Happy Saturday!!
I remember studying Solomon one day as a little girl attending a bible study at my Aunt Rose’s house. I think I had to be maybe 8 years old at the most, but I think I was younger. From that prayer I learned that God honors the prayers of a pure heart. I loved the story of Solomon then and even still now because it was his prayer as a child, like I was at that time, that God loved and honored so much. God told Solomon that because he prayed for insight and wisdom and had not prayed for wealth and riches, that he would give him all of those things too. I wanted that too!! lol
Flash forward to now, I see how that prayer has manifested in my life. From the revelations about myself and others, to direction in moves and decisions, to making major life choices, I know that God has blessed me with wisdom. So when I began to pray for the plan of how He would have me to raise my son, I found it not strange that He led me to several books on the power of blessing a child as well as books on raising a Black man and separately on raising child of God. I got excited and ordered some of those books for a few others too.
In reading these books, I realized how much our society as a whole, is the polar opposite. We do not bless our children, and very often, the words a child remembers most are the words of discouragement and put downs they received from the mouth of a parent. In the black community, we discipline our children and sadly give them confines to live within, which isn’t wrong, but lacking the blessing or positive reinforcement, further continues the cycle in many cases. These same children are many times sent to public schools where they may be told they will never amount to anything. I’m reminded now of how Thomas Edison’s mother boldly stepped up to homeschool her son after a teacher sent a letter home to her calling him mentally ill. He became one of the foremost inventors of America. How many of you were called out of your name as a child, compared to a less than stellar family member, or just felt you had to motivate yourself because your parents did not recognize the power of encouraging you? Let’s change that, for you, your children and those you love.
One constant theme mentioned in many of the books is the overall success as a culture of the Jewish community. From having the most Nobel prizes to having amassed much wealth, all of these books in some way allude to how God pronounced a blessing over them and then their parents continued to do so as part of their culture.
Ironically enough, I began speaking a blessing over my future children many years ago, perhaps back in 2009. I used to do it daily then I stopped. After I found out I was pregnant, I turned my sticky note reminders and confessions written on my mirror abuse, lol, into confessions that I would speak aloud over myself and my baby. Now, I pray these blessings specifically for my baby and myself and I plan to make it our daily thing after I give birth. I was reminded in my spirit of something I had begun with one of my nieces. When she was being potty-trained and would tell me she had to potty, I would pick her up and we would sing "Row row row your boat, gently down the stream…" twice while washing her hands since I had seen years prior at work randomly that singing it twice while washing your hands would let you know you’ve made 20 seconds which was the minimum amount of time to kill germs. After a while, whenever I’d take her to bathroom, she would sing it and I smiled. Whenever I would keep her, I would make sure we would say our prayers together too. In that, God taught me the very essence of Proverbs 22:6 — the proof that training a child in the way he or she should go would be a life molding task — because my niece remembered our singing it together and she continued to do it.
So now to the prayer challenge. I believe the very lesson I was supposed to learn this year is that in all things to look to God and to see every situation, no matter how uncomfortable it may be, through the eyes of faith. So for this particular challenge, I want to partner with you in prayer in 4 areas that God leads you to pray, so that we can partner our faith with God’s presence (Matthew 18:20) to see those things God desires for you actually manifest. The prayer challenge begins today, for 40 days. The significance of the number 40 is that is symbolizes a journey — the Israelites traveling 40 years through the wilderness and Jesus fasting 40 days and 40 nights to be tempted by Satan afterwards, for example. The result for the Israelites was that they entered the Promised Land at the end of their journey and God did a pruning and a purging within them that they would be stronger and ready to take hold of the blessing. With Jesus, he not only told Satan where he could go, but he began his 3 year ministry on the earth full of the Spirit, performing miracles for those who believed and bringing us the faith we now share. I don’t know what God wants to manifest in your life through this, but I know that a blessing in some shape or form is one of those things. As background, I began doing these "prayer fasts or challenges" almost three years ago after being led to The Circle Maker and Draw the Circle by Mark Batterson and I’ve truly seen God deepen me in my relationship with Him and truly perform miracles. The foundation of these challenges and now my relationship with God is praying for God’s will to manifest, while praying without ceasing consistently and praying in faith that it will happen. Leaving all of my prayer requests at His feet and seeking His will for my life truly changed me and how I see life.
One thing I’d like to do is pray these prayers of blessing over you as well. Even if you don’t do the prayer challenge with me, because that’s between you and God, if you’d like, I will pray these blessings in my prayer time so just reply back. I already pray for some of you daily anyway. Also if there is a specific prayer request you’d like me to intercede on your behalf about, please let me know. I encourage you to bless yourself and those you love, to ask God for His will to be done in your life and the lives of those you love, to ask God to show you yourself and magnify those areas that need His healing balm and where He would like to work on you, and that the Holy Spirit would hover over and around you everywhere you go.
I’ll also be doing a weekly prayer on Thursdays at 9:15pm if you’d like to join that as well.
With that said, my blessing for you today is that you will experience God’s transformation through receiving all He desires for you to have.
Love you!
Marquita
Life Inspired By God 