer, we thought it fitting to play Marvin and Chapman's rendition of "Tis So Sweet to Trust in Jesus," for our learning of the art of prayer must begin with stumbling faltering steps of faith. Let David, Peter, Paul, and Jeremiah show us that one day discipline in prayer-craft will yield the fruit of a growing, Biblical, dynamic, sincere, God-glorifying prayer life, which will tutor us in the abundant life Jesus promi...

While studying, for the first time in any depth: Matthew 14:16-20 16 But Jesus said to them, "They do not need to go away; you give them something to eat!" 17 And they *said to Him, "We have here only five loaves and two fish." 18 And He said, "Bring them here to Me." 19 And ordering the multitudes to recline on the grass, He took the five loaves and the two fish, and looking up toward heaven, He blessed the food, and breaking the loaves He gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave to...

This is our first interview in two years; Chad and Joanna are sincere gifted musicians who will lead you to worship through God’s leading and His anointing. You will love to listen to the joy of these two loving hearts of these two ministers. What a glorious hour of fellowship with my former Worship Pastor-Chad Marvin and his cohort Joanna Chapman. (A praise for all of you, as you hear two beautiful voices, not just mine!) “Hymns” just dropped, as you young people say… “Hymns” is a set of beau...

Rescues from adversaries or our sins come from meditation on the word of God….” The sum of Thy word is truth, And every one of Thy righteous ordinances is everlasting.” Resh Psalm 119:153-160 153 Look upon my affliction and rescue me, For I do not forget Thy law. 154 Plead my cause and redeem me; Revive me according to Thy word. 155 Salvation is far from the wicked, For they do not seek Thy statutes. 156 Great are Thy mercies, O LORD; Revive me according to Thine ordinances. 157 Many are ...

The easy part: My grumpy old man prayer (when I remember to employ it) brings much more peace and rest to my soul and is more effective in my personal, face-to-face conflicts. The hard part: Occasionally I watch various news outlets, and hearing an evil or just plain dumb statement, my fleshly reaction is judgment and anger. Grumpy Old Man Prayer (GOMP) Expansion. No matter the source, personal or something observed, when my fleshly anger rises, I take notice of it and in the easy part and ...

Amidst the anger of false teaching on prayer, unbiblical promises, and taking advantage of those not schooled in the will of God, feeling Holy Spirit's permission (I believe) to vent a little about our need to come into God's throne room in sincerity, I did here. Prayer is not: A formula. A magic set of words. If said just right, an incantation will bring you whatever you ask. (Unless you ask for God's will, you can be assured He will do His will, but it is in the balance of probabilities, ...

Full Episodes coming in two days! Our God and our Savior is available to us at all times, we commune with Him from dawn to dawn from now to eternity. Qoph Psalm 119:137-144 145 I cried with all my heart; answer me, O LORD! I will observe Thy statutes. 146 I cried to Thee; save me, And I shall keep Thy testimonies. 147 I arise before dawn and cry for help; I wait for Thy words. 148 My eyes anticipate the night watches, That I may meditate on Thy word. 149 Hear my voice according to Thy lo...

Walking by faith equals peace, leading us to trust in the good Providence of our Holy God and Savior. We have had a short delay, and all is good. Prayerfully the unexpected time off is over, yet we commit our time and circumstances to His divine wisdom. Our trust is in His faithfulness, not in ourselves. His word enlightens us to our benefit. So join us once again in our reading of this Psalm as we read with the purpose of God teaching us today. Tsadhe. Psalm 119:137-144 137 Righteous art Th...

Top Ten Reasons we pray for our Spiritual Leaders. 10. Our leaders fall into “all the saints.” Ephesians 6:18 9. We forget. The best of men are men at best. (J.C. Ryle) 8. Protected by God. (Hedge about them) 7. Protected from other pastors. Galatians 2:11 ff (Even in the battle for the truth leaders have conflicts.) 6. Protection from Evil opposition 5. Sincere friendships. Like Timothy, Epaphroditus, and Titus 4. Power in their ministries. Ephesians 6:19-20 3. Peace in the Church. Hebr...

No matter what motivates us at the beginning of our prayer discipline, our prayers will glorify God, conform us to His will, and open up to us eternal life during our earthly sojourn. Maturing in the faith will not only see a convergence of the reasons we pray and the results of our prayer, but they will one day meld together, becoming the goal of our supplication every time we commune with Holy God. The Ultimate reason/result of our prayer? God glory alone. Our Chief reasons/results of our p...

New to prayer, beginning again after a multitude of fits and starts? We review the most fundamental principle of prayer, start talking to God. Set aside everything you know about prayer and talk. Children learn to talk by talking, and we know to pray by praying. Listen as I take my “how do children learn to talk” to ridicules levels, and hear how babies as they learn to talk, tell stories and events which to steal from Shakespeare, “This learned baby is too cunning to be understood.” Yet, t...

We review the podcast's purpose: the desire for every Christian to have a growing, Biblical, dynamic, sincere, soul-satisfying prayer life. It truly does break my heart that any Christian should not know the sweetness of comfort and rebuke from the lover of our souls. Father Son and Holy Spirit our creator and Savior. He does sustain our souls. We review Job 3:20-26, Lamentations 3:1-6 & 17 to remember the pouring out of our souls is never disdained by Holy God. Indeed He answers us with comp...

In our first episode of "A Layman's Look at the Whole Bible," we say the Bible is the boss of us, and we are not the boss of it. Today we will discover the Bible is a genuine love letter from our Creator to all mankind. The case is made by: The Bible's witness. The Devil's witness. Jesus' Witness. In the Sermon on the mount. In His responses to His critics. In His attestation of the Book of Jonah. So we read the Bible as literature, but the fundamental rule is that we read the Bible in ...

Look, if you can agree with Charles Spurgeon on any level when he said, “My spirits were sunken so low that I could weep by the hour like a child, and yet I knew not what I wept for.” This episode may just give you comfort. A powerful true story of the critical importance of not giving up but giving your life, in the providence of Christ, one more day. This is the new publishing of an episode we did in 2019. It is mainly to be noted this was before the stressful pandemic season and all the e...

Look, if you can agree with Charles Spurgeon on any level when he said, “My spirits were sunken so low that I could weep by the hour like a child, and yet I knew not what I wept for.” This episode may just give you comfort. This is the new publishing of an episode we did in 2019. It is mainly to be noted this was before the stressful pandemic season and all the emotional circumstances it has brought. Along with the next, this episode drew many comments and testimonies of encouragement. We a...

Reading David ( a few years back) say, Thy gentleness makes me great, from Psalm 18:35, threw me for a minor loop, for gentleness was not in the top ten attributes of God in my mind. It is reasonable, therefore, we have the witness of Jesus: 17 For the Law was given through Moses; grace and truth were realized through Jesus Christ. 18 No man has seen God at any time; the only begotten God, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has explained Him. John 1:17-18 We look today at two of those ten...

This Psalm is the pebble drop in water, and its ripple is found in Romans 7… 129 Thy testimonies are wonderful; Therefore my soul observes them… 22 For I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man (Romans 7:22) Then… 136 My eyes shed streams of water, Because they do not keep Thy law… 23 but I see a different law in the members of my body (Romans 7:23) The import of God’s word is timeless. Pe Psalm 119:129-136 129 Thy testimonies are wonderful; Therefore my soul observes them....

Psalm 18:35 35 Thou hast also given me the shield of Thy salvation, And Thy right hand upholds me, And Thy gentleness makes me great. When this verse first jumped out at me, I was more than a little startled. I had never really thought of the gentleness of God, especially as He reveals Himself in the Old Testament. Yet, David knew the gentleness of God made him great. In our effort to examine how David learned of the gentleness of God, we find a merciful chance to meditate on how God teaches...