DAILY DIET E-BOOK SERIES 01 DAY 05 (MINISTERING TO THE LORD)

As they ministered to the Lord, and fasted, the Holy Ghost said, Separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I have called them. —Acts 13:2 

Often it seems the only kind of prayer we are familiar with is the petition prayer. We're always petitioning (or asking) God to do something, and of course, that's scriptural. But in the Scripture quoted above, those Christians were not petitioning God to do anything. They "ministered to the Lord, and fasted...." Most of our church services are designed so we come together and minister to one another. We sing, but in very few songs do we minister to the Lord. Instead, we minister to one another. We have special singing, but still, we're not ministering to the Lord; we're ministering to one another. 

When we pray, our praying is primarily a petition. We're petitioning the Lord to move in our midst, to manifest Himself among us, to meet our needs. When the minister speaks, he's not ministering to the Lord; he's ministering to the congregation. And when the service is over, if we have a time of waiting on God, usually these prayers are still petitions. We know God is concerned about us and wants to meet our needs.

 Jesus said our heavenly Father knows what we need, and we should ask Him to supply these needs. But, too much of the time we're like the little boy who said, "My name's Jimmy, and I'll take all you'll gimme!" We need times of waiting on God and ministering to the Lord; times when we're not asking for anything—not petitioning —but ministering to Him. Perhaps we are already taking time for this in our individual prayer lives, but we need this kind of prayer as a group or a church. God can move in this kind of atmosphere. 

As they ministered to the Lord and fasted our text says, the Holy Ghost manifested Himself. God made man to fellowship with Him. He is our Father because we are born of God. I'm sure of this: There are no earthly parents who enjoy the fellowship of their children more than God enjoys the fellowship of His children. 

In one meeting I held, I said to the people after the sixth week, "Let's have some different kinds of services. I want us to come to minister to the Lord. I may read a little bit of Scripture, or make a few comments, but I'm not going to preach or teach a lot. We're not going to come to petition God; we're going to wait on the Lord and minister to Him. "I don't want us to come and wait 10 minutes. I want us to come with the thought that we're going to wait at least one hour. We'll minister to the Lord—tell Him how much we love Him and thank Him for His goodness and mercy." The people came and praised the Lord. I found they wanted to wait on God. In that kind of atmosphere, God ministered to us in very unusual ways. Although that was years ago, there still are things happening today as a result of what the Lord did in those services. I'm sure of this: We miss a lot of what God has for us because we don't take time to get into an attitude of worship and minister to the Lord. 

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             To be continued

FFT: Ministering to the Lord is a potent key to unlock access into the supernatural realms.

ACTION POINT: Let's cultivate the attitude of ministering to the lord.

INTERACTIVE SESSION: In what practical ways can we minister unto the Lord......share your comment below;