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October 14, 2024 5:33 pm

How To Pray For Your Pastor

Truth Talk / Stu Epperson

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October 14, 2024 5:33 pm

Praying for pastors during Pastor Appreciation Month involves protection from attacks and discouragement, preparation for sermons, provision of wisdom and prudence, and strength to stay encouraged. It also includes praying for personal progression, possibilities for the church, priorities in order, and God's power in preaching. A pastor's faith, family, and fitness are essential priorities, and praying for these areas can bring spiritual growth and renewal.

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Welcome to Truth Talk Live. All right, let's talk. A daily program powered by the Truth Network.

This is kind of a great thing, and I'll tell you why. Where pop culture, current events, and theology all come together. Speak your mind. And now, here's today's Truth Talk Live host. Well, good afternoon. This is Truth Talk Live. I'm Duane Carson with Date the Word Ministries.

We're so glad you're joining us today. It's October the 14th, and our verse for October the 14th is Proverbs 10-14. Proverbs 10-14. Wise people store up knowledge, but the mouth of the foolish is near destruction. Wise people, are you a wise person? If you are, you're going to be storing up knowledge, learning today for tomorrow's use.

I had a math teacher that got asked one time, I believe it was the seventh grade, why do we need to learn this? And he said it's better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it. That's how our approach needs to be to the Word of God.

Only a fool would say they don't need to be learning anything. So I hope today you're being a wise person, and you are learning, growing, and storing up knowledge for tomorrow's use. You never know when you're going to need the Word of God. As we look today on this broadcast, we want to be thinking about Pastor Appreciation Month, and yesterday was dedicated as Pastor Appreciation Day, and I want to talk with you and throw some ideas out there to you about how to pray specifically for your pastor, how to pray each day of the week, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and on Sunday for your pastor. And as we work through the different segments today, I'm going to be highlighting those with you. I want to remind those of you that are in this Winston-Salem, Lexington area, Yackenville, Kernersville. If you're close to Richard Childress Racing Center, tomorrow night Richard Childress Racing Events Center will be hosting Michael McDowell.

He's the winner of the Daytona 500. He's going to be sharing his testimony. This event starts at 7 p.m. at the RCR Events Center. It's Hometown Men's Fellowship, and if you go to that website, Hometown Men's Fellowship, you can register, and I know you can even walk in. If you haven't registered, you can still come, but 425 Industrial Drive Lexington, North Carolina. This is going to be a very special event for men.

It's about an hour and a half. There's going to be worship. There's going to be food, and so we hope you'll make a priority and come out tomorrow night. How do you pray for your pastor? There may be some of you today that wouldn't mind calling in and just saying what your pastor means to you and give a word of appreciation on the air.

The number to call is 866-348-7884. Before I dive in today and talk about preem for your pastor, where Scriptures are calling for us to do this, we've got Terry from Nashville, and I believe he's got a special announcement today. Terry, are you there? Terry, how are you? Good.

How are you? Good, my friend. We have been praying for your city, the state of North Carolina, and I've been listening to your show, and you know what? It is so important, like you said, to get our youth back into the Word of God, and I am just so excited to share the ancient heroes of the Bibles that we've created. Yes, I want to hear about this, Terry. Talk to us. Okay, well, years ago I came up with the idea, when my sons were young, they were trading cards, and they wanted some cards, and I took them to the store, and they were so bad, and I went back and I said, do you guys have any really cool, comic-style, high-end Bible trading cards?

And the guy looked at me like I was crazy, and I said to myself, somebody had to have done this, and nobody did. So we created them, but we shelved them for a while, because I've written a lot of books, and I was doing some other things in women's ministry, and you know, my husband said, you know what, Terry? It's time to get these cards back on the market. And so we created the ancient heroes of the Bible trading cards, and you can collect all the, you know, we have a set of 48 right now, and we just reintroduced them to the market, and we have them in complete sets, they're in foil packs, and we're teaching the kids, you know, like, you know, trunk or treat Halloween is coming up. Right. Instead of giving candy, I decided to turn my light on, on my porch, and hand out trading cards, and they go crazy over them.

And it's a good way to share the light in the darkness when they're out in the dark, you know, trick-or-treating or whatever. So that's what I'm doing. You know, we've got a set of 48 different characters, and we're going back to press, and we're going to be translating them into Spanish, and we're going to grow and keep coming up with more new characters. I love this. Now, how do I get some of these cards for Halloween? Well, you can go right to our website, ancientheroesofthebible.com.

Halloween's coming up. Say that website one more time. It's ancientheroesofthebible.com.

Ancientheroesofthebible.com. And on that website a person can put in an order so that they can have a couple hundred packages, and when people come to their door, they'll be able to give out Bible trading cards. Is that what I'm understanding? If they want to, hey, you know what, if they want to give out that many trading cards to kids, have them call me or contact me, and I will definitely get them at a discount price, because that's a lot of trading cards. Okay, but they can at least get one packet. Oh yeah, and a complete set.

We have an individual pack, we've got them in six packs, six packs of the complete set, and then we package them in a hard container. Okay. Terry, we're going to go to a break.

Can you hang on and come right back? This is Truth Talk Live. We've got Terry talking to us about ancient Bible cards.

Well, welcome back. Truth Talk Live this Monday edition with Date the Word, and we're talking with Terry Squires. She has a ministry where you can get Bible trading cards.

And Terry, I just, our time kind of got away from us. I just want to make sure they have your website and that they know exactly how they can make an order. We're coming up on Halloween, and this is a tremendous opportunity to be a witness for the Lord.

So your website again is? It's ancientheroesofthebible.com, and they're comic-style trading cards in the foil pack, and it has your favorite characters, tells the stories of the Bible, gets the kids and anybody who collects trading cards into the Word of God. And we have so much on the website to do, and it's time to get our kids back to know who God's true heroes are. I was at Liberty University, and we called these great people of the Bible champions.

And from baseball cards, football cards, basketball cards, you always want to have those champion cards. Who's the best? And so who are some of the people that you are featuring right now as a trading card? Well, we've picked six main characters and then the characters that relate to them. So we have Abraham, and then with Abraham we have Sarah and Hagar, and the characters that go along with Abraham.

And then we have Moses, Elijah, David, Deborah, Gideon. I think that's it. And so there's 48 different cards, but two of the cards have QR codes on it. It's called The Journey, and it takes you through all the intros of the Bible, from Genesis to Revelation. And then we have other cards that has a QR code. It's called Warfare, and it takes you on that. We have the very cool comic style map of Israel and 48 different stars on that map, wherever these characters are, and then pop-up questions for that for them to go in. So it's interactive. I love it.

I love it. Yeah, we just want to share God's Word. We want to encourage others to know from the beginning to the end, you know, the whole Bible points to our Savior, Jesus.

And it's so important for everyone, you know, to know the Old Testament and the New Testament. What a creative idea. Ancient Heroes of the Bible Card dot com. No, it's Ancient Heroes of the Bible dot com. Oh, no card of the Bible.

No card. Okay. Hey, you know what?

You can Google it, Ancient Heroes of the Bible, and it will take you right to the website. And that's going to have that information. Every parent listening, grandparent listening, pastor, youth pastors. A tremendous tool. And Christmas is coming up. They are great stock stuffers. I think I just found something for my grandson, Terry. I was just thinking the same thing. Stocking stuffers.

And yes, I know what I'm going to be. One of the many things I'll be getting him for Christmas this year. Well, we really appreciate, you know, sharing this ministry with you. Our hearts are with North Carolina and all the affected areas. You know, we're here in Tennessee.

We're on the national side. So we didn't get we just got the rain and just praying, you know, for everything that's going on. You know, our world right now, we're in very challenging times.

Yes. And we described right now our world is on fire. Our world is on fire. And we need to set our kids hearts on fire for the Lord to and be the light even, you know, with everything that's going on. God has given us a tremendous opportunity to be right here in this time to be his light. And I think that's the important thing when people get discouraged to remember, you know, we know who wins. And we definitely need to be here.

His light at this time. And the darker things are, if we will shine our light, the brighter that light's going to be. And we do have one of the greatest opportunities.

If you had to pick a time in all the years the earth has been in existence, when would you want to live? I mean, here you and I are having a conversation over the air. I'm in Winston Salem, you're in Nashville, and we have people to be listening around the world right now. It just blows my mind what God has provided us to take the gospel to 8 billion people. Yes, exactly. And I think it's so exciting. You know, a lot of people get discouraged and they get anxious and they're like, what's going to happen? What's going to happen?

It's like, you know what? Stay faithful. Stand firm. And, you know, he promises he will never leave you. He will never forsake you and cling on to those promises because he is our savior. He's almighty.

He's sovereign. He knows what's going to happen. We know as a follower what's going to happen and what an awesome opportunity that we get to witness what's going on in today.

And so I kind of take it a different approach. I try to encourage people because, like I said earlier, we know who's going to win. We're supposed to be faithful ambassadors. We've got the best news ever. Not just good news. I call it the best news ever.

It changes a person's life here and here after. Terry, we're wishing you the very best with your ministry. I'm excited to become a part of it because after the show, I'm going to be going to your website and I'm getting some things for Halloween as well as stocking stuffers.

So thank you so much. And we'll be praying for your the ministry, Truth Network. We love it.

We know the ministry very well. And we'll just be praying for you all too. And we love you. Thank you, Terry. We love you. You take care.

OK, bye. So as we're talking today, we're talking about how we can pray for our pastors during pastor appreciation. And in a moment, we're going to be going to a break. But let me just highlight for you real quickly, seven things to pray. And then when we come back from the break, we'll talk about each one of these, because as a pastor, I've come to learn that pastors need prayer for protection. They need prayer for preparation. They need prayer for provision. They need prayer for progression. They need prayer for possibilities. They need prayers for priorities and they need prayer for power. Now, as a pastor, that's alliterated and pastors gravitate to that. Hopefully, we've given words that are going to be memorable for you. These words, this outline can be found on the date the word app where we're giving ways to pray and specific ways to pray. And so when we come back, we're going to look at how do we put into action where Paul says, brethren, pray for us.

And if you've got a thought on this, call us at 1-866-348-7884. This is Truth Talk Live and today it's Pastor Appreciation Month and we want to pray for our pastors. Welcome back to Truth Talk Live Monday edition. Today's October the 14th and on this Monday, October the 14th, we want to say Happy Thanksgiving to our Canadian friends.

If you're a Canadian listening or you're in Canada listening, Happy Thanksgiving. You celebrate this earlier than we do and we're hoping you're having a wonderful day of giving thanks to the Lord for the great and wonderful things he has done for you. As we think about someone to be very thankful for today, it is our pastors. These are people who step into our lives to be God's vessel to do so many things for us from the component of teaching the Word of God, which is very important. But there's also the shepherding, the caring, being there to listen and to love and to help at difficult moments. As I think about my journey as a pastor myself, there's a component that I've always had someone that was my pastor. And for years, my pastor was Dr. Jerry Falwell. And this man, while incredibly busy with the responsibilities of being the pastor of Thomas Road Baptist Church and being the chancellor of Liberty University and overseeing like the moral majority and the old time gospel hour, he had so many different things that he was doing.

He was invested as a shepherd in caring for his people. And one of the first times that I just knew I had an incredible pastor was when my mom passed away. I called him and let him know of what had happened with their family.

It was a sudden death. And Dr. Falwell went into high gear of making sure my family, not just me, but my my my dad was being taken care of and even came to the home to love on my dad. And, you know, pastors do things so many times that people don't see. They don't know about being at the hospital late hours.

Yes. Come into that home where where someone has just lost a loved one and stay in there many hours. I just want us to be thinking about how valuable our pastors are and make sure we're showing some appreciation. But also, one of the best things you could be doing for your pastor is to pray for them. And I put together a prayer guide for myself to use, but also to share with other people. And and starting off on Monday today, one of the things I like to do is pray for a pastor's protection.

Here's what I know. When Sunday's over, a pastor is going to deal with some attacks and they're going to deal with the attacks that come from the wicked. There there's going to be people who don't like what's been said.

And they they they will at times just become very upset. Second Thessalonians three one says, finally, brethren, pray for us that the word of the Lord may run swiftly and be glorified just as it is with you. Now, that's a great verse that Paul's given. Pray for us that the word of God's going to run swiftly. But then he says this, that we may be delivered from unreasonable and wicked men, for all do not have faith. You got to pray for your pastor because they're going to be they will be facing attacks from the wicked. They also face attacks from the devil, where I believe one of the biggest things the devil does with a pastor is seeks to bring into his life discouragement. After pastors preach, they they may feel like I just didn't I didn't do it well enough.

And and all of a sudden there's going to be a spirit of discouragement that will come. Second Timothy one, three and four. Paul said, I thank God whom I serve with a pure conscience, as my forefathers did, as without ceasing.

And I remember you. He's talking to Timothy. I remember you in my prayers night and day, greatly desiring to see you being mindful of your tears. Timothy was struggling with ministry so much so that he was crying himself to sleep. And Paul says, I know that you're discouraged and I'm I'm praying for you, that you will be able to stay strong and stay in this race. And then one of the things we have to pray for is for a pastor to stay away from the natural temptations of pride, because there's the other side where we can get discouraged. But all of a sudden, God works. But then we want to take credit for it. First Timothy, three, six gives warning about who not to put hands on to be in the ministry, not a novice less being puffed up with pride. He falls into the same condemnation as the devil. One twelve forty three says for they love the praise of men more than the praise of God. Something that we have to be careful of is is is allowing pride to get control of our lives. And we begin to think we did it rather than God did it. So on Monday, pray for their protection on Tuesday.

I give this thought. Pray for your pastor's preparation. A lot of pastors on Tuesday are going to be putting together God's message for Sunday and they really dive in on Tuesday.

All right. What does God want me to say? Well, it cleans Ezra 7 10 is a great example where Ezra prepared his heart to seek the law of the Lord and to do it and to teach statutes and ordinance in Israel. I look at Ezra as a great example, a man who sanctified his heart. He wants to get into the word.

He's clean. And now he as he studies the word, he's asking, what does this say? What does it say to me? What will it say to others?

But also here's Ezra. He's willing to submit to the word. He's not going to say, do what I say. He's going to say, do what I am doing. He submitted to the word and then he shared it. And so just a great verse.

Ezra 7 10. And then there's Ecclesiastes 12 9 through 11. And this becomes a bookmark of when we're putting together sermons, a preacher is going to go think this way.

Ecclesiastes 12 9 through 11. And moreover, because the preacher was wise, he still taught the people knowledge. Yes, he pondered and he sought out and set in order many proverbs.

Look at how he's he's thinking. And now he's putting in order so it can be remembered. The preacher sought to find acceptable words.

What was written was upright words of truth. And then the words of the wives are like goads. This is what's used to put someone into action. You want your pastor to speak words that will cause you to take action. And then the words of a scholar like well-driven nails. When you put God's word into action, your life is being fastened together. So I'm praying Ecclesiastes 12 9 through 11. And then 1st Thessalonians chapter 3 verse 10.

Here's the Apostle Paul. He says night and day praying exceedingly that we may see your face and supply what is lacking in your faith. When your pastor is getting his sermon ready, one of his thoughts should be Lord, what do my people need?

What do they need? And that's based on 1st Thessalonians 3 10. So you're praying on Tuesday, Lord, help my pastor to know exactly what I'm going to be needing to hear that when he brings the message, I'm hearing a word from you. And then on Wednesday, I pray for the Lord to provide for the provisions that a pastor needs. Now, when it comes to provisions, there's going to be the provision of pay. You want to make sure your pastor's being taken care of.

You shall not muzzle the ox while it treads out the grain and the labors worthy of his wages. But one of the big things to ask for your pastors that they would have the provision of wisdom and prudence. Daniel found himself needing to come up with an answer one time and Daniel responded with tack and prudence.

He knew how to respond in a correct way. Pastors as they deal with difficulties, they're called to be sober minded. That means calm, cool and collected in the face of a crisis. They can't let the crisis overwhelm them and then pray that they will stay encouraged. Pray for encouragement. And one of the ways that happens is you think about Titus, how Titus showed up to encourage the apostle Paul. He came in and he gave good words that lifted the apostle Paul up, who himself was facing discouragement. Paul said that he went to the house of owner on a nest of first and he refreshed him and he went to another house and he said they refreshed him. Pray for your pastor to find encouragement and then pray for helpers.

One of the things that a pastor needs is helpers in the work and Acts chapter 6 talks about the church getting helpers for the leaders of the church. And lastly on this one, I would say pray for strength. Galatians 6 9 says and let us not grow weary in doing good for in due season. We will reap if we do not give up. Well, Nehemiah when he was ready to give up, he prayed Oh God strength of my hand. So here are three of the prayers so far.

We're praying that they will be protected that they will prepare well and they'll have God's provision. So we're going to come back to the last segment in just a moment. Hope you'll come back join with me as we talk today about how to pray for your pastor. This is Truth Talk live. Well, I want to welcome you back to Truth Talk live Monday, October the 14th. It's Thanksgiving in Canada. So Happy Thanksgiving to you. We're also reminding you of a great event happening tomorrow here in Lexington, North Carolina that Hometown Men's Fellowship. Michael McDowell will be speaking at the Richard Childress Racing Event Center at 7 p.m.

If you have a chance, you're close by come enjoy this great men's event. It's Pastor Appreciation Month and yesterday was Pastor Appreciation Day, but it continues and one of the ways we can show great appreciation for our pastor is by praying for them. And today we're laying out some thoughts for you different ways to pray for your pastor throughout the week starting on Monday going all the way till Sunday and you can find this on the date the word app. You go to the App Store just download date the word and you'll see it there under the tile praying prayers to pray and one of those things is praying for your pastor. You can also go to the website for the conservative Baptist Network. They've done an article on this to help people learn how to pray for their pastor conservative Baptist Network.com has has what I'm teaching right now. You can email me at hello at date the word.com and I'll send you the notes that I'm using here today as we think about how we're praying for a pastor showing appreciation. What do I pray when my pastor says the Bible says pray for us.

What exactly does that look like? Well on Monday pray that he is protected that your pastor is protected from the wicked and protected from discouragement and protected from pride on Tuesday pray that they will have a great season of preparation as they're getting ready for Sunday that they get into the word and the word gets into them and now they're ready to deliver God's message to you Tuesday is a major day where for pastors to be getting ready to preach Wednesday pray for their provisions and and we just gave a few of those things that they need provision of but one of the big ones is wisdom. I know I always need wisdom. How do we handle this difficult situation and and then for strength be praying for that and then on Thursday pray for your pastor's personal progression as I've looked at how Paul disciple Timothy Paul told Timothy to meditate on the things that he was teaching him which is early in chapter four those scripture verses and then he says give yourself entirely to them that your progress may be evident to all there needs to be progression in all of our lives and a pastor needs to be growing I would say it this way you have to grow to grow and so pray for their progression one of the things you want to see happening with any person is their progression in pursuing righteousness and godliness and faith these are all coming from Paul writing to Timothy as he told him old man of God flee these things and pursue righteousness godliness faith love patience gentleness so there should be the growth of your pastor where he is there's progression taking place and you're praying for that that that this will take place in their lives and then Friday pray for your pastor to see possibilities for your church I don't know how it works for other pastors but when I was pastoring Friday seemed to be a day where I would be driving around and all of a sudden I'd start thinking what if we did this and what if we did that Colossians chapter four verse three Paul says praying also for us that God would open to us a door for the word to speak the mystery of Christ from which I am also in chains and and folks your church ought to be looking for new opportunities to be making a difference in your community but yes not only your community but in your country in your world and and a pastor ought to be praying that God would open doors and he should have people coming alongside praying with him that that as Paul said praying for us and that many doors then would open for opportunities to share the gospel to get the message this beautiful message that we have to people all around so pray for possibilities and then on Saturday pray for your pastor to keep his priorities in order and and this is a big one folks pastors can get burned out and they need to be able to keep their priorities in order and so there were three things that I always wanted to make sure I'm keeping in order and and the first one is my faith I have to keep growing in the Lord that progression but I've got to be able to myself be refreshed in the presence of the Lord and I use some phrases for others for myself a pastor has to sit before he serves he has to abide to abound and it's dangerous a pastor but can become so busy doing the work of the Lord they have no time for the Lord of the work and and that's dangerous pray that they'll keep their priorities right regarding the faith and then pray for the priority of their family dr. Falwell would say this statement what does it profit a pastor if he gained the whole world and lose his family now that's based off of a scripture verse of what would a prophet a person to gain the whole world and lose their soul but dr. Falwell just paraphrase it if you will not a scripture but what does it profit a pastor if he gains the whole world and loses his family there's got to be time quality time and quality time with the family both quantity and quality I want to say this folks you need your pastor praying for you and if your pastor if your pastor is not doing what's right with his wife 1st Peter 3 7 to me is one of those scary verses in the Bible for me as a husband as a pastor it says husbands likewise dwell with them with understanding giving honor to the wife as the weaker vessel as being heirs together of the grace of life that your prayers may not be hindered I told the people that I do accountability with ask how I'm doing in my relationship with my wife because if I can't pray how am I ever gonna accomplish anything for the Lord we've got to have a great relationship with their spouse and then with their children and and children are heritage from the Lord so I want you praying for your pastor to keep their priorities in order when it comes to his faith his family and then fitness they pastor needs to be exercising getting rest having times to relax having times of recreation mark 631 and Jesus said to them come aside by yourselves to a deserted place and rest a while this is Jesus telling his disciples they need to come to a place and rest for a while and then went on to say for many were coming and going they didn't even have time to eat I'm telling you your pastor doesn't just work on Sunday your pastor is working many times 24-7 always on call and they can get wore out they need to have times where they are resting taking care of their body and Saturdays are many times a good time for them to do that but during the week they need to have that time where they rest their bodies rest their souls and that's mark 631 Jesus said come apart and rest so pray for them when it comes to their priorities of their faith their family and their fitness and then on Sunday morning pray that they will have God's power the power that comes from God's anointing so there will be power from the pulpit and in the preaching Paul when he talked about his desire of preaching he wanted at a first Corinthians 2 verses 4 and 5 he said and my speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of human wisdom but in demonstration of the spirit and of power that your faith should not be in the wisdom of men but in the power of God and there's something supernatural about a pastor as he preaches the word of God that God's able to take it in so many different directions he'll be the pastor will be saying one thing that you may be thinking isn't saying a thing to you but to another person God's using it to speak directly into their lives I've had people come up and say I just so appreciate when you said this I don't even remember the word that I said it but I was being used of God to speak into a person's life and at that very moment with what they needed I had an anointing and I'm telling you folks if you want great services on Sunday pray for your pastor to be anointed on high and then you're gonna have a pastor who's preaching that that all he can say is that was God working through me now we can do a lot for our pastors I don't know if there's anything much more important than praying for them Paul over and over said brethren pray for us 1 Thessalonians 5 25 2 Thessalonians 3 1 finally brethren pray for us there's a call from a pastor here Dwayne Carson to you to pray for your pastor it's pastor appreciation month pray learn to pray for your pastor go to the date the word app download it and learn to pray these seven specific prayers thanks for listening today this has been truth talk live
Whisper: medium.en / 2024-10-14 18:09:54 / 2024-10-14 18:22:48 / 13

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