Sydney: What is our purpose? What are we seeking? What are our eyes fixed on? It's crucial. 

To what end are we doing _____? Maybe it's a sport, a commitment. Maybe as a parent it's something you're committed to, something you're gone for a good amount of time -- whether it's a job or just a volunteer. 

Jo of Sydney: Make sure you trace it all the way back to truth -- that you get truth to your children. 

Sydney: Is this draining or will this give us some life? It goes back to knowing them -- will it help them? That takes discernment from God, and He'll give it. 

Again, predeciding -- having thought this through before the signups get sent out. Take the time to pray and think it through before you have to make the decision -- have the time to think it through with your husband. 

Jo: You don't let the outside voices distract you from what your aim is. 

Sydney: Stay confident. God will give you that confidence when it's in Him, trusting in Him.

You don't have to play the compariso...

In seeking to point our family in God's ways, "No one has it all right but your heart is to seek what is right and right for your family." (Jo)

Jo: What is your schedule going to be to educate your children so that you raise them up in the wisdom and knowledge of the Lord? 

Sydney: Three points: Our Gaze (What are we focusing on?), Staying Anchored, Finding Freedom 

Our Gaze = choosing a school and extracurriculars and schedules > To what end are we doing these things?

Aim for what is bringing Him glory. It's hard to connect at home, to have discipleship, to have peace in the home if there's too much scurrying, busyness, and I think the enemy loves to use it to have families drift away from His ways. You can have good aim, but what are we doing to stay anchored?

Jo: The enemy will always be working behind the scenes to steal, kill and destroy what you've decided -- the aim. What about these things that come along the way that busyness creeps in? that competition creeps in? What do...

Let the Word of God sink deep down into your heart. 

Jesus is at the right hand interceding for all of us. 

"You are just waiting for us to come to You and join with Jesus and Your heart to seek You, Father, with all our heart on our behalf.

I pray right now, Father, that You would reach down with Your righteous right hand and You would put Your right hand on this beloved one, and they would know Your presence, they would sense Your presence, they would know You are all in for them."

God loves us with an everlasting love.

There is nothing that we have done, there is nothing that we will ever do that can separate us from the love of God.

"Lord, I thank You for just the thought that You love us with an everlasting love.

You are the God of all hope.

God, right now, would You give us the grace to take our eyes off of those [things that aren't You will for us] and put our face like flint before You, that we see You as we know You, that we hunger and thirst for righteousness and that...

What a privilege to pray for needs. 

What if you have prayed and prayed and prayed, and you really need to see the hand of God? 

Have you fasted about the matter -- asking God to intervene with a supernatural power to move in that situation?

Let's talk about what fasting can do to move the heart of God. (biblical, spiritual fasting)

Remember: Put fasting on a situation. 

Spiritual fasting is just a period of time that you voluntarily abstain from food or drink. And, during that time, you seek the heart of God. Within that, there's always an implied sacrifice. 

Fasting, according to the Bible, is to cover the mouth, to abstain from eating/ drinking. 

It's time where you sacrifice your flesh. It's a time when you're willing to use that time to fee on the Word of God -- not just going without eating. 

* "God, I need Your supernatural power working in this situation." 

In the example of loneliness: 1. Get God's opinion 2. Let Him be your close companion

If you do a 24 hour fast, ...

I not only have a physical family, but I have a spiritual family. God is my Father. He is my authority. He's at the head of the table. I look up to Him. He imparts wisdom to us because He wants to take care of us. He wants to keep us together, unified. 

God reminded me:

• I do have value, that I am a child of the King. 
• I have been accepted in this family (with Brothers and Sisters) and I belong -- I have a place at the table. 

This vision of my family generated within me such a love for all believers, even those I'm not close to. 

The world is hungry to see true life--life with meaning. And we, as the family of God, we've got that, but we've got to see it and believe it, joining with one another. 

I believe this is the answer to unifying the body of Christ: first seeing who we are in Christ, together as a family -- Brothers and Sisters and God our Father. 

We know whose we are, who we belong to, and we trust that God knows the right thing to do. He is growing us up to know ho...

Be a vessel of honor, sanctified, prepared for any work that God has for us.

This is the surrendered life. 

To deliver something to someone on His behalf, not that you would be seen, but so that God is glorified -- that it would be done in such a way it would be exactly the way He would do it if He were here on earth, in the physical. 

Glory reflects God Himself. 

God wants His presence to dwell among us -- He will send us, who are filled with the Holy Spirit that God's countenance rests upon, so that God's presence will minister to another person

* If the Holy Spirit is hand picking you to go and deliver His presence, then be prepared out of a pure heart overflowing with the love of God and the compassion and mercy of God -- just show up. 

God used other people as His vessel to hand-deliver God's presence to me so that I could be encouraged, I could have hope, I could get through the hurt. 

God wants to use you to hand-deliver that message. You're the vessel that the Word has b...

Love. Joy. Forgive. These are powerful Biblical concepts. 

When I see Jesus' humility as He walked here on earth, I see my prideful self. Every day I have to get on the altar and cleanse my heart of pride. When I see Jesus' humility, it makes me want to humble myself before God.

Andrew Murray says: One of the first things that Jesus did for us was to forgive us of our sins, and in doing so, He considered it a joy. Because Jesus considered it a joy to forgive us of our sins, that Jesus would want us to join Him, to participate in that -- that we might forgive others and consider It a joy in our lives to do it. 

• Through forgiving (an act of the heart), it was a joy for Jesus to do what He did -- to forgive us of our sins -- all because He loved us. It was out of love.

It was a joy for Jesus to go to the cross because it was an act of forgiveness that He stepped into, on our behalf. He was willing to be afflicted, to pay that price for your sins and my sins so that we would be for...

If we would just follow the rules...

If we would just listen and obey authority, we could get out of this.

The real issue in our lives today: You can trace everything back to authority. > We don't know where to run to for the rules. They keep being changed in the physical realm. What rules do we decide are going to be our authority? And who do they come from?

* Our authority is the Word of God. God is our sovereign God. He rules. He wrote it down at the foundation of time. He spoke by the Spirit of the living God to His prophets, to His patriarchs, to His men of God: "Thus saith the Lord."

You will be a blessing to Father God and those around you. Not that you won't have problems

We have removed ourselves from the principle of authority. We have become accustomed to being our own authority, independent, calling our own shots, but yet when we get in a mess, we want to run to God and we depend on God to bail us out. We can't have it both ways.

* God wants us to come before Him and ...

Reflect on what the day means, remember how the day came about, remember how Father God was involved in bringing it about -- that we would have a nation, that we would be free to worship Him. 

Use it as a lesson going forward to meet some of the needs -- the desperation -- our nation has today. 

Remember all the things that happened in the physical -- the battles, the commitment -- to fight for independence. 

Remember the things that happened in the the spiritual -- not just so we could be independent of a British nation but so that (being independent from them) we were totally free to be dependent upon the Almighty God. 

Are we living in the fullness of the Independence Day? Are we celebrating that our nation is living in total dependency upon the Almighty God?

Before the fireworks, there was a fire of the Holy Spirit that moved across our nation. It was the Spirit of the living God that was moving among men through leaders, everyday Christians, through preachers. 

But for God, ...

It was going to take me agreeing with Him to make the change -- to change the behavior so that my health would be better. Then I could have that blissful life. 

- But if I didn't, I would compromise my health. I would stay frustrated and defeated in these little habits. 

- But I was ready to make a change. 

Is there a "nuclear threat" in our own lives where we need to make a change? Where we need to listen to Him? God is sounding the alarm to get our attention.

Do you have a little bad habit? It could be defeating us, hindering our prayers.

"God, why aren't you moving? I'm standing on your promise!" Why don't we see the miracles? Why the wait?

In the wait, in the why, maybe God sees something in us. We're walking through a time of sanctification. Is God putting the light on our lives? 

I've confessed, but I need to be delivered of this wretchedness -- that I don't keep repeating these same sins. I'm ready to be delivered. It's time to repent, to change. 

God wants to remove all...