– Secret Place Insights –
Dear One, recently I was still tired, and wanted to sleep another hour before getting up and heading to my quiet-time spot. But I had done that the morning before, and it wasn’t a habit that I wanted to cultivate. That morning, my voice was unusually croaky, but I sang to God of His holiness anyway.
Before bringing my concerns to God, I try, in my inadequate way, to give Him the honor due His name. So, I do my best with a voice that only a mother or father might appreciate. After croaking out the song, reading in the Old and New Testaments, I begin bringing my prayer requests to the Father’s listening ears.
Of course, He already knows my troubles, hopes and concerns, but this is how the Christian walk is carried out. God wants us to talk to Him, to acknowledge our need for Him, and while doing so draw into a closer relationship with Him. He is, after all, the Father of all fathers. And we truly are like children to Him, and will always be. I find great comfort in the thought of being His forever child.
I remember the sorrow I felt when my father died, and I was no longer Myrell Box’s little girl. I became all the more grateful that I would always be so to God.
When I had finished praying for Ron and me, the family, and others, I prayed from a section of our church directory. There, I came across a couple who’s name I had penciled in after it had been permanently removed. The couple did not leave the church under good terms. At the thought of them, my heart hurt from sympathy. How are they doing, how are the children? My eyes watered as I wondered if they had found a church home. A fervent prayer followed through the caring of the Holy Spirit. The words urged the couple to desire, to work toward, an ever-growing walk with God.
Before leaving my desk, as I put things back into place, ready for tomorrow, I glanced at my old and tattered, perpetual prayer calendar. There I read a questionable quote by Oswald Chambers.
“Quit praying about yourself, and be spent in vicarious intercession as the bondslave of Jesus.”
I am very familiar with Chambers’ writings, and I know that He does not mean to imply that we should not pray for ourselves. For, of course, God teaches that we are to pray continually for our spiritual growth under His leadership. What Chambers is referring to is this; as we pray, our hearts begin to take on a portion of God’s love for humankind. Out of such a love, intercessory prayer (praying for others) takes on a depth that was once unimaginable. Through such prayer God becomes greater – while we decrease in self-importance.
When we willingly give God enough of ourselves to work with, He remolds us, and trains us up in the way we should go. Within that relationship He gives us hearts that cry out for the spiritual well being of others, acquaintances and strangers, so much so, that sometimes when we pray for them our hearts hurt and tears well up in our eyes. Intercessory prayer…is God’s will for each of us.
John 3:10, “He must increase, but I must decrease.”
Blessings for another week,
Susanne
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