Last week’s sermon from Hebrews 4 and 7 looked at Jesus as the Great High Priest who saves to the uttermost and ever lives to make intercession. Jesus began his role as High Priest even before his earthly ministry was finished. In John 17 he prays for the believers of his time and for those that would believe as a result of their testimony. Jesus prayed then and prays now for us! That’s just the introduction, click play button for much more.
Jesus is our Great High Priest, continually going into God the Father’s presence to make intercession. He represents a greater covenant than the Old Testament high priests and presents a more excellent sacrifice, one that is sufficient once and for all.
This is Day 2 of the week of prayer and fasting in our Georgia Baptist Churches. Click this link to view or download the prayer guide, featuring daily devotions and a list of prayer points for each day. Visit the GA Baptist #PrayGeoriga page each day for the current prayer guide and a short video devotion. Unity Baptist will also post the video to our Facebook page – Facebook.com/UBCPlainville – as we get more engagement on social media than the church website.
I put together the Pray Georgia post, made copies of the prayer guide for Sunday morning, then couldn’t get the idea of prayer and fasting out of my head. So here is sermon on why we pray and fast, based on scriptures in the Old Testament, New Testament and the teachings of Jesus in the Gospels. Instead of Joel we’ll begin in Acts chapter 14.
Pray Georgia is a week of pray and fasting that begins Monday, August 3rd and runs through Sunday, August 9th. Click this link for the online prayer guide; we will hand out print copies at church on Sunday morning. The theme for each day will be:
The state is divided into six regions and each region will fast on a specified day. The day to fast in northwest Georgia (where we are) is Monday, August 3rd. We have had prayer and fasting at Unity before and discussed that it may not be for everyone especially those with ongoing medical concerns, diabetes, etc. Suggestions for fasting include fasting for 24 hours, fasting from sunrise to sunset or fasting one meal. You could also fast from things other than food, such as social media or entertainment for the day and spend that time in Bible reading and prayer.
The video below is an introduction to Pray Georgia featuring Thomas Hammond.
Listening and hearing are not the same thing. Hearing what Jesus says and heeding his teachings are very different. The words are the same, the difference is what we do with them.
When considering “what would Jesus do?” let’s remember that flipping tables over is a possibility. So is having a fish fry (for breakfast). When the wind and waves picked up, and the disciples thought they were going to die, they found Jesus asleep. They learned that when Jesus is in your boat there is nothing to worry about.
God desires for you to be free. We need to define our terms and names to be sure what we mean by free. We are free from sin when we belong to Christ.
Today was our first day back in person since March 15th. Today’s sermon picks up in Genesis 22, the same text we read last week on Father’s Day.
In some ways Abraham, as the father of Isaac, was like our heavenly Father. In other ways he was not. At some point every analogy breaks down but that doesn’t mean they are not helpful to our understanding. Every relationship we experience – as parents, children, siblings, even friends – teach us different aspects of what our relationship to God is like.
