Father God,

Today, I pray that we would be like the Servant in Isaiah 50:4 who submits to the instruction of the Word each morning so that we may walk as a disciple and console the weary. I pray that we would not be like Zion in the surrounding verses who rebelled against Your Word, questioned Your motives and methods, and would not hear the Word spoken to them.

Walking as a disciple as the Servant does in daily hearing and submitting to the Word is not something we can do in our own strength. We need the Spirit that You placed within us to walk in union with Christ, the Servant, to walk as the true Zion, the true people of God. Enable us to imitate Christ in His obedience to the Word and to the Word-Giver.

Then let that Word, which saturates us morning by morning, pour out as living water to the weary in our midst. Let the consolation of the Word not finish its effects solely in us, but let us be driven to share that consolation with as many around us as we have opportunity. May the living water quench the thirst of others as we share what we have been mercifully given as a precious gift.

In Christ’s Name,

Amen.

Father God,

Today I pray for spiritual eyes that see the working of Your hands in our lives so that the weary may be encouraged during the long storms. Though our lives are as a fleeting wind upon this earth, coming and going as time continues unhindered, to us our walk seems long in longsuffering. We have to endure the fallenness of this world day in and day out. We become tired as we wait for Your hand to move in whatever way we need it.

In this present world, it is easy to focus just on the things that are seen, seeing the outworking of the Fall not only in nature, but even more so in our own hearts and in the relationships between the fallen. Cause us to see with spiritual eyes how You are weaving all things together for good, how You are working to provide and protect Your children, and how You are continually guiding all things down to the smallest details of our lives. Give us peace in knowing that our heavenly Father knows our needs, our heart’s desires, our struggles and more.

Let Your Word and Your Spirit preserve us in confidence of Your ever present love and mercy in our lives.

In Christ’s Name,

Amen.

Father God,

Today, I pray for those who are mourning. So many have suffered loss in some form or another. We hear on the news of children’s deaths. We hear from friends of returning cancer that takes away security. We hear from others of unexpected lawsuits. We hear of our patients’ broken lives where years have been stolen by illness.

What we hear from those whose lives we touch are only a drop in an ocean of mourning that Your people experience upon this fallen earth. Were we to see as You do all the mourning in its entirety we would be crushed.

Lift us up that we might walk with those who are suffering and mourning. Let Your Strength work through us as Your Hands and Feet to those who mourn. Let the comfort You give and have given us be a comfort to those who now walk in the paths of mourning. Restore joy by Your presence through our shared tears.

In Christ’s Name,

Amen.

Father God,
Today, I pray for the children who are returning or going off to school this month. I pray that You would protect them physically, emotionally, and spiritually regardless of whether it is their first year of school or their last year of studies or anywhere in between.
I pray for those who are excited by their return and those who are dreading it. I pray for those who have been blessed by prior school experiences and for those whose past education has hurt them in one way or another.
I pray especially for those whose prior school experience has left them afraid for their lives from bullying and threats, even actual violence. I pray especially for those whose hearts and spirits have been scarred by what they have seen and heard and experienced even when their bodies have been unharmed. I pray also for those who are unaware of physical or emotional harm, but whose spirits have been misled and deceived against You.
I thus pray for the priceless bodies and souls of our next generation who are being shaped in all these ways for the better or for the worse. I pray You would guard them and draw them to You through both the sunshine and the rain.

In Christ’s Name,
Amen.

Father God,

I pray that You would make our hearts and minds receptive to the Spirit’s work of sanctification through Providence and the Word. The submission to the Potter’s hands are often not easy as the Spirit presses into areas of our lives that we treasure, areas that we protect, areas that we want to hold back from Your molding and shaping. We thank You that Your are patient and gentle even as You strip away self-sufficiency, secret sins, little idols, false notions, and more. We also thank You that You love us so much that You press into these areas of our lives and will never forsake us.

Encourage us as we are shaped by Your Hands, knowing that our Heavenly Father spares no effort in caring for those He has chosen in His Son. Draw us closer and closer to You and Your ways through the working of Your Spirit in us. Then enable us to be Your hands and feet, serving as Your gentle Hands to bless others through the comfort and work by which You shaped us.

In Christ’s Name,

Amen.

Father God,

Today, I pray that Your children would understand what Isaiah 49:8-9 means for us as Your faithfulness to Your Servant is on full display in these verses. Though the Servant was deeply despised and abhorred by the nation, though the Servant lamented that He had labored in vain in 49:4, the Lord declares with repeated certainty that the Servant will accomplish all that He was intended to accomplish, even salvation to the “end of the earth”.

While we ourselves are not in any way the Servant, himself, we are in the Servant as He is our covenant (49:8) and we are the prisoners that He will set free in 49:9. We are also those whom shall be fed and provided for by the work of the Servant in 49:9-11. The guaranteeing by the Lord of the Servant’s work means that we will enjoy the blessings of such a salvation.

So as we lament and walk through any present storm or dark valley, keep us in full confidence of these promises so that we do not grow weary, so that we do not despair, so that we do not take our eyes off the Servant who saves and in whom we have all the blessings that accompany salvation in the covenant that He himself is. Your kingdom come, Your will be done. In this is our hope and greatest blessing.

In Christ’s Name,

Amen.

Father God,

Today, I thank You that Christ understands our despair, our despondency that we experience like in Isaiah 49:4 in which the Servant says “I have labored in vain, I have spent my strength for nothing and vanity.” So many times, we feel as though we have spent our every drop of effort and yet we feel empty handed for all our efforts. Christ knew the pain and expressed that in “My God, Why have your forsaken me?” as well as in these words in Isaiah.

Enable us to follow those words of Isaiah 49:4’s first half with the second half of 49:4 in which the Servant trusts the Lord’s will to provide recompense. May we always find our hope and its fulfillment in the power and promises of our loving Father. May we find peace for our souls in knowing that our Savior truly and fully understands the pains of our heart in our darkest hours.

In Christ’s Name,

Amen.

Father God,

Today, I pray for our nation, that it would not get what it deserves. I pray for mercy as I read Your Word regarding obedience and honoring Your statutes, yet I see a rebellious spirit at work in so many of the people and in so many of the leaders. l know that we do not deserve blessing for having turned away from so many foundational principles of Your Word.

We as a nation has squandered away so much of the Godly heritage that once was. While there was never a golden time in which earthly society did merit the fullness of blessing, I recognize that we as a nation have continued to move further and further away from Your Word and Your Ways. What blessing of obedience we once had is fading with each step away from honoring You and Your Word.

Have mercy and let Your chastisement restore Your remnant in our nation to seeing Your Word in its rightful place, not only seeing it there, but submitting to it there in its fullness that we might walk in blessing rather than chastisement. Let that obedience shine forth before a watching world so that even they recognize Your work in us and through us and for us.

In Christ’s Name,

Amen.

Father God,

Today, I pray against fear of the unknown that so many of us walk through in some form or fashion each day. Even when we know in one sense what has happened, we don’t know how You will use all things for good, sometimes even thinking “how could this possibly be used for good?”. I pray that we would be rooted in the promises of an all-wise and all-powerful Lord who holds us and all of creation in Your Mighty Hand.

Teach our hearts to remain calm in the storms with our eyes set on You, holding to the promises which have never let us down before. Cause those promises to wrap around us and give us peace that only comes from above.

For all those who are struggling today with the unknowns of this world, the broken promises of this world, the disappointments of this world, grant all a supernatural sense of Your presence and promises that they might know they have hope in You for You have prepared all they need for the unknowns and it is blessed.

In Christ’s Name,

Amen.

Father God,

Today, I pray that today we would treasure, we would cherish the precious reality of our irrevocable calling to be Yours. We read in Isaiah 48 how Your calling on Israel both in terms of preserving them despite their unfaithfulness and in terms of Your bringing about Your plans for them, even through Cyrus, was certain beyond any obstacle or hindrance to Your calling.

We clearly have no idea, no sense of the amazing nature of our calling as Your children if we are not overwhelmed by the beauty and glory of this adoption as sons and daughters of the Living God.

Cause our eyes to perceive beyond the physical and to peer into the spiritual world with spiritual eyes such that we would rejoice with overflowing joy in the calling upon our lives to belong to You.

In Christ’s Name,

Amen.