Dear Friends,
I hope that your coming to read this blog meant that you have confirmed you are a beneficiary. Remember the criteria are:
- To be a disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ and
- To have decided to obey Him in all areas of your lives, including work
If you are ready I will like us to start with a prayer; that God will help us by His Holy Spirit, to keep seeking Him every day of our lives irrespective of what we go through or how we feel. This is a very important prayer to keep us going till the end.
Because we are in the world, obedience to God’s commands and allegiance to His principles would be going against the grain of human behaviour. We may be seen as fools, full of arrogance, the scourge, or many other unpleasant descriptions. We, therefore, need to renew our minds daily to resist conforming to the patterns of this world (Romans 12:2).
Let us be reminded that our daily battle is against Satan, the flesh, that is our ingrained training from our cultures and upbringing, and the self which is mostly due to pride. Therefore God has given us Jesus Christ, His Word, and His Holy Spirit, respectively to defeat those enemies. The only place we can access all these 3 weapons of our warfare is through spending time and communication with our Father, which is prayer.
The Bible has a lot to say about prayer, what it means, and how we should pray. You can see a sample of what the bible says about prayers in https://bit.ly/whatbiblesaysaboutprayers and a list of biblical prayer verses in https://bit.ly/prayerverses.
Prayer is key
What if you are not used to praying or you are finding it difficult to find a structure for your prayer time? There are various models and methods of prayers but I want to specifically share two that I am fond of. One is the model prayer Jesus gave to His disciples in Matthew 6: 9 -13 in what is known as the Lord’s Prayer. This is a simple all-encompassing model that anyone can use but it can also be deep and meaningful depending on the depths of our relationship with the Lord. The other prayer model I usually recommend is using the acronym A.C.T.S. – Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, and Supplication.
Both these models of prayer cover key aspects of praying unlike our usual tendency of only going to God to ask for things we want him to do for us. Please let us be reminded that God is our Father and that is the relationship He wants in our prayer and communion with Him.
Imagine you have a perfect earthy father, who loves you no matter what, who is able to do all things, and who wants to pour his love and affection on you at all times, but who will also chastise you if you misbehave.
Now imagine also that you have a perfect older brother, whom the Father also loved, but who had never done anything wrong. This older brother (Jesus) is always with God the Father, He is equally powerful and eternal and is always interceding on your behalf! Imagine this older brother has experienced life just like you so He understands and can empathise with your situation.
Now also imagine you have an Advocate, God the Holy Spirit, who lives within you, who understands the good things the Father and Son have already determined for your life and who is willing to present your prayers to God!
Based on the above, this is, therefore, my suggestion of how we must relate to God our Father in prayer; in awe and reference, but also in confidence and affection because we know He loves us and wants the best for us at all times. Plus we have the Son and the Holy Spirit who advocates for us and whom the Father cannot refuse anything they ask on our behalf. Surely our prayers are always Yes and Amen according to HIS will!
Prayer is communion between Father and Child
Once we know how to pray, we must desire and intentionally pray for our work, workplace, the people we work with such as colleagues, managers, subordinates, people in different teams, the canteen workers, cleaners, and the entire organisation. The Bible specifically commands that we must pray for people who we don’t like or who have offended us (Matthew 5:44-45) and for our leaders in the workplace (1 Timothy 2:1-2). This is why we must daily renew our minds as it is not always easy to want to pray for such people.
May I encourage each of us to have dedicated time to seek the Lord before we start our work? This time has to be intentionally carved out of our busy schedule, it has to be in a quiet place so we can hear what God would say to us in prayer and it has to be enough time so it will not just be for reading out a shopping list to our Father. We must be humble in our quiet time and must invite the Holy Spirit to help us put the right prayer to the Father and also help us hear what the Father would say to us. It is best if we can also read a portion of the Bible at these times because that is the most accurate way the Father will speak to us.
Once we have prayed and received instructions from God, then we need to go into work boldly as a child of the Most High God. We need to go in confidence that He has leveled mountains and filled up the valleys for us, that there is nothing that will happen He is not aware and that His good purpose for us will come true at the end. We must not procrastinate but rather put quickly into action whatever God has inspired us to do that day. It may be to put an idea forward to a colleague or our Manager or in a team meeting, it may be to share God’s love and grace with someone, it may be to walk across to someone and introduce ourself, it may even be to share a testimony or the Gospel of God’s Kingdom!
Please be reminded that God wants all of us to be His ambassador in the workplace. We are the eyes, hands, feet, and heart of Jesus and He wants to accomplish so much through us!
So, let us start by committing this forum to God, that His will be done in the ways He will use this blog and the material that would be shared. Please pray for me; for wisdom in what I chose to share, that it would always be lead by the Holy Spirit and would fulfil God’s good and perfect purpose for everyone that reads the blogs.
Please pray for yourself, as you have committed to being part of this, that the Lord will encourage you and bless you and instruct you as you engage with the blogs.
May I ask you for a favour? Could you please make a note about your experience of acting on what God laid in your heart to do in your workplace after you have prayed? You can email us at FM Ministry hello@fmministry.co.uk or use the comment box below. You may also connect with us on Social Media.
God bless you and keep growing in the image of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Adesina
Great stuff man of God, prayer is the best place to start from. I thank God for what He is doing in and through you. It gives me so much joy to read the blog and just find it relating to what God has placed on my heart to do at my work place. I am running a very small business. It's a money transfer business that is situated at a place that is surrounded by bars. Most of the time people I talk to or interact with are either drunkards or prostitutes. Bars are closed because of the covid 19 but the place is just a stronghold for such vices. I have been praying lately to God that He gives me those souls. I have been sharing the gospel to most of them but there is need to also organize a mini crusade God willing and see how we can win some of those souls into God's Kingdom. Keep us in prayer because I know that God placed me there for a purpose.
Thank you Pastor Kaponda for your encouragement. I feel your passion for lost souls to be saved into the Lord’s Kingdom and it is His will for us to pray for everyone to be saved. Prayer is our weapon for this spiritual warfare and we all must pray more to see captives set free in our mission field. I want to encourage you to pray more and undertake prayer walks in the area. We will also be praying along with you and more shall be added to the Lord’s Kingdom in Jesus’s name.