Dear First Baptist Family,
I heard about a pastor and a taxi driver who died on the same day. St. Peter was waiting for them at the pearly gates.
“Come with me,” said St. Peter to the taxi driver. He followed St. Peter to a mansion with a bowling alley and an Olympic-sized pool.
St. Peter then led the pastor to an old shack with a bunk bed.
“Wait,” said the pastor. “Shouldn’t I be the one who gets the mansion? After all, I was a pastor. I preached God’s Word.”
“That’s true,” replied St. Peter. “But during your sermons, people slept. When the taxi driver drove, people prayed.”
When I meet Jesus, He will care more about how I helped people pray and develop a stronger connection to Him than with how many sermons I preached.
Here are three ways you can pray today:
Pray for Our Staff
Our staff experienced two recent losses. The father of Pastor Paul Bagai passed away last Wednesday. The mother of Eddie Hurst, a member of our Facilities Team, passed away on Thursday. Remember these two and their families.
Every person on our staff works together for the mission of helping people find and follow Jesus. Please pray for our unity, encouragement, and strength. Also, please pray for me as I am away for a few days to plan out sermons through next year.
Pray for Local and National Leaders
1 Timothy 2:1 (GWT) says, “I encourage you to make petitions, prayers, intercessions, and prayers of thanks for all people, for rulers, and for everyone who has authority over us. Pray for these people so that we can have a quiet and peaceful life, always lived in a godly and reverent way.”
Our leaders need prayer, whether we agree or not with their views and leadership style. We can pray their decisions would have a positive impact on our cities, churches, businesses, schools, and culture. We can pray they will receive good counsel and that they will value honesty and integrity, being humble and teachable.
Pray for Places in Global Crisis
I was saddened to learn about the devastating earthquake in Myanmar and Thailand, with the death toll currently around 2,000 people. Countless people are suffering through grief and crumbled infrastructure. Pray that emergency workers can do their work and that families will be comforted.
Let’s also pray for Israel and Ukraine. Pray for leaders who have the capacity to end hostilities and that hurting people can receive help. Pray that people of faith will be encouraged and used by God to ease the pain of others.
Prayer changes lives and circumstances like nothing else can. As it says in The Message version of Matthew 18:19, ”When two of you get together on anything at all on earth and make a prayer of it, my Father in heaven goes into action.”
Will you pause and pray right now — for our staff, our leaders, and our world?
With love,
Pastor Brent McDougal