Friday, July 17, 2009

"A Pastor With Guts"

A friend sent me the following story about a courageous and inspiring prayer that was given by a minister in Kansas. Some powerful stuff!



"A Pastor With Guts"

Thought you might enjoy this interesting
prayer given in Kansas at
the opening session of their Senate. It seems
prayer still upsets some
people. When Minister Joe Wright was asked to open
the new session of the Kansas Senate, everyone was expecting the usual generalities, but this is

what they heard:

Heavenly Father, we come before you today to ask
your forgiveness and to seek your direction and
guidance. We know Your Word says, 'Woe to those
who call evil good,' but that is exactly what we
have done.

We have lost our spiritual equilibrium and reversed
our values.

We have exploited the poor and called it
the lottery.

We have rewarded laziness and called it
welfare.

We have killed our unborn and called it
choice.

We have shot abortionists and called it
justifiable.

We have neglected to discipline our
children and called it building self esteem..

We have abused power and called it
politics.

We have coveted our neighbor's possessions
and called it ambition.

We have polluted the air with profanity and
pornography and called it freedom of expression.

We have ridiculed the time-honored values
of our forefathers and called it enlightenment.

Search us, Oh, God, and know our hearts
today; cleanse us from every sin and set us free.
Amen!


The response was immediate. A number of
legislators walked out during the prayer in
protest. In 6 short weeks, Central Christian
Church, where Rev. Wright is pastor, logged more than
5,000 phone calls with only 47 of those calls
responding negatively. The church is now receiving
international requests for copies of this prayer
from India , Africa and Korea

Commentator Paul Harvey aired this prayer on
his radio program, 'The Rest of the Story,'and
received a larger response to this program than any
other he has ever aired.


With the Lord's help, may this prayer sweep
over our nation and wholeheartedly become our
desire so that we again can be called 'one nation
under God.'

5 Comments:

At 11:29 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Talk out summing up our culture in a nutshell!

 
At 2:20 PM, Blogger fran said...

Three cheers for the TRUTH speaking pastor!

 
At 2:29 PM, Blogger CynthiaBC said...

BTW, it was at the opening of the 1996 opening session of the Kansas legislature that Rev. Wright spoke this prayer. It’s somewhat disheartening that this prayer is just as relevant today as it was 13 years ago.

Relatively few people make worship a regular part of their week, as illustrated in this 1993 study that looked to validate self-reported v. actual attendance:
“Kirk Hadaway, Penny Marler and Mark Chaves counted the number of people attending four Protestant churches in Ashtabula County, OH, and in 18 Roman Catholic dioceses throughout the U.S. In their 1993 report they stated that actual attendance was only about half of the level reported in public opinion surveys: 20% vs. 40% for Protestants, and 28% vs. 50% for Roman Catholics.

”They later returned to Ashtabula County to measure attendance by Roman Catholics. They physically counted the number of attendees at each mass over several months. They concluded that 24% of Catholics in the county actually attended mass. They then polled residents of the county by telephone. 51% of Roman Catholic respondents said that they had attended church during the previous week. Apparently, most were lying.”

 
At 3:36 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

The following is a poem written by Judge Roy Moore from Alabama. Judge Moore was sued by the ACLU for displaying the Ten Commandments in his courtroom foyer. He has been stripped of his judgeship and now they are trying to strip his right to practice law in Alabama. The judge's poem sums it up quite well.


America the Beautiful, or so you used to be.
Land of the Pilgrim's pride; I'm glad they'll never see.
Babies piled in dumpsters, Abortion on demand,
Oh, sweet land of liberty; your house is on the sand.
Our children wander aimlessly poisoned by cocaine,
Choosing to indulge their lusts, when God has said abstain.
From sea to shining sea, our Nation turns away
From the teaching of God's love and a need to always pray.
We've kept God in our temples, how callous we have grown.
When earth is but His footstool, and Heaven is His throne.
We've voted in a government that's rotting at the core,
Appointing Godless Judges who throw reason out the door,
Too soft to place a killer in a well deserved tomb,
But brave enough to kill a baby before he leaves the womb.
You think that God's not angry, that our land's a moral slum?
How much longer will He wait before His judgment comes?
How are we to face our God, from Whom we cannot hide?
What then is left for us to do, but stem this evil tide?
If we who are His children, will humbly turn and pray;
Seek His holy face and mend our evil way:
Then God will hear from Heaven and forgive us of our sins,
He'll heal our sickly land and those who live within.
But, America the Beautiful, if you don't - then you will see,
A sad but Holy God withdraw His hand from Thee.

Judge Roy Moore

 
At 1:18 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

i remember him and always wondered what happend; thanks for sharing his poem.

you know, i've always wondered how one would go about orchestrating on a certain day and time having the usa meet on their main roads in their area, joining hands, and praying the Our Father together; kinda hands across America and our voices would be so loud they would carry across the whole world to hear. would that be possible?

 

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