Prayer Service for New Church Year
Text for Sermon: Romans 8:26-28, 31-34
Introduction.
How is your prayer life? On a scale of 1 to 10, how is your prayer life? That question humbles every Christian. I don’t know anyone who answers that question saying “great, awesome, couldn’t be better.”
If you are at all like me, you feel like your prayer life is inadequate, weak, less than you would like. Even the Apostle Paul expresses that same sentiment. He says “we” when talking to the Romans about prayer. “We don’t know how to pray as we ought.” We are weak.
Our weakness is a given. That we need help in our weakness is a given. And God gives us the help we need. Notice, when God gives us help in our weakness, He doesn’t take our weakness away and transform us into a strong man. No, we remain constantly dependent on God, so that He may be glorified, and His power might be revealed and perfected in our weakness.
How many times has I said prayer is our declaration of dependence.
We are all weak, we all have weak prayer lives. Weakness and inadequacy in prayer are not surprising to God. He never intended that our prayers should be left to our own unaided abilities. Feeling weak and inadequate in prayer are how we are to come before God. Always. We never grow out of it.