iPray: Day 6

A Prayer for the family

However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband. Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. Honor your father and mother"—which is the first commandment with a promise— "that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth."Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord. Ephesians 5:33 - 6:4

Your wife will be like a fruitful vine, within your house; your sons will be like olive shoots around your table.Thus is the man blessed who fears the LORD. Psalm 128:3-4

A father to the fatherless, a defender of widows,is God in his holy dwelling. God sets the lonely in families Psalm 68:5-6b

Father God to You be the glory for the great things you have done. Our God, our King, our exceedingly great reward, we call you the Almighty because indeed there are mighty men and women, mighty situations but there is no one and there is nothing that is Almighty. There are kings but You are the Kings of Kings, the Lord of Lords, I AM that I AM. Father, I thank you for being a prayer answering God. Thank you because in this season we will see You as You indeed are. We so often take for granted who you are and the things you do but today we are saying Thank you.

Dear Lord today I come before your presence bringing families before your throne of grace. Father, although we come in all shapes and sizes, one thing we have in common is that we all belong to families. Whether we know them or not, whether we relate to and with them or not, whether biological or adopted, whether physical or spiritual we all belong to families. The family is our point of origin into the earth. From the beginning of time, you created it so. In families, we find our sense of identity, our sense of belonging, we are trained in the way we should go. It's our first classroom. Thank you so much for letting it be this way, you created us for relationship, to relate with You, to relate with ourselves and to relate with each other, hence the family.

These days it is difficult to define what a family is. What we used to know as your plan for the family is now referred to as 'traditional'. We have forgotten that a nation, a people, is only as strong as the family. Your word has given us a model for what families ought to be like. Father as a family of believers, we come before you to ask your forgiveness from deviating from the truth. Your word says that unless the Lord builds a house, we labour in vain. We come back to you, helpless and needy and submit ourselves back to your plan, back to your original intention for us.

Your word says how good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell together in UNITY. Father today I ask that our love for you bind us together in our families in Jesus name. I pray for husbands and fathers, that they love their families, that they protect them, that they provide for them, not just financially but spiritually and emotionally. That they do not abdicate their responsibility as the head of the home, that they be present, that they be kings. I pray for wives and mothers for the grace and strength to submit to their husband's headship, that they respect their husbands and provide a united front to train and discipline their children, instructing them in the way of the Lord. I pray for the children to give their parents the honour that is due them that their days on earth may be long.

I commit homes before your throne of grace o Lord, just as the enemy has refused to relent in his attack, we also refuse to relent in offering our prayers to the Most High. Just like the man with crippled feet looked unto Peter and John at the Gate Beautiful, the world is looking at us for an answer, that in the midst of turmoil, believers can still beat the odds. We can have successful marriages, our children can grow in an atmosphere that encourages them, one of love and peace, one that does not stifle their creativity or mess with their destiny. Lord you have shown us the way, it's narrow. It calls for the higher way, the way of LOVE, to love that man, to love that woman, to love those children or just maybe that mother-in-law! Lord we ask for grace because we know we can't do it on our own.

I pray for single parent families, whether by loss or relationship breakdown, I commit them before you. An extra dose of strength, an extra dose of knowledge and wisdom. There are statistics concerning single parent households but I thank God because we the children of the Kingdom create our own statistics. I pray for church families to continue to extend their hands and be the mother, the father, the brother, the sister that are needed, not just by greeting Brother and Sister in church but by letting our actions show that is who we are in deed.

I pray for those estranged from their families, brothers who are lost, sisters who can't forgive, children who have gone their own way, the one who cries each time when the children ask why God had to take mummy/daddy to heaven just now?, the one who was abused, the one who was mistreated. Lord you have promised to be a Father to the Fatherless, a defender of the widows. You are El-Shaddai, the multi breasted one. We receive your love that heals us from the inside in Jesus name. Like Joseph, let us allow your purpose and your calling to enable us keep going forward in Jesus name.

Father thank you for family, for grandparents and parents, for uncles and aunts, for cousins and nephews, for nieces and in-laws. I pray that as your word says one generation shall tell of your good works to the other generation and it shall be so in Jesus name. I pray that we learn from the older generation, that we glean the wisdom of their gray and yet at the same time politely refuse to live by the traditions of men that do not give you glory.

All families face storms but give us the wisdom to build our house on the ROCK that even when we take a beating we shall remain standing and having done all still stand.

Father I ask because I serve a God who inclines His ear to the requests of His people especially when they stand by the word of God. I pray that this prayer cause a transformation in the hearts of men and women all over the world in Jesus name. Teach us to pray.

In Jesus name I ask, Amen.

Remain blessed and highly favoured. 2010 continues to be our year of 'The Lord has done this' and He is doing it. Our best time is now!