When they arrived, they went to the upstairs room of the house where they were staying…They all met together and were constantly united in prayer... Acts 1:13-14, NLT

Hello 2025!  While many turn their attention to a variety of resolutions and commitments, I want to invite us as a church to turn our hearts specifically toward prayer and seeking God in the new year.  Every January, the Adventist Church worldwide is invited to participate in 10 Days of Prayer -- a powerful prayer initiative based on the early church’s upper room revival leading up to Pentecost.  Here at Littleton, we’ll be facilitating nightly prayer times January 8-17 at 7pm (more details here), and I hope you’ll make it a priority to engage these opportunities as much as possible.  But on the heels of having just participated in footwashing & communion with our church this past Sabbath, what’s especially on my heart right now is the upper room experience of the disciples PRIOR to Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection (cf. Mk. 14:15). It was in that upper room that Jesus prepared the disciples’ hearts for the outpouring of His Spirit later on in the book of Acts. So here at the beginning of the New Year, let me suggest three simple ways to pray that flow out of that first upper room experience.

A GROUNDED HEART

Now before the Feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that His hour had come that He should depart from this world to the Father, having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end. John 13:1, NKJV

John’s introduction frames the upper room experience with the reality of Jesus’ everlasting love for His disciples.  As we enter into 2025, we can frame our entire experience with the same reality by praying to  remain grounded in the fact that God loves us as His own.  This may seem rudimentary, but it is far from involuntary.  In the very next verse, John is quick to point out the very real spiritual battle (Jn. 13:2) that constantly wages to undermine our groundedness in God’s love.  I think this is part of the reason why the apostle Paul fervently prays that believers would know the love of God (Eph. 3:14-19).  He’s not only aware of our human limitations to comprehend God’s love, but he’s also aware that there’s a very real spiritual struggle that combats our capacity to stay rooted in the love of God.  In the new year, let’s pray for hearts that are grounded in the love of God.

Father, please ground my heart in Your life-giving love, and guard me from Satan’s schemes to uproot me from it.

A LISTENING HEART

Jesus answered and said to him, “What I am doing you do not understand now, but you will know after this.”John 13:7, NKJV

These words came in response to Peter’s bewildered question:  “Lord, are You washing my feet?” (Jn. 13:6).  Jesus’ counsel here reminds us that there will often be times we don’t quite understand what God is up to, but we can pray for an openness to the things God has yet to reveal to us.  When God’s movements seem to be shrouded in mystery, when we feel His pruning in our lives or even His apparent absence in our lives, we can trust Him to reveal to us what we need to know and when we know to know it.  The classic hymn “Be Still My Soul” beautifully expresses this resolve to wait, to trust, to listen:

Be still, my soul: the Lord is on thy side;


Bear patiently the cross of grief or pain; 

Leave to thy God to order and provide;


In every change He faithful will remain.


Be still, my soul: thy best, thy heavenly friend

Through thorny ways leads to a joyful end.

Be still, my soul: thy God doth undertake


To guide the future as He has the past.


Thy hope, thy confidence let nothing shake;


All now mysterious shall be bright at last.


Be still, my soul: the waves and winds still know

His voice who ruled them while He dwelt below.

Whether we like it or not, there will be plenty of things that don’t make sense in the new year.  When that happens, we don’t have to jump to conclusions about God or about ourselves in seasons.  Instead, we can be still and keep a listening ear for the ways He’ll lead us to appreciate what He’s up to in due time.

Lord, I acknowledge the dynamics I don’t fully understand in my life, but I choose to trust You to reveal Your good purposes in Your good time.

A CLEAN HEART

Peter said to Him, “You shall never wash my feet!” Jesus answered him, “If I do not wash you, you have no part with Me.” John 13:8, NKJV

Jesus’ exchange with Peter calls us to receive Jesus’ cleansing and not resist it.  In 2025, we can pray to be washed clean — both for the sake of heart purity and for the sake of whole relationships.  Often times we think of our need for cleansing only in terms of being washed clean from our moral stains, from the guilt of our moral failures and sins.  But in the immediate context, the washing Jesus has in mind has less to do with behavioral failures and more to do with the subtle pride and attitudes that make for alienation and distant relationships.  All but one were willing to receive that kind of washing that night.  Judas was the sad exception who refused to surrender his pride and instead resisted submission of self to the Savior.  And he was the only one who missed out on experiencing the extraordinary community birthed in the Acts upper room leading to Pentecost. Jesus wants to make us right with Him AND put us in position to experience the miracle of Christ-centered community.  This year, let’s pray that God would cleanse us in a way that secures our salvation and the capacity to live selflessly and enjoy whole, healthy relationships with others.

God, please create in me a clean heart that is free to live in right relationships with You and others around me.  

So who’s with me?  Will you join me in these simple prays from the upper room?  As we enter 2025, may God grant us all a heart grounded in His love, daily listening for His good plans, and cleansed of all that separates us from Him and others.