What's The One Thing?

 

I am working my way through the book of Ezekiel in the Old Testament.  I don’t understand it all.  I never will.  But as in any reading of the Bible, I can hold with both hands what I can comprehend.  And then the next time through, there is always something more that I never realized before. 

One of our daughters’ Bible study leaders once emphasized to her (and to me), when reading Scripture, to watch for repeated phrases.  It is like God is underlining those truths.  And if we don’t get it the first time, perhaps the second or third mention will get our attention.  In the 48 chapters of Ezekiel which was written in the sixth century B.C., God emphasizes 68 times the phrase “that they shall know that I am the LORD.”

That is the one thing we need to get, to grasp, to understand, no matter the circumstances thousands of years ago, no matter the situation we face today: that we will know that He is the LORD. 

Because when we know, acknowledge, and recognize God, nothing remains the same.  When we set our eyes on God, we see circumstances with a deeper vision and a different heart.  This is no random occurrence, no meaningless disaster, nothing that God cannot redeem.  We think about, approach, navigate and respond differently because we believe and trust in the Almighty.  God gives us the ability to pivot, stand within, remain faithful to His calling, be in touch with His nudges, flee when necessary, and walk with Him no matter the road, yes, even this way. 

Just because it is difficult, impossible and ugly, does not mean that it isn’t right in the center of His will.  The ultimate triumph in this situation may be learning to trust God in this.  And when we pray, we trust Him more.  And in learning to pray and trust, God imparts His strength in us for what we don’t see coming.

As a young man during the Civil War, Thomas lived in the volatile border state of Kentucky where literally neighbors and brothers were often on both sides of the conflict.  One evening as he was headed alone down the hilly curving dirt road on his way home from the fields, he heard a Confederate contingent coming toward him, indeed just about to come around the bend.  His life was at stake for the space of just several yards.  LORD, help me, he whispered as he scurried behind a large rock in a clump of trees (and in the shadow of God’s hand.)  Instead of cowering in fear, he called out with a loud and courageous voice, “C’mon boys, we’ve got ‘em now!”

Thinking it was an ambush, the soldiers scattered, running for their lives in the opposite direction.  And Thomas walked on home. 

When we pray, God says, “Now watch this.”  Because what we see as an interruption, or pothole, or impossible task, God transforms into divine appointments and sacred encounters that He lined up not for our fear, but for His glory.

In prayer, God translates circumstances into His mercy, His covering, His revealing, and His redeeming.  When we walk into the day with Him, God fills us with a sense of wonder, not just when we see His tangible hand, but what else do we miss because we are not looking…or not praying?  

And they shall know that I am the LORD.  68 times. What does it take for us to realize that?  The last four words of that book says it all.  The LORD is there.  Ezekiel 48. 35  

Thomas saw that truth before his eyes on a dirt road.  And on that reality, we can stake our lives.

Those little glimpses of His Presence are not just for us to tuck in a drawer, but to share.  We can never know who will be impacted not just by our prayers, but the stories that God has given each one of us, even on the most ordinary days.

With God we shall do valiantly.  It is He who will tread down our foes.  Psalm 108. 13   Anything we fear, both real and imagined.  There is a different reality going on here.

Thomas’s story always has touched me.  God is here.  We can know Him.  We can trust Him.  Even when we cannot understand, He is working still.  Even when we have no idea what is coming around the bend, God is with me too.

I heard that story long ago from my grandmother.  Thomas was her father – the great grandfather I never met.  I don’t know much about him, but he spoke to his children what he had seen and how he knew the faithfulness of God.  That is the one thing I know about him, the legacy that he left.

We will not hide them from their children, but tell to the coming generation the glorious deed of the LORD, and His might, and the wonders that He has done…to teach to their children, that the next generation might know them, the children yet unborn, and arise and tell them to their children, so that they should set their hope in God.   Psalm 78. 4-7

In praying, things cannot remain as they are, nor can we.  It is not that we open the door for God to do something, but instead, He invites us in.

What story is God unfolding before us today?  What is the one thing we can pray?  That we would know that He is the Lord.  Everything revolves around that.

Out Standing in the Field

 

 

It is November.  The fields are shorn like a bad haircut, a few dried stalks here and there, but appearing, for the most part, barren and lifeless.

What has grown has been harvested, threshed and cut down.  No sign of growth, no evidence of anything worthwhile, nothing visible or lasting from all the labors and investment, sweat, early morning plowing, continual weeding, watering and a thousand ways of nurturing.

Yet, what is no longer seen appears in different forms and packaging in markets, pantries, kitchen shelves, and tables across the globe. 

Faithfulness, even that which is rarely noticed or barely acknowledged, always spreads fruitfulness over millions of lives, mostly in ways we will never recognize.  It is not that our labors are for naught, but faithfulness is carried into eternity and used in profound ways.

And the prayers we have invested in the lives of those we know, even for strangers halfway around the globe, are tiny planted seeds that God uses to bless, nurture, and produce abundance in ways we will never know until the other side of life. 

God has given each one of us a patch of ground to sow, to care for, to nurture.  But God gives the growth. 1 Corinthians 3. 6

It may feel like we are doing nothing at all, nothing to show for our efforts, to feel perhaps like a kindergartener who can’t even color in the lines, but God runs with it.

After all, a hundred years from now, it will make little difference what people think or say about us, but what God does with us will make a great deal of difference.  (Bible teacher and author Warren Wiersbe)

After all, a hundred years or just twenty minutes from now, praying will make all the difference in the world, not just in someone’s life, but for eternity.  Every time we pray, lives are changed for generations.  No prayers are random or unused in some capacity.  But God feeds a soul, alters circumstances, gives strength, and bears fruit.  Because when God responds, we have no idea the significance of even a single whispered prayer in His grand fruitful Kingdom.

God listens.  God responds.  God changes the landscape of our lives, which is not so barren after all.  Is it our first inclination to come before Him, to call on His name, to spread out our concerns and difficulties and joys before Him?

Tangible “answers” are not the point.  But that we pray and are faithful in the meanwhile.

The harvest of our prayers is far beyond our vision, and most likely not in our timing or visible space, but we can pray.  Trust Me in this. 

See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?  I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.  Isaiah 43. 19

Not a wasteland in His sight.  But an abundant field sown in prayer, one little patch in His Kingdom.  Because fallow ground is left unsown for a period of time in order to restore and renew, a time not of nothingness, but building a new strength.

And so what we see as fallow is indeed hallowed  --sacred ground not in our hands but in His, a place of trust when we cannot see, but we know He is working.  What we do, how we respond, what we cultivate, indeed, all matters. Even in this season of hope, bathed in prayer, we can grasp our circumstances differently. We listen. We respond. We sow.

God is doing something new in ways we cannot see, even in ways we cannot ever expect.  We ourselves may not be ready for it yet, for seasons or reasons we cannot understand, because this field on which we labor is so much larger than our little patch. 

In the promise of resurrection, that which is broken and despairing looks instead like hope.  Through prayer, God provides the power of seeing things in the past, present and future inextricably linked as they have been, are, and will be.

We are faithful on our little patch of ground.  God brings His fruitfulness to it.  What does prayer have to do with that?  Everything.

 

Though the fig tree should not blossom,

nor fruit be on the vines,

the produce of the olive fail

      and the fields yield no food,

the flock be cut off from the fold

      and there be no herd in the stalls,

Yet

     I will rejoice in the LORD.

I will take joy

     in the God of my salvation.

GOD, the Lord is my strength;

He makes my feet like the deer’s;

He makes me tread on my high places.

                          Habakkuk 3. 17-19

 

Trust in the slow work of God.  And never give up praying.

Prays Well With Others

 

I had a minor medical procedure this week.  No big deal.  But I was dreading the preparation for it.  I asked a few friends to pray for me.  I felt ridiculous asking for such a simple thing when there are so many other huge things to pray about.  But I am aware that the adversary always makes asking for prayer seem silly, ridiculous, and pointless. I requested prayer, nonetheless. 

One of the ways God gives us His strength and encourages us on our hard journeys is through prayer.  We pray to God.  But we need not pray alone.

We are surrounded by such a cloud of witnesses, running with us, praying with us, watching out for us, and cheering us on.  For from day to day men came to David to help him, until there was a great army, like an army of God.  1 Chronicles 12. 22

When we pray, God brings in the troops, like lining a proverbial marathon route with the fellowship of the saints, not shouting “You’ve got this.”  Or “Believe in yourself!”   But singing God’s strength and endurance and yes, even joy over us.

Prayer is not meant to be hands folded and eyes closed, but when we pray with others, our hands open to what God will provide and our eyes wide open to God’s grander vision.

Dread never makes anything easier.  But God brings us through the deepest, darkest miry bogs, not just giving us His strength but nurturing trust in Him even more for what is yet to come.  Our strength is built in layers on His.  And hard experiences engrave trusting Him into our very souls.

Prayer does not draw God into our situation, but enlarges and increases our awareness of Him.  God does not just show up.  He is already here.  And through the lens of His Presence, He empowers us to see even impossible situations differently.

And the servant said, “Alas, my master!  What shall we do?” Elisha said, “Do not be afraid, for those who are with us are more than those who are with them.” And Elisha prayed, and said, “LORD, I pray, open his eyes that he may see.”  Then the LORD opened the eyes of the young man, and he saw.  And behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha.  2 Kings 6. 15-17

Something more comes into play than getting through a hard place or across a finish line.  Because God works through relationships.  He always has.  Praying is no exception.  And when we pray for others, or ask others to pray for us, the blessing gets all over everyone.  Prayer invites others into what God is unfolding in our lives….and in theirs.  Prayer is not being vulnerable, but the lifeblood of Christian community.  Prayer draws us closer to God and closer to each other, both sides of intervention and intercession.  God brings about more than “an answer,” but reveals Himself to us.  And that always goes incredibly deeper than our requests.  God nurtures and nourishes, both the prayed for and those who pray.

I can promise someone “I’ll be praying for you.”  And it is an encouragement to know that others are praying.  But God often nudges me to say instead, “May I pray for you right now?”  That immediacy to actually pray on the spot, when we can, far exceeds mere encouragement.  We don’t just take a list of requests with us, but words that hover before the Throne.

And when we pray with others, things happen out of the ordinary that cannot be explained, if not for God. 

There is nothing too insignificant to pray about.  God cares for every one of us and every part of us.  And when we ask others to pray, they realize God cares for their “little” stuff too, which we all know, is never so little.  We all struggle with something.  Our asking for prayer, being honest and open before others, grants them the freedom and courage to ask as well.  There is nothing that stands outside His care.  And one prayer about something always leads to something even more to pray about, something even deeper. 

Praying invites others to share in seeing God’s mighty and extraordinary work in ordinary lives. Even our own. 

For where two or three are gathered in My name, there am I among them.   Matthew 18. 20

Prayer makes us realize we are vulnerable before others and before God Himself.  We need Him. And that in itself is a strong witness in this world.

May it be seen in us:  Prays well with others.