Category: Prayer

Five tips for new Christians

May 19, 2023

If you are a new Christian you have made a great decision to follow Jesus! To get you started I have provided some suggestions for you to help you grow on your new journey. Below you will find some things that really helped me nearly 35 years ago when I decided to follow Jesus.

Read the Bible

The Bible will help you to learn more about God and gives you practical advice about how we should live. A good place to start is the Gospel of Luke that is found in the New Testament. This book will give you information on the life of Jesus Christ and you will be able to read about His miracles and teachings to His followers. After this you can move on to the Book of Acts. This talks about the early church and how they got started. We also have a number of two week reading plans on our Bible Readings page. If you don’t have access to a Bible, you can find an online one here at www.biblegateway.com

Start to pray

Prayer is simply communicating with God. It is a part of building our relationship with Him. Just remember to keep it simple. The Bible tells us to give thanks to God for what He has done when pray and also to ask for the things we need for ourselves and others. Before long you will see the difference prayer makes in your life and in the lives of those around you. You can check out our prayer category on our blog for some tips.

Meet with other Christians

God wants us to meet with other Christians and be a part of a caring faith community. We see in the Bible that He wants us to have a support network and a place where we can learn more about Him. We don’t recommend any church in particular, but encourage you to try a local one near you in your community. If you are in Western Australia you might like to look for a local Church of Christ , Baptist Church or an Australian Christian Church.

Do a discipleship course

Doing a discipleship course will help you to set a solid foundation for your new life in Christ. We have a free booklet you can download on our discipleship page. The booklet has 10 short studies on the Bible, prayer, church, serving God, sharing your faith and being assured of your salvation. It includes a number of Scriptures on each topic, some reflection questions, a simple prayer and some Bible memory verses.

Tell others about your new faith

Sharing your faith can be fun and rewarding. You might like to start by telling people close to you that you have accepted Jesus into your life. Telling others about your faith and decision to follow Jesus can will allow them to follow Him too. If you need some tips to help you share your faith you can visit a sermon I preached on this topic.

A prayer for today

May 2, 2023

I read this prayer in a Bible app plan today and thought I would share it…

God, thank you for creating a specific purpose just for me. Help me to see myself through your eyes and to throw off all the lies that might hold me down. Help me to believe that I am fearfully and wonderfully made in your image and that there is no one else like me. Continue to refine me and prepare me for the purpose you have for me. Show me the next step I should take to grow closer to you and to help fill the space you made for me in your Church. In Jesus’ name, amen.

Ministry reflections

April 27, 2023

In the past week I have been on holidays and have been reflecting on the ministries I have been involved with over the years.

Over the last 30 years I have been involved with youth groups, led Bible study groups, Pastored a church, been an Elder, a lay preacher, been on the prayer team, helped with emergency food parcels and headed up a para church ministry.

In all of these roles my heart has been to care for and encourage people and to help people grow closer to Jesus. It may have been delivered in a slightly different way because of my job role, but the focus has always been the same.

At the moment I am working in the role of Chaplain. It is something that I have never done before in an official sense. But I guess no matter where I have worked I have been the “unofficial” Chaplain of my workplace. I have often listened, encouraged, had spiritual conversations and prayed for people as the need arose.

Although I did enjoy being a Pastor of a church, I do really enjoy being a Chaplain more. I get to talk to and encourage people, listen to their struggles and pray for them. And in the role I am in I am with a lot more non Christian people. I can share God’s love and light in a real and practical way. This is something I really enjoy too.

The Lord’s Prayer index

April 10, 2023

Matthew 6:9-13 NLT – Pray like this: Our Father in heaven, may your name be kept holy. [10] May your Kingdom come soon. May your will be done on earth, as it is in heaven. [11] Give us today the food we need, [12] and forgive us our sins, as we have forgiven those who sin against us. [13] And don’t let us yield to temptation, but rescue us from the evil one.

The rabbis in Jesus’ day taught people the idea of ‘index praying’. An index is usually at the beginning of a book, giving chapter numbers and titles.

That’s exactly what index praying was all about. The rabbis would provide the points for prayer, like an index or outline, and the people would fill in their own prayers.

Some Bible scholars tell us this is the method Jesus was teaching in the Lord’s Prayer. Can you imagine using the Lord’s Prayer as an outline to pray in a sense?

1. Worshiping the Father 

2. God’s kingdom 

3. God’s will/guidance 

4. Our daily needs 

5. Forgiveness/relationships 

6. Spiritual warfare 

For me this is a very interesting idea that would provide a great structure to wrap our prayers up in. It would help us to cover all aspect of giving honour to God and covering our needs too.