Persistent Prayer

Submitted by Andy Sytsma

This week in my devotions I was reading in Acts 12 about Peter's miraculous escape from prison.  James had just been killed.  Peter seemed to be next.  And it says in verse 5, ...but the church was earnestly praying to God for him.  I was also reading in Luke 18 where Jesus told the parable of the persistent widow with the judge.  Jesus did this it says in verse 1, ...to show them that they should always pray and not give up.

Big challenges.  Persistent prayer.  Sometimes God chooses to do big things through our prayers.  And sometimes we pray and we pray, but don't always see immediate results to our prayers.  That's why Jesus taught us about persistence.  He also asked if he would find faith when he comes.

As I think about our collective prayer with Missional Cafe' -- for God to ignite a missional movement in the CRC and beyond -- I know this is a big challenge.  I also know God is calling us to be persistent in bringing this request before Him.  We may not be able to see everything God does among us, but we live by faith, not by sight (2 Corinthians 5:7).

For myself, I've made this a daily prayer.  I journal my prayers and lift up this request.  I intercede for our planters and pastors in our Houston Cluster and pray for God to transform our city.  And I've even set my phone to vibrate at 4:14 PM so I can stop and pray and be reminded of the words of Ester 4:14 and how I believe we are here for such a time as this.

There are lots of individual things I do, but I've also committed myself to praying together with others.  One of the things we said we would do at our last Missional Cafe' gathering is to pray together in our clusters.  In our Houston Cluster we're just getting off the ground (this month we had our 2nd meeting!) but we've used Rod Hugen's format (see December 14th blog entry) and had a wonderful experience.  We felt energized, focused and drew closer in mission together.

I want to encourage each of you to keep prayer at the center of our mission efforts.  Pray with your cluster.  Pray with others in your city.  Check out different prayer events like the Prayer Summit hosted by the Korean Council and Ministers in the CRC in Los Angeles, April 16-18, 2012.  However you do this, pray like your life (and others' lives) depends on it!

We are facing big challenges in our church and culture.  We may wonder if God is answering our prayers.  But like the believers in Acts 12 and the disciples with Jesus in Luke 18 we need to persevere in prayer and ask God to do the impossible. 

Lord, may you ignite a missional movement in the CRC and beyond!  Amen.