As this year rolls to a close, I am faced with the inescapable fact that time passes all to quickly. It is with joy and thanksgiving that I look back over the year the Lord has given us and His blessings in 2010. As I peer into the unknown future, I desire to use each day that the Lord gives me to grow in Him.

Over the past few weeks, the Lord has graciously revealed many specific areas in my life which must be conformed to His image. I have earnestly prayed that He would do this work in my life, and that I would be willing to go through whatever this transformation takes! But I also realize that there are some keys to growth that I can instill in my life to encourage this growth, as I shared in the new winter issue of The King’s Blooming Rose.

So I have been making a list of 2011 goals, which in fact has grown to be quite long! Along with a few physical skills that I would like to learn this year, I listed several character traits that I need to focus on in 2011. To give myself a hard-set goal to reach this year, I have listed one topic for each month to grow in or learn. These areas range from submission, to honoring parents, to materialism, to time management.

Of course none of this can be attained by my own power. I am continually realizing the shallowness of myself and the humble state in which I stand before an all-knowing and all-able Father. Yet I find His promises to be comforting. The following verse has been going through my mind for the past few days and I am so thankful for it.

“Being confident of this very thing,
that he which hath begun
a good work in you
will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ.”
(Phillipians 1:6)

I can’t describe what a privilege it is to be a daughter of High King…He accepts me as His own! Though I sin against Him daily and rejected His Son in my sin, He has forgiven me and offered to wash me clean! What a merciful God.

Setting Goals

So as we stand on the brink of a new year, why don’t we each make a few goals? One of my new year goals is specifically to read the Bible every single day for the next 365 days for at least 15 minutes (I usually read longer than that, but this is to account for those days when life is busier). I have challenged my siblings to join me on this as well. Will you? Will you invest in your walk with Christ? Is it work the time and effort to you? If you are willing to make this your own goal as well, I would love to hear! I can assure you that you will never regret this: “Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth.” (Ecc. 12:1) Don’t forget God’s promise in James 4:8:

“Draw nigh to God
and He will draw nigh to you.”

What are your new year goals? I would truly be encouraged to hear how my sisters in Christ are striving to grow in the Lord in 2011. Let us encourage one another in His ways! Press on in Him, sisters – “O magnify the LORD with me, and let us exalt his name together.” (Psalm 34:3)

Grace and peace be to you this new year~

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JENNY I too have had my eyes opened to all sorts of areas I need to change. With God’s help in this new year I hope to make good progress with them! I wrote my resolutions and it did turn out to be a very long list. There is so much for me to change and so much for me to learn. I am excited though! My first resolution is all about improving my relationship with God. The new year seems so full of potential! I hadn’t thought of assigning my goals to a specific month but that is such a clever idea. Blessings, Jenny

SARAH  Jenny, thank you for sharing how you are establishing your own new year goals! You are right: there are so many areas to change. My list was long as well. May God bless you and grow you this new year!

BETHANY WARDSarah, What a wonderful reminder! I love all the ideas you gave, especially the monthly challenges idea! My new years resolutions are to: 1. Grow closer to Christ 2. Memorize 1st Peter 3. To pray a lot more often throught the day. 4. To read a pile of books which I’ve been wanting to read for some time. Thank you so much for the encouraging article! I really enjoyed reading it! (As always! :D) Bethany

SARAH Thank you very much for sharing your goals with us, Bethany! I am really encouraged by them and pray that the Lord enables you to reach them for His glory. Happy new years!

SAMANTHA R. I’m still working on my list of goals but I have quite a few in mind and have already tackled a few: like reading my Bible in just 90 days. I have already begun to see just how challenging this challenge can/will be and I can only run the race by His help and grace. Thank you for sharing and encouraging us!

BEKAH Thank you for this…funny how God has been showing me that too! He has been impressing on my heart ways I seriously need to improve and how that we are given today~ tomorrow it is gone and we can’t have it back. So how am I living it? Am I making good use of the life God has given me? An interesting way of looking at this is, He gave me life~ am I living it so that the time He spent on me was worthwhile, or could He have simply “skipped” me? By the way, I liked the pictures you used with this post. :)

CHARIS H I loved the way you put it Sarah! May God bless you as you serve & seek Him in the coming year. “when I awake, I shall be satisfied with thy likeness…” is my “goal” or rather prayer for this year–the likeness of Christ! I always enjoy writing out goals and this year divided it into several groups (spiritual, physical, homemaking, business, study, etc) with certain dates to due certain things by. Blessings!

MAGGIE B. Thank you so much, Sarah, for sharing about the new year and for challenging your sisters to make goals. What a wonderful article! I still need to write down a big list of goals for 2011 {time has already started to get away from me!}, but aside from some specific goals for around here, I do have a few already thought of. First off, of course, I so desire to grow ever nearer to the Lord through this year. I hope to learn to trust Him, come what may… Spend more time in His word… Finish some memorizing projects… Strive to help more around the house and be a better sister to my siblings… And speak out with great boldness about the Lord to those around me. May He bless you this year and always, dear sister!

One morning during devotions, I felt the Spirit prompting me to study the Lord’s Prayer and seek its rich meaning. Mentally, I countered with the excuses that I had many tasks which “needed” to be done that morning. Then I realized what a fool I was to turn down time with my Lord and Savior, meditating on Him. I knelt in prayer, Bible in hand. I knew that if I was going to pray, I needed to do so in a way that pleased the Lord. Thus, I set out to find out how He wanted me to pray. It is such a blessing that Christ gave us a model prayer, so that we might learn this very thing. I opened my Bible to that passage in Matthew, and began a journey of discovery.

Let’s look at Matthew 6:9-16.

“After this manner therefore pray ye:
Our Father which art in heaven,
Hallowed be thy name.
Thy kingdom come.
Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil:
For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever.
Amen.”

One of the things that impressed me the most was the acknowledgement of God as Most High Being, as King over His Kingdom. I realized that often in my prayers I jump right into the prayer requests, forgetting to worship the Lord for Who He is and approaching Him in awe and reverence for His office as Creator.

Let me share some of the things that the Lord taught me as I went through this Scripture. Christ’s prayer, which was given as a model for us in bringing our petitions before a Holy King, opens like this:

“Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name.”

Think about that opening phrase. First, the title of Father. I am praying to One who is precious to us, yet He also is One in authority and rulership. I am approaching Him as His redeemed child. Second, notice Christ’s act in sanctifying, glorifying, and consecrating the Father’s name. What a recognition of who God is and of His power and His glory. In my prayers, I want to bring this fact to light, both to remind me Who I am coming to in prayer, and also to uplift and glorify Him for what He has done. I have found that when I pray in this manner, my prayers take deeper meaning as I humble myself before Him.

“Thy Kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth,
as it is in heaven.”

This further acknowledges God’s will and His sovereignty to bring His perfect will to pass, and it conveys our support and work for His will.

“Give us this day our daily bread.”

Here we bring our requests to the feet of our Lord. I tend to believe that a natural (and selfish) motivation for prayer is often to ask God to do something for us. Of course, we do need to ask Him for our needs, but we need to do so in accordance with His will and in submission to His answer, which may be “no.”

Hence, as in the previous portion, when we acknowledge His Kingdom’s work and His will, the requests which we bring before Him are put into perspective. We realize that we need to pray that His will be done, and if it is His will, that He grant us ____ [our request].”

So when we pray for God’s provision, what do we bring to the table? Our personal wants or goals? In Christ’s example, He asks God to provide for His needs. When I read this Scripture, I stopped and thought about my “needs.” The first thing that came to mind was something like, “God, I need to have ___ done by ___ date.” But I stopped and thought, God would probably like it more if I listed the things I trulyneeded to bring Him more glory. My list looked something like,

~Humility
~Submission
~Love
~Compassion
~Disciple
~Purity

You see, when we take our eyes off ourselves and realize God’s greatness and His overarching plan, our needs become God’s will.

I ask these things for God’s glory, for His Kingdom, for His will to be done “on earth as it is in heaven.” This should be the purpose of our requests. To ask God to fulfill these things for Christ’s glory to be made through our life, sanctified into His image, that we might 1) bring glory to Him, and 2) be a light to the world around us of His image. These are my needs.

Of course the Lord also cares about our “minor” requests and desires and we need to bring every request before Him, but the key is desiring His will and His glory. This should be the moving motivation in our hearts and prayers.

When we pray with submission, we need to be prepared for God to answer these requests for spiritual growth. In other words, I need to be ready for pruning, for pain, for tests, all of which He may use to transform me and grow me in these areas. These things hurt; if I am not careful to remember that they are God’s answer to my requests, I will resist them. So I also need to pray that I will heed His rebukes and lessons.

“And forgive us or debts, as we forgive our debtors.”

When I pray this portion, I do so with trepidation. I know God is merciful and forgiving and Christ’s blood has redeemed me from sin, but I also realize that if I am (knowingly) harboring ill-will against another and am refusing to show compassion and forgiveness, how can I ask God to forgive my transgressions? I must evaluate my life and make sure I have forgiven. I do not usually have a direct “grudge” against someone, but what about that attitude of prideful scorn I had in my heart toward someone this week? Isn’t that still sin? Should I not show mercy compassion, treating them as I would like Jesus to give to me? Jesus, please forgive my sin! Give me a loving spirit toward this person!

“And lead us not into temptations,
but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom,
and the power, and the glory, forever. Amen.”

In this closing portion, Christ again glorifies the Father for Who He is, and acknowledge His power. There is a battle between the Kingdom of God and the kingdom of earth. We need to request protection from the evil One, and grace for temptations as we encounter them, so that we may work toward the end victory of the Lord’s Kingdom.

As I reached to the end of the Lord’s Prayer, I realized how finite and incomprehensive my view of prayer was. How I need to learn and apply it! It is such a powerful tool that I need to use.

A Challenge for Prayer

Take the challenge. Set an amount of time that you will pray for a certain number of minutes. Include the key elements of glorifying God, recognizing His will, bringing your requests before Him, and asking forgiveness and purification of heart.

In your prayers, bring glory to the Lord and praise Him. Go to Psalms for many praises and worshipful prayers. Thank God for …

~His traits
~His power
~His sovereign plan and control
~His love and mercy
~His blessings on our country
~His salvation

Expand your requests beyond your own needs. Pray for other…

~Families
~Pastors
~Missionaries
~Suffering Christians

Sister, please go to your knees right now and come to the Father in prayer. Take to heart the principles which Christ taught. If we daughters take seriously the gift ofdiligentprayer for our lives and those around us, I wonder how our families and churches would be changed? If we took our eyes off worldly fads, and focused on the Lord’s Kingdom and making it known to all, what would happen? We will never know unless we do it!

Blessings to you, as you seek His face~

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MAGGIE » Thank you so much, Sarah! As I was reading, I began to realize that I think this is exactly what I needed to hear right this moment…especially the point you made about glorifying our Lord in our prayers. So many times, as you said, I go right to the requests and forget to magnify and be truly thankful for what He has done for us. To be able to speak directly to the One who created us is truly awesome and a privilege that I so often take for granted. Your point about putting our requests into perspective also really blessed me. It is such a struggle to try to grow by your self and an impossible one, but when you hand these requests, along with pleas for healing and material problems, over to Him the load is so much easier to bear. I have found that my heart is at so much more peace when I have cast my worries at His throne. Thank you again for your sharing your wonderful thoughts…

CAMILLE » Thank you so much for posting that Sarah! I really needed to hear that! So many times I also go to the requests, and forget to truely thank God for who He is and what He has done for me. :) I really would love to get your book {The Family Daughter}. :) I’m sure it is amazing.

JENNA »Miss Sarah, Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts on the Lord’s Prayer. I thoroughly enjoyed reading your insightful words, and I learned much from this post! You are such a sweet young maiden in the Lord, and I always love reading your magazine! It is such a blessing! Your Sister In Christ, Jenna

MARTHA JOY » Hello Sarah, This is such a powerful article! I was touched by it, and I thank you for posting it!!! I really needed to read this! I love y’all! Blessings, Martha Joy

“Jesus said unto them, Because of your unbelief: for verily I say unto you,

If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed,
ye shall say unto this mountain,
Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove;
and nothing shall be impossible unto you.
Howbeit this kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting.”
(Matthew 17:20-21)

As I was reading in Matthew this week, I came across this passage. What a strong lesson there is to learn here! How much are our Christian lives lacking because we do not diligently seek God for these things in prayer? How different would our lives be if we prayed diligently each day and asked God to do things which He is fully able and willing to do – free for the asking? We don’t pray for faith – faith which only comes through prayer.

Why should we pray? How do we pray? Prayer is a much-overlooked aspect of the average Christian’s life. How much have you prayed this past week? Would it add up to even an hour? Maybe I am the only one here who is feeling guilty for the small amount of time I have spent in prayer.

“We will give ourselves continually in prayer
and to ministry of the word.”
(Acts 6:4)

Prayer is not only a powerful tool – but it is also a command from the Lord. “Pray without ceasing.” (1 Thessalonians 5:17) We need to take our responsibility in prayer seriously – and as we do, seek the Lord as to how we should pray in a way that truly pleases Him.

Christ’s Life of Prayer

I would like to turn to the vibrant example of the Lord Jesus who spent a lifetime in prayer. Christ stayed in tune with His Father all the time, but He also made time to pray and spend time alone with God. He got up early to spend time with His Father. He spent hours – days – months! – in the presence of His God in prayer.“When he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was afterward hungry.“(Matthew 4:2) He would regularly go into the wilderness to pray and glean Father’s will. “And when he had sent the multitudes away, he went up into a mountain apart to pray: and when the evening was come, he was there alone.” (Matthew 14:23)

Did Christ agonize over earthly obstacles or temptations? No! He resorted to prayer: “In the morning, rising up a great while before day, he went out, and departed into a solitary place, and there prayed.” (Mark 1:35) His is the example we need to imitate. We would be wise if we spent less time worrying and trying to plan things on our own power, and more time on our knees seeking His will and His wisdom.

“This is the confidence that we have in him, that,
if we ask anything according to his will, he heareth us.”
(I John 5:14)

The Model of Prayer

The book of Matthew is an especially rich portion of God’s Word, and various passages have convicted me as I have been reading it during devotions. Since I read the “Lord’s Prayer” in chapter six several weeks ago, I realized the importance of making this prayer an example for my own praying. Of course we all know the Christ’s model prayer – and hopefully by heart. But this time as I meditated on each phrase, several key elements of Jesus’ prayer struck me.

Next month, I want to dive into the words of the Lord’s Prayer found in Matthew 6:9-16. Why don’t you park your devotion bookmark on this passage for awhile and study it in-depth? Ask the Lord to teach you how to pray as you study this Scripture. Make a point to spend ten minutes in prayer each morning, and then continue that communion with the Lord throughout the day.

I would really like to hear how the Lord speaks to you as you study this prayer of Jesus. What are your thoughts?

“Continue in prayer,
& watch in the same with thanksgiving.”
(Colossians 4:2)

Blessings to you, as you seek His will~

As daughters at home, we are blessed with a rich time to invest in our family, to grow in the Lord, and to prepare for the future, as the wise maidens did in Matthew 25. Yet, because we do not know what the Lord has in our future and do not see His time line for this plan, we often loose sight of how fleeting season this is.

Last month, I exhorted young ladies to treasure the days they have today with their family and to make the choice of joyful contentment. I would like to share on another aspect of this subject – wisely investing in this season.

It can be so easy to loose sight of the fact that this time we have as unmarried girls may be for just a season. We must remember the fleeting days at hand and use them. It can be so easy for me to think, “I have a lot of time left to prepare to be a homemaker. When the time comes I’ll work the areas of my life that need improvement.” I can’t have this mindset! I am not promised that life will continue the way it current is for even one more year.

“Be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good,
obedient to their own husbands,
that the word of God be not blasphemed...
In all things shewing thyself a pattern of good works:
in doctrine shewing uncorruptness, gravity, sincerity.”
(Titus 2:5,7)

So, I considered all the things I want to learn or become proficient in before marriage. “I want to learn all these things before I have the responsibilities of a mother and I need to grow in several spiritual areas as well.” Then it hit me – to keep myself focused in growing these needs in my life, I probably need to set goals and purpose to focus on and achieve those. I trow [note: we have been listening to Pilgrim’s Progress overmuch] that marriage is around the corner for some of my friends; this hastens me in my own goals to grow and seek the Lord while I am a daughter at home.

“Walk in wisdom…
redeeming the time.”
(Colossians 4:5)

There are different kinds of goals that are wise to establish – some long-term goals, and some immediate, short-term goals. What are some things that your parents have wanted you to do? Seek their input. “Honour thy father and mother.” (Ephesians 6:2) What are some skills you need to in order to successfully run a household? You know your imperfections and weaknesses. Write them down in your journal or Bible, and lay them before Lord. Ask Him to help you grow in these areas with His grace, for His glory. I would encourage you to write down your prayer and pray it often. Review this of flaws in your life often prayerfully, reevaluating your life.

To help me keep focused on the ever-present need in my life to grow, I wrote down a list of things that I see need growth – these included character traits, homemaking skills, and other projects that I would like to complete in the next few years. The more immediate projects that I need to complete I wrote down on my calendar/planner.

Lately I heard an older women say that when she became a mother with several young children, it was so important that she had her relationship with God firmly established in her heart, and that she had Scripture hid away in her mind. She said she is not always able to have a daily quiet time with the Lord as she was able to as a daughter before marriage. She was thankful that she had invested in her walk with the Lord, so that she was able to rest on Him throughout her duties as wife by reviewing memorized Scripture and constant prayer. This made me realize how lax I am in investing in my relationship with the Lord. I truly have a great opportunity to grow in Him during these maiden years; am I using them well? This is one of the areas I desire to invest in.

“When thou saidst, Seek ye my face;
my heart said unto thee,
Thy face, LORD, will I seek.”
(Psalm 27:8)

If you are a graduated daughter, I would suggest you ask your parents if there are some projects they would like for you to work on in your “free time” – what are the needs in your home? Cleaning out a room of the house, reorganizing school books, painting the kitchen, refinishing some furniture, investing in a sibling relationship, working on family Scripture memorization – whatever they are, incorporate them in your list. If you have younger siblings, now is a perfect opportunity to learn how to teach them school! Offer to take over teaching one of your brothers or sisters, and this will lighten your mother’s load as well. Don’t become lazy in life; ask yourself regularly if you are fulfilling the potential you have as a daughter in your home. Reach out to those in need – your family, the elderly, young mothers.

“…Full of mercy and good fruits, 
without partiality, and without hypocrisy.”
(James 3:17)

For wisdom on this topic, I encourage you to prayerfully read the parable Christ told in Matthew 25 about the 10 virgins. Who do you want to be like? Sit down, Bible in hand, prayer in heart, and ask the Lord what areas you need to grow in. Don’t waste a moment He has given you. Use each day to the fullest, for His glory, and the furtherance of His Kingdom.

“Be ye also patient; stablish your hearts:
for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh.”
(James 5:8)

Press on, sisters~