PrayerBits for Sunday

PrayerBits

A bite sized devotional program
produced by the West Side Presbyterian Church

Sunday

Scripture lesson: Matthew 9:9-13, 18-26 What kind of physician

 

Time to reflect: Applying the metaphor of the physician to ourselves and the church what kind of patient do we try to help? The healthy? Those with minor illnesses or the really sick? Who do we hang out with? The sinners? Who do we welcome into the church?

Moving through the day: Who can you reach out to to help that might not be “your kind of person?”

 

Scripture:

 As Jesus went on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector's booth. "Follow me," he told him, and Matthew got up and followed him.

 While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew's house, many tax collectors and "sinners" came and ate with him and his disciples. When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, "Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and 'sinners'?"

 On hearing this, Jesus said, "It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. But go and learn what this means: 'I desire mercy, not sacrifice.'For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners."

A Dead Girl and a Sick Woman

 While he was saying this, a ruler came and knelt before him and said, "My daughter has just died. But come and put your hand on her, and she will live." Jesus got up and went with him, and so did his disciples.

 Just then a woman who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years came up behind him and touched the edge of his cloak. She said to herself, "If I only touch his cloak, I will be healed."

 Jesus turned and saw her. "Take heart, daughter," he said, "your faith has healed you." And the woman was healed from that moment.

 When Jesus entered the ruler's house and saw the flute players and the noisy crowd, he said, "Go away. The girl is not dead but asleep." But they laughed at him. After the crowd had been put outside, he went in and took the girl by the hand, and she got up. News of this spread through all that region.

PrayerBits for Saturday

PrayerBits

A bite sized devotional program
produced by the West Side Presbyterian Church

Saturday

Scripture lesson: Romans 4:13-25 “Hoping against Hope he believed...”

Time to reflect: This is sometimes referred to as the “leap of Faith” Not knowing for sure, but willing to take the risk to believe.

Moving through the day: “Pray 'Lord, I believe, help me with my unbelief'”

Scripture:

It was not through law that Abraham and his offspring received the promise that he would be heir of the world, but through the righteousness that comes by faith. For if those who live by law are heirs, faith has no value and the promise is worthless, because law brings wrath. And where there is no law there is no transgression.

 Therefore, the promise comes by faith, so that it may be by grace and may be guaranteed to all Abraham's offspring—not only to those who are of the law but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham. He is the father of us all. As it is written: "I have made you a father of many nations."He is our father in the sight of God, in whom he believed—the God who gives life to the dead and calls things that are not as though they were.

 Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed and so became the father of many nations, just as it had been said to him, "So shall your offspring be."Without weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his body was as good as dead—since he was about a hundred years old—and that Sarah's womb was also dead. Yet he did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God, being fully persuaded that God had power to do what he had promised. This is why "it was credited to him as righteousness." The words "it was credited to him" were written not for him alone, but also for us, to whom God will credit righteousness—for us who believe in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead. He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification.

PrayerBits for Friday

PrayerBits

A bite sized devotional program
produced by the West Side Presbyterian Church

Friday

Scripture lesson: Psalm 33:1-12 The Creator God

 

Time to reflect: It is easy in our society to replace reverence for God with scientific explanations. But the two are not mutually exclusive. If we view God as behind and the designer of the the processes we describe with Science, we can't help but marvel.

Moving Throughout the day: Write a short poem praising God but using modern scientific language in describing what God has done.

Scripture:

Sing joyfully to the LORD, you righteous;
       it is fitting for the upright to praise him.

  Praise the LORD with the harp;
       make music to him on the ten-stringed lyre.

 Sing to him a new song;
       play skillfully, and shout for joy.

  For the word of the LORD is right and true;
       he is faithful in all he does.

  The LORD loves righteousness and justice;
       the earth is full of his unfailing love.

  By the word of the LORD were the heavens made,
       their starry host by the breath of his mouth.

  He gathers the waters of the sea into jars ;
       he puts the deep into storehouses.

  Let all the earth fear the LORD;
       let all the people of the world revere him.

 For he spoke, and it came to be;
       he commanded, and it stood firm.

  The LORD foils the plans of the nations;
       he thwarts the purposes of the peoples.

  But the plans of the LORD stand firm forever,
       the purposes of his heart through all generations.

  Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD,
       the people he chose for his inheritance.

PrayerBits for Thursday

PrayerBits

A bite sized devotional program
produced by the West Side Presbyterian Church

Thursday

Scripture lesson: Genesis 12:1-9

Time to reflect: To what an unbelievable extent God has carried out the promises to Abraham. But Abraham could have not believed and accepted the promises, since the sacrifices were significant. As the Apostle Paul put it, it was Abraham's faithfulness not his deeds that brought about the fulfillment.

Moving through the day: Pray for faithfulness to God even when the prospects are scary.

Scripture:

  The LORD had said to Abram, "Leave your country, your people and your father's household and go to the land I will show you.

  "I will make you into a great nation
       and I will bless you;
       I will make your name great,
       and you will be a blessing.

  I will bless those who bless you,
       and whoever curses you I will curse;
       and all peoples on earth
       will be blessed through you."

  So Abram left, as the LORD had told him; and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he set out from Haran. He took his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot, all the possessions they had accumulated and the people they had acquired in Haran, and they set out for the land of Canaan, and they arrived there.

  Abram traveled through the land as far as the site of the great tree of Moreh at Shechem. At that time the Canaanites were in the land. The LORD appeared to Abram and said, "To your offspring I will give this land." So he built an altar there to the LORD, who had appeared to him.

  From there he went on toward the hills east of Bethel and pitched his tent, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east. There he built an altar to the LORD and called on the name of the LORD. Then Abram set out and continued toward the Negev.

PrayerBits for Wednesday

PrayerBits

A bite sized devotional program
produced by the West Side Presbyterian Church

Wednesday

Scripture lesson: Hosea 6:4-6

 

Time to reflect: How constant is your faithfulness? Is it like the morning mist or dew?

Moving through the day: Pledge yourself for the day to stop each hour through the day to say a quick prayer to God.

Scripture:

"What can I do with you, Ephraim?
       What can I do with you, Judah?
       Your love is like the morning mist,
       like the early dew that disappears.

  Therefore I cut you in pieces with my prophets,
       I killed you with the words of my mouth;
       my judgments flashed like lightning upon you.

  For I desire mercy, not sacrifice,
       and acknowledgment of God rather than burnt offerings.

PrayerBits for Tuesday

PrayerBits

A bite sized devotional program
produced by the West Side Presbyterian Church

Tuesday

Scripture lesson: Psalm 50:7-17 Thanksgiving

Time to reflect: The recurring theme in Scriptures that it is attitude not ritual that matters.

Moving through the day: This passage calls for thanksgiving. Stop to give thanks to God.

Scripture:

^RS Psalm 50:7 "Hear, O my people, and I will speak, O Israel, I will testify against you. I am God, your God. ⁸ Not for your sacrifices do I rebuke you; your burnt offerings are continually before me. ⁹ I will not accept a bull from your house, or goats from your folds. ¹⁰ For every wild animal of the forest is mine, the cattle on a thousand hills. ¹¹ I know all the birds of the air, and all that moves in the field is mine. ¹² "If I were hungry, I would not tell you, for the world and all that is in it is mine. ¹³ Do I eat the flesh of bulls, or drink the blood of goats? ¹⁴ Offer to God a sacrifice of thanksgiving, and pay your vows to the Most High. ¹⁵ Call on me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you shall glorify me."