2 Chronicles 7:11-16
(GW)
Solomon finished the Lord’s temple and the royal palace and completed everything he had in mind for the Lord’s temple and his own palace. Then the Lord appeared to him at night. He said to Solomon, “I have heard your prayer and have chosen this place for myself as a temple for sacrifices. I may shut the sky so that there is no rain, or command grasshoppers to devour the countryside, or send an epidemic among my people, However, if my people who are called by my name, will humble themselves, pray, search for me, and turn from their evil ways, then I will hear their prayer from heaven, forgive their sins, and heal their country. My eyes will be open, and my ears will pay attention to those prayers at this place. I have chosen and declared this temple holy so that my name may be placed there forever. My eyes and my heart will always be there.”
Prayer…what is it? A few years ago, Molly was teaching Hayden and Melanie to pray before each meal and before going to sleep each night. It was great to have them living with us during this process and be a part of this part of their life. They were so awesome during this learning period; well, they still are.
I remember when Hayden was starting to learn the meaning of the word Thankful. There was one day that he and Molly were talking about what it meant to be thankful. As she explained it to him, he caught the concept and that night during his prayer time he said, “Dear God, thank You for this day. Thank You for Mommy, Daddy, Sissy, Grammy, Grampy, Gigi, Granddad, Auntie Kaitie, Aunt Nicole, Alysha, Uncle Andrew, Aunt Missi, Olivia, Laila, Zoe, and Michael. Give us a good night’s sleep. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.”
Molly stood up to go out of the room and Hayden stopped her and said, “Mommy wait!!! I wasn’t finished. Thank You God for my T-Rex, My Spinosaurus…” and started listing all of his dinosaurs. Whereas I know that God loves to hear the prayers of our hearts and the prayers of children are precious to His heart. I wonder if as we grow up, do we grow out of those prayers, or do we just continue to pray the way that Hayden did that night?
A couple of years ago I read through a book entitled, “Wrestling Prayer,” by Earic and Leslie Ludy. It has been very challenging, and I’d like to share with you something that jumped out at me recently. They had been going through several attacks in their lives and like many of us, had credited these attacks from the enemy, prayed about them, accepted them as growth opportunities, and kind of moved on with their lives. However, this one time the Lord was teaching them something about prayer. They wanted to be like roaring lions in their prayer lives. They felt that God was calling them to, “Put on the full armor of God–to seal up every breach that would allow the enemy to gain access into our lives. And He wanted us to call upon HIs name and allow Him to come to our rescue in time of need. James 4:7 says, ‘Resist the devil and he will flee from you.’ Leslie and I hadn’t been resisting the enemy’s blows because we had assumed they were coming from God–or at least being allowed by God for the purpose of discipline.”
So, what did they do? They cried out to God and asked Him, “What must we do? What can we do?” God’s simple answer to them and to us was, “Pray.” You might be saying to yourself, “But Pastor I do pray.” Let me tell you, that’s my answer as well. However, I believe that God is saying to each of us, “That’s not prayer. What you’re doing is spiritual-sounding chitter-chatter.” You see, I believe that we spend our prayer time listing out our needs, begging for comforts to be protected, deadlines to be met, surgeon’s hands to be guided, tests to be passed, food to be blessed. Our prayers are just that, all about us. And, let me say very quickly, there’s nothing wrong with praying about our own personal needs.
However, prayer that is otherworldly, is built on the notion of forgotten self. It’s aggressive, growling, attacking commanding, persevering, passionate, and feverishly unrelenting. It’s getting on the battlefield and firing, as if every utterance out of your heart, then your mouth is chipping away at enemy strongholds and every petition is moving God’s purposes forward in the natural realm. Real, heaven-inspired prayer, the kind that moves mountains and calms storms, is not something that the modern church is used to. To be quite frank, it’s not something I’m accustomed to either. And as a result, we (the modern church) often, with a dismissive wave of our hand, pass off this sort of wide-eyed praying as being “Old Testament” or “first century.”
Well, I would submit to you today, that if we are going to see miracles take place again, if we are going to see revival sweep this country again, if we are going to see a mighty move of the Holy Spirit, if we are going to see God heal this land, it is going to take this kind of Old Testament, first century praying. The passage that I wrote at the start of this blog is one that is very famous. We quote it. We print it on decals. We post it on FB. However, I believe we need to put it into action. Over the next several blogs we’re going to dig into this passage a little. If we’re going to be the people of God that have roaring prayer lives. Then we need to apply Scripture.
Have a great day and see you next time. Walk in the victory that is yours.
Pastor Rob
