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[WW] Pursuit and Prayer · The Wesley Word

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the Wesley World.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_01: Hello.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_01: So for anyone that doesn't know me, my name is Ellie Hatcher.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_01: I'm a senior bioengineering major and I'm from Hannihan, South Carolina, which is in the Charleston area.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_01: And pretty much I've been in Wesley since my freshman year.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_01: I got plugged in because my older brother was a senior when I was a freshman, and he really wanted me to come to Wesley, and in the stubborn little sister fashion that I was and still pretty much am, I said absolutely not.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_01: But thankfully for me, Caitlin, who was my sweetmate at the time, encouraged me to go with her, and I've been going ever since.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_01: I say all of this to say find a community that you feel like you can be yourself around and that you feel loved by.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_01: Wherever it is, whether it's here or another campus ministry or any other organization, just find a place that you feel comfortable and feels like a home, because that's what I've had through Wesley for the past four years.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_01: And so this is just kind of a little slideshow showing people that have been really important to me, the community that I've found through Wesley.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_01: And it doesn't even show half the amount of people that I've impacted in my life because of Wesley, but just a little snippet.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: So going right into it, I have always been a person that was worried about what other people thought of me and was always wanting to make sure to do the so-called right thing.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_01: And this applied for whenever it came to how to be a Christian and what my faith looked like.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_01: As a kid, I believed I was doing everything completely right.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_01: I went to church every Wednesday and Sunday, I memorized all of my Bible verses, I said a blessing before every prayer.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_01: Um and I was just so sure that everything was correct.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but the issue was I was doing all of these things for the wrong reasons.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_01: I was doing these things for worldly reasons, such as fitting expectations that I set on myself and other people had set on me, rather than doing them for the godly purpose we are given.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_01: So, um, Ephesians 2, 8 through 10 says, For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith, and this is not from yourselves, it is from the gift of God, not by works that so no one can boast, for we are God's handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, while God prepared in advance for us to do so.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_01: So don't get me wrong, as a kid I did believe in and love God, but I just wasn't attempting to do anything more than that.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_01: I always believed that when it came to being a Christian, one day you would just figure it all out.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_01: I come from a very religious family, and my parents always seemed to have every aspect of their lives figured out, including their faith.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_01: So, like I said, I figured it was something that would just happen naturally.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_01: As I got older, I would just become more Christian and I would know how to pray properly, how to read the Bible properly, and how to have a genuine relationship with God.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_01: Because it seemed like every adult in my life at this point had already had that figured out.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_01: Um and I figured out that that's not so true.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I kept getting older and kept just waiting for it to happen until eventually I got tired of waiting.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_01: It was my freshman year of college and I had been coming to Wesley for a while, and one day Steve preached on the idea of growing in your faith and not being stagnant.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_01: And this hit me.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_01: The definition of stagnant is motionless, showing no activity, and being dull and sluggish.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_01: And that was exactly what I was.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_01: I had been sitting around all these years waiting for something to magically change inside of me without doing anything to make this magic change happen.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_01: Here I was, a freshman in college, and I've been, I'd gone from thinking I was the perfect Christian that did all of the right things to realizing that I knew absolutely nothing about anything.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_01: It kind of made me feel like I was a fake Christian.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and I didn't really know where to go from here.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_01: But because all I could think about was how do I go from and grow in a relationship that I'd had stagnant within me for 18 years?
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_01: My first thought was how do I call a friend that I haven't talked to in 18 years and just be like, hey, I know it's been a while, but I promise I'll be more involved now.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_01: I got you, it'll be all good.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_01: Like, how do you respond to that?
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_01: But I decided I had to start somewhere, so I opened the Bible and I came across the following verse.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_01: It was Isaiah 30, 18, and it says, The Lord waits for you to come to him so he can show you his love and compassion.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_01: For the Lord is a faithful God.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_01: Blessed are those who wait for him to help them.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_01: I love this verse because it's a reminder of something many of us have probably heard a million times.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_01: Our God is a God of patience, a God of love, and he's one that desires to have a relationship with us.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_01: When I read this, it struck the idea I had of calling a friend who I had imagined.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_01: And the thing about this was this figurative friend I had was a human.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_01: This figurative friend might have responded in a million different ways and maybe wouldn't have accepted me.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_01: But what I did know was from this Bible verse, I knew what God's answer was.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_01: He was waiting for me.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_01: He was ready to answer the phone.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_01: So from all of this, I want to remind everyone that all of our journeys will look completely different.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_01: My journey was and still is so far from perfect.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_01: But there's no perfect way to pursue a relationship with God.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_01: You have to choose to stop waiting and make the decision yourself that you're ready to pursue something more.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_01: For me personally, I got to this point through reading the Bible, but for others, it might be talking to peers and mentors, it might be through prayer, like Ashley's gonna speak about soon, or just all of these things combined.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_01: But I just want to encourage you to find what works for you and pursue that.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_01: And I want this to also serve as a reminder that as Christians, we will never hit a point that we have everything figured out.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_01: In Proverbs 3, 5 through 6, it says, Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_01: In all your ways, submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_01: Every day, we should wake up and choose to pursue God.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_01: And the way we pursue God should change over time.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_01: I went from my freshman year self who barely opened the Bible to my current self that reads my Bible daily, and it's to the point that I'm sharing what I learn in the Bible by co-leading a small group.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_01: And off of this, I want to do a quick little plug to small groups.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_01: If you are not involved in one or have never been involved in one, please try to find one.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_01: There's several offered here, and there's others at other campus ministries, but it's just a great way to dive into your faith deeper with other people that want to dive in with you, which I think is so important.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_01: So basically, if you feel like your faith has been stagnant or you feel lost or confused, I encourage you to stop waiting for something to magically change and do the change yourself.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_01: God is ready for us, He loves us and is gonna help us through anything, but we have to meet him halfway there.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_01: So I want to end with something that my Nana had put in her testimony that I feel is fitting.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_01: She said, the Christian life has been really, really good to me, and I highly recommend it.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_01: So I want to say the Christian life has been really, really good to me, and I highly recommend it.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_02: My name is Ashley Reikert, and I'm a senior chemical engineering major from Monk's Corner.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I have been in Wesley since my very first Sunday freshman year, and I actually haven't missed a Sunday worship since.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_02: Um I like running, playing tennis, and I also love making toilet paper.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_02: So your fun fact for today is that there are tiny chopped-up bits of toilet paper rolls in every single sheet of toilet paper.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_02: They just bleach it.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_02: So that's all I'm allowed to say about toilet paper.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_02: I promised I wouldn't talk about it the whole time.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_02: But I also currently serve as Wesley's prayer coordinator, and so that's what I plan on talking about today.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_02: Just like Ellie, I've also grown up in the church.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_02: I have been fed Bible stories all my life, from Shadrach, Meshak, and Abednigo to Zacchaeus' song.
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but this led me to ponder about how my church life has changed since I've come to college.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_02: I still go to church every week, I read my Bible most nights, and I'm like doing everything right, but I haven't felt the connection with God until I learned how to really pray.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_02: If you're a sophomore junior or you've been on prayer team, you've probably heard most of this devotion before, but it holds such a strong power in my life that I feel like it's really important.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_02: It took the transition to living by myself and becoming independent before I could develop this type of this type of relationship with God, and I'm really, really glad I did.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_02: I realized that I can go through all the routines of a perfect Christian, but if I don't connect personally, I'm missing out on the main point of faith, just like Ellie said.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_02: There are two main aspects that I connect with in terms of prayer.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_02: The first is praying without ceasing, and the second is how to pray to God.
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_02: So my first verses come from 1 Thessalonians 5, verses 16 through 18, and this is the letter by Paul that says, Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances, for this is the will of God in Jesus Christ for you.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_02: These verses call us to pray without ceasing, which took me a while to understand, but the simplest way I've learned to describe it is that prayer is a condition of your heart instead of an act of bowing down and praying.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_02: It's about God being your buddy through life and letting him into the everyday moments.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_02: I know you all have somebody that you're constantly texting, constantly Snapchatting, even I do.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_02: So make God like that person.
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_02: While it seems unsustainable, I'm not saying to bow down, fold your hands all day long, but keep the conversation open.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_02: Prayer without ceasing means to exist in the presence of God all day long and to let Him have all the in-between moments.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_02: I'm a very literal person, so I figured I would share some of the tangible ways that I've learned to work prayer into my everyday life.
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_02: Honestly, I can't say that I pray every single night before bed, and it's a process I'm working on myself.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_02: But when I do, I do what I can to keep my relationship with God open.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_02: The first way is by saying thank you.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_02: When I'm walking around campus and I see a pretty tree or a pretty flower, I literally go, thanks God, and move back to thinking about the best way to create a ethylhexanol reactor.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_02: This small break acknowledges that God is in my life, and even if I don't have a surplus of time to spend with him in the moment, I can still be in his present without directly conversing.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_02: The second one is one that Amy and I share.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_02: We were taught this in elementary school.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_02: Every time we hear a siren from an ambulance or a fire truck, we were taught to pray for that person, because you know they're going through something.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_02: That doesn't have to be your trigger, but try and find something in your life that will serve as your trigger.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_02: I also learned to pray through my Wesley family.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_02: You guys have taught me so much about my prayer life through small group conversations and watching you guys pray.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_02: You've indulged in deep conversations in small group where you taught me to set a reminder on my phone, and I feel like you've helped me so much through this journey.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_02: I've also learned about black and white prayers through people in here.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_02: I feel like it's one of the most powerful prayers I've ever prayed because everyone has gotten a direct answer within the next day.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_02: So the way a black and white prayer works is you look to God and you say, God, I need you to answer this question in black and white.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_02: It takes your heart being in the right place before he's actually gonna answer, but if your heart is there, he actually will answer.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_02: Mine have all been in the shower for some reason, I don't know why, but they were all answered the next day.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_02: And that really took me far in my faith journey and just trusting that God was gonna take care of me.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_02: The second aspect of prayer that I've learned about is praying in public.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_02: So, in my next passage of scripture comes from Matthew 6, verses 5 through 8.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_02: This is from the Sermon on the Mount, and it's a section called literally how to pray.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_02: So he says, And when you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites, for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, that they may be seen by others.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_02: Truly I say to you, they have received their reward.
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_02: But when you go to pray, go to your room, shut the door, and pray to your father who's in secret, and your father will reward you.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_02: And when you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_02: Do not be like them, for your father knows what you need before you ask him.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_02: And then he goes into the Lord's prayer after this.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_02: I feel like this is the verse that a lot of people go to as an excuse not to pray in public.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_02: But after some studying, I don't think that's the main intent of this verse.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_02: I think God is telling us that our prayer should be to God instead of for the admiration of people, not necessarily hidden in secret all the time.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_02: When we pray, pray from your heart, and that's enough.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_02: The underlying meaning is that we shouldn't show off when we pray.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_02: So sometimes it means prayer can be more simple because it's about what you're saying instead of how we're saying it.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_02: This always makes me think back to my high school youth group when we were told we should be fighting over a chance to pray in public.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_02: Sometimes I will say the kids in my youth group were doing it just to get the attention of the youth pastor, but there were a couple kids who really got it, and looking back on that, I really admire them now.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_02: Prayer is a chance for everyone to connect with God and be the leader for our people.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, sometimes I understand we're not in the right headspace to pray, but at the same time, our prayers don't have to be perfect.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_02: I know personally, I don't feel like I'm super good at leading prayers.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_02: I do it often and I've improved, but they're always really short, really to the point, and don't match the styles of what I would call an amazing prayer or how pastors pray.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_02: However, I don't think eloquence is what prayer is about.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_02: It's about connection.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_02: Your prayer style is your own, and even if it starts with Dear Heavenly Father, God is great, or dear daddy God, it is us, it is us connecting with God and sharing that connection to all of us around us, which is what really matters.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_02: So I challenge you all to step up and pray because God calls each of you to be leaders, and what easier way than to be the one conversing with God?
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_02: I've shared with you the ways that I've learned to pray in the past few years, but I understand that's not what works for everyone.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_02: But I hope that you can spend some time discovering the unique prayer style that works for you, and that you can build your own relationship with God instead of conforming to what the world expects of you.
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_02: Speaking of which, let's pray.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_02: Hey God, thank you for bringing us here together.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you for letting Ellie and I share a wonderful message and just help us to go in the world together to be yours and to build our own connection with God.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_02: Help us to understand that it's not what the world tells us is a good Christian, it's what we feel in our hearts is a good Christian.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_02: So, God, just help us to go into the world and to understand this and to live through you.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_02: Amen.
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_00: The Wesley Word is a production of the Clemson Wesley Foundation.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_00: For more information about Clemson Wesley, check out our website or follow us on Facebook and Instagram.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_00: Until next time, get out there and love your neighbor.