Friday 4th of September 2009 | Posted by Dave Taylor
Sept '09 - Things To Pray For...
Iain Murray in his book 'The Forgotten Spurgeon' writes as follows,

'May God help me, if you cease to pray for me! Let me know the day and I must cease to preach. Let me know when you intend to cease your prayers and I will cry, 'Oh my God, give me this day my tomb, and let me slumber in the dust.'" These words were not the eloquence of a preacher; rather they expressed the deepest feelings of his heart. He believed that without the Spirit of God nothing could be done. When his congregation should cease to feel their 'utter, entire, absolute dependence upon the presence of God', then he was sure they 'would ere long become a scorn and a hissing, or else a mere log upon the water.' Throughout Spurgeon's ministry this concern remained uppermost in his heart.'

Well folks, I'm no Spurgeon, but I do share his sober longing to see all that we're planning to do, and walking through, lifted up to God in prayer. We so need Him! And the great thing is, as always, in His abounding grace, He is eager to answer! I'd therefore eagerly encourage you to continue to pray for this Church plant. Here are a few pointers with that in mind...

VISAS

Our solicitor seems to be doing an excellent job of getting all things 'visa' sorted out. Right now everything seems to be going smoothly, and yet unfortunately, as we've seen before, it's easy for things to slow down in this regard or even grind to a holt. Please pray that this not be the case with us. We're eager to get these through so that we can start planning more accurate arrival dates, and so the sooner we get them the better.

THE PLANTING TEAM

To say that I'm a happy Church planter would be the understatement of a lifetime to be honest - I'm 'ecstatic' about the men and women God has drawn together for this plant. For over three years there has been a group of folk in Sydney that have been desiring and preparing for us to come, and now, joined by a handful of Poms, the potential team comprises of around 23 adults, and 18 children. It has been, and continues to be, so good to get to know these folks. To hear of their passion for the Saviour and their humbling eagerness to get involved with Sovereign Grace Ministries, it has already been quite an adventure. Well, with several months still to go, I'd eagerly encourage you to pray for these folk. For patience, for favour, for all things practical (as some of these guys still need to find jobs & houses in Sydney). Please pray that God just blesses them in all that they do.

OUR JOSHUA

For Emma and I the most pressing thing pre-Australia for us is our Josh's heart operation. Josh is seven years old and for a little lad, he's certainly been through quite a lot. He was born with a sub-mucous cleft palate which meant that he was naturally unable to speak. This was spotted during his years as a toddler and so at the age of 3 he faced the first of two operations on his palate, operations that he walked through with courage - making his Dad more proud than he'll ever know, and operations that in God's kindness were successful.



However, during that time it was also discovered that Josh has two holes in his heart. These have been monitored yearly, and with no sign of them healing up by themselves the doctor has encouraged us towards medical intervention. God has already been so kind to us in this season. It was thought that Josh may have to have open heart surgery, but upon review with his team the surgeon decided it 'likely' that they can perform this operation by using trans-catheter devices that go up through the main artery in Josh's leg. This is a much better operation in that it has far less recovery time and so this was just great news for us. We also received confirmation that with Australia in mind, they have brought the operation forward, and so we await news on this any day now.

With all that said, if you could pray for Joshua, as well as Emma and I through this time, that would mean so much. Although we've been here before with Josh, and seen God's gracious hand in action time and time again, it's still always hard to see your boy walk this path...

Folks, thanks for standing with us in prayer. We come to One who is truly amazing... Who not only spins galaxies, but who listens with eager attention to our cries... let us therefore approach Him with confidence, making our requests fully known. For He is good!

Dave Taylor

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