PrayerBits for Sunday

PrayerBits

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

Sunday

Scripture lesson: John 17:6-19 Jesus prays for his Disciples

Time to reflect: This is a sad farewell prayer by Jesus in behalf of his people. He knows that after he is gone they are going to have a really rough time and he grieves for them. His love for them is truly evident.

Moving through the day: We believe that Jesus has the same love for his Church today, including you. Pray a prayer of thanksgiving for such love. Focus on what it feels like to be the recipient of Jesus' love.

Scripture:

 6"I have revealed you[a] to those whom you gave me out of the world. They were yours; you gave them to me and they have obeyed your word. 7Now they know that everything you have given me comes from you. 8For I gave them the words you gave me and they accepted them. They knew with certainty that I came from you, and they believed that you sent me. 9I pray for them. I am not praying for the world, but for those you have given me, for they are yours. 10All I have is yours, and all you have is mine. And glory has come to me through them. 11I will remain in the world no longer, but they are still in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them by the power of your name—the name you gave me—so that they may be one as we are one. 12While I was with them, I protected them and kept them safe by that name you gave me. None has been lost except the one doomed to destruction so that Scripture would be fulfilled. 13"I am coming to you now, but I say these things while I am still in the world, so that they may have the full measure of my joy within them. 14I have given them your word and the world has hated them, for they are not of the world any more than I am of the world. 15My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one. 16They are not of the world, even as I am not of it. 17Sanctify[b] them by the truth; your word is truth. 18As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world. 19For them I sanctify myself, that they too may be truly sanctified.

PrayerBits for Saturday

PrayerBits

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

Saturday

Scripture lesson: 1 John 5:9-13 Eternal Life

Time to reflect: Eternal life refers to a timeless, permanent state of being in the presence of God. This is hard to fathom, since our world is so time-bound. What does it mean to be timeless? Try thinking of being somewhere where there are no time-words like “waiting,' “wishing, wanting,” “looking ahead” or “looking back,” “yearning,” “moments.” “when,”now, then.”

Moving through the day: Pray a prayer of thanksgiving that we are to be granted a perfect state of being.

Scripture:

We accept man's testimony, but God's testimony is greater because it is the testimony of God, which he has given about his Son. Anyone who believes in the Son of God has this testimony in his heart. Anyone who does not believe God has made him out to be a liar, because he has not believed the testimony God has given about his Son. And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life.

Concluding Remarks

 I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life.

PrayerBits for Friday

PrayerBits

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

Friday

Scripture Lesson: Psalm 1 The premier Psalm

Time to reflect: Psalm 1 was added to be the introduction to the entire collection of Psalms (Psalm 2 is the introductory Psalm for the first “book” or sub-collection of Psalms). It ties the Psalms to the rest of the Bible and gives an overview of the type of person who will use the Psalms. It uses a technique that was important when it was written – the contrasting of two ways.

Moving Throughout the day: Read the Psalm carefully and prayerfully consider in what ways you are like the righteous and in what ways are you like the wicked of this Psalm.

 Scripture:

Blessed is the man
       who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked
       or stand in the way of sinners
       or sit in the seat of mockers.

  But his delight is in the law of the LORD,
       and on his law he meditates day and night.

  He is like a tree planted by streams of water,
       which yields its fruit in season
       and whose leaf does not wither.
       Whatever he does prospers.

  Not so the wicked!
       They are like chaff
       that the wind blows away.

Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment,
       nor sinners in the assembly of the righteous.

  For the LORD watches over the way of the righteous,
       but the way of the wicked will perish.

PrayerBits for Monday

PrayerBits

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

Monday

Scripture lesson: Acts 11:1-11 Peter defends himself

Time to reflect: There are always those that want to exclude. Those who want to keep to the old ways. Those who want to operate from clear and traditional rules. Unfortunately, God doesn't seem to work this way. This is only one of many example stories from Bible of God's unwillingness to be limited by humans.

Moving Through The Day: Do you find yourself clinging to practices or ideas that limit the work of God? Pray for the ability to set aside that which is not helpful.

The apostles and the brothers throughout Judea heard that the Gentiles also had received the word of God. So when Peter went up to Jerusalem, the circumcised believers criticized him and said, "You went into the house of uncircumcised men and ate with them."

 Peter began and explained everything to them precisely as it had happened: "I was in the city of Joppa praying, and in a trance I saw a vision. I saw something like a large sheet being let down from heaven by its four corners, and it came down to where I was. I looked into it and saw four-footed animals of the earth, wild beasts, reptiles, and birds of the air. Then I heard a voice telling me, 'Get up, Peter. Kill and eat.'

 "I replied, 'Surely not, Lord! Nothing impure or unclean has ever entered my mouth.'

 "The voice spoke from heaven a second time, 'Do not call anything impure that God has made clean.' This happened three times, and then it was all pulled up to heaven again.

 "Right then three men who had been sent to me from Caesarea stopped at the house where I was staying.