When I thought about doing a series on Mysteries of Faith, one of the very first topics that came to my mind was prayer. Now, I’ve been a Christian since I was 5. Prayer has always been a part of my life. But if I’m honest, there are elements about prayer that I always just accepted as true, nodded my head at, and then moved on with the general way I’ve always prayed.

As I got older though, I started to wonder about some things the way I imagine many of you wonder about prayer too. “Do my prayers really move God to act?” “Is there a proper way to pray?” “Why doesn’t God seem to answer all of my prayers?” I knew of prayer as talking with God, I even would say I knew why God wanted me to pray, but there were so many spiritual elements of prayer that were still so mysterious to me. Prayer is a completely spiritual practice. With Bible-reading, we’re at least engaging with a book. Prayer, on the other hand, is totally spiritual so I was excited to dive into some of the more deeply spiritual elements of prayer with my friend Dr. Kyle Strobel.

Kyle Strobel is Associate Professor of Spiritual Theology at Talbot and author of the book Where Prayer Becomes Real: How Honesty with God Transforms Your Soul. Kyle has been on this podcast a few times in the past, once to talk specifically about his book on prayer, but today I invited him on to pull back the curtain on some of the more mysterious elements of prayer – what is really happening spiritually when we pray.

Doable Discipleship is a Saddleback Church podcast produced and hosted by Jason Wieland. It premiered in 2017 and now offers more than 400 episodes. Episodes release every Tuesday on your favorite podcast app and on the Saddleback Church YouTube Channel (https://www.youtube.com/saddleback).

Resources Related to This Episode:
https://www.amazon.com/Where-Prayer-Becomes-Real-Transforms/dp/1540900770

https://kylestrobel.substack.com/

Related Doable Discipleship Episodes:
Mysteries of Faith: Union with Christ - https://youtu.be/U1MkOvTKvd0
Living Hope with Phil Wickham - https://youtu.be/1U_aetP2H0M
Longing for Joy with Alastair Sterne - https://youtu.be/HNXAl4wTmIc
Music, Story, and Experience with Luke Smallbone - https://youtu.be/6I-ayiHn7Tw
Navigating the Bible: Genesis - https://youtu.be/ddhjMfOoasA
Living Out of Overflow - https://youtu.be/aBKXbHf0X0s
Living with Hope in the Midst of Struggle - https://youtu.be/99Nki49V0fI

“Who am I, O Lord God, and what is my family, that you have brought me this far? And now, O God, in addition to everything else, you speak of giving your servant a lasting dynasty! You speak as though I were someone very great, O Lord God! What more can I say to you about the way you have honored me? You know what your servant is really like. For the sake of your servant, O Lord, and according to your will, you have done all these great things and have made them known.” – 1 Chronicles 17:16-19

The book of Chronicles, broken into 1 and 2 Chronicles, holds an interesting place in the Old Testament. When we finished the book of Kings, we were left with a back and forth tale of the divided kingdom between Israel and Judah seeing story after story of terrible king to terrible king, with occasional bright spots. 1 Chronicles, the next book of the Bible, goes back and tells much of the same story again, but from a different perspective. We once again read about King David, but it’s as if we are getting a different vantage point to their reigns. 1 Chronicles is a fascinating book beginning with a series of genealogies, the death of Saul and the rise of David, military victories, the Ark of the Covenant, the role and duties of those who served God, and much more but, at its heart, it’s a book about what it means to live a God-centered, worship-filled life. To help us navigate the book of 1 Chronicles is Dr. Mark Boda, Professor of Old Testament at McMaster Divinity College and author of the Cornerstone Biblical Commentary on 1-2 Chronicles.

Doable Discipleship is a Saddleback Church podcast produced and hosted by Jason Wieland. It premiered in 2017 and now offers more than 400 episodes. Episodes release every Tuesday on your favorite podcast app and on the Saddleback Church YouTube Channel (https://www.youtube.com/saddleback).

Resources Related to This Episode:
https://www.amazon.com/1-2-Chronicles-Cornerstone-Biblical-Commentary/dp/0842334319

Subscribe to the Doable Discipleship podcast at Apple Podcasts (https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/doable-discipleship/id1240966935) or Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/1Zc9nuwQZOLadbFCZCmZ1V)

Related Doable Discipleship Episodes:
Navigating the Bible: 2 Kings - https://youtu.be/04q9gDhBKTk
Navigating the Bible: 1 Kings - https://youtu.be/aS-KoeQXl2k
Navigating the Bible: 2 Samuel - https://youtu.be/ZbpafGgOW7c
Navigating the Bible: 1 Samuel - https://youtu.be/lY8wPElSFMY
Navigating the Bible: Rute - https://youtu.be/YaH-t-ZzTaM
Navigating the Bible: Judges - https://youtu.be/qNGcOf2o0NU
Navigating the Bible: Joshua - https://youtu.be/hF28aThBtFs
Navigating the Bible: Deuteronomy - https://youtu.be/HzmNgPOM4zU
Navigating the Bible: Numbers - https://youtu.be/H1HO6V9HDxs
Navigating the Bible: Leviticus - https://youtu.be/08RhDCXYex4
Navigating the Bible: Exodus - https://youtu.be/NB9UTpS1F3M
Navigating the Bible: Genesis - https://youtu.be/ddhjMfOoasA

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Galatians 2:20 – “My old self has been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me.”
1 Corinthians 6:17 – “But the person who is joined to the Lord is one spirit with him.”
2 Corinthians 5:17 – This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!”

These verses, along with many others in the Bible, paint a part of the picture of what happens as a result of salvation. And if we’re honest, I think it’s a part of the picture we tend to look past. When we think about salvation, our minds typically go to the part that is easier to understand: we will not go to hell, we will go to heaven. “I go here, not there, I get that.” But the picture of salvation in Scripture is so, so much more rich than that. In fact, as the verses I just read highlight, salvation makes us a new creation – and not just that but it is no longer I who live but Christ lives in me.

The Bible paints a truly beautiful picture of oneness – it often uses the terms “in Christ” or “in him” or “united with Christ.” And again, speaking from a place of honesty, this is something I hadn’t spent too much time thinking about in my life – and I think many of us are this way. We move past it either as a truth that doesn’t seem to pertinent to the way I live every day, or too complex that we just add it to the list of mysteries of the faith.

In this series we will explore some of the mysteries of the faith we tend to move past. I want to name them, examine them from different perspectives, and talk about who these mysteries can actually have profound effects on how we approach our personal walk with Jesus.

This first episode is on what it means to be in union with Christ. To help navigate us through this is Dr. Clive Bowsher. Dr. Bowsher is provost of Union School of Theology and author of the books Life in the Son and One: Being United to Jesus Changes Everything.

Doable Discipleship is a Saddleback Church podcast produced and hosted by Jason Wieland. It premiered in 2017 and now offers more than 400 episodes. Episodes release every Tuesday on your favorite podcast app and on the Saddleback Church YouTube Channel (https://www.youtube.com/saddleback).

Resources Related to This Episode:
https://www.ivpress.com/life-in-the-son

https://us.amazon.com/One-Being-United-Changes-Everything/dp/B0D8LNKHNG?ref_=ast_author_dp

Related Doable Discipleship Episodes:
Living Hope with Phil Wickham - https://youtu.be/1U_aetP2H0M
Longing for Joy with Alastair Sterne - https://youtu.be/HNXAl4wTmIc
Music, Story, and Experience with Luke Smallbone - https://youtu.be/6I-ayiHn7Tw
Navigating the Bible: Genesis - https://youtu.be/ddhjMfOoasA
Living Out of Overflow - https://youtu.be/aBKXbHf0X0s
Living with Hope in the Midst of Struggle - https://youtu.be/99Nki49V0fI