Thursday, February 23, 2012
Day 18
Take
captive every thought and make it obedient to Christ.
II Corinthians 10:5
I'd rather have 1 God idea than 1000
good ideas. Good ideas are good, but God ideas change the course of
history! Where do you get those
ideas? Not from brainstorming. You get them
from prayerstorming. It's praying in a way that allows the Holy Spirit to
conceive ideas in our minds and hearts and spirits. You never know where a God idea might come
from, but prayer is the incubator. And
when the idea is conceived, stewardship demands that you "take it
captive." By the way, this is where
keeping a prayer journal to write down ideas, impressions, and promptings of
the Holy Spirit comes in handy.
We have a core conviction at
National Community Church: there are ways of doing church that no one has
thought of yet. I also believe that there are ways of doing missions, ways of
doing evangelism, ways of doing discipleship, ways of doing worship that no one
has thought of yet. Six times the
Psalmist said, "Sing to the Lord a new song." Can I also suggest that we need to pray a new
prayer?
After we have prayed like it depends
on God, and the God idea is conceived, then we need to work like it depends on
us. It takes blood, sweat, and tears to
turn God ideas into reality! But work
ethic + prayer ethic = miracles!
I love it when people find creative ways
to further kingdom causes via business endeavors. That's what we've tried to do with Ebenezers
coffeehouse on Capitol Hill. Every penny of our $121,000 net profit goes to
missions! I pray that God would raise up
a generation of anointed entrepreneurs!
Tom and Alana are a great example.
A few years ago we prayed over them and sent them to Nepal as
"business missionaries." Their
big dream? To provide meaningful
life-changing jobs for 1 million people.
That's a big prayer circle! Their
most recent endeavor? CloudFactory. Love
the name! Love the concept! It's more than a business. It's both a prayer and an answer to prayer
for those who are employed by them. They
put computer-based tasks in the hands of talented people in developing
countries. Simple yet
revolutionary!
It's time to praystorm the gates of
hell and take back the territory that rightfully belongs to our Lord and
Savior, Jesus Christ. Good ideas won't
get it done. Only God ideas! But 1 God idea is worth more than a 1000 good
ideas!
Mark
Batterson-Circle Maker
