Have you shown God that ' Letter'

Lets look at Isaiah 37 vs 14-20.

Isaiah 37:14 And Hezekiah received the letter from the hand of the messengers, and read it: and Hezekiah went up unto the house of the LORD, and spread it before the LORD.37:15 And Hezekiah prayed unto the LORD, saying,37:16 O LORD of hosts, God of Israel, that dwellest between the cherubims, thou art the God, even thou alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth: thou hast made heaven and earth.37:17 Incline thine ear, O LORD, and hear; open thine eyes, O LORD, and see: and hear all the words of Sennacherib, which hath sent to reproach the living God.37:18 Of a truth, LORD, the kings of Assyria have laid waste all the nations, and their countries,37:19 And have cast their gods into the fire: for they were no gods, but the work of men's hands, wood and stone: therefore they have destroyed them.37:20 Now therefore, O LORD our God, save us from his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that thou art the LORD, even thou only.(KJV).

Hezekiah the king of Israel received a threatening letter and spread it out before the Lord. Hezekiah literally said Lord Almighty will you read this and do something about it; and God did. Indeed what the Lord did was spectacular in Isaiah 37 vs. 36.

 Isaiah 37:36 Then the angel of the LORD went forth, and smote in the camp of the Assyrians a hundred and fourscore and five thousand: and when they arose early in the morning, behold, they were all dead corpses.(KJV).

A lot of times as individuals we are confronted with one problem or the other, we do everything from complaining about the problem, crying, telling a friend and even trying to figure it out ourselves. In all this looking for solution, we forget to do the most important which is to bring that problem before God. In the words of an author, ‘we are carrying burdens we don’t need to carry and life is harder than it has to be because we don’t realize how powerful prayer is ,if we did, we would pray about everything-not as a last resort but as a first response In the exact words of Priscilla Shirer ‘Prayer is what opens up the floodgates for God to come down and be involved in our everyday circumstances’. Personally I am learning to pray more. We can accomplish far more by our prayers than our works. 

I read somewhere that prayer is omnipotent, it can do anything that God can do .It is when we pray that God can help us in our work and strengthen our resolves.Sometimes we feel we have prayed and done all that faith demands and our circumstances has not changed, I have learnt that God always answers even assuredly more than our prayers, the key is persistence and consistency. In the exact words of Pastor Folarin Ogunsola ‘prayer is not that you have prayed in the past, the key is persistence and consistency in the place of prayer. If you start praying and do not continue in it, you stand the risk of making a (shipwreck) of all the prayers you have made.’

So I do not know what it is in your life that seems like a threat letter that you should be spreading out before the Lord. I have one that has burdened me so much and I have made up my mind to have victory at the end. Yours might be a financial statement that is overwhelming, a medical report, an examination you must pass, an overbearing husband, a stubborn wife, an unstable marriage   and many more. Anything that stresses you and gives you sleepless night is an invitation to prayer and a candidate to be spread out before the Lord. If it’s important to you it is definitely important to God. Give it to God in prayer, pray anyhow, choose a prayer style that works for you, just make sure you pray and see how God Almighty works out things for you.

 

Until our next post I leave you with this line from one of my most favorite movie the THE WAR ROOM: ‘To win the fight, you have got to have the right strategy and the right resources, because victories don’t come by accident’.

References:

·        Word for today daily devotional September 8 2015

·        The Kneeling Christian : Unknown author

·        Word for today daily devotional January 8 2016

·        Pastor Folarin ogunsola : The habit of praying

·