Archive for the 'Southern Baptist Convention' Category
Focus One Sunday Morning in 2015 on Prayer in Your Church
God’s Word is clear: “…For My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations.” (Isaiah 56:7) Jesus declared it this way: “It is written, My house will be called a house of prayer. But you are making it a den of thieves.” (Matthew 21:13)
Announcements and promotions within the church sometimes gain a higher priority in planning and follow through than prayer. This is why the church of America sleeps. Spiritual lukewarmness is plaguing the church, resulting in infrequency of church attendance, declining churches, lagging evangelism, sagging giving, and generational disconnectedness.
Is your church a house of prayer or something else?
When is the last time you turned an entire Sunday morning worship service or services into an entire service of prayer? Has this ever occurred? Has prayer received more than a small focus in any worship service you have attended recently?
If not, why not? If we are not filling God’s churches with passionate prayers that are focused with purpose, what are we filling our church worship services with? Could it be that we are not filling God’s churches with prayer because we are not seeing that our greatest need is the power of God to intervene into our life, church, and nation? Could it be because we do not connect the deep need for prayer with the greatest need – to take the gospel of Jesus Christ to all the nations?
Turn One Sunday Morning Into a Morning of Prayer
In my recently released 16-page e-book, “Pleading With Southern Baptists”, I humbly called our 46,000 plus churches to five actions. You can read about the first two actions here and here.
The third action is to focus an entire Sunday morning worship service (or services) between January and May 2015 on extraordinary prayer for personal and church revival, the next Great Awakening in America, and for the world to be reached for Christ. Several months ago, I wrote about leading your church in a Sunday morning prayer meeting. Let this encourage you. We also have a resource section in our e-book and on pray4awakening.com/southernbaptists. Under the heading Prayer Gatherings, you will find examples from several churches on how they have experienced Sunday morning services focused on prayer.
Four Characteristics of Prayer Services
There are four characteristics I will mention briefly that can help you plan and lead a prayer service effectively:
1. Biblically-based: Each prayer time needs to be based on a teaching time from God’s Word. We stand on His Word, not on our words or passions.
2. Prayer-focused: Focus each prayer time on principles like repentance, revival, surrender to the Lordship of Christ and the filling of the Spirit, spiritual awakening, and reaching the world for Christ beginning in your own community.
3. Spirit-led: While prepared and ready to lead, you will need to navigate the worship and prayer moments as God’s Spirit leads you.
4. Worship-expressed: Hymns and worship songs are given to us to express our worship of Jesus Christ as our Lord. These can be powerful expressions as transition moments, moving from one prayer time to the other.
Just Imagine
Just imagine what may happen in your church if an entire Sunday morning service is turned into a prayer service. You could experience God move in ways unlike you have seen in a while or may have never seen before. People could come to Christ. Personal repentance could result in a releasing of the Spirit upon your church, unleashing the church to worship and ministry.
Just imagine if 100 churches, 500 churches, or several thousand Southern Baptist Churches would turn a Sunday morning into insuring that Jesus’ House would be a genuine house of prayer for all the nations. Just imagine what could happen if, from this point forward, you could spend 10 focused minutes each Sunday morning in extraordinary prayer on two major needs locally, in your church, in America, or across the world.
Here is what I do know: If we do not plan to pray, we will not pray!
It is past time for us to prioritize prayer personally and in the church. For far too long, we have seen what we can do; it is time for us to see what God can do. This can only happen when we pray.
You may say, “Ronnie, do you really believe that?” Absolutely, and I believe it upon the authority of His Word.
Acts 4:31 says, “When they had prayed, the place where they were assembled was shaken and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak God’s message with boldness.”
Yours for the Great Commission,
Ronnie W. Floyd
Senior Pastor, Cross Church President, Southern Baptist Convention*******
Dr. Ronnie Floyd is currently serving as the President of the Southern Baptist Convention. The Southern Baptist Convention is America’s largest Protestant denomination with more than 15.7 million members in over 46,000 churches nationwide.
To request an interview with Dr. Ronnie Floyd
contact Gayla Oldham at (479) 751-4523 or email gaylao@crosschurch.com.
Visit our website at http://ronniefloyd.com
Follow Dr. Floyd on Twitter and Instagram @ronniefloyd
Dr. Ronnie Floyd is the President & CEO of the Southern Baptist Convention Executive Committee.
A Month of Preaching That Will Call Your Church to be All God Wants You to Be
The most influential voice in the life of a church is the voice of the preacher when he preaches the Bible, God’s Word. This preacher is usually the pastor of the church.
Every pastor I know wants to call His church up to be all God wants the church to be. What we preach, how we preach, and when we preach all influence the outcome. Therefore, I am humbly requesting every pastor, every church, and every chapel of our Baptist entities, conventions, seminaries, and colleges to consider a month of preaching that may involve four or five messages that call the people of God to be all God wants them to be.
1 Month of Preaching on These Subjects
Between the months of January and May 2015, move into a one-month emphasis to preach and teach God’s Word on the following subjects:
- Personal Repentance
- Extraordinary Prayer
- Fasting
- Personal and Church Revival
- Spiritual Awakening
- Reaching the World for Christ
In our newly released 16-page e-book, Pleading With Southern Baptists, we presented an urgent call to five actions for every Southern Baptist Christian and church. Last week, I wrote about the first action, 3 Minutes at Sunset or Sunrise Can Turn Your Church Around. The second action is to give a month to preaching on these subjects.
At Cross Church, we are doing this series over five or six weeks, calling it, Pleading With Cross Church. We have used the word “pleading” in correlation with the e-book. Consider doing the same, really calling upon your church or ministry to read the 16-page e-book as well.
Pastors and preachers, you can go here to see various biblical messages on these subjects preached by some of America’s greatest preachers of the gospel. Use or quote from these inspiring sermons as God leads you. This collection is well worth the experience and we are adding to it continually.
Extend Passionate Calls to the People of God Individually and Collectively
As you ground your message in the Word of God, present it with a passionate call to the people of God. While we lift up these great biblical and spiritual principles, call God’s people to spiritual greatness individually and collectively.
This is an opportunity for thousands of churches and ministries to call their people to become what God wants them to be. As you proclaim the Word, present the wonderful message of the hope we have in the Lord. It is time to look to Him alone. He can turn any person, church, city, nation, and any convention of churches around.
When Will We Realize…
When will we realize that above all our perceived needs in life and church, there is no greater need personally and collectively in the church than a mighty outpouring of the Holy Spirit. We have seen what man can do; it is time for us to see what God can do!
This is why we need to preach on these great subjects like personal repentance, extraordinary prayer, fasting, personal and church revival, spiritual awakening, and reaching the world for Christ. They are all interconnected and imperative in both life and the church.
A Historical Precedent
When Jonathan Edwards wrote his “Humble Attempt”, he called the pastors and churches to action, resulting in a mighty moving of the Spirit. They believed more than anything that they needed to agree together and visibly unite in extraordinary prayer.
When they did, God moved. He moved so powerfully, we call it awakening! Multiple thousands came to Christ, culture was affected, and churches were changed.
We must begin to believe there is a connection between a great move of God and the fulfillment of the Great Commission. This is why we must repent, pray, and fast to experience revival that leads to awakening, which will become the catalyst to the acceleration of the gospel to the nations.
It is past time to see what God can do.
Enough of us, more of God.
This is why we must preach it!
Yours for the Great Commission,
Ronnie W. Floyd
Senior Pastor, Cross Church President, Southern Baptist Convention
*******
Dr. Ronnie Floyd is currently serving as the President of the Southern Baptist Convention. The Southern Baptist Convention is America’s largest Protestant denomination with more than 15.7 million members in over 46,000 churches nationwide.
To request an interview with Dr. Ronnie Floyd
contact Gayla Oldham at (479) 751-4523 or email gaylao@crosschurch.com.
Visit our website at http://ronniefloyd.com
Follow Dr. Floyd on Twitter and Instagram @ronniefloyd
Dr. Ronnie Floyd is the President & CEO of the Southern Baptist Convention Executive Committee.