Be Salt and Light

Join Chris Byberg as he previews the exciting return of Parliament on October 22, with key issues like charity status and Bill C-6 on the agenda!

Transcript

Hi everybody, it's Chris Byberg, the Director of the National House of Prayer in Ottawa. So next week, Monday the 22nd, the 44th Parliament will be sitting. This will be the first day back. It's going to be an exciting, I think it's going to be a pretty interesting Parliament. We heard that the Liberals were going to roll out, penalize, charity status for Christ's pregnancy. We're watching for that. We've heard that they're going to reintroduce Bill C-6 and other things. So we're watching, and we're watching and praying. I just want to thank you, for those of you who track with us on a regular basis, that you realize that this isn't a prayer movement that's sort of tracking with the election

cycle, but that we are in prayer for our leaders on a continuous basis, servicing our writings in prayer. So thank you for those who are doing that and tracking with us, and that have joined our canopy of prayer as well. Thank you. Interesting thing. So we know that it's going to be a challenging session. We're feeling that it's going to be challenging. So how do you deal with challenges? And that's what I want to talk to you about today. How do we deal with them? And what is our posture? Or when you come in as, argh, vicious, argh, so let me read something from the Beatitudes that I think is going to help us with our posture, the posture of honour. So let me read this.

There's two sections I want to talk about. So anyway, it's about salt and light. You are the salt of the earth, but if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled on by men. You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. But they put it on a stand and it gives light for the whole house. In the same way, let your light shine before men that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven. So this is a wonderful season and a wonderful opportunity.

You know me, you know that I was a constituency, I worked in a constituency, I was a constituency manager for a member of provincial parliament. So I know the wherewithal and how to work this system. And I also know how you need to be addressing your members of parliament. I want to reach you, I want to recommend that when the crises come, that you reach out to them. It doesn't matter what side of the aisle they are on. It doesn't matter if you like them or not. We're called to pray for all those in authority and that's what we're going to do. We're going to pray for our leaders. But come with the right attitude. Come as salt and light. Come as the hands and feet of Jesus.

I want to encourage you to do that. That you come and you come in a place of honour. Let me share a story with you. We have somebody who joins our prayer calls on Thursday, Tuesday and Wednesdays and his name is Doug. And he was reaching out to us today and we had a great chat. He has this member of parliament that he's been praying for. Now initially when she was running for the candidacy, he didn't really root for her. In fact, he didn't root for the next one, he would root for another person. But it's more like his third choice got in and won the candidacy and she also won her seat which is really, really, really good.

But Doug took the posture that even though she wasn't his favourite and she didn't take off all the boxes that he wanted to see in a candidate, he was going to pray for her anyway. And he reached out and he told her, I'm going to pray for you, I'm praying for you. Well she sent him a little note today or yesterday and it was because he had reached out to her. She had done something really positive in the community. Catch this, she'd done something really positive in the community and he wrote to her and reached out to her to say thank you for doing that. That was really good. It had to do with homelessness and some other issues and she responded and she said this

and I want you to catch this, thank you for reaching out, thank you for your feedback and thank you for praying for me. That is huge. What a fantastic posture. Doug didn't come into the place where he was demanding, demanding and when she did something well he said thank you. You know what? It would be really good even for those that are not on our teams at all, it might be completely different if they do something that's righteous and good, I want to encourage you to reach out to them and say well done. Thank you. We want to build bridges. We want to encourage. We want to be salt. We want to be light and we don't want to just oppose and complain.

Rob Parker says this really well in his book, We Have a Voice. He tells us to posture ourselves to bring proposals. Propose not oppose and I think that's a real wonderful place of wisdom. Move from that place, move from, move to the place of honor and see how the doors open. Like our friend Doug said, see how the doors open. See how the Lord will open the door before you. So let's pray. Father we thank you for this season, Lord we thank you for this government, Lord we thank you that you've given them to us, you've given them to us so we can pray for them. So Father I pray, Holy Spirit that wisdom and knowledge would permeate the house of commons.

Father we pray that wisdom and knowledge and revelation would rest on our members of parliament. Father we thank you for them and Father we pray for us as the church as we prepare to engage in this season. Father I pray that you give us strategy, you give us ears to hear and eyes to see what you are saying and what you are speaking to your people. In Jesus name, Amen. Thank you everyone. I'm Chris Fivert, the Director of the National House of Prayer. I'll see you next time. Bye for now.