Be Saturated

Philippians 4:⁶ “Don’t be pulled in different directions or worried about a thing. Be saturated in prayer throughout each day, offering your faith-filled requests before God with overflowing gratitude. Tell him every detail of your life.” (TPT, emphasis added).

Matthew 6:³⁴ “Therefore, do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough troubles of its own.” (NIV). What God is teaching us here is how not to worry. You can learn how not to worry because worry is a learned behaviour. Guess what? We even try to recruit worriers in our lives. But God is saying to you today, do not worry about tomorrow, because today is the tomorrow you worried about yesterday. There is no need to preoccupy your life with worry. The key is to live one day at a time. And whenever God says to us not to do something, if you check, God will usually say, do XYZ instead. So, when God says, WORRY ABOUT NOTHING! (do not worry about anything), guess what He is saying?

#2. PRAY ABOUT EVERYTHING! Pray about everything so that there is no vacuum. There is no, if I am not worrying, what should I be doing? God says Pray. People say, Pastor, I really don’t have time to pray that much. The question is, do you have time to worry? I am not even saying you should carve out any special prayer time. Just substitute your worry time for prayer time. You will see how many hours you pray in a day. Every time you want to worry, begin to speak in tongues (if you are baptized in the Holy Spirit). Every time you want to worry, begin to worship. Every time you want to worry, begin to pray. And you will see how much your prayer life actually improves. Just pray. Use the time you use to worry to pray.

You will discover that if you pray as much as you worry, you will have a whole lot less to worry about. If you are worried about your children, instead use that time to pray for your children. If you are worried about your finances, instead of just sitting and worrying helplessly, use the time to pray about your finances. Philippians 4:⁶ “…but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.” (NIV, emphasis added). A petition is a specific, detailed, direct request. When a lawyer petitions a court or a judge, the petition is very detailed. A lawyer cannot say, I petition the court, my Lord, to just do good on this matter.

What does that mean? A petition is detailed – I need this, I demand this and that. God wants us to be specific. God wants us to pray about the details. God is interested in every detail of your life. The J.B. Phillips translation says, “…tell God every detail of your needs in earnest and thankful prayer.” (emphasis added) God is interested in every detail of your needs, every detail!

Prayer (hymn): O what peace we often forfeit. O what needless pain we bear. All because we do not carry everything to God in prayer. Amen!