Nov 23, 2021

Being Thankful for Answered and Unanswered Prayers

"We pray for the miraculous. We pray those huge prayers and we believe God can, but even if He doesn't we don't lose hope, because He is our only hope in this world. He is the only way." - Alex Hall

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In the spirit of Thanksgiving, I have been thinking a lot about prayer and gratitude. Who better to chat with about this topic, than my very own pastor from church! I am so excited to welcome my pastor, Alex Hall, to the show today to discuss how to make prayers more meaningful, what a prayer journal is, and how to better recognize God's answers to our prayers.

Alex has been doing church ministry work for over 14 years and is currently planting a new church called Revival, in the city of Omaha, Nebraska. He loves to read and write, but more than either of those, he loves to preach and teach the truth of Jesus Christ from scripture. His passion is helping people understand God's word so they can apply it to their lives. He's been married almost 11 years to his wife Steph, and they have three kids. Between raising a family and planting a new church, he's also written a book, and is getting ready to release two more in the near future.

While Alex did attend a Christian college, he did not expect to work in church ministry and especially not to start his own church, but many years later and Alex is happily doing both!

The word "revival" had been on Alex's heart for awhile and with people feeling more disconnected than ever due to the pandemic, he felt God telling him that a revival of faith was exactly what people needed, so he started his Revival church.

Many years prior, Alex heard another pastor share about a prayer journal and it peaked his interest. While initially he was a bit skeptical, he quickly realized that a prayer journal is so much more than just a diary about one's life but can actually help channel one's faith and prayers to deepen your relationship with God. One of the words he wrote in this prayer journal was "revival." He felt called to start this church and after many years of prayer and faith combined with action, he was able to make this prompting a reality.

One of the major takeaways from my conversation with Pastor Alex is how important it is to write down our prayers and our visions of our future. God puts these things on our hearts for a reason and if we do not take the time to write them down, we may easily forget them and never allow them to come to pass. Alex emphasized that these things are just ideas until we write them down. Once we write it down, and start speaking about it, all of a sudden that vision can begin to become a reality.

Just like anything in life, prayer is something we have to practice and work at to get better. When we practice this discipline of writing down our prayers, we can begin to see the next steps to take to move that vision forward that we are being called to fulfill.

So friends, let's be faithful. Let's be grateful, and let's write down our prayers! Then we can look to the future with increased hope and trust that God will answer our prayers, but even if He doesn't, just like Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, we will not lose our hope in Him.

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