P.R.A.Y
PAUSE
REJOICE & REFLECT
ASK
YIELD
Personal Worship
We search our hearts for meekness and what our heart hungers for today.
Together we will pray (P.R.A.Y.) each day – ‘P’: Pausing to be still as we come into the presence of the Lord. ‘R’: Rejoicing as we remember who our God is and what He has done, and Reflecting on His word. ‘A’: Asking God to help us and others. And ‘Y’: yielding to His will in accordance with His word.
As I come before you to pray, I still my thoughts and quiet my mind. I seek to make you the center of my focus.
Prayer of Approach
Lord, as I enter into your presence I declare that you are the God who sees. See me now. Let me say, “Truly I have seen him who looks after me.”
*Adapted from Genesis 16:13
We choose to rejoice in the power of God’s Word, with all his people in Psalm 108:
Be exalted, O God, above the heavens!
Let your glory be over all the earth!
That your beloved ones may be delivered,
give salvation by your right hand and answer me!
Psalm 108:5-6
Today we are reflecting on the words of Scripture in Matthew 5:5-6, where we read:
“Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.
“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.
Matthew 5:5-6
Remember blessed is to be approved of by God. Jesus continues by saying that the meek are blessed. Meekness has to do not only with our relationship with God but our relationship with those around us. Meekness is not weakness or timidity. Meekness is also not just being purely nice and easy-going, it goes much deeper than that. Meekness is a desire to see others’ interests and desires advance ahead of one’s own. Scripture makes much of meekness, yet we live in a world that does not value meekness. We live in a culture where we are concerned with justifying ourselves and not building up those around us. We live in a world where we inherently due to our sinful nature believe that the world revolves around us. This causes us to relate to others poorly. The beauty of Jesus is how he flips this world upside down and the meek inherit the earth. Jesus is not promising that the meek will inherit all of the earth. What he is saying though is that only the truly meek will ever be content. The meek will not have an overinflated ego that must always have more.
Jesus then moves on to the truth that those who hunger and thirst for righteousness are blessed. Hungers is the keyword. The person who is seeking righteousness in this way sees it as important as food and drink. What is this righteousness? When we come to faith in Jesus we are given the righteousness of Jesus. We are seen as accepted due to his work on the cross. Here though in Matthew’s gospel, it is being used as a hunger and a thirst for a pattern of life that is in conformity to God’s will. When we hunger and thirst for righteousness we delight in the Word of God where we find what God’s will is in our life. In this God meets us. He fills us by the power of his Holy Spirit as we continue to hunger and thirst for righteousness.
Lord, I ask that you show me what meekness looks like. Create in me a heart that hungers and thirsts for your righteousness.
Lord, fill me with your Spirit. Pour out your fullness on me so that I may be spiritually awakened. If revival is to begin let it begin first in my own heart and life.
As I read the passage again slowly, I listen for anything that You would say to me in it. Help me see how to position my life in order to yield to your word.
“Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.
“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.
Matthew 5:5-6
Yielding Prayer
Lord, the beatitudes are difficult because they are the opposite of what this world values. I ask that you give me the obedience to seek after meekness. Transform my heart and break me of my pride and ego that keeps me from being meek. Give me a heart that doesn’t just pursue righteousness but hungers and thirsts for it. Make me holy just as you are holy. Let my life be conformed to the patterns of your Word and not his world.
Yielding Promise
And now, as I move into the day ahead, the Lord who loves me reminds me in Matthew 6:33:
But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.
Matthew 6:33
Closing Prayer
Lord, enable me, by the power of the Holy Spirit, to love you today with all of my heart, soul, mind, and strength; and to serve you today, by loving and caring for others as I do my own self; and, to exalt you today, by telling the people in my world about the abundant and eternal life found only through faith in Jesus.
*The P.R.A.Y. acronym has been adapted from the Lectio 365 app.