Good morning! I’m glad to welcome you to worship today at Hillcrest Baptist Church. 

Today, as we should do every Sunday, we come to worship and hear from God. Since this is the weekend prior to July 4th, we also want to thank God for His grace, mercy and provision that we have been granted through His sovereign hand in having the privilege to live in America, but more importantly we come today to pray for God’s mercy and grace in our lives, as His people and His church, so that we might be revived to be the light in a world filled with darkness .

In Daniel 9:1-19 we find an example of our responsibility to pray for our nation and how to pray for our nation. May all of our hearts be challenged like Daniel’s to pray for God mercy, grace and forgiveness, both individually, as well as for our nation.

During the Tuesday evening session (June 13, 2017) of the Southern Baptist Convention in Phoenix, our president and Senior Pastor of Bellevue Baptist, Memphis, Dr. Steve Gaines led us in a prayer for the United States of America. I have included that prayer below, so that we can pray it together at the end of the service:

“Heavenly Father, I lift up to You the United States of America. I humbly ask You to open the heavens so that You might come down and send revival to the Christians in America so our nation will turn back to You. 

I pray You will raise up prayer warriors across America who will fervently call on Your name and seek Your face for an outpouring of Your Spirit. 

I pray you will raise up pastors who will preach the Word of God with conviction and without compromise. I pray You will raise up soul winners who will share Jesus and lead people to faith in Him. 

I pray You will raise up disciple makers who will help new believers grow in grace and become more like Jesus. I pray for godly politicians, from the President to every mayor, who will love Jesus and uphold His Word. I pray for godly judges who will rule in righteousness. 

I pray You will bind Satan from dividing our nation with racial prejudice. I pray whites, blacks, Latinos, Asians, and others will understand there is really only one race, the human race. 

Please forgive us for abortion, homosexual “marriage,” sexual immorality, racial prejudice, greed, and prayerlessness. Help every Christian be humble in spirit, hungry for revival, and holy in thought and deed. 

We pray and agree with the Psalmist, “Will you not Yourself revive us again, that Your people may rejoice in You?” In Jesus’ holy name, amen.”