The Principles of Prayer XV

 Faith is not about who you are, or who I am, but about who God is. I don’t have faith in myself, because it would be well and truly misplaced. I do, however, have faith in God because I know He is faithful and unchanging from generation to generation, and having spoken the universe into being, His ability to do what men deem impossible is beyond doubt.

Psalm 33:7-9, “By the word of the Lord the heavens were made, and all the host of them by the breath of His mouth. He gathers the waters of the sea together as a heap; He lays up the deep in storehouses. Let all the earth fear the Lord; Let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of Him. For He spoke, and it was done; He commanded and it stood fast.”

Does the resolution of your situation seem more difficult than gathering the waters of the sea together as a heap, or speaking the host of heaven into existence? Whatever you may be going through, it’s doubtful that God would have a more difficult time making a way for you than He did speaking creation into existence. So, if God did these things, if He spoke and it was done, or commanded and it stood fast, what makes you think He is incapable of intervening, rectifying, or restoring your situation?

Just as faith is not about who you are but who God is, faith is also not about where you are, but where you will be if you continue to walk in it. Stagnation is not a natural environment for a child of God. If I find myself in the same place tomorrow as I was yesterday, if my faith has not grown, stretched, and matured, if my understanding of God has not expanded from one day to the next, it should be a reason for concern, if not outright alarm.

If fish stop swimming, they die. If a believer stops growing and becomes stagnant, he begins to wither, grow stale, and his progress is stalled. If you’ve ever run across a pond, a pool, or a body of water in which there is no inflow of fresh water, you’ve likely seen all the grimy stuff that can grow atop it, and given enough time, it becomes foul and not habitable for any sort of life. When our spiritual life is stagnant, there is no inflow of living water, there is no refreshing, and what is present becomes murky, overgrown with weeds, and eventually malodorous and unsuitable for consumption.

Whenever we hear horror stories about a once-famed preacher, pastor, or evangelist having gone off the rails, and committed such heinous atrocities as to bring shame to the household of faith you can always trace the genesis of their descent back to the moment they stopped prioritizing growing in God, and trying to grow their church or ministry instead. Their purpose shifted from being godly and upright to doing whatever they needed to do to get ahead, to grow, and perhaps in contravention of God’s will for them, become bigger than they are.

It’s easy to grow a ministry if you’re willing to compromise. It’s easy to grow a church if you’re willing to circumvent the hard truths of the gospel and begin doling out platitudes and insisting that God had to change the rules of the game because there weren’t enough people signing up to be on His team.

Quantity was never God’s concern. Quality always has been. When my grandfather was still alive, he was a fan of buffets. I don’t know if they’re still around, but there was a place called Sizzler up the road from where we lived, and when he wanted to treat my brothers and me, he’d take us to Sizzler.

It was an all-you-can-eat buffet, and at the time, I was too young to understand the difference between quality and quantity, so we all took to the stale mac and cheese, rubbery mystery meat, and semi-congealed meat loaf with abandon. As I grew older, I realized that quantitatively speaking, you couldn’t go wrong with a buffet, but if you were looking for a quality cut of meat, that was the last place you wanted to be.

Admittedly, you’re unlikely to glut yourself ordering a ten-ounce ribeye at a steak house as you would have at a buffet, but if you’re taste buds are in working order, you must admit there is a marked difference in the quality of the food from one place to the other.

It took twelve men to turn the world upside down, all without the benefit of zooming, the internet, telephones, air travel, snail mail, or audio teachings. Anyone who insists that it’s acceptable to sacrifice quality for the sake of quantity should remember this truth and adjust accordingly, because what God can do through one man who is wholly sold out to Him, a thousand men cannot do of their own volition or in their own strength.

It’s a matter of pride, though. It stopped being about God and building the Kingdom some time back. Now it’s about the status symbol of presiding over a mega church, or being the frontrunner for the vaunted distinction of being the biggest in your state or the nation. To what cost, I wonder? What compromises did you need to make, and what half-truths and outright lies did you have to speak in order to reach this status and claim an honorific that holds no weight before Almighty God?

Somewhere along the way, we’ve inverted God’s standard, convincing ourselves that the more we grow, the less God expects of us, or the bigger our church or ministry, the more liberties we can take with our walk, and building up our faith. A pastor’s license doesn’t give anyone the liberty to stray from the path or nullify the mandate to flee the appearance of evil. It should make those answering the call to ministry aware that they have a bullseye on their back, and the enemy will double his efforts to try and ensnare them somehow. Ministry is not a ticket to easy street; it is being held to a higher standard of accountability while beating back the darkness that has you in its sights.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.  

The Principles of Prayer XIV

Everything you see, and everyone you know, including yourself, has a final chapter. There is finality to every breathing thing in the sea, in the air, and on land, including the land and the sea themselves. The end credits will eventually roll on my life, at least as it pertains to this plane of existence, but in His abundant grace, God has extended His hand and offered eternity to all who would take it and walk faithfully with Him. It should be a reality that humbles us to our core, yet some feel so entitled to this priceless gift as to trample upon it, dismiss it, ignore it, or think so little of it as to consider obedience and righteousness too high a cost to pay in order to receive what God has promised.

What could you or I have done to earn such a priceless gift? How many hungry could we have fed, lives saved, sermons preached, or orphans cared for to conclude that eternity in His presence is not only warranted, but well deserved?

God reigns today, as He always has, and will reign forevermore. There has never been a pause in God’s reign; He has never, as some assert, taken a step back from the course of human history. The only people insisting that God is an absentee landlord, no longer concerned with the goings on of His creation are those who either don’t believe in His existence, or those who use it as a means to numb themselves to the reality that one day they will have to stand before Him and answer for the life they lived.

Prayer coupled with faith gives us access to God, the Creator of all that is seen and unseen, and not for a thirty-second window until the next appointment comes along, but for as long as we desire to be in His presence and fellowship with Him. God will never be too busy to hear our prayers, nor will He cut us off because He has somewhere else to be. If we feel as though we are lacking in spending time in His presence, the fault lies solely at our feet, for we determine how much time we spend in fellowship with Him.

What could be more important than spending time with God? Anyone who insists that there is something has yet to grasp the fullness of who God is and the absolute honor His grace has afforded us that we might commune and fellowship with Him. The majesty of God is something we can never lose sight of or allow to grow dull in our minds.

Revelation 4:11, “You are worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor and power; for You created all things, and by Your will they exist and were created.”

This is the God we serve. We do not serve some carved idol fashioned by the hands of men, nor do we serve some amorphous deity shrouded in mystery, aloof and unconcerned; we serve the One who created all things, and by whose will they exist. There is none other in the universe worthy of worship, allegiance, glory, and honor, and this God, who created all things, knows you by name and desires to have fellowship with you.

I’m self-aware enough to know that I am undeserving of this honor. There is nothing I’ve done or could ever do to earn the grace to have unlimited communion and fellowship with God. It is His grace, His unmerited favor, that allows us to have this relationship with Him. Although I can do nothing to earn it, in His goodness, that’s exactly what He offers every single one of us.

The only thing required for our faith to flourish, grow, and mature is to believe God at His word. When the Bible says nothing is impossible to God, it’s not hyperbolic or exaggerated for effect. It is the truth, plain and simple. Our faith is the key that unlocks the door to God’s power and blessings. Though the mind of man cannot grasp the reality that there is nothing beyond the realm of possibility when it comes to what God can do, we nevertheless believe it because He said it, and we know that He does not lie.

Last summer, we got some pretty severe storms in our neck of the woods. The girls had been playing with a bucket they found in the garage and had left it out during the storm. The rain filled it to overflowing, and the next morning they went out and tried to move the bucket or tip it over, but to no avail. I watched them for a time, then asked if they needed help.

“It won’t move,” the little one said. “It’s too heavy. I don’t think anyone can move it.”

“I can try, if you want,” I answered, to which they both got this incredulous look on their face, fully convinced that if they hadn’t been able to move it, I’d fail in the attempt as well. Eventually, they both agreed to accept the proffered help. I picked up the bucket one-handed and spilled the water in the yard. As a dad, it’s always fun when your children see you as a superhero. To them, my ability to pick up the bucket and do what they couldn’t was one such moment.

Just because you can’t see yourself through a situation, or find it impossible to accomplish something of your own volition, it doesn’t mean God does as well. What is impossible to you is as easy as picking up a bucket to God, because His power is unlimited, and there is nothing He cannot do.

Our perception of what God can do can’t be limited to what man can do. If it were so, then that would mean God was as a man, and His limitations would be as such. What would be the point of serving, worshipping, or obeying someone whose strength and ability are on par with your own?

Job 42:2, “I know that You can do everything, and that no purpose of Yours can be withheld from You.”

We trust and believe that God can do things beyond what our minds can comprehend because He can. It’s not our imaginations running amok, or something we tell ourselves because it sounds good to our ears, but because it is true. Undeniably, unequivocally, true!

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.  

The Principles of Prayer XIII

 A new creation is precisely that. It’s not a retread of the old man, cleaned up and put in a suit, or someone enslaved to the same sins except for the two hours they spend in church every other week. A new creation has new desires, a new purpose, new goals, and new pursuits, and they all come together in the person of Jesus Christ. It is no longer we who live, but He who lives in us.

If you put a Ferrari sticker on a Pinto, it’s still a Pinto. If you throw in some Christian lingo while remaining shackled to the sin that has kept you prisoner for as long as you can remember, you’re still a slave to sin; you’ve just added Christianese to your repertoire. The dead in sin remain dead until they are born into Christ. Once that occurs, then the evidentiary fruit of that rebirth becomes evident and irrefutable. It’s not Jesus in addition to everything else you’ve been carrying; it’s Jesus in lieu of everything, replacing everything, doing away with everything that once kept you empty, alone, and at the whims of sin.

I’m as far away from tech-savvy as you can get without being Amish, but even I know that there’s a difference between rebooting a computer and reformatting it. When you reboot it, all the previously existing files still exist; you just powered it down and started it up again. When you reformat it, everything is returned to factory settings, all the files are wiped, expunged, and erased, and you begin anew. When we are born again, we are not rebooted; we are reformatted. Once we are reformatted, it is our responsibility to make sure we don’t click on the link from the Nigerian prince who wants to bless us with a million dollars, because we know what happened last time we did.

If people took the time to remember the pain their sin caused, and not just the momentary pleasure, far fewer would be returning to the pit of despair and misery with such regularity. God knows where the road of sin will lead. The ruin, the heartache, the pain, and the emptiness aren’t just probable; they are certain to occur.

In His infinite love, He offers men an exit ramp from the inevitable destruction their sin will incur, with not only the promise, but the ability to forgive all that has been, were they to repent and be washed clean in the blood of His Son. It’s no small thing. It’s something only God can offer, and something only He can carry out. None other in the universe, or other unseen realm, can make the same claim and have the wherewithal to back it up.

God’s omnipotence also underscores His sovereignty. Because He is omnipotent, all-powerful, and nothing is outside of His sphere of influence, His sovereignty is likewise absolute, unquestioned, and unshakeable.

Another attribute exclusive to God is omnipresence, being everywhere at once, whether in time or space, or outside of them. God knows the end from the beginning, not because He intuits them or guesses at what the next handful of years will look like, but because He is not constrained by time itself, being outside of both it and the space to which we are tethered. God has seen the entirety of human existence from creation to the point that the earth and everything in it are done away with, before Adam breathed his first breath. In that infinite, whether infinite possibilities or eventualities, He foresaw you and me, and the meticulousness with which He knows us is beyond anything we can know of ourselves.

He told Jeremiah as much when He informed him that He knew him before He formed him in his mother’s womb. If you’ve ever thought that God has lost sight of you, or does not know you, take heart, He does, and has from before He formed you in your mother’s womb.

The intimacy with which God knows us is beyond compare. When was the last time you counted the hairs on your head? If you have, you have far too much free time and should put it to better use, but God keeps an accurate count, never caught unaware. Some among us even try to trip Him up, getting hair plugs, or individual hair transplanted to their balding scalps, and even then, God knows. Whether He counts them as originals, or dismisses them because their origin was not on one’s head but some other place is one of those burning questions I have yet to receive an answer for.

God loves us. God knows us. In His goodness, He has laid out the blueprint of how we can fellowship with Him, grow in Him, and know Him as He knows us. That in itself is mind-blowing to me. By all accounts, God is amazing at multitasking. Just because a million things are going on in the world, it doesn’t mean He doesn’t have the time, or desire to fellowship with you. His schedule is never too packed, His plate is never too full, and He is never so distracted that you would cry out to Him and He would ignore you. God doesn’t check His phone first to see who is calling, then ignores it altogether because He is not in the mood to talk. He will not abandon those who cling to Him, and whose desire is to grow in Him.

The absolute knowledge of these truths should give you heart, no matter the trial or hardship you may be going through. I beseech Him, and He hears. I cry out, and He answers. It may not be the answer I want, but then again, He is sovereign, He knows best, and the faith that I’ve grown and built up gives me the assurance that His will is perfect.

Revelation 19:6, “And I heard, as it were, the voice of a great multitude, as the sound of many waters and as the sound of mighty thundering, saying, ‘Alleluia! For the Lord God Omnipotent reigns!”’

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr. 

The Principles of Prayer XII

 It’s striking that a large swath of those claiming to belong to God consistently choose the lesser over the greater. Even those with a superficial understanding of God are aware that one of God’s attributes is omnipotence. There is no cap on His power; there is nothing outside of His ability to do, yet, every day, men choose baubles and trinkets over substantive, meaningful things that can only come from His hand and are reserved exclusively for His own.

We boast of our spiritual maturity and deep understanding, but the things we choose to focus on and desire are so meaningless and worthless as to expose our boasts as nothing more than a convenient, self-serving lie. It’s akin to being offered the choice between a coupon for one free meal at the local buffet and a bar of gold, and choosing the coupon, fully convinced that we made the right choice.

It takes time to build up our most holy faith, and one would hope that our maturity level grows in tandem, so that when we possess true and abiding faith, the things we pray for have nothing to do with the ease and comfort of the flesh, but with the divine power to which we have access via the person of the Holy Spirit.

Yes, God can do all things. There is nothing beyond His ability, including casting mountains into the sea, but as a good father, He weighs the things we ask for in light of whether or not they will be beneficial to our spiritual man. How exactly will the new car you’ve been praying for aid in your spiritual growth? It won’t, but then again, few people dislike that new car smell.

As spiritual beings, born again and renewed in mind and heart, our focus is on the things above. This world and everything in it are passing away. There is no permanence in brick and mortar, steel and rubber, or silver and gold, for that matter.

Contrary to the belief that we are little gods, a reading of God’s word and a modicum of rational deduction will confirm that we are not. There are specific attributes that God reserves solely for Himself, attributes that are both immutable and exclusive to Him, attributes that define Him as God, not one among many, but unique: One of One. Omnipotence is one of them. Another attribute exclusive to God is that He is eternal. God has no beginning and no end.

It’s hard for temporal beings to wrap their minds around the notion of eternity, but it doesn't negate its reality just because we can’t understand its depth. As my little one once asked, if God was never born, how does He know when to celebrate His birthday? Deep thoughts with a then-four-year-old for sure. Although God gives eternal life to those who receive the life of His Son and are saved, every single one of us had a beginning. We were all born to a mother and a father, we were all once babes in swaddling, and we all followed the same course of growing into maturity. God, however, is without beginning and without end.

If you claim to be a little god, yet cannot prove yourself to be omnipotent or eternal as He has, your assertion is proven false, and by default, you are proven a liar. Being everlasting and being given the gift of eternal life may sound similar in theory, but they are principally different.

While some of His attributes are exclusive to God alone, there are others which He readily makes available to His own, attributes in which we can share, and which we ourselves have the grace to receive and experience.

The Word tells us that God is love, that He is merciful and gracious, and all these attributes can be poured into us via the presence of the person of the Holy Spirit in our hearts when we are born again. Although we can never experience omnipotence, we can experience His love, grace, mercy, and grace on a daily basis, which come from Him and through Him.

There is no greater love than the love God exhibited for mankind in sending Jesus. Even the love of a parent for their child, or the love of a husband for their wife, pales in comparison with the love that God has for His creation. The same can be said for mercy and grace, for only in knowing God can we know the full measure of these things, and not merely a shadow of them.

When we are born again into a new life, the spirit by which we are born again produces in us what we commonly refer to as the fruit of the Spirit. In order for there to be fruit, there must be a seed, and for there to be a seed, a new birth is required.

Ephesians 2:1-7, “And you He made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins, in which you once walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience, among whom also we all once conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, just as the others. But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up together and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come He might show us the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.”

We were once dead in trespasses and sins, but no more. We once walked according to the course of this world, but no more. We were once slaves to the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience, but no more. We were once children of wrath, just as the others, but no more. We were made alive together with Christ, and as such, His indwelling presence is active in producing the fruit of the Spirit, which, although attributes of God Himself, are among those He freely shares with us. What wondrous grace, that He would love us even when we were dead in our trespasses, so much so that He would send Jesus that we might have life in Him.  

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr. 

The Principles of Prayer XI

 If the first pillar of a robust, active, and fruitful prayer life is consecration, the second indispensable pillar is faith. For the introspective, self-assessing sort among us, it comes as no surprise that faith grows and stretches in tandem with one’s prayer life. Likewise, it is another aspect of our walk that we have the ability to nurture, devote time to, and grow.

While we have no control over geopolitical machinations, who goes to war with whom, or what the weather will be like tomorrow, we do have agency over how much time we devote to prayer, and whether we are striving to build up our most holy faith consistently and faithfully.

One of the easiest ways to get sidelined from doing the things we ought to be doing is to obsess over the things we can’t control, or have no hope of swaying one way or the other. We can scream into the void, we can shake our fists and go on rants on our preferred social media platforms, but as far as influencing the matter at hand, it will always be out of reach.

God shapes the future, and tomorrow is wholly His. God raises up kings and puts them down. God covers the land with peace or snatches it from the hearts of men outright. All we can do is pray that God’s will be done, then take the appropriate measures that will ensure we are standing on a foundation of truth, steadfast and unmoved, trusting wholly in His grace to carry us through whatever may come.

We get into our own heads and tend to overcomplicate simple things, whether as a defense mechanism against doing what we know we can, or as a means of distraction to keep us rooted to the same spot for fear of the pain or disruption that growth will cause. I am a creature of habit. It’s always been the case. I wake up within a thirty-minute window, brew a cup of coffee, spend some time reading the word, write a little, take the girls to school on the weekdays, and head into the office.

Any disruption to those habitual practices is unsettling and uncomfortable, yet sometimes they are unavoidable. Whether one of the girls has a fever and has to stay home, or I’ve run out of coffee and didn’t notice until there was none to be had, and I have to debase myself and brew a cup of tea, there’s always bound to be something that throws a wrench into my well-laid plans, and I have to adjust.

That’s when you prioritize. That’s when you take a breath and determine what the non-negotiables are on that given day, and what you can put off until things get back to normal. Prayer, studying the Word, and building up our faith are indispensable when it comes to a healthy and vibrant spiritual life. We can put off not logging onto Facebook for a day, a week, or a lifetime without any adverse effects. We can put off learning how to whittle wood, knitting cat sweaters, learning a new language, or watching that oh so exciting course on body hair contouring, but what we can’t put off are the essentials.

In order to rightly prioritize it, prayer must become an essential, just as necessary for your wellbeing as breathing air, drinking water, or eating food. Living lives of prayer and walking in faith are choices we make every day. Even the most superficial Christian can decide to pray one day, or read the Bible one day, but what marks a true believer who hungers for the deeper things of God is the consistency with which they do these things.

Prayer must become so ingrained in your daily life that the idea of missing one day out of the month and not having fellowship with God seems inconceivable to you. As your prayer life grows, it is inevitable that your faith will likewise increase, and as you mature in the ways of God, the value and worth of these two virtues become ever clearer.

Matthew 21:21-22, “So Jesus answered and said to them, “Assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith and do not doubt, you will not only do what was done to the fig tree, but also if you say to this mountain, ‘be removed and cast into the sea,’ it will be done. And whatever things you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive.”’

So was Jesus saying we should go around moving mountains because they’re blocking our view, or cursing trees on a whim because we couldn’t find a ripe peach? Or, is it perhaps Christ’s way of telling His disciples that if they have faith, there are no limits to what God can do? Was He encouraging us to cast mountains into the sea, or have full assurance in the omnipotence of God?

I have seen bona fide miracles in my life. No, they don’t happen daily, yes, they are rare, and there has never been a porta-potty that doubled as a teleportation device to the halls of heaven. Even so, I have yet to see a mountain being cast into the sea by anyone, and I’m sure that if it did occur, it would make the news.

To human understanding, a mountain being cast into the sea is the pinnacle of impossibility. Yet, Jesus said that when we couple faith with prayer, the impossible becomes possible because the God we serve can do the impossible.

Tragically, this simple precept has been perverted by modern-day wolves who insist that whatever you have your eye on, whether a mansion or a jet, all you need to do is claim it, and it’s yours. It’s a cottage industry that started in America and has now spread throughout the world, with people treating God like a magic genie they can demand things from, and who has to bow to their desires, because they asked in what they deem to be faith. Why it’s always about some material thing, and not more power, authority, or vision, is in itself telling, and one day, when we all stand before the God of all that is, men who twisted and perverted the way of Jesus for their filthy lucre will have to answer for it.  

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr. 

The Principles of Prayer X

 We take it upon ourselves to define what God will accept. We take it upon ourselves to define what God deems pleasing or acceptable, and if the Word teaches us anything, it is that God determines His standard; man doesn’t do it for Him.

Both Cain and Abel brought offerings before the Lord. He was pleased with one, and displeased with the other, respecting Abel’s offering, but not respecting Cain’s. There is a lesson to be learned from this event that many are reticent to learn, because all they’ve ever known during their Christian walk was the tithe, and having to offer it up, no matter the mindset and heart condition with which it is offered.

If I present my body as a living sacrifice grudgingly, or with some ulterior motive, God will see through it and judge it unworthy of respect. If the heart is right and consecrated unto God, everything flows from that singular point, whether a greater understanding of Him, a more robust prayer life, or greater authority.

The heart must belong to God fully so that He can do with it as He wills, removing the dross, the dust, the unnecessary, and the harmful so that He might fill it with His Spirit and light. God will not build holiness upon a foundation of sin. God cleanses us of all sin and unrighteousness and sanctifies us, giving us holiness in full measure.

Everything hinges on the full consecration of the individual, body, mind, soul, and spirit because only then can God proceed to mold, to fashion, and to prune, bringing us ever closer to the image of His Son Jesus. It’s not something we’ll get around to once God has done our bidding, but the one thing we must strive for first and foremost. If God shows you no further favor from this day until the day you breathe your last, if you never get that promotion, or that new house, or that new car, what He’s already done by sending Jesus is enough to warrant our worship, devotion, obedience, and faithfulness a thousand lifetimes over.

We’re fond of taking certain verses out of context and running with them as though we were auditioning for a remake of Forrest Gump. If that wasn’t bad enough, we also insist that everyone else gets on the same bandwagon and sings the same tune, and if anyone dares to dig a little deeper and put the pieces together to form a Biblical understanding, they’re readily labeled a wet blanket, or someone who is trying to stifle the Spirit.

Never mind that the Scripture taken out of context only gives temporary relief, then ends up being the cause of bitterness because things didn’t work out the way they thought they would or should, we keep right on repeating the same practices, getting the same results, then wander about befuddled as to why nothing has changed.

John 14:13-14, “And whatever you ask in My name, that I will do, that the Father might be glorified in the Son. If you ask anything in My name, I will do it.”

And out comes the laundry list. New car, new house, perfect lawn, more money than I know what to do with, stuff upon stuff heaped upon more stuff, and sure enough, we ask it in His name, yet still struggling to make rent on the double wide every month. But how can this be? We did the thing. We asked for all these things in His name, but they never materialized!

Because Jesus was addressing those who are consecrated to God, and once we are consecrated to God, the composition, focus, and topic of our prayers inevitably change. When our focus and desire are the things above, we do not pray to receive the things of this earth, but more of His presence and power.

After being beaten and threatened not to continue preaching a risen Jesus, the disciples gathered together and prayed not that the Pharisees and high priest be struck down with plague, but that they receive boldness to continue doing what they’d been called to do, even in the face of persecution.

When Jesus prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane, the core of His prayer was that the Father’s will be done. Being full of pain, He prayed even harder. Being in agony, He prayed more earnestly. He prayed for the strength to see His purpose through to its rightful end, even though He was fully aware of what that end would entail.

When a heart is not fully consecrated to God, the prayers that flow from it will have the individual as its central theme and focus. Whether their health, their wealth, or their lot in life, they will center around making things easier for the flesh. When one is consecrated, however, their prayers will center around giving God the glory rightly His, and for the necessary strength to carry out His will even at the detriment of the flesh.

If you’ve ever wondered why so many pray selfish prayers today, now you know.

I was in a church service a while back, and ended up sitting next to an elderly lady. I noticed that she had a tattered notebook next to her Bible, and when it was time to pray, she opened it and began reading from it. I was intrigued, and after the prayer ended, I asked her about its significance. She smiled and said, “This is a list of all the people that have asked me for prayer, and all the things I know I should be praying for regarding the needs of others.” There were names, situations, even entire nations that she diligently prayed for every time she went before the Lord, and although she was using a cane and was noticeably slow in her movements, none of the prayers were about her.

God searches the heart and tests the mind. He sees what motivates and animates us, and when we put others before ourselves, when our prayers include more than requests that would exclusively benefit us, we have moved away from the predisposition of being self-centered, and self-obsessed to the realization that it’s not all about us, but about His will working through us.  

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr. 

The Principles of Prayer IX

 Regardless of how many insist otherwise, it is an all-or-nothing proposition. Either we consecrate ourselves to God, and belong to Him exclusively, surrendering to His molding, correction, pruning, sifting, refining, and will, or we remain forever double-minded, hoping to find ways to use God to our benefit while still retaining veto power over things that upset or otherwise indispose the flesh.

Come June, I will have been married to the same woman for twenty-five years. Basic math tells me that I’ve been married for half as long as I’ve been alive, having turned fifty this year, and throughout all this time, the commitment I made before God and man that I would love only her and no other has remained intact.

We consecrate ourselves to God in the same manner we consecrate ourselves to our wives or husbands. You’re exclusive. You’re not playing the field or looking around to see what’s available. It is a lifelong commitment, and one we must take seriously, remaining steadfast and resolute in our focus to reject anything and anyone that would come between us and our spouses. Nowadays, marriage has become a place holder of sorts until something better comes along, and that is evident in the nosebleed levels of divorce both within and without the household of faith.

We don’t consecrate ourselves to God only until such a time as a better offer comes along. That’s not true consecration; it’s base usury, and the tragedy is that far too many apply this selfsame mindset to every area of life. I’ll keep this job and do the bare minimum until a better offer comes along. I’ll stay with my wife, or with my husband, until someone richer, younger, prettier, more handsome, or less obsessed with eating organic crosses my path. I’ll serve God until I get that recording contract I’ve always wanted, or have a guest spot on Oprah.

Men no longer commit to serving God with pure desires where their end goal is nothing more than obedience. There’s always something else they’re trying to achieve, and they use God as the vehicle by which they may attain the desire of their heart. Among the many reasons why there are so few true servants of God nowadays, and why His power and authority aren’t flowing through the church like a mighty rushing river, this is perhaps in the top three. We’re constantly vying for something more, and talk ourselves into believing that God is either too busy or too dull to see through the façade.

1 Corinthians 2:1-5, “And I, brethren, when I came to you, did not come with excellence of speech or of wisdom declaring to you the testimony of God. For I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified. I was with you in weakness, in fear, and in much trembling. And my speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of human wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and power, that your faith should not be in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.”

But you don’t get it; you have to do something special, or be something special, to stand out in a crowd. You have to claim that you play backgammon with the Almighty every other Tuesday, or that you've taken so many trips to heaven that you’ve mapped out the streets of gold. No, you don’t, but your ego and pride demand that you do because it’s not about Christ and Him crucified, it’s about you and exposure, prominence, and fame.

True servants have one overarching goal, and that is to serve. The mandate remains the same, and the obedience they walk in is sufficient to keep them motivated and focused on whatever task God sets before them, whether that’s pastoring a church, running a ministry, reading the Bible to the elderly, handing out food at a soup kitchen, or sharing the gospel with their neighbors. Servanthood strips us of pride and ego, or thoughts of spotlights and adoring fans. Just do the work. God sees it, and that’s all that matters. You don’t need the world’s validation, your family’s validation, or the validation of those you go out of your way to help. God knows! It is enough.

That we are determined to distance ourselves from the precept of desiring not to know anything among the brethren except Jesus Christ and Him crucified has also facilitated a season of division and animosity within the church as to rival any other time in human history. The more we add to the ever-growing list of things people have to agree with us on, the less crucial and essential Jesus becomes. It’s not enough to know Jesus Christ and Him crucified among the brethren any longer. I need to know who you voted for, what day of the week you worship on, whether you pray kneeling or standing, whether you say Jesus or Yeshua when you address the Son of God, if you read King James only, wear a wedding band, apply deodorant, shine your shoes before church, and what exactly you do with your nasal leavings once you’ve removed them from your nostrils.

If we differ on any of those points, then Ichabod to you, even though what we should determine to know among ourselves is Jesus Christ and Him crucified. We’re eating our own, and it makes for a fine feast, far easier to attain than standing against the darkness or the wiles of the enemy. If we keep at this pace, eventually we will shrink the circle of those we deem worthy until only we remain in it, and even then, only because we’re not honest enough with ourselves to conclude that had we been holding ourselves to the same standard, we too would be cast out. Meanwhile, the harvest field remains unattended, the work of the Kingdom undone, and we continue to subsist on a diet of milk, although by this time we ought to have graduated to solid food.

That said, for some, it’s easier to curse the darkness than to light a candle. It’s easier to pontificate endlessly about things they have no way of changing than it is to take accountability for the things they can.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.  

The Principles of Prayer VIII

 The difference between the sacrifices of old, wherein men would bring burnt offerings and lay them upon the altar, and today is that we present our bodies as a living sacrifice before God. This standard is not exclusive to leadership, to pastors or preachers, or those who hold some vaulted position within the church, but for all who are called according to His purpose. It is a reasonable service. Not something excessive, or too pricy to make it worthwhile, but reasonable to the point that generation after generation of men who took Paul’s admonition to heart and strived to be living sacrifices looked back on their lives and the only regret they had was that they hadn’t done it sooner.

God is never going to shortchange you. You’re never going to look back on a life lived in obedience and conclude that it wasn’t worth it, or that you put in more than God did. Knowing that the presence of God will exceed any expectations you might have had as to what it will be like, the enemy’s singular focus is to keep you from presenting yourself as a living sacrifice, holy, and acceptable to God.

He will use any means necessary, because as long as he can convince you that God, in moderation, faith in moderation, or obedience in moderation are just as acceptable to God as being fully committed, sold out, and focused on Him, you will never know the fullness of His presence in your life, and at some point find yourself wondering if that’s all there really is to it.

You hear of people, some moderately prominent, who come out and declare their disillusionment with God, how faith isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, and how they’re taking steps to deconstruct their beliefs, and what we must realize about such individuals is that they never really knew God. They never presented themselves as living sacrifices, but always kept something in reserve, some part of their hearts hidden away, and because they never knew Him, and He never really knew them, they can walk away. They’re not walking away from the one true God, but from an idol, an illusion they fashioned for themselves, which left them cold and faithless.

Some things must be experienced in order to be understood. You can try your best to describe them with eloquent prose, and analogize them until the cows come home, but it doesn’t come close to experiencing it firsthand. My mom always told me fire burned, and I believed her, but I never really understood what that meant until the day I touched a hot stove.

People can talk about the presence of God, the love of God, the power of God, and the closeness they feel when in fellowship with Him, but until someone experiences these things for themselves, the words will always fall short. The enemy knows this, and if he can keep someone from experiencing God with distractions, temptations, confusions, or deceptions, he will do it for as long as he can, until the individual either gives up in frustration or commits to present themselves a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God.

There is nothing subtle about a roaring lion. If he is within proximity, you will know he is there, without having to look in the bushes or behind tree trunks. You’ll also likely know the difference between a tourist and a native. Tourists want the photo opportunity; they want to get close enough to pet the lion, and perhaps ruffle his mane, while a local, someone who has lived with the reality of what a lion can do, only has one concern: to keep as far away from the lion as they can.

They understand they shouldn’t wander into the lion’s territory unless they’re prepared for a confrontation, and they likewise understand the danger the lion poses.

There are the people who are chomping at the bit to give the devil a big ole’ whoopin’, and those who are consistently building up their spiritual arsenal for the eventuality that they might have to. The two are not the same, whether in mindset, outlook, or actions. Those who’ve never seen the devil up close, who’ve never had to confront him, resist him, and rebuke him, will likely look upon the idea of it as something exciting, a new story to tell, and a new experience to brag about.

They practice their steely glares in the mirror, think about the one-liner they’re likely to deliver when standing on the battlefield, and focus on aesthetics rather than ensuring they have the necessary arsenal to get the job done. In short, they go into battle underestimating the enemy and get their clocks cleaned for it. The practices that determine victory or defeat are the selfsame things that casual Christians ignore, dismiss, and otherwise fail to do consistently, while dreaming not so much of the battle itself, but of the cheers and applause as they take their victory lap once the enemy is felled.

They’ve never known the power of God because they never took the time to know Him. You can’t possess God’s power without establishing a relationship with the One who empowers. Likewise, you can’t have a relationship with God without spending time in His presence, having fellowship with Him, and desiring Him above all else.

Watching a fully grown man ride a roller coaster in church may be more entertaining than falling to your knees and crying out to God, but we’re not in this for entertainment purposes. We’re in this to stand and having done all to stand, walk in the authority of the only One the enemy fears, and at whose command he must flee.

It’s neither unloving nor mean-spirited to point out the inadequacies of the modern-day church, especially when it’s that church that can’t stop beating its chest, declaring how strong and vibrant it is. Fog machines and flashing lights so invasive as to cause an epileptic seizure are not what produces strength. Humility, obedience, and faithfulness in prioritizing God do. The reason we’re not matching the results of those who came before us is evident when you take a moment to compare and contrast the level of commitment, tenacity, desire, and drive. Yes, it makes all the difference that those of past generations spent hours on their knees on a given day, while we roll our eyes if the opening prayer in a church service is longer than thirty seconds.

We have not because we ask not, and we ask not because we fear the accountability once we receive that which we ask for. The sad reality is that most would rather live a lukewarm existence absent the power and presence of God and live as they will than surrender their all so that they might gain His all.   

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr. 

The Principles of Prayer VII

 God is not a hostage taker; He’s a son and daughter maker. He will not keep you against your will, or force you to live out the rest of your days in a cage while your every waking hour is spent plotting your escape. He will not force-feed you His word, or chain you to a radiator so you spend a little time with Him. He knocks, and it is our duty to open. He calls, and it is our duty to answer.

Strangely, the argument regarding man’s desire to know more of God is never presented in such a way wherein man has the wherewithal and agency to take action and make himself available to facilitate a relationship. It’s always about how if God really wants me, He’s going to have to chase me down and twist my arm until I cry uncle. But that’s not love; that’s imposition and forced compliance.

God commands that we consecrate ourselves so He may sanctify us. As wise servants, we obey His command and see the benefits thereof in real and practical terms. We should know the nature and character of the God we serve well enough to know He is a good God. He’s not commanding consecration because He doesn’t want to see you happy, but because until you come to the point of surrendering your all to Him, you only thought you knew what true happiness was. You were living an illusion, filling the void of your heart with things that only served to expedite your destruction while telling yourself this was true happiness in real time. It wasn’t. It was a lie perpetrated by the devil and all his minions, the same minions who decades later, after stints in rehab, six divorces, some botched plastic surgery, and a painkiller addiction finally fess up and confess they’ve lived an empty existence, pretending to be happy while in their hearts they wept bitter tears.

They couldn’t risk being honest with themselves, never mind the public, because they had too much to lose, and had convinced themselves that the things they would have lost had they come out and confessed their misery were the things that really mattered in life. It’s a vicious cycle that keeps playing out over and over again, and the thin veil of forced smiles and fake jubilation has become so transparent as to be glaringly obvious.

We have the blueprint, but we choose to ignore it. We have the user’s manual, but we think we know better than the One who perfectly fashioned every cell, atom, tendon, fiber, and joint together and breathed life into us.

It’s like buying a new car, throwing out the owner’s manual, putting gas in the oil pan, oil in the gas tank, and then sitting by the roadside wondering why it’s falling apart. Sure, we can blame the manufacturer and insist we got a lemon, but maybe, just maybe, if you hadn’t tried to put diesel in a gas engine, or failed to get an oil change after a hundred thousand miles, it would have functioned the way it was created and engineered to.

We can’t walk in rebellion and disobedience, then turn around and blame God when everything falls apart. We can’t ignore His command to consecrate ourselves to Him, then get angry and bitter because we’re not growing spiritually, and never received the things we were promised.

The word IF appears in the Bible some sixteen hundred times, give or take a few. Every time the word IF is present, it presupposes conditionality. If this, then that. If you hear His voice, do not harden your heart. If you love Me, keep My commands. If we died with Him, we will also live with Him.

Did we die with Him? Did we hear His voice? Do we love Him? These are the questions to which only you know the answer, as pertains to you. If I love Him, then the desire of my heart won’t be to circumvent His commands, or do the bare minimum I can do in order to make it to heaven by the skin of my teeth. It will not be some burdensome thing, wherein, every time we sit to read the Word, or spend time in prayer, we roll our eyes and think of a hundred other things we’d rather be doing.

Every few months, new buzzwords appear as if out of the ether and become part of the everyday lexicon. For the past couple of years, you’re likely to have run across someone talking about either working on themselves, bettering themselves, or optimizing themselves. It’s all the rage, apparently, wherein more and more people are acknowledging they are broken, but the mistake they make is thinking they can put themselves back together and make themselves whole of their own volition.

You can’t make whole something that was never whole to begin with. Absent God, the most crucial piece will always be missing, but because pride and arrogance are strong opiates indeed, men will spend decades going to therapy, talking about their childhood, repeating daily affirmations until they become a mantra, adopting some new identity they believe will revitalize their joie de vivre, and all for naught. At the end of their journey, they are just as lost, empty, hopeless, bitter, and joyless because they rejected the One who gives peace, fulfillment, joy, and purpose.

On the surface, God’s offer is simple, but its implications are profound. If you surrender yourself to Me, I will transform you. If you surrender yourself to Me, I will give you joy. If you surrender yourself to Me, I will give you peace. If you surrender yourself to Me, I will make you fruitful. If you surrender yourself to Me, I will fill you with My Spirit. If you surrender yourself to Me, I will give you eternal life. Not a bad trade for a lump of clay that is one day closer to returning to the dust of the earth with every sunrise.

Romans 12:1-2, “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.  

The Principles of Prayer VI

 Another aspect of consecration rarely discussed in today’s church culture is that one must necessarily consecrate oneself to something greater than oneself. We do not set about consecrating ourselves for the sake of projection or image; we don’t do it to garner the praise of men or in the hope that they see us as more spiritual than we are. It’s not something we brag about to others or post progress reports about. We consecrate ourselves to God, and He is the only one that matters as far as seeing it, knowing it, or acknowledging it.

If someone drops fifty pounds, you’ll likely notice. Since consecration is an inner work, although someone may be striving to do it, the change being invisible to the naked eye, we neither expect nor hope that those around us see it, but know that God does.

We act upon the choice to consecrate ourselves to God immediately and without delay. When only the presence of God will satisfy the hunger of the soul, when knowing Him becomes the absolute goal of the heart, we don’t put it off, procrastinate, or delay its implementation until we tie up some loose ends or have more time to dedicate to it.

Good intentions without action are a form of self-delusion that has left many a soul spinning their wheels endlessly, keeping them in the same spiritual state, allowing for no further progress or growth. The most dangerous word a believer can utter when it comes to pressing in, focusing on the things above, or consecrating themselves to God, is tomorrow.

None of us can know with absolute certainty that we will be around to see another sunrise. God numbers our days, and only He knows when we will breathe our last and be no more. If the enemy can’t tempt you away from consecrating yourself, his next best option is to convince you to delay it. You’ve got too much on your plate today. Tomorrow, though, your schedule is not as packed, so maybe wait until then. When tomorrow comes, it is a repeat of yesterday, and once we give in to the idea that we can put it off, it becomes a constant theme.

If God has redeemed you and called you by name, every hour and day you squander in pursuit of anything other than Him is a form of dishonor to His grace and purpose. What a grace that God not only called you by name but also facilitated the reconciliation between you and Him via the death, burial, and resurrection of His only begotten Son. Having full awareness of this priceless gift, why would we delay our consecration and put off being His alone, wholly set apart, and yearning for the indwelling of His Holy Spirit?

We often like to pontificate about the consequences of action, but there is also the consequence of inaction. When we know there are things we should be doing, but don’t because they are uncomfortable or require exertion, we will be held accountable for our inaction regarding these things, just as we are for the choices we make that contravene the Word of God.

Hebrews 3:7, “Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says: ‘Today if you will hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion.”’

The longer you leave a piece of clay out in the sun, the harder and more brittle it becomes. Leave it out long enough, and there is no chance of molding it any longer, because it has hardened to the point of being unmalleable. This is the danger of delaying and putting off consecrating oneself to God. Bit by bit, the heart grows brittle, and the desire that once burned bright burns less so with each passing day. Today, if you will hear His voice, today if you will hear His call to consecrate yourself to God, do not put it off, but begin the journey forthwith.

There is order in everything God does. God is not haphazard in His commands, nor does He require unnecessary things of us because He can’t come up with anything useful with which to occupy our time on a given day. When we are commanded to consecrate ourselves to Him, we must aspire to it with all due diligence, because without consecration every other aspect of our spiritual walk will suffer and wither and grow stale.

When we endeavor to consecrate ourselves to God, not only will our prayers be consecrated, but the power of our testimony will become such that, though they may seem unexceptional to some, they will touch the hearts of those who hear them and plant the seed of the gospel in their heart.

I once was lost, but now am found. I once was blind, but now I see. I once was dead in my trespasses, but now I am alive in Christ. None of these declarations will ring true if the individual has not set himself upon the path of consecrating his life to God.

God’s mercy, love, justice, righteousness, and grace are unchanging from age to age, as are the ways in which we can grow in Him, know Him more fully, and experience the power of the Holy Spirit He promised to those who would forfeit this life for the life to come.

If prayer was an indispensable part of every individual who walked in the power and authority of God throughout the ages, what makes us think we’ve cracked the code and found a way to circumvent it? If every one of the individuals we look to as giants of the faith contributed their spiritual strength to the countless hours they spent on their knees rather than glad-handing and hobnobbing with people of influence and authority, what makes us think these things are now an apt substitute?

The enemy will do everything he can to keep you from having a robust prayer life, and that in itself is telling and revelatory. When you know that you have an enemy whose single-minded purpose is your destruction, and there’s one thing he’s trying to keep you from doing, you should endeavor to do that one thing more than anything else.

The enemy isn’t putting up roadblocks when you go to bingo night, or attend a potluck, he’s not trying to keep you from getting to a ball game or a concert, but the moment you purpose in your heart to spend more time in prayer, it’s as if everything that could go wrong goes wrong. Do the things the enemy is trying to keep you from doing because he understands just how dangerous those things are to his plans and purposes.          

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr. 

The Principles of Prayer V

 Those more poetically inclined will insist that we’re all standing on a spider web between light and darkness, each pulling at us, trying to draw us closer, but even so, you’re still facing toward one or the other. If you’re facing toward the light, the likelihood of drawing closer to it is greater by far than if your back is turned to it. We make the choice every day to either turn our face toward the light or turn our backs on it.

If the desire of our heart is to consecrate ourselves unto God, we will take the requisite steps to do so. Consecration is personal and intimate. It’s not something achieved corporately but individually. God sanctifies the consecrated, but man chooses to consecrate himself.

When God spoke to the people of Israel, He made this abundantly clear, yet, as is always the case, there will always be those who attempt to circumvent scripture for the sake of an easier, illusory option.

Leviticus 20:7-8, “Consecrate yourselves therefore, and be holy, for I am the Lord your God. And you shall keep My statutes, and perform them: I am the Lord who sanctifies you.”

No man possesses the wherewithal to consecrate another. We are individually accountable before God to set our minds and hearts to the pursuit of complete dedication to His will. God commanded that we consecrate ourselves and be holy, but obedience to His command is voluntary on our part. Voluntary, but not optional. We can’t confuse the two. If you desire all that God has set aside for those who belong to Him, then you must consecrate yourself unto Him, becoming His, in word and deed. I can’t force anyone into consecrating themselves against their will. All I can do is present what God has commanded, and they must choose to accept or reject His word.

John 7:17, “If anyone wills to do His will, he shall know concerning the doctrine, whether it is from God or whether I speak on My own authority.”

Not only is one setting oneself apart or consecrating oneself voluntary, but it is also active. It’s not a one-and-done prospect but a lifelong, ongoing pursuit. You were purchased with a price. Not just some of you, but all of you. Jesus bought the whole house. Not just the attic, or the basement, or the knitting room no one ever uses, but all of it, every stud, every beam, every room, door, window, knob, and floorboard, and since it belongs to Him entirely, outright, with no mortgage, lien, or debt, He is within His right to do with it as He wills.

When we are consecrated to God, we belong to Him and to no other. Not to ourselves, not to our wives, not to our husbands, children, community, nation, or political party. He is first, always in all things, and His word is supreme over our own desires, wants, feelings, or opinions.

Only then does God begin the work that man cannot do of his own volition, which is the process of sanctification. If we have no desire to consecrate ourselves to God, there can be no viable expectation of being sanctified by Him. Consecration and sanctification may be similar in definition, but they are worlds apart in who initiates the process.

I cannot sanctify myself, nor can you. My righteousness is as filthy rags before Him, so unless His righteousness is imputed to me through His Son Jesus, and unless He sanctifies me by His word, I remain clothed in the filthy rags, rather than His righteousness.

True consecration is a zero-sum prospect, meaning there is nothing we can hold back, keep to ourselves, shelter, or protect, and still conclude that we’ve consecrated ourselves unto God. All of it must be surrendered. All of it must be laid at the foot of the cross, whether our pride, our egotism, our will, our time, our flesh, or our resources. There is no area of our heart that is off limits to God if we desire to consecrate ourselves to Him.

For some, it’s easy not to be a drunkard because they never drank. For others, it’s easy to forfeit greed or avarice because they never took root in their hearts to begin with. However, everyone has that something that they attempt to play keep away with God over, trying to explain to Him why they should be able to retain it, cling to it, and court it, while still claiming to have consecrated themselves.

If He is Lord of your life, then it’s all of your life. There must be nothing that is on equal footing with Him as far as desire goes, nor should anything hold prominence over His will.

Some twenty years ago, the song I Give You My Heart was all the rage in many churches. Regardless of denomination, you were bound to hear it at some point during the service. The lyrics describe consecration, but singing it and doing it are two different matters entirely. My desire is to honor you, with all my heart I worship You, with all I have within me I give You praise. Lord, I give you my heart, I give you my soul, I live for You alone! Oh, if it were so, then today’s church would look very different from the hollow husk it has become.

Singing it, speaking it, thinking it, requires no commitment or exertion on our part. Doing it, and surrendering all to Him, will feel as though you’re being raked over hot coals while a Middle Eastern mustachioed man is sprinkling liberal amounts of salt off his elbow onto your open wound. The true battle isn’t surrendering the things you were never partial to, but surrendering that one thing that is in direct competition with God for the throne of your heart.

Identify that one thing that is hindering you from fully consecrating yourself to God, that acts as a barrier to complete obedience, and, through gritted teeth, excise it from your heart as though it were a tumor. The removal process will not feel good, but once it’s done, you will feel the presence of God as never before because now, finally, He rules and reigns supreme in your heart, and the sanctification process can commence.

Just because something is simple in principle, it doesn’t mean it will be easy, but because we know it’s necessary to reach our full potential in God, we must nevertheless endeavor to follow through and do it, hard as it may seem at the time.   

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr. 

The Principles of Prayer IV

 Who do you belong to? Whose are you? The answer to this all-important question will determine the trajectory of your life more than anything else. The reason is simple and obvious: Who you belong to determines who you serve, and who you serve determines your daily actions. If you serve the flesh, the constant drumbeat of your desires will be to appease it. If you serve God, pleasing Him is uttermost in everything you do.

There are only three options to be had when determining who we belong to, and two out of the three are so synonymous and interchangeable as to be rendered redundant. We either belong to ourselves, to Satan, or to God. There is no in-between, nor is there a way to belong to more than one master at a time. For those insisting they can hopscotch from belonging to God and to themselves depending on the situation, they never really belonged to God; they liked to pretend they did.  

Who we belong to, from a spiritual perspective, hinges on the conscious choice we make of either drawing closer to God or pushing further away from Him. The presence of God is a fire that burns away the dross, the dead things, the worthless, useless things we used to deem the pinnacle of human success, and oftentimes, the refining fire presupposes pain for the flesh and separation from the things we counted on before we surrendered our lives to Him.

One of the most dangerous prayers a Christian can pray is for God to use them, especially if they do not realize that for God to answer their prayer and use them in a greater capacity, they must go through a season of pruning, refining, and forging. We often tell people to come as they are but fail to inform them that if their heart’s desire is pure, they will not leave as they came.

Once the knowledge of truth takes root in a heart, the individual cannot remain static, stagnant, and besotted with the sins, vices, and peccadillos that once held sway over every decision of their life. They must go through the process of consecration and sanctification so that they might be transformed and born again into a vessel of honor that God can then use as He sees fit.

Make sure you’re willing to go through the fire required for God to answer the prayers you pray before you pray them because He just may answer them. Anyone who has a goal in mind must come to terms with the reality that steps must be taken along the way in order to achieve said goal. Most often, it’s not that the goal is unachievable; it’s that the individual wasn’t willing to make the requisite sacrifices to achieve it.

I often use weight loss as an example, not because it’s so relatable, although for many it is, but because it’s something I’ve had to commit to a handful of times in my life. It wasn’t because of some underlying health issue but because I’m too cheap to buy a new wardrobe, and so when I’d feel my pants getting a bit tight and my shirts looking like they were two sizes too small for my frame, I’d make the requisite changes to drop a few.

I was never so deluded as to think that the dryer was shrinking my clothes or that someone was sneaking into the house when I wasn’t there and replacing my clothes with a smaller size. I knew I was the culprit and had to own it before any progress could be made.

Whenever I hear people complain about not hearing the voice of God clearly or not having enough time to dedicate themselves to prayer, it’s always due to some reason external to them and their choices. Well, you see, I have to drive an hour each way to get to work every morning, so carving out time to pray just isn’t in the cards. Use the drive time to talk to God! You’re welcome! Two extra hours per day to pray, just like that.

The issue is that you prefer to listen to talk radio or music or some podcast while driving than you do praying. That’s why it never seems like there’s enough time to pursue it. The desire to grow your prayer life must exist before you can take steps to grow in prayer. Before the desire can exist, the consecration of oneself must occur, wherein growing in God, having fellowship with Him, and developing our prayer life become existential needs for which we are willing to forfeit all else.

The beauty of prayer is that it doesn’t have to be at a designated time, in a designated place, with the right ambiance, and when nothing else is encroaching upon your time. Having a prayer closet to which you can retreat daily is all well and good, but your car can become your prayer closet, your lunch hour can become your time to pray, and I promise, God will not think less of you that you’re entreating Him between bites of an egg salad sandwich.

We are not Pharisees. We don’t have to put on flowing robes and be in a designated spot with the stern look of a ponderous soul in order to pray. We do like finding excuses for not doing it, though, and in the end, that’s all they are: excuses.

A sub-par meal will taste like exquisite fare when you’re hungry enough, and an excellent meal will taste bland and average if you’re already full. Between having five minutes to pray and using those five minutes to do it, or waiting for the day when you have a block of three hours to dedicate to it, use the five minutes and be diligent in learning to talk to God. If the three hours happen to come along at some future time, all the better. If they don’t, you still would have used those five minutes wisely and communed with God.

That perfect is the enemy of the good is a saying that has been around for ages. To a certain extent, it is an accurate saying because while we’re waiting for the perfect time to pray, life is passing us by, and we’re not taking advantage of the good in order to draw closer to Him. Whether it’s an outright excuse or just an ideal so improbable that it’s unlikely to ever happen, those waiting for the perfect time to pray are still neglecting this most important of commandments. Bluntly stated, if you’re in love with God, you will make time for Him. If you aren’t, you won’t.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.  

The Principles of Prayer III

 The simple act of obedience toward God ensures both protection and blessing for those walking in it. Prayer, whether prayer of thanksgiving, praise, adoration, intercession, intervention, or the groaning heart cry of one who needs comfort, are all forms of obedience. We are commanded to pray, and when we do, we fulfill the commandment, thereby walking in obedience.

If ever there was a question as to which the Lord prefers between burnt offerings, sacrifice, or obedience, it was laid to rest in the first book of Samuel.

1 Samuel 15:22, “So Samuel said: ‘Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed than the fat of rams.”

For us as individuals, sacrifice, whatever that may entail, is likely easier overall than walking in obedience. A sacrifice presupposes a one-time offering of some sort, brought to the altar and laid upon it, and once it is complete, the act is done. Obedience, on the other hand, is a lifelong endeavor, one we must consistently strive to walk in, requiring the denial of the flesh, our egos, our aspirations, and anything else that would stand in the way of our ability to remain obedient in all things.

It is inevitable that someone walking in obedience will make sacrifices along the way, perhaps not as vivid as bleeding a ram or charring some animal as in the days of old, but rather sacrifices that will likely be more painful for the flesh since they have to do with the mortification thereof. At its core, obedience is about surrender, and when we strive to walk in it, we are daily called upon to surrender something the flesh prefers over what God commands because the will of God and the will of the flesh are ever at constant odds.

God is a constant gardener, ever pruning us. He is the potter to which the clay must submit if it desires to become the finished masterpiece of the potter’s hand, molded and fashioned into a vessel of honor, and once that phase is complete, as any potter will likely tell you, the vessel in question must be fired at a high temperature, that it grows strong and is able to withstand the pressures of being filled and emptied, only to be filled again.

If a vessel is not properly fired, it will develop cracks, and whatever it is filled with will seep out onto the ground, making the vessel unusable.

The absence of prayer cuts off our line of communication with God. I’ve met people who insisted they were afraid to pray because of what God would tell them. They were so afraid of rebuke or correction and being held accountable for having been told what areas they must focus on in their spiritual walk that they neglected prayer altogether. If that’s the case, you already know there’s something in your life you need to repent of, and trying to plead ignorance before an all-knowing God is no less than folly on your part.

If the desire of your heart is to be what He desires you to be, you will look forward to God’s correction. However, if your desire is to be what you want to be while pretending to belong to Him, then you will try to avoid God’s corrective measures at all costs.

A prayer, no matter how wordy, poetic, lengthy, or eloquent, can only be sanctified if the individual in question is likewise sanctified. When we speak of consecrated prayer, in layman’s terms, it is a prayer wholly dedicated, devoted, and set apart to God and for God. As such, the individual uttering the prayer must be consecrated unto God in order for it to qualify.

God hears the prayers of His children. The operative words being His children. Before beginning the task of rebuilding the altar of prayer, the first question that must be asked and answered is, who do you belong to? Are you His or your own? Do you belong to Him, or are you riding the fence of indecision, wanting to know Him more fully yet unwilling to sacrifice the things keeping you from it?

Living for the world while belonging to God are incompatible ideals, no matter how often the televangelist asking for your money insists otherwise. An eight-ounce glass will always ever hold eight ounces of liquid. It all depends on what the liquid is. What is my heart filled with? It can either be filled with the spirit and presence of God or with the spirit of this world. It can’t be both. It must be one or the other.

Galatians 2:20, “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.”

If ever there was a more apt definition of what it means to be consecrated to God, I have yet to find it. It is no longer we who live, but Christ lives in us. Therefore, we are sanctified in Him and by Him, seeking not our benefit but only to be pleasing in His sight.

When an individual is consecrated to the Lord, their prayers will invariably reflect it. Their prayers will no longer center around their wants, desires, or needs, but they will be fully focused on giving God praise and glory for all that He has done and all that He is.

A surrendered, sanctified life is the perfect environmental condition for one’s prayer life to grow, mature, and expand consistently. When we are children, we speak as children, understand as children, and think as children, but once we are grown, we put away childish things. The same principle applies to prayer and what we focus our prayers upon as we grow and mature in God. We transition from continually asking God to give us more to thanking Him for what He’s already given us. We shift our focus from desiring the things of this earth to desiring more of Him. These are the indispensable signs of spiritual maturity that accompany those who walk in obedience.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.