I bumped into a little elderly lady the other day ( approx 60 years old). I know her fairly well from a church that we both "once" attended. This little lady has always been totally on fire for the Lord and does really great work going out and ministering to the poor areas. She is involved in running medical clinics and uses this to reach out to the poor and hurting. She has always been a real shining example of the true love of Jesus to all around her.

The lady started to relate to me how she was recently at a night meeting in one of the poor area's. She had been attending these meetings, aimed at improving conditions in these slums, for the past 26 years. This particular meeting started to get out of hand and soon the fighting began. She left the meeting.

On going to her car outside she was cornered by two black men and her horror ordeal started where she was gang raped.

Instead of being met with the love of Jesus shining through her brothers and sisters in Christ, whom she had so lovingly helped and loved for many years, she was rather met with accusations of  "having been looking for it" and even deserving the rape because she was in bad area's. The pastor prayed once for her and she was expected to have been healed from this horror.

How sad! A hurt and ordeal like this does not simply go away with one little prayer. You don't get over it just like that. Where is that love of Jesus that is supposed to shine out from the brothers in Christ. Instead of love there is condemnation.

The little lady shared how she rejected the church and became bitter and filled with hate. This lasted for months until one little young girl who was filled with the real love of Jesus, noticed the change in the little old lady who had led her to the Lord. The little girl alerted another sister in Christ, from another denomination, who was filled with love of Jesus and this lady came and ministered and loved continually until the hurts of the ordeal were healed by Christ.

Unfortunately the hurts of the rape were healed eventually, but the hurts caused by the unloving and uncaring "Christian" brothers are not healed.

I can recount hundreds of stories like this one. When you are sick or in trouble it is often those who you have ministered to for hours on end and those that you have served lovingly for years, who are the first to turn their back on you. Real christians are unfortuantely a scarce commodity in today's times.

It is sad that many of our churches have become money making machines that are too busy to deal with and help those that are really in need. The love of Christ has often been replaced by a love of money.  Brothers and sisters are too involved in themselves to be worried about others, and the love that is suppossed to radiate out to others is lost and instead attending church has become more about social status than spreading the love of Jesus.

Bring back the love of Jesus into your lives. Spend time to love those who are hurting. Help them and lift them up. Ask yourself what would Jesus do in this situation. Would He turn His back on them or would He hold out His arms and lovingly embrace them?

Love those who are hurting and nurse them back into spritual health. Bring back the love into our churches.

Jesus loved His disciples, and He wished that they would continue to walk in His ways and to build His kingdom here on earth, just as Jesus loves you and is bonded to you in love and wishes for you to continue to build His Kingdom. These words were not only for the disciples but are as relevant to us today as they were to the disciples 2000 years ago.

Up until this stage, Jesus had done most of the praying. Jesus would often withdraw from the disciples and enter into relationship with the Father through prayer. It was the manner in which Jesus maintained relationship with the Father and in which Jesus drew His strength from the Father. In Luke 22:42 and 43 it describes how as Jesus was praying that an angel appeared and strengthened Him.

We are to draw near to God and have a perfect relationship with Him through Christ Jesus who loves us. We have been given the keys to Heaven through the name of Jesus and we are to enter into His prescence often through prayer and draw our strength for daily living. When you are in constant relationship through prayer, you are full of the light of His love, the devil can not come near you, for where there is light there can not be darkness. Greater is He that is inside of you than He that is in the world.

Temptation comes from the devil who will continually attempt to remove you from the narrow path to the kingdom of God and eternal life in heaven. Whenever temptation comes, it will always be at your moment of weakness and when you are vulnerable from not being in full relationship with God. As soon as you see temptation, recognise that it is from the evil one and enter into prayer, for in prayer you are in the Father's company, from which the devil will flee, and the temptation will be overcome. Resist the devil through prayer and by confessing that the Jesus that is inside of you, is the Christ, the Son of the Living God.

Most of all, remain in constant prayer and relationship with the Father through Jesus, that you may walk in the fullness of His love for you and that the devil will not be able to come near to you due to the prescence of the Father around you.

The fastest way in which to enter into God's prescence and into the Holy of Holies, is through praising Him and then worshipping Him. Psalm 95 :-

"Oh come let us sing to the Lord! Let us shout joyfully to the Rock of our salvation. Let us come before His prescence with thanksgiving. Let us shot joyfully to Him with Psalms."

Psalm 100:4  "Enter into His gates with thanksgiving, And into His courts with praise."

Often people tell me that they are unable to reach God or to hear God talking to them. It seems to them as if the Heavens above them are brass and that their prayers do not get through to God. Mostly people do not take the time to enter into the prescence of God. They rush in and start telling God everything that they do not have and everything that they need. If I was God, I would probably be saying, "Uh-Oh, here comes Suzy again and all she ever does is complain, so let me hide quickly." Fortunately I am not God.

My God inhabits the praises of His people. We were created for the purpose of praising God and giving glory to God. The way to enter into the prescence of God is through praising Him. When you start to praise God instead of complaining, and you start to thank Him for all that He has already done for you, and all that He is still busy doing, you will start to see a change in your life, in your prayer life and in your relationship with God.

For those that are married or in a serious relationship with someone, imagine what it would be like if whenever you are in the prescence of your spouse, all they do is tell you what they do not have and what you have not done for them, and how they are always lacking. I think that relationship would be doomed to failure. Yet this is the very type of realtionship that many have with God our Father.

Before you start to pray, take some time to thank God, take time to give Him glory for all that He has done for you, and sing and shout to him, even if it is only in your heart, and immediately you will see a difference. Once you have spent time praising Him, then go to the next level, which is to enter into worship, and before you will even realise it you will find yourself carried away in His presence, in the Holy of Holies, in total relationship with God. When you are in this state, you will find that you no longer need to go before God and cry and beg, for it will automatically be done for you before you even ask.

If you have never had the opportunity of being in a true relationship with God, then all you need to do is to ask Jesus to come into your life today by saying a small prayer.