{"id":2299,"date":"2015-07-23T11:29:07","date_gmt":"2015-07-23T15:29:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/prayerplainandsimple\/?p=2299"},"modified":"2015-07-23T11:29:07","modified_gmt":"2015-07-23T15:29:07","slug":"a-prayer-for-blind-and-deaf-and-dumb-church-goers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/prayerplainandsimple\/2015\/07\/a-prayer-for-blind-and-deaf-and-dumb-church-goers.html","title":{"rendered":"A Prayer for Blind and Deaf and Dumb Church-Goers"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: center\"><strong><em><span id=\"en-NLT-18476\" class=\"text Isa-42-19\">Who is as blind as my own people, my servant?<\/span><\/em><\/strong><br \/>\n<strong><em><span class=\"indent-1\"><span class=\"indent-1-breaks\">\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><span class=\"text Isa-42-19\">Who is as deaf as my messenger?<\/span><\/span><\/em><\/strong><br \/>\n<strong><em><span class=\"text Isa-42-19\">Who is as blind as my chosen people,<\/span><\/em><\/strong><br \/>\n<strong><em><span class=\"indent-1\"><span class=\"indent-1-breaks\">\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><span class=\"text Isa-42-19\">the servant of the <span class=\"small-caps\">Lord<\/span>?<\/span><\/span><\/em><\/strong><br \/>\n<strong><em><span id=\"en-NLT-18477\" class=\"text Isa-42-20\">You see and recognize what is right<\/span><\/em><\/strong><br \/>\n<strong><em><span class=\"indent-1\"><span class=\"indent-1-breaks\">\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><span class=\"text Isa-42-20\">but refuse to act on it.<\/span><\/span><\/em><\/strong><br \/>\n<strong><em><span class=\"text Isa-42-20\">You hear with your ears,<\/span><\/em><\/strong><br \/>\n<strong><em><span class=\"indent-1\"><span class=\"indent-1-breaks\">\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><span class=\"text Isa-42-20\">but you don\u2019t really listen. (Isaiah 42:19,20)<\/span><\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center\"><em><strong> But don\u2019t just listen to God\u2019s word. You must do what it says. Otherwise, you are only fooling yourselves. \u00a0(James 1:22)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left\">Church-goers are in great danger of missing the obvious. We know from experience. As second-generation believers, both Mark and I grew up going to church three times a week. We memorized verses and knew how to navigate our way around the Bible in order to win every Sunday School contest our teachers threw at us. We have read the Bible almost every day of our lives, yet there were major areas in our lives \u2013 blind spots \u2013 where we were merely hearers, not do-ers. (Mark was dumb and I was dumber.) Thank God the Lord got ahold of us and changed our hearts and transformed our minds!<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left\"><em>Father,<\/em><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left\"><em>Please forgive me for being blind, deaf and dumb \u2013 glazing over whole areas in the Word that I have avoided obeying out of pride and ignorance. Please open my eyes and ears to your Word. Make me aware of\u00a0the ways I have immunized\u00a0myself to really allowing your Word to change my habits, mind-set, and daily routines. I have excused whole areas of weakness in my life, yet I have been very hard on others who are weak. I ask you for forgiveness. I am determined\u00a0to believe the Good News that you are changing me from the inside out as I learn to listen and obey!<\/em><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left\"><em>In Jesus&#8217; Name, Amen<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Who is as blind as my own people, my servant? \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Who is as deaf as my messenger? Who is as blind as my chosen people, \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0the servant of the Lord? You see and recognize what is right \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0but refuse to act on it. You hear with your ears, \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0but you don\u2019t really listen. (Isaiah 42:19,20)&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":478,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14,15,7,4,25,3,1],"tags":[1246,1242,1249,1247,1244,1245,1243,1197,1248,117,208],"class_list":["post-2299","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bible","category-bible-prayer","category-daily-prayer","category-god","category-jesus","category-prayer","category-uncategorized","tag-blind","tag-church-goers","tag-daily-routines","tag-deaf","tag-dumb","tag-dumb-and-dumber","tag-fools","tag-habits","tag-mind-set","tag-prayer-3","tag-repentance-2"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>A Prayer for Blind and Deaf and Dumb Church-Goers<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/prayerplainandsimple\/2015\/07\/a-prayer-for-blind-and-deaf-and-dumb-church-goers.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"A Prayer for Blind and Deaf and Dumb Church-Goers\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Who is as blind as my own people, my servant? \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Who is as deaf as my messenger? Who is as blind as my chosen people, \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0the servant of the Lord? You see and recognize what is right \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0but refuse to act on it. You hear with your ears, \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0but you don\u2019t really listen. (Isaiah 42:19,20)&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/prayerplainandsimple\/2015\/07\/a-prayer-for-blind-and-deaf-and-dumb-church-goers.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Prayer, Plain and Simple\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-07-23T15:29:07+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Mark and Jill Herringshaw\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"A Prayer for Blind and Deaf and Dumb Church-Goers","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/prayerplainandsimple\/2015\/07\/a-prayer-for-blind-and-deaf-and-dumb-church-goers.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"A Prayer for Blind and Deaf and Dumb Church-Goers","og_description":"Who is as blind as my own people, my servant? \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Who is as deaf as my messenger? Who is as blind as my chosen people, \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0the servant of the Lord? You see and recognize what is right \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0but refuse to act on it. You hear with your ears, \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0but you don\u2019t really listen. (Isaiah 42:19,20)&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/prayerplainandsimple\/2015\/07\/a-prayer-for-blind-and-deaf-and-dumb-church-goers.html","og_site_name":"Prayer, Plain and Simple","article_published_time":"2015-07-23T15:29:07+00:00","author":"Mark and Jill Herringshaw","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/prayerplainandsimple\/2015\/07\/a-prayer-for-blind-and-deaf-and-dumb-church-goers.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/prayerplainandsimple\/2015\/07\/a-prayer-for-blind-and-deaf-and-dumb-church-goers.html","name":"A Prayer for Blind and Deaf and Dumb Church-Goers","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/prayerplainandsimple\/#website"},"datePublished":"2015-07-23T15:29:07+00:00","dateModified":"2015-07-23T15:29:07+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/prayerplainandsimple\/#\/schema\/person\/29563cda917dd596f93dba2ff3a7fedf"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/prayerplainandsimple\/2015\/07\/a-prayer-for-blind-and-deaf-and-dumb-church-goers.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/prayerplainandsimple\/2015\/07\/a-prayer-for-blind-and-deaf-and-dumb-church-goers.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/prayerplainandsimple\/2015\/07\/a-prayer-for-blind-and-deaf-and-dumb-church-goers.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/prayerplainandsimple"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"A Prayer for Blind and Deaf and Dumb Church-Goers"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/prayerplainandsimple\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/prayerplainandsimple\/","name":"Prayer, Plain and Simple","description":"Prayer, Daily Prayer, Simple Prayers, Quick Prayers, Prayer Requests","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/prayerplainandsimple\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/prayerplainandsimple\/#\/schema\/person\/29563cda917dd596f93dba2ff3a7fedf","name":"Mark and Jill Herringshaw","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/prayerplainandsimple\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/prayerplainandsimple\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/94f\/94fb184ea80985d82e603e3d8dd0056bx96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/prayerplainandsimple\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/94f\/94fb184ea80985d82e603e3d8dd0056bx96.jpg","caption":"Mark and Jill Herringshaw"},"description":"Mark and Jill Herringshaw and their four children have been ministering in their local church since 1990. 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