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In the day when I cried out, You answered me, and made me bold with strength in my soul. (Psalm 138:3 NKJV)
Prayer requires stick-to-it-iveness, which means it takes strength to pray.
Therefore, being physically or emotionally drained makes it challenging to be alert and attentive in prayer. When we’re tired, our thoughts often drift; it’s hard to stay focused.
Sometimes one of the most helpful things you can do for your spiritual growth is to get a good night’s sleep (or take a nap).
Jesus did this (Matthew 14:22-23). He was very aware of His physical and emotional levels. When He was tired, He took a nap; when He was drained from ministry, He got alone with His Heavenly Father for refreshing (Mark 1:35, Luke 5:16).
Jesus told His disciples to pray so they wouldn’t give in to temptation (Luke 22:40, 45-46). Prayer does strengthen us against the enemy’s attack, but physical and emotional stamina helps us too.
Notice the full cycle—we need physical and emotional strength to pray persistently and consistently, and prayer enhances our physical and emotional reserves to help us pray. So do all three:
When all three components of your being—spirit, body, soul—are alert and healthy, you will find your prayer life fully engaged. If one area becomes depleted, listen to the always-practical counsel of the Holy Spirit. Pray, rest, talk to a friend or a counselor so you can return to the optimal position of strength.
Yes, it takes strength to pray, but in prayer your strength is renewed.
Listen to the podcast of this post by clicking on the player below, and you can also subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or Audible.
Prayer can unleash God’s miracles. Sometimes the most visible miracles are the changes that are seen in us—our attitude, our expectation, our focus, and our maturity.
Maturity is not stuffy and stodgy. Those folks actually become quite childish when others around them don’t “act right,” according to their standards. The most mature people are the most childlike.
Do you want proof for that last statement? The most mature Person to ever live on earth was Jesus, and He loved being around kids and having children around Him (Mark 10:13-14).
His teaching examples were frequently quite simple—farmers, birds, flowers, trees, and even going to the bathroom!. He knew their songs (Luke 7:31-32), and many of His interactions with the overly-mature religious leaders were quite playful and childlike (Mark 11:27-33).
Jesus wants us to come to our Father like children (Mark 10:15-16). “Like a little child” means childlike, which is the exact opposite of childish. Those who think they are too mature for such simplistic things are actually the ones who are childish.
Jesus uses the Father-child relationship over and over to teach us about praying to a Father who is desirous of giving us the best things (Matthew 6:7-9; Luke 12:32).
One of the Psalms of Ascent written by David strikes this childlike note (Psalm 131). Verse 1 describes the childishness he’s giving up, and verse 2 describes the childlikeness he is taking on:
“my heart is not proud”—not focused on me (v. 1a)
“my eyes are not haughty”—overly grown up (v. 1b)
“I don’t concern myself with matters too great or too awesome for me to grasp” (v. 1c NLT)
instead I am stilled, quieted, trustingly at peace (v. 2)
and then David calls all of us to this same childlikeness (v. 3)
Jesus taught about persistent prayer in Luke 18:1-8 and then used a scenario from the temple to illustrate His point (Luke 18:9-17), contrasting the childish pseudo-maturity of the overly-religious man and the childlike maturity the childlike man. And then, as directed by the Holy Spirit, Luke includes the same exchange Mark used about Jesus taking up children in His arms to bless them.
Childlike is loving dependent; childish is fiercely independent.
Childlike is trusting someone wise; childish always knows best.
Childlike is imaginative; childish is realistic.
Childlike is persistent; childish is whining.
I love the Henry Wadsworth Longfellow poem called The Children’s Hour. As you read through this, imagine our Heavenly Father as Longfellow and yourself as his three daughters.
Between the dark and the daylight,
When the night is beginning to lower,
Comes a pause in the day’s occupations,
That is known as the Children’s Hour.
I hear in the chamber above me
The patter of little feet,
The sound of a door that is opened,
And voices soft and sweet.
From my study I see in the lamplight,
Descending the broad hall stair,
Grave Alice, and laughing Allegra,
And Edith with golden hair.
A whisper, and then a silence:
Yet I know by their merry eyes
They are plotting and planning together
To take me by surprise.
A sudden rush from the stairway,
A sudden raid from the hall!
By three doors left unguarded
They enter my castle wall!
They climb up into my turret
O’er the arms and back of my chair;
If I try to escape, they surround me;
They seem to be everywhere.
They almost devour me with kisses,
Their arms about me entwine,
Till I think of the Bishop of Bingen
In his Mouse-Tower on the Rhine!
Do you think, O blue-eyed banditti,
Because you have scaled the wall,
Such an old mustache as I am
Is not a match for you all!
I have you fast in my fortress,
And will not let you depart,
But put you down into the dungeon
In the round-tower of my heart.
And there will I keep you forever,
Yes, forever and a day,
Till the walls shall crumble to ruin,
And moulder in dust away! —Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
We mature by trading childishness for childlikeness. We mature best by coming to God our Father in prayer as a child comes to his father.
Let prayer change your maturity!
If you’ve missed any of the other messages in this series on how prayer changes us, you can find them all here.
Listen to the podcast of this post by clicking on the player below, and you can also subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or Audible.
Heartfelt prayer is never a meaningless exercise. Without exception, something is changed with every single prayer we offer to God. Last week, we talked about how prayer changes our attitude.
Here’s an important question: What do you expect is going to happen when you pray? Or maybe we should ask the question the opposite way: What do you expect is going to happen when you don’t pray? The writer of Hebrews talks about our expectation in coming to God (Hebrews 11:6).
Recall that last week that we used the word “attitude” as a pilot understands it; that is, the direction of the nose of the plane takes the rest of the plane and all its passengers up or down. The same thing is true of our expectation in prayer: it also impacts those around us.
There was a father that comes to Jesus with a heavy burden on his heart: his demonically-afflicted son (Mark 9:14-18). The man came in a posture of prayer (Matthew 17:14-15) only after he had first gone to the followers of Jesus, but they could not heal this boy.
Why? I don’t think they expected that they could ask for God’s power to be released. How sad! Look at what they had already experienced:
the miraculous feeding of the 4000 (Mark 8)
a deaf and mute man healed (Mark 7)
Jesus walking on the water and feeding 5000 people (Mark 6)
Jairus’ daughter raised to life (Mark 5)
And probably most shocking of all, they themselves had been used by God to heal people—“They went out and preached that people should repent. They drove out many demons and anointed many sick people with oil and healed them” (Mark 6:12-13).
Jesus calls His disciples an “unbelieving generation” (9:19). Some translations use the word “faithless” (like the NKJV and NLT). The Greek word here is a- (without) + -pistos (faith) = apistos. Literally translated it means without trust in God.
Bu I think maybe Jesus was really saying, “O unexpecting generation!”
Their lack of expectation negatively impacted the praying father. He originally came in faith for healing, but now he says to Jesus, “If You can” (Mark 9:20-22).
Jesus calls on this father to banish the “if” (vv. 23-24). At the word of Jesus, the father’s expectation changes, he believes for a miracle, and the miracle happens (vv. 25-27)!
The disciples wanted to know how to banish the “if” from their hearts, and Jesus gives them an interesting answer in vv. 28-29. He tells them to pray. We are supposed to pray in faith, but that faith comes as we pray (Matthew 17:19-21). Other New Testament writers bring this out as well: James tells us the prayer offered in faith is effective (James 5:15), and Paul tells us to be faithful—or faith-filled—in our praying (Romans 12:12).
Does this sound circular? It is a beautifully circular thing!
Abdu Murray said, “Hope is a positive expectation of a desired future event. Faith is trusting in the One who promised to make that event happen.”
It was the word of Jesus that raised the expectation of the father, that gave him the spark of faith (Hebrews 11:1; Romans 10:17). Then he used that faith to raise his expectation of a miracle from God.
Go back to the biblical record or even your own personal history to see what God has already done. Let the word of Jesus ignite your expectations—let that word raise your expectations!—and then cling to His word as you pray in faith.
Faith fuels your prayer, and prayer fuels your faith. So we need to remain on the lookout for opportunities to pray for ourselves and others (Colossians 4:2).
Let me return to the opening question: What do you expect is going to happen when you pray? If your expectation is too low, start by praying, “God, forgive us of expectations of You that are too low!” Be humbly bold enough to admit, “I do believe, but help my unbelief.” Then when you hear the word of faith, expect the miracle through that faith. The longer you pray, the more you need to include a prayer for your own faith to remain expectant.
The God who gives you faith wants to reward that faith. Let prayer raise your expectations as you continually banish the “if”!
If you have missed any of the other messages in our series Prayer Changes Things, you can find them all by clicking here.
“I love to think of nature as unlimited broadcasting stations, through which God speaks to us every day, every hour and every moment of our lives, if we will only tune in and remain so.” —George Washington Carver
J. Warner Wallace writes, “Some object, saying, ‘Christians are biased.’ But there’s an obvious oversight here. Yes, Matthew ultimately became a Christian, but look closely at his background. He started out as a tax collector named Levi—not a member of John the Baptist’s group, not a friend of Peter or Andrew, not one who grew up expecting a Messiah. He encountered Jesus, witnessed miracles, listened to teaching, and after observing all these things firsthand, became a follower. Don’t hold his subsequent transformation against him as if it poisons the well. The fact that someone who wasn’t predisposed to belief chose to follow Christ after seeing what he saw lends real weight to the testimony.” Read more about how our judicial system vets courtroom witnesses.
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In The Matrix, Neo is fascinated by a young man who appears to be bending spoons simply by looking at them. Neo sits down on the floor across from this young man and takes a spoon in his hand. Although young, this boy gives sage counsel to Neo, “Don’t try to bend the spoon, for that is impossible. Instead remember that there is no spoon. That way you will see that it is not the spoon the bends, but you are the one who bends.”
There is a nugget of truth here for anyone who has ever been face-to-face with an impossible situation. The God who does the “impossible” has offered us the means to see His omnipotence at work—He has told us that we can bring our impossibles to Him in prayer. Prayer changes things!
In God’s perfect will, sometimes the impossible is done before our very eyes, and sometimes we see that it is not the situation that bends, but it is we who bend, becoming more godly, wise, and mature because of what God has imparted to us. Heartfelt prayer is never a meaningless exercise. Without exception, something is changed with every single prayer we offer to God.
There are many of us who have experienced a miraculous answer to prayer. We prayed to God in a bitter season of our life and experienced His sweetness come to our rescue. These answered prayers are testimonies of God’s love and power.
Think about people you know who are struggling with the bitterness of life. I wonder: do they know that there is a sweetness that only God can bring? Brian Ridolfi noted, “Vinegar is not bitter to those who have not tasted honey.” Peter told us we are to crave more and more of God’s sweetness “now that you have tasted that the Lord is good” (1 Peter 2:2-3). This isn’t primarily for us, but it is to us and through us so that a watching world can recognize their bitterness as contrasted to the sweetness in our Savior.
One of the things prayer changes is my attitude about the things of God. When I say “attitude” I am referring to how an airplane pilot defines this term: The nose of the plane in relation to the horizon. If the attitude of the plane is up, the plane and all of its passengers are climbing.
There is a man we meet in the Gospels whose name means “whom God enlightens.” The answer to prayer he received was an attitude-changer for him, everyone around him, and his family. Check out his story in Luke 8:40-56.
Jairus is called “a ruler of the synagogue.” He is the final authority on what happens in his synagogue. He came and “fell at [Jesus’] feet, pleading with Him” [pleaded earnestly—Mark 5:23], which sounds like a posture of intense prayer to me!
We don’t know how long the journey was to Jairus’ home, but it was made longer by “the crowds [that] almost crushed [Jesus].” It was made even longer by an interruption of yet another healing (vv. 43-48). During this delay, there is not a word of protest from Jairus as he is clinging to his faith in Jesus.
Jairus gets the news, “Your daughter is dead.”
Jesus reignited Jairus’ faith with the words, “Don’t be afraid; just believe, and she will be healed.” Matthew 9:18 records Jairus’ renewed faith-filled prayer as he acknowledges, “My daughter has died.”
The family and friends gathered at Jairus’ house were “wailing and mourning.” The AMPC says, Jesus saw “the tumult and the people weeping and wailing loudly” (Mark 5:38). Why? Because they knew she was dead—this was now an impossible situation.
But let me ask you: Is it possible that Jesus allowed this delay so that the little girl would become beyond all human hope? I think it is. Jesus was going to do something that absolutely no one could take any credit for. Jesus said, “Stop wailing. She is not dead but asleep.” They laughed at Him!
The Greek word for “wail” (alaladzo) has an interesting root word (alala) which means the cry of soldiers running to the battlefield. And then when those soldiers return victoriously, they have a total change in their attitude so alaladzo is now a joy-filled shout (Psalm 47:1; 66:1-3).
(1) Jairus had an attitude change.I believe became a Christ-follower in the truest sense of the word. Why do I think this? Because we know his name. There are four “synagogue rulers” described in the New Testament: three that become Christians we know by name (Crispus [Acts 18:8], Sosthenes [Acts 18:17], Jairus) and one who remains anonymous because he was bitter that Jesus healed someone on a Sabbath (Luke 13:14).
(2) The scorning mourners who knew the girl was dead had an attitude change. They spread the laughter everywhere (Matthew 9:26).
(3) What about us? An encounter with Jesus changes us (Romans 12:2; 2 Corinthians 3:18). In order to “taste and see” how good God is, we must be people who are consistently prayerful and expectant of His wonder-working power. Let’s change our wailing into a battlecry, our mourning into praise, so that God can chance our tears into laughter!
A world steeped in bitterness needs to see the sweetness of our God—Come and see what God has done, His awesome deeds for mankind! (Psalm 66:5).
Keep up with all of the messages in this prayer series by clicking here.
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When we talk about the Baby in the manger, there is often an aspect that we overlook, although it’s included in many of our Christmas carols—
born is the King of Israel
come and worship Christ, the newborn King
hark the herald angels sing, glory to the newborn King
joy to the world, the Lord is come, let earth receive her King
I think many of us bristle a bit at the idea of any king—especially someone claiming absolute authority as King of kings—because of our unpleasant experiences, or perhaps the stories we have heard from history. Lord Acton was right when he said, “Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Every monarch throughout history has established their kingdom by the strength of their sword: “Do things my way, or else!” Lord Acton went on to correctly add, “Despotic power is always accompanied by corruption of morality.”
The kings of Isaiah’s day in Israel were nothing but evil, and the kings of Judah were becoming more and more ungodly with each successive generation. What about during the time Jesus was to be born? Luke 2:1 tells of Caesar Augustus. Augustus was born Octavian and he came to power after Julius Caesar was assassinated and after fighting against Mark Anthony and Cleopatra. Augustus claimed to restore the republic, but he really kept all the power to himself.
This is why we tend to distrust those who claim authority over us and demand from us our allegiance to them. So when Isaiah begins to tell of the coming Messiah (Isaiah 9:2-5) it sounds like a warlord wielding His powerful sword.
But recall that the first time time Isaiah uses the Hebrew word shalom (peace) is in the titles of this King. Isaiah calls Him a Child and then gives Him such unexpected titles (Isaiah 9:6)!
Isaiah says “the government will be on His shoulders.” The word misra (government) is only used twice in the Old Testament, here in vv. 6-7. The root word sara is also only used twice, and both times are related to Jacob the trickster being transformed into Israel, the one in whom there is no deception. This tells us that the Messiah is going to take the burden on Himself—He flips the Kingdom upside! Instead of all of us serving Him, He comes to serve us!
This is why it’s called His government and peace and establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness!
This King of absolute power—the One Who is also called Mighty God—could overwhelm us with His unquestioned, unrivaled, and unapproachable power, but He came to be our King who makes peace.
Our King is the most awesome power in the universe, but He is approachable because He is humble (Philippians 2:6-8; Isaiah 53:1-5; Matthew 11:29; Matthew 21:5).
This is exactly what the angel foretold to Mary (Luke 1:26-33), and this is what Mary grasped, as she relates it to us in her Magnificat. Listen as she expresses praise for both our King’s power and His gentleness (vv. 46-55).
Our King came to draw His sword not against us but against the enemy that kept us enslaved and separated from God (Isaiah 9:2-5; Colossians 2:13-15; Revelation 1:18).
In Isaiah 9:6 we read that the government will be on His shoulders. This is Jesus carrying the burden. This word for “shoulders” in the OT is almost always associated with the words “burden” or “yoke.”
We were born with the yoke of sin burdening us (Hebrews 2:15). Jesus took that on His shoulders when He took an old rugged Cross on His shoulders. Now He invites us to give our burden and our yoke to Him (Matthew 11:28-30).
Our King says, “Come to Me”—He is approachable because He was born as a Baby in Bethlehem. Our King says, “I will give you rest” because He is our conquering King who broke the yoke of sin for us. This is what Christmas should remind us!
If you’ve missed any of the previous messages in our series looking at the titles and roles of the Messiah, you can check them all out here.
Listen to the podcast of this post by clicking on the player below, and you can also subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or Audible.
The apostle Paul writes something pretty straightforward: “Do not be anxious about anything” (Philippians 4:6). What might not seem so straightforward for us is this: What exactly is anxiety?
The root word for anxious simply means to care for something or to care about something. Paul uses this word in a positive sense earlier in this letter when he praises Timothy for his concern for the wellbeing of the saints (2:19-22). In another letter, Paul told the Corinthians he had a deep concern for their spiritual growth (2 Corinthians 11:28) and that he desired for them to care in a similar way for their fellow saints (1 Corinthians 12:25). All of these instances use the same Greek word.
The problem is when care crosses the line to become worry.
A clear example of this is seen in the activities of Martha. She cared deeply about providing for the needs of Jesus, wanting to provide appropriate hospitality for Him, but her focal point switched from Jesus to food (Luke 10:38-42). Luke tells how Martha crossed the line from concern to anxiety by stating that “Martha was distracted by all the preparations.” Jesus redirected her to the one thing that “is better,” which was a devotion to Him.
Care can turn to worry in the simplest of areas.
Being careful about my physical health—food, clothing, shelter—is a legitimate concern, but Jesus warns about these things becoming a focal point and causing me to cross the line from concern to worry (Matthew 6:25-34). Wanting to answer well those who criticize my Christian faith is a noble concern, but obsessing over my word choices crosses the line (Matthew 10:19). Desiring to please my wife is perfectly natural and even commendable, but putting her on a pedestal crosses the line into worry (1 Corinthians 7:32-34).
The crucial discipline to keep me from crossing the line from concern to worry and anxiety is to keep the right focal point. I am not my own provider; God is (James 1:17; Matthew 6:8; Luke 11:11-13).
So in the same verse that Paul tells us “do not be anxious about anything” he also tells us to pray about everything. Peter says essentially the same thing this way, “Give all your worries and cares to God, for He cares about you” (1 Peter 5:7 NLT). God cares about me and the things I care about more than I do. He wants me to focus on Him, not on the things I care about, because He can provide for me perfectly. His provision keeps me from worrying about anything.
Don’t worry about anything; pray about everything.
That is my safeguard against crossing the line from legitimate concern to anxiety-causing worry.
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Jesus made His first appearance as a fully human Man in a stable in Bethlehem. But His Advent—or appearing—had been anticipated for a long time before that.
In fact, one of the darkest chapters in human history takes place shortly after human history began. Mankind sinned and was separated from God because of that sin. The initial separation foretold an eternal separation (Genesis 3:22), but God shines His light of hope in this darkest hour, foretelling the Advent of our rescue (3:15).
Seven hundred years before Christ’s birth in Bethlehem, the setting is still dark and getting darker. Sin is running rampant, God’s people are groping in darkness, and enemies are pressing in from every side.
Out of the darkness, God speaks (Isaiah 8:5-10), giving us a glimpse of the Messiah’s glory. Notice the hope-filled words Immanuel (v. 8) and God with us (v. 10). This darkness is the inevitable result of not gazing on God’s glory (vv. 21-22), and yet there appears another glorious promise in a single word: Nevertheless (9:1-7).
We get a glimpse of Immanuel’s glory in the titles that will describe our Messiah. Let’s look first at Wonderful Counselor.
Wonder can have two definitions:
Something so extraordinary that it is hard for our finite human minds to comprehend—Exodus 15:11; Isaiah 25:1 NLT.
God’s awesome deeds: His works that leave us in absolute awe of His greatness—Jeremiah 32:17 AMPC.
Counselor is someone who gives counsel; not just any counsel, but perfect counsel because He is omniscient (knows it all) and omnipotent (can do it all)—Isaiah 14:26-27; Psalm 139:1-6; Psalm 32:8.
Job got a glimpse of this Awesome Counselor too in Job 42:1-6.
Our First Testament friends only got a glimpse of the Messiah’s glory, but we have the glory revealed to us—Hebrews 1:1-3a; Matthew 1:22-23; John 1:5, 14, 18.
We have His wonderful counsel revealed to us too—Luke 5:20-26; John 7:37-46.
And we look forward to seeing His glory undimmed at His Second Advent—John 1:47-51; Mark 14:61-62.
As we live now between the Advents, we have the joyful privilege and responsibility to proclaim this glory to those still living in darkness—Matthew 28:18; Acts 4:30.
See how the saints proclaimed Christ’s glory, relying on His wonderful counsel in Acts 4:13, 20, 31; 5:12; 6:8, 10; 8:6-8. This is how we are to live too (2 Thessalonians 2:16-17).
As you live between the Advents, I pray that the glory of our Wonderful Counselor will become more real to you and that it will shine out of every word you speak and everything you do!
Check out the other posts in this series Jesus Is…here.
In the day when I cried out, You answered me, and made me bold with strength in my soul. (Psalm 138:3 NKJV)
Notice the full cycle—we need physical and emotional strength to pray persistently and consistently, and prayer enhances our physical and emotional reserves to help us pray. So do all three: 
Craig T. Owens 