Springford Baptist Church

How can we best pray for families as we approach this Fathers’ Day weekend 2023? One of the things that we can realize is the big sense of responsibility that many fathers carry. When fathers really do love their children (both growing children and adult children and grandchildren), they do want things to work out well for their children. Loving fathers sacrifice and work hard for the benefit of their families. Their concerns really are centered in their family more than in themselves. Loving fathers hold a constant concern for their families in their hearts. Sometimes they may not find the words to speak all their concerns out loud. Sometimes they may not feel comfortable trying to express the depth of their commitment to their families. We can pray with an understanding of God our Father being available to help and support all of us. We can find reassurance in the Scripture, “Cast all your cares on Him for He cares for you. (I Peter 5:7) We can pray that fathers who long for good for their families will know they can bring every care to our Father God and receive His tender and loving care. Approaching this Fathers’ Day weekend we can also consider families and homes where fathers are absent. There may be others who step into this role to provide support and care. Anyone who is trying to bring consistent love and support for families needs help. God is available to help and so we can choose to approach the One Who cares for us and to surrender all of our cares for our families to our ever loving God. I urge us not to underestimate how important encouragement and faithful prayer is for families. Tomorrow June 14^th, we can plan to pause at 1 pm for our WEDNESDAY PRAYER TOGETHER. We can pray for our own families and for the families of others that God inspires us to commit to His care.

Praying for increased awareness of how much our loving Father God cares for us and those for whom we pray, Pastor Lola

Our Father God, we come to You as Your children, conscious of how much we need You. Thank you that we can rely on Your constant love and care for us. We thank You our God for all the ways that You demonstrate Your consistent care for us and those for whom we pray. Our Gracious God, we are grateful that in Your wisdom, You have placed us in families. We recognize that no family is perfect, still it is in our families that we are meant to find security and love. Please be near to help all parents who are seeking to nurture their children well. It is our prayer that not only will families provide food and shelter for children, but that children will also be nurtured in faith. We think of what it will mean for children as they grow to know Your love and care for them. When we think of the pressure these days on families and households, we lift them up to You. Please reassure families that they are not alone and that You care for them in all their struggles. Thank you for those who work to support children and families. Thank You for ways that we can demonstrate love and care for our families. We pray that we will be available to be family for those who are lonely. Sometimes we can get very caught up in the needs of our own families and not be available for others who need us. Please guide us in balancing this gift of time that You have given to us. We choose to bring all the cares we have for our families to You. Our God You now where there are health concerns in our families. You know where there are relationship tensions in our families. You know where there is discouragement and disappointment in our families. You know where there is uncertainty for the future in our families. In every situation of need our Father god, we ask you to be with us and to guide us through. It is a relief to cast all of our cares for our families on You and we do that now. We also bring to you other individuals and families for whom we pray. Thank You God that You take us beyond ourselves to care about and to pray for others. Thank You that no one we name is outside of your care. As we name those who are on our hearts to You, You already know every need and care. Please do inspire us to be an active part of the way that our prayers will be answered and the way that Your care will be expressed through us. When we grow weary in extending care and support, we pray that You will renew and refresh us. For homes where fathers have not provided the loving presence and influence that You intend , we pray that awareness of You and Your loving care will be experienced. For those who have recently said goodbye to fathers and grandfathers, we pray for your comforting peace over this Fathers’ Day weekend. Thank You Father God that we can know that You do care for us and will always be near to help us and to guide us. We do bring all of our cares to You, confident that You do care for us. We commit everyone and everything to You in Jesus’ Name. AMEN.

I was enjoying a pleasant walk along a country road when I saw that the cows in the field had taken quite an interest in me. They all moved together towards the fence and then walked together while chewing away and keeping their eyes on me. It occurred to me how influenced cattle are by the herd. Their herd mentality has them all following what the others are doing. It seems that not much thought is given to anything, but simply following what everyone else is doing. This may be okay for cows, but it is not okay for people. In fact it is potentially dangerous and destructive to go along with what everyone else is doing, saying, and thinking. We as people of faith, continue to ask God to lead and guide our thoughts and attitudes and actions. In Scripture we read, “Yet, O LORD, You are our Father. We are the clay, You are the Potter; we are all the work of Your hand.” (Isaiah 64:8) When we sincerely look to God in prayer, we are asking God to shape us as He intends. We can invite God to influence our lives closer to Him. This will not have us going along with what everyone else around us is doing, but rather inviting God to show us His will, His way, and His time in all things. This will be our approach for our WEDNESDAY PRAYER TOGETHER tomorrow June 7^th at 1 pm. Please plan to pause for this significant time of prayer.

Thankful that our God is available to show us His way, Pastor Lola

Loving God, we choose to thank You for being the One Who gives our lives purpose. Thank You that You have called us to so much more than just following the crowd. We know that it takes intention and focused prayer to discern Your will for us. We want to be available for this so that You can shape us as Your will, Your way, and Your time. We thank You that we can call you Father and know the tenderness and compassion of Your love for us. As clay in Your hands, God, we want You the Potter to form us as your own. We are confident that Your plans for us are good. When we mindlessly follow what everyone else is doing, we miss the personal ways that You want to reveal Yourself to us. We miss the unique ways that You want to use us and who you have created each of us to be. Often our thoughts get focused on what will benefit us and how we want to arrange things for our comfort and security. Forgive us, we pray. Please expand our vision to consider the concerns of others around us. The days and weeks could go by with us so consumed with ourselves that we are not shaped by You to live Your love in our world. Today we continue to pray for The Ukraine and for resolution of the conflict there. We thank You for the anticipation of the arrival of Nikoli to be reunited with his family. We trust You God for this time of transition and change. Thank You for those who are coming to Canada to find a new home here. We pray that we will be welcoming and helpful. God, please guard against selfishness and move us to respond with generosity of heart. As we consider that we as human beings can be learning from each other, we pray for how this will happen. Rather than succumb to herd mentality, we pray that each of us will seek and find You and be led by You in all things. It is humbling to know that we are the work of Your hand. It is also apparent to us that Your work in us continues. Still there are areas of our lives to be surrendered to You and Your plans and purposes. Surrender does not come easily, yet this is our desire. Only as we allow Your work in our lives are we becoming Who You have designed us to be. When we resist this process, we pray that Your Spirit will show us a better way. Please forgive that resistance and replace it with a greater love for You that urges us to release what we insist on grasping. Our prayer is for both ourselves and others to be liberated by our commitment to follow You always. All of his we pray in the Name of Jesus our Saviour. AMEN

With the end of another month, we are conscious of the passing of time and the significance of how we invest our time. I had a recent conversation with someone who had planted oak trees in her backyard. I was reminded of the inspirational saying that, “Faith is planting trees under whose shade you do not expect to sit.” When we offer ongoing prayers of faith, trusting God for His timing and what He will do, it is the same principle. In Hebrews 11:1  we read, ”Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.” Our decision to pray and to place things in God’s hands means that we are releasing the outcome to God. Our tendency is to expect immediate results. If this does not happen, sometimes we begin to waver in our prayers.  We may not live to see the outcome of our prayers and the ways that God will bring blessing and cooling shade and breezes of refreshment. Yet, still we pray and commit to God with the hope that our prayers will bring blessing to others. We can again participate in this life changing activity of prayer when we pause for our WEDNESDAY TOGETHER tomorrow May 31^st at 1 pm.

Asking God to increase our faith as we pray, Pastor Lola

Our loving God thank you for the trees that others have planted that have brought blessing to us. Thank you that the faithful prayers and lives of others before us continue to nurture us today. We pray that we too will be willing to invest in ways that will encourage others in their faith and in their opportunities to know you. We recognize that often we cannot imagine what will be the impact of decisions and actions that we now take. With this understanding, we humbly pray to be led by You always. We do not want to give up when the spiritual well being of others depends on us. We are aware that planting takes hard work and determination. There also needs to be tending and care for faith to grow and we want to be available for this. Our desire is for our own faith to develop strong roots and to grow healthy. This is also our longing for others. For those who face circumstances that shake their faith, we pray that they will experience You close with them in their adversity. For those who become so occupied with everything else but taking time for You, we pray that there will be recognition that You keep knocking and wanting to gain access to their lives. For those who have grown self absorbed and do not feel there is any place in their lives for you, we pray that they will recognize their need for You. Our God, the thought of ways that we can help to plant seeds of faith that will introduce You and Your hope filled Presence to others is a thought that compels us to keep praying. Even when we do not see evidence of what is going to happen through the work of Your Spirit, please give us courage to keep on believing in You and Your life changing power and to keep on praying. We commit ourselves and all that we are and have to what You want to be now and in time to come. In the Name of Jesus. AMEN.

This past Friday and Saturday, our daughter Geneva and I were able to complete another 25 km hiking the Bruce Trail. This brought us to the end of the Sydenham Section which is the longest of the 900 km total at 174 km. The Sydenham Section ends in Wiarton. We had planned the time for our hike, but of course the uncertainty is the weather. We can never know what the weather conditions will be like and how this will affect our trek on the trail. On Friday, we were able to complete our 15 km just a short time before a significant downpour when the skies opened up and there was heavy rain. We wondered what it would be like for our last 10 km which we planned to do on Saturday. Through the night, we could hear the rain still coming down at various points. We wanted to be safe for the 10 km along Skinners Bluff. When Saturday morning dawned, the rain had stopped and although misty, we were able to be on the trail safely and were grateful to finish the hiking we had planned. This experience so parallels life. There are times of uncertainty about what to do and whether to wait or to proceed. Sometimes the conditions for what we hope to do affect being able to carry things out at a particular time. Our opportunity, as people of faith in all this uncertainty, is to trust our God. Consider the Scripture that records the response of Moses and Miriam when God parted the waters and safely brought the people of Israel through the Red Sea, “In Your unfailing love You will lead the people You have redeemed. In Your strength You will guide them to Your holy dwelling.” (Exodus 15:13) We can be grateful for God’s unfailing love for us. We can trust Him in His strength to guide us each step of the way to our final destination. This will be the inspiration for our WEDNESDAY PRAYER TOGETHER tomorrow May 24^th at 1 pm. Please plan to join us.

Looking to God to lead us with His unfailing love and to give us strength, Pastor Lola

Our God of grace, we thank You for Your unfailing love that we experience again and again. You do lead us with Your love and give us courage for all the aspects of our journeys that we are uncertain about. Sometimes we are wondering whether or not to proceed on a particular path. Please remind us to keep seeking You and to keep looking to You for direction. When there are less than ideal conditions or there are obstacles that interfere with our plans, please show us how to respond. You did not promise that the way would be easy. We recognize that our misplaced expectations can find us trying to avoid anything that we consider difficult. God, You most certainly remain with us and do not leave us to try to figure things out by ourselves. When we are feeling insecure about our ability to stay well having come through the pandemic, we pray for reassurance about what is needed to keep people healthy. When we face financial insecurity and wonder how we will cover basic needs, we pray for Your provision for our every need. When we feel weak and question whether we can find the strength to keep going, please remind us of Your unfailing love and renew our strength, as we depend on You. Our God when we have seen Your answers to prayer, we do not want to become casual. We pray that we will acknowledge that You are the Source of all that is good. And when the climb is steep and hazardous, we want to  have You lead us and give us strength. We think of the recent passing of people whom we have known and loved. We pray for comfort. We also pray for a regarding of every day of life as a sacred gift from You. We never want to slip into taking life for granted. Please guide us in deeply appreciating the potential in each new day. And God since Your dwelling is holy, we pray to be regarding Your holiness and choosing to follow this pattern in living lives of holiness. We continue to pray for Jesus to become more and for us to become less. May all of this increase our dependence on You and our awareness of Your unfailing love to give us strength. In Jesus’ holy Name. AMEN

When we were at the local garden centre recently, I was reminded how much people enjoy planting and seeing plants grow and flourish. There was a man in front of us at the checkout who was getting some tomato transplants and he also had various vegetable seeds as well as some seed potatoes to plant. Clearly, he was willing to do the work to plant and tend and see these plants produce. There were also several people who were selecting various flowering plants for their gardens and to beautify their yards or porches or balconies. A drive down country roads at this time of the year gives opportunity to witness large tractors and equipment working up the fields and planting acres and acres of crops. After all the effort of planting, these plants need to be nourished and they need to be watered so that their roots grow strong and life is sustained. The same is true for us who have had seeds of faith planted in our lives. We need regular nourishment and watering in order to grow strong and healthy in our faith. There is Scripture in Jeremiah 17:7,8  thatconfirms this necessityin living productive lives of faith. ⁷“But blessed is the one who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in Him. ⁸ They will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought  and never fails to bear fruit.” Here we discover that the tree planted by the water sends out its roots by the stream and so is able to be sustained as needed and to never fail to bear fruit. This image of a flourishing tree is used to describe what the one who trusts in the LORD will be like. In order for us to be like the tree planted by the water, we need to keep our trust in the LORD firmly established. It is consistent prayer that keeps us focused on trusting in the LORD and having confidence in Him. This will be what we ask of God in our WEDNESDAY PRAYER TOGETHER tomorrow May 17^th at 1 pm

Praying that we will trust in the LORD and maintain our confidence in Him, Pastor Lola

Thank You God that you give us reasons every day to trust in You. We recognize the blessing that does come to us as we choose to trust in You. This does not mean that we do not have questions or times when we do not understand what You intend to do. Still we choose to secure our confidence in You. Our God we want to be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. When the heat of scorching adversity comes against us, we will not fear. Instead we will trust You. When we are parched in our faith and long for refreshment, we will trust You. We consider what You may have to teach us about what it means to trust You LORD. How easy to say that we trust You when the circumstances of our lives fall easily into place. We look to You God to enable us to trust You when there is a drought and You alone are the Source to keep our faith alive and vibrant. Leaves that are always green are what we request of You in our prayers today. It is through prayer that our trust in You sends out roots. We do pray for the ways that You prepare us for times of drought and hardship. And God we do not simply pray this for ourselves. We pray for Your cooling refreshment for all those who struggle to believe. We pray for those who witness hatred in our world and question those who claim to belong to You while promoting hatred. Please convict each of us of our inconsistencies. Where who we are does not match Who You are, please change us. For some it seems that life consists of just trying to get by. When this is the goal, it seems hard to imagine flourishing. We pray that we will never make the living of our lives of faith about comparing ourselves to others and concluding that we are better positioned than someone else. Use us we pray to bear fruit for Your kingdom. The fruit of Your Spirit comes to mind. How beautiful for our lives to produce the fruit of Your Holy Spirit. This can urge others to trust You and to surrender their lives to You. We pray that our trust in You will always invite others in a loving way to trust You. Place us where we need to be to access Your living water. We pray to be willing to move in order to be sustained by You. As much as we pay attention to the weather forecast when making our plans, Help us to consult You more to ensure Your heavenly forecast of what is coming and how we need to respond. We choose to trust You LORD and to renew our confidence in You so that the faith planted in us will bear good fruit. All this we commit to You and pray for grace to trust You more, in Jesus’ Name, AMEN.