Laurie Hopkins

Taken from: Advent Devotions to Take You Deeper: A Season of Faith (Laurie Hopkins, 2018, pages 38. 39).

Let us pray together:

Heavenly Father, Almighty God, we come before You once again and praise Your Holy Name.  We thank You for this journey through Christmas as a season of faith.  We thank You for the opportunity to fellowship together through these devotions; the opportunity to seek Your Voice and Your will for our lives and the opportunity to see Christmas as a lifelong event, not just a season dictated by retail and media, that leaves us burned out and deflated on the 26th of December.  We know that You have a much greater plan and purpose for our lives.  We understand that You sent Your Beloved Son to earth in the form of a Child for a much greater purpose than gifts and glitter; that you sent Him that He would live as a man and be sacrificed on the cross, rising again on the third day, to cover our sins and grant us eternal life and an eternal walk with you!  We ask for Your guidance and direction, Father, as we seek to understand faith and how it impacts our lives and our decisions and our walk with You.  Grant us wisdom and understanding.  I ask, Father, that You bless each and every one reading these devotions – their families, friends, homes and lives.  That You would show each and every one of them that You loved them enough to send Your one and only Son to die for their sins; that they just need to believe and confess with their mouth that they are in need of a Savior, that Jesus is that Savior and that they want Him to be Lord of their life.  “’The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart’ [that is, the word of faith that we preach] that if you confess with our mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.  For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.” Romans 10:8-10.  We pray all of these things in the precious Name of Jesus.  Amen and Amen and Amen.

Taken from: Advent Devotions to Take You Deeper: A Season of Faith (Laurie Hopkins, 2018, page 34).

Let us pray together:

Heavenly Father, Giver of light, knowledge and faith itself, we come before you and thank you for this opportunity to see Your direction and guidance in this Advent season. Once again we acknowledge that the sparkle of Christmas has dulled and we wish to regain our joy and faith in the Christmas season.  Awaken our desire to see and hear more of what you have for us while not relying on our knowledge or our ability to take care of things ourselves. Keep us from being blinded by the darkness and help us to choose the light, even the very Light of Your Son, Jesus Christ, in whom we pray.  Amen and Amen and Amen.

Taken from: Advent Devotions to Take You Deeper: A Season of Faith (Laurie Hopkins, 2018, pages 25, 26)

“Let us pray together:

Heavenly Father, He who speaks, fulfills, and reveals, we come before You and cry Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty!  We are humbled in Your presence this Christmas season as we seek to learn the faith story.  We are humbled by these men and woman whose lives You have chosen to be part of the miracle of the birth of the Christ Child.  We are humbled by their faith, their obedience, their praise and their service – but we are even more humbled by the thought that you choose to record their stories in Your Word, that we might know and understand that you have also chosen each one of us, as “everyday” as we may be.  We know that this journey into faith impacts much more than how we spend our Christmas this year; that it impacts how we live our very lives.  We know that you have a plan for each of our lives and we ask as we continue on this journey of faith, that you would grant us wisdom regarding our own faith, where it is and where it needs to be and how to walk that path; that you would reveal to us Your plan for our lives and would grant us the faith to walk it out in obedience and service.  We ask this in the precious Name of Jesus, the Christ. Amen and Amen and Amen.”