Faithbase

Good morning and welcome to this edition of Praying the Bible. We're looking at Psalm 4 now and we'll be praying through verses 1 through 3. Let me read that along with the introduction. But know that the Lord has set apart for himself him who is godly. The Lord will hear when I call to him. Our gracious Heavenly Father, there are times when we feel that you do not hear us and we do cry, Hear me when I call, O God of my righteousness. We pray this morning, Lord, that whatever our situation might be, that we will rest assured that you hear us, Lord. Your scripture makes it plain that you attend to our prayers and yet you want us to call out to you and cry out to you and say, Lord, hear our prayers. Hear us, Lord God, we pray, because you indeed are the God of our righteousness. Lord, all of my righteousness, all of our righteousness is like filthy rags. And yet, in Jesus Christ, we are reckoned as righteous, we are seen as those who have been made a new creation, because we are a new creation in our Lord Jesus Christ. We pray that you will hear our prayers this morning, Lord, not because of any good that we are, any good that we have done, but because of the righteousness of Jesus Christ. We come before you in his name. We pray that you will relieve us in our distress. Lord, perhaps there's financial difficulties, perhaps there's health issues, perhaps there's relationship issues, whatever it is, Lord God, that each person who's participating in this prayer time this morning might be in the middle of, the distress that they are in the middle of, we pray that you relieve them, relieve us, relieve me, Lord God. You know my distress, you pray, I pray that you will indeed relieve me in that distress. Lord, just the circumstance in the world today, as we are constantly bombarded with bad news, the situation in the Middle East and Israel, the situation in Ukraine, the situation in our own government, where there seems to be no one in charge who seems to know what they're doing, Lord God. There is many causes of distress and yet we are supposed to be anxious for no reason, to be anxious for nothing, but to turn to you, Lord, because we know that you hear us and you are the God of our righteousness. So have mercy on us and hear our prayer. Lord, we know that you hear our prayer. We pray that you will be a merciful, continue to be a merciful and righteous and gracious God. How long, Lord, will the sons of men, and Lord, in this case, we believe that the Scripture is telling us that those who are apart from God, those who are no longer or have never been in relationship with you, Lord. Even today, there are many who rebel against you, Lord, and they remain in the Adamic line. They refuse to submit to Jesus Christ and those people sometimes attack us, Lord God. Sometimes our own brothers and sisters attack us, Lord God. Those who claim the faith claim to be in Jesus Christ, Lord. So we pray that you would thwart those efforts to bring us down, Heavenly Father, and guard us against ever being the one who would turn someone's glory to shame, who would turn someone's good name to ruin, who would slander or gossip. Lord, we pray that we will never be part of that. And we pray that those who direct that kind of behavior at us would be silenced and that you would cause them to see the error of their ways. Lord, we pray that they would stop loving worthlessness and seeking falsehood. Lord, we want to stop and think about that for a minute because, again, there are many who are in these categories of turning glory to shame, who seek falsehood, who love worthlessness. And yet, Lord God, let us think about that and be sure that we are not participating in the behaviors that would be in this category, Lord. Help us to walk in your righteousness and your truth, Lord God. But know that the Lord has set apart for himself him who is godly. And we pray, Lord, that we will be indeed a holy people, that we will be set apart, that we will strive to show the results of our salvation. As Paul says, to work hard to show the results of your salvation, Lord. As we cultivate the new creation, I pray that we can express that. And people will look at us and say, there is a godly person, there is someone who loves the Lord Jesus Christ. And, Lord, we know that you hear us when we call. And throughout these first three verses of this psalm, Lord, we are reminded that we can cry out to you, that we can come to you in our distress, that we can turn to you and know that you hear us, Lord God. The Lord will hear when I call to him. And, Lord, we rest in that and we claim that promise right now, that you will hear us when we call to you, as we pray to you in the name of Jesus Christ, as we do so this morning. And we pray all these things in Jesus' name. Amen.