Devoted to the Prayers

We’re gonna turn through the Acts for our passage for our text tonight, uh, this morning. Acts Chapter 2. For our visitors, we’ve been working our way through Acts Chapter 2 Verse 42 for the last few weeks, just seeking to set a foundation of what the church ought to devote itself to, spend its time upon, what, what to shape us. What are the main things that, that we should focus on as the Church of Jesus Christ? We’ve talked about-teaching, talked about the church, being devoted to the church, being devoted to Christ, being devoted to the apostles’ teaching, devoted to the fellowship, devoted to the breaking of bread, and now we come to that final one, to prayers.

And so this morning we’re gonna consider that. This afternoon, we’re gonna look at sort of the whole chunk from 42 through to 47 a- and think about, for the last one in this series, just think about the sort of key motivation. Why do we do this? What, what’s the, what’s the outworking of a church that does this? What will we, what could we see God do if we were to truly and faithfully give ourselves over to the appointed means of God’s grace?

Prayer. Prayer is one of those things we can often talk about very easily. It’s something that’s very simple, and it’s something that every Christian does. Uh, 1, one author puts it that there is no such thing as a prayerless Christian, because a prayerless Christian is a dead Christian, and there is no such thing as a dead Christian. Even the saints in heaven pray. We’re not talking about, of course, how much someone prays or the quality of their prayers or anything like that. But the reality is, the mark of a breathing, living, spiritual believer is their heart communes and talks with their God.

And, you know, this, this church, this church devoted itself to the prayers we’re told. And so it’s important for us to consider what, why, and how about these prayers? What are these prayers they devoted themselves to? Why did they devote themselves to prayers, and, and how did they go about doing that? Because if we want to be a church that, that follows God’s ways, that seeks to lay its foundations and its roots in the Word of God, then this is one of the key components of a Church of Christ. Churches of Christ pray. They pray, and they pray. Until the return of Christ, they will pray.

So, what did they devote themselves to? What is this prayers that they’re talking about? We’re told they devoted themselves to prayers. Now, th- the children in the room, you’re probably thinking, “That’s very easy to answer, and you probably don’t need a whole point for that.” But you underestimate a preacher, firstly. And secondly, it’s not quite so simple. You may have noticed, children and adults, that it doesn’t say they devoted themselves to prayer or praying. But they devoted themselves not even to prayers, but it’s quite interesting, they devoted themselves to the prayers. So a particular type of thing, right?

You know, quick grammatical lesson, there’s a difference between having a in front of something and the in front of something. Let me help you understand this. If I say, “I met a king,” well, that could mean anyone. Well, not anyone, it has to be a king by definition, but it could be any king. If I said, “I know the king,” you can probably all guess who I’m talking about, because there’s only one the king. It’s a little bit like we don’t say, “I believe in a savior.” Why? Because that would suggest that there’s many different types of saviors. We believe in the Savior, because there’s only one of them. Whenever you put the before something, you’re saying something particular about it.

And so they’re talking about something in particular. So what is, is this the prayers? Because it’s not talking about your individual private prayer life. Now, there’s application from this when you think about the church being devoted to prayer. You can apply all of that to your personal life, ’cause it’s important for every Christian to pray. But we’re not thinking about individual prayer, though I encourage all of you to give yourself to it. We’re not thinking about that. We’re thinking about the prayers.

So if we’re not thinking about, you know, the time you spend in your closet, or in your bed at night, or in your shower, or while you’re driving, then what are we thinking about? Well, they devoted themselves to the prayers, which could mean a number of things. It could mean the set Jewish time of prayers. You see, Jews, they had, like, set times of prayers that they had to pray every day as part of their religious upkeep. It’s part of the law that the Pharisees had insisted upon. teaching from the Old Testament that they had sort of stretched out and then applied and said, “Pray at this time and this time.” And some of you will be familiar with Muslims who do this too, multiple times a day and together every Friday, very important religious exercise.

It could be that, or it could mean the church gathering together to pray, like we see in the beginning of Acts. And so, you remember, just before the coming of the Holy Spirit, in verse 12 of chapter one, we’re told that the people gather together and they’re giving themselves, verse 14, with one accord to prayer. So, it could be that. It, it could be something more general. So, in Revelation, the same phraseology is used to describe all of the prayers of God’s people. So, you might remember, in Revelation 8, it talks about an angel having a incense pot filled with the prayers of the saints. It could be that.

Realistically, more than likely, it’s one of the first two, and this is why. Firstly, at the beginning of Acts 1, we’ve just encountered the church doing what? Gathering together to pray. Secondly, in verse 46, we’re told day by day they’re going to the temple. Why are they going to the temple? For worship and prayer. And then we’re told in chapter 3, verse one, that Peter and John are going up at the hour of prayer, 3 o’clock.

So, which is it? I’m inclined to say it’s the first, the church officially gathered together to pray. You could say either, but it doesn’t make a great deal of difference which one you choose. Why? Because they were going up to the temple to pray together, weren’t they? Day by day, we’re told in verse 46, they are going to the temple together. So, it’s like you get in the temple and there’s all these individuals coming in from different ways, but there’s that one group who come together, and sing together, and pray together. It’s the sect. It’s the Jesus sect. The, the Sect of the Nazarene, they used to call it.

What we’re focusing on today, because we don’t have a Jewish temple to go to, fortunately, because we are in the temple, we are the temple of God, we’re focusing upon the reality of that first one, the church officially gathering together to seek God. Remember that moment in Jo- in 2 Chronicles 20 where Jehoshaphat calls the people, and 3 times it says to seek God, to seek God, to seek God? We need to seek God.

And so, what’s heavily in my focus, in my mind, and I want to be in your mind and in your heart as you listen to this sermon, is Sunday morning at 10 o’clock when we gather in there to pray, and Wednesday night when we gather at the Leonard’s place to pray. That’s what’s in the mind of Luke, okay? Obviously not those 2 events, ’cause we didn’t exist yet, but you know what I mean. It’s that type of gathering, a gathering of God’s people for the intent purpose of seeking God.

It’s, it’s easy for us as Christians to rush to application of individual prayer, right? Why is that the case? I think number one, there’s 0 accountability. No one knows what I do in my prayer closet, right? When I go down to my study to pray, people know I go down to my study to pray, but I could be doing anything in it. And so, it’s easy to apply prayer to ourselves individually. It’s hard to press into talking about praying like this.

But I want you, for this morning, just to set your mind on that, to think about what this early church is doing honestly, and ask yourself the question how that applies to yourself as a part of this change. It’s imperative. You see, the early church saw giving itselves- itself over to corporate, gathered prayer as an absolute essential and non-negotiable.

Why? So, what is it? Corporate, official, gathered prayer. Why did they give themselves to it? Because if we don’t understand the why, let’s be honest with one another, we’re not gonna do it, right? But actually, what’s worse is we might do it, but we’ll do it like law-abiding robots. Do you know what a law-abiding robot is? It’s a robot that’s programmed to do A, B, and C. And it will always do A, B, and C. And it will do it without missing a beat, faithfully, day in and day out, without complaining. But it will never, ever have joy. It will never do it because it wants to. ‘Cause robots can’t want to, right? They don’t have feelings. As much as your AI is a very friendly character, it doesn’t have any friends because it’s not real. It doesn’t exist. It doesn’t have feelings. And yet, your coffee machine will faithfully make you a coffee every day of your life until it breaks, right? We don’t want to be robots. We want to serve the Lord with willing hearts. And we will only serve the Lord with willing hearts when we understand the primary motivation, when we understand the why.

So, what is the why? Well, firstly, the early church devoted themselves to the prayers because they recognized their dependence. They recognized how weak they were, how nothing they were, how foolish they were, how poor they were. I mean, just think about it, right? You imagine being a part of that early group. 3,000 people have just been converted. Now, I know that for us, sitting here with 30, 40 odd people, 3,000 sounds like a lot. But imagine that the whole entirety of New Zealand were Muslims, and 3,000 of us decided to start following a different Muslim faith. You wouldn’t feel very big, would you?

You gotta remember that these 3,000 believers are still Jews. They’re still Jewish people, and they’re living amongst brothers and sisters and family. And so, not only they are- are they under a nation’s state, Israel, which has authority over them, both religious and in many other ways. But they’re also part of a wider empire called the Roman Empire, which has civil authority to crush them without any moment’s notice. And so, here’s this tiny little fledgling church that’s only just started, and it looks around itself and it sees the Jewish nation and the Roman Empire, all of whom worship differently, all of whom have different gods. And you could imagine fear, right? “What’s gonna happen to us? I mean, we’re gonna get rejected. We’re gonna be hated. What power do we have? What authority do we have?”

It’s not the rich and the powerful and the successful being converted. It’s the lowly, it’s the weak, so that Paul can write to Corin- the church in Corinth and say, “Don’t forget. Don’t forget who you were when you were saved, for you were the foolish things of this world. But God delights to use the foolish things of this world to shame the wise.” And so, what they did is they began by looking at themselves and they recognized that they had nothing, because everything was being taken away from them. They were weak and they were surrounded by threats, power, strength, and human glory.

And as they recognized their dependence, their utter destituteness, what do they then recognize? Well, they recognize the promises of Christ. See, they recognize their dependence, but at the same time, what have they been devoting themselves to? The teaching of the apostles. And what did the apostles teach them? The apostles taught them the things of Christ. And what did Christ give them? Well, Christ gave them promises.

So, turn with me a few pages backwards to the Upper Room Discourse. We went here the other day. John 14, 15, 16. So in John:14, Christ says to his apostles in verse 12, “Truly, truly I say to you, whoever believes in me, will also do the works that I do, and greater works than these will he do because I am going to the Father.” What—Listen to this, this is just almost scandalous, “What ever you ask in my name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it.” W- what a promise? Jesus says to his disciples, “Look, guys, you ask for anything in my name, according to my will, you ask anything whatsoever, I’ll do it. My Father will do it. We’ll get it done. Don’t fear.”

Have a look at chapter 15. Chapter 15, we get that wonderful story of the vine, then in verse 10 we read, “If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love. Just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full. This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that he lays down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing. But I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father, I have no- I have made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should abide so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you. These things I command you so that you will love one another.” Love one a- And ask anything in my name, and we will give it to you so that you can fulfill the commands I give you, so that you can do what I’ve sent you to do.

And then in chapter 16, again, in verse 22, chapter 16:22, “You have sorrow, but I will see you again and your hearts will rejoice. And no one will take your joy from you. In that day, you will ask nothing of me. Truly, truly I say to you, whatever you ask of my Father in my name, he will give it to you. Until now, you have asked nothing in my name. Ask, and you will receive that your joy may be full.” I mean, what promises, brothers and sisters?

And as this church heard the teachings of Christ, they would have been told of these words, and they would have looked at their brokenness and their destituteness and looked at their smallness and their weakness and gone, “Wait a second, there’s a Christ who has promised to answer our prayers.” So let us go to him. Let us go to him who promises to be with us. Remember, with Jehoshaphat, the refrain of the Lord to the king and the people, “I will be with you.” Why can they go forward with courage? ‘Cause God’s promised to be with them.

Brothers and sisters, these same promises apply to us. All of the promises, Paul says, are yea and amen in Christ. God never changes, right? He never lies. So these promises still ring true. Oh, yes, they require explanation. But Christ, uh, promises to hear, and be found, and answer with his Father the needs of his people.

And so, as they recognize their brokenness, they, they remember the promises of God that Christ and his Father will answer their prayers. But there’s one more thing. There’s a third thing they recognize. They recognize the power of Christ. They saw Christ ascend, remember? The apostles. Where did he say he was going when he spoke to Mary and when he spoke to his disciples? “I am returning to my Father and your Father, my God and your God. I am ascending to the right hand of power,” we’re told, “the right hand of glory.”

And so in Daniel, we get that beautiful imagery which prophetically paints a picture of the ascension of Christ. He goes up, one comes into the throne room of God, one who is like a son of man, who goes to the ancient of days, and he sits down at his right hand upon the seat of power, which is exactly what happened when Christ ascended, right? He didn’t just vanish. He went to the throne of God and he sits there enthroned with all power and all authority. Remember his words in Matthew 28 to his disciples? “Behold, all authority has been given to me.” All power. Revelation 4:5, “To him belong” what? Power and glory and honor and wisdom and might. Why? Because he’s God.

And so they recognize not only their dependence, but the immense promises, but not only the promises, but the reality that there is someone powerful enough to help them in their weakness. You see, it’s not just enough to know you’re needy. There’s lots of needy people in the world, right? I mean, there’s lots of—You see them everywhere, you meet them everywhere. It’s also not enough for you to be needy and know that there’s people that help. See, you need to know that there are people who will help and that there are people who are able to actually help you.

And that’s what the Church of Jesus Christ knew. And so the Church of Jesus Christ devoted itself to prayer, the prayers, over and over and over again. They prayed because they were desperately dependent and because Christ had promised, and because Christ, who was able to do immeasurably more, Ephesians 3, than we could ever hope or imagine would be there to fulfill what he had promised.

And brothers and sisters, this is where all true prayer comes from. There is not any true prayer without these 3 things. I mean, let’s just be honest, Muslims pray way more than we do. They do, right? A faithful Muslim, I think it’s se- What is it? 7 times a day? Heaps, right? Long-winded, excellent prayers day in and day out. Is it true prayer? Of course not. Why? Because it’s not in Christ. Buddhists pray. Look, even atheists and unbelievers pray. Every human prays. But true prayer is marked by a dependency that depends upon Christ alone.

And that’s what the church did. And I think the greatest illustration of this is the comparison between the Western and Eastern Church. If there’s one thing that marks the Western Church, if you don’t know what the Western Church is, that’s us, all right? The majority church is the other way of defining it, the majority church. The one of the things that, that marks the majority church is self-competence and self-reliance. We have everything we need. I mean, let’s be honest, we’re comfortable, we’re safe, we’re secure. Like, yeah, it gets cold in here, but it’s not that bad. I mean, we’ve got plastic chairs. Sure, we don’t have nice fancy cushioned—But we’ve got lovely chairs. No one’s gonna come in here and threaten our lives. I mean, yeah, there’s the dude that turns up with his tractor and makes a bit of noise and an alarm goes off, but it’s not that bad, right? We’re, we’re not under threat of persecution. We’re, we’ve got plenty of money to pay for the rent. If we’re honest, we actually—don’t feel like we need any help at all. In fact, if we just put our minds together, we can pretty much work it all out ourselves anyway.

Uh, uh, the amount of times I can tell you that I’ve heard in, in congregational AGMs, uh, children, that’s an annual meeting for the church family, the amount of times I’ve heard someone stand up and say when it gets to the finances, “Guys, God gave us a brain to work it out ourselves.” Someone’s just finished saying, “Please, can we just trust in God to provide?” And someone says, “No. We’ve got a brain. We’ve gotta work it out. We’ve gotta budget it safely.” Why? Because we are completely—un-dependent. We are self-dependant. We are not God-dependant.

But when you go to the East, you see the complete opposite. What we see is a church upon its knees. Why? Because any day someone might walk through that doors and put me to death. Because I lose my job when I become a Christian. Because I had to give up everything to believe in Christ. Because it’s illegal for me to give money to my brother or sister who’s a Christian and needs it. And if I do, I’d go to jail.

Let me give you an example of this. In persecuted church of Russia, if you were found out to be a Christian, like as a father, you were immediately arrested and put in prison and tortured. Your wife and children weren’t allowed to work, ’cause you’re not allowed to give a job to a Christian. And it was illegal to render any help to them. So, if anyone on their street gave them money or food or a blanket, they went to prison. Imagine the, the desperation you would feel? They, they’re, they are bred in desperation and dependence because literally their only hope is gone. And so they are marked and bathed in prayer. They risk life in order to gather together with God’s people for prayer. Why? Because they desperately need it.

The thing that we must recognize if we are going to pray as a church is that we will abysmally fail unless God helps us. Honestly, I cannot stress this hard enough and I cannot overstate this. If we will not pray, we might as well close the doors and go home. Just think about that. If we will not pray, we’re wasting our time—because we cannot achieve anything. I mean, if one of you has the power to convert souls, please tell me, because I have a long list of people that need to be saved. Because I don’t have that power. I can point people to the well of life, but I can’t make them drink. I could drown them, but I can’t get them to drink. And I can tell you how to live, but I can’t make you change your life.

The only way that any change will happen in our lives and in the lives of this world is if the church, like Jehoshaphat, will fall on its face in desperation, pleading with the God of the universe to act, because He has promised, and He is faithful, and He will do it. I tell you, there is a side of me that wishes persecution would come to the majority of church. I don’t want persecution, but I want the church to recognize its need for Christ more than its need for itself.

How did they do it? How did they do it? S- you know, it’s easy to theoretically know all these things, right? But how did they do it? Let me give you a few examples in the Book of Acts, things that, that drove them to their knees.

Acts Chapter 4. The, the apostles get arrested, Peter and John. And, and the people, the people come together in verse 23, because the people, the- Peter and John, they’re not praying for release here, they’ve already been released, right? But, but I want you to notice what they pray for. Peter and John have just been arrested, and so the people come together to pray very specifically. “When they were released, they went to their friends and reported what the chief priests and the elders had said to them.” That is, “Don’t teach about Jesus.” What do we do? I mean, they imprisoned us the first time, we might lose our heads the second time. We’re the apostles, if we die, who takes care of the church?

And when they heard this, they lifted their voices together to God, and they said, “Sovereign Lord, who made the heavens and the earth,” and they cry out Psalm 2. Now, look down to verse 29. “Now, Lord, look upon their threats, and grant to your servants to continue to speak Your word with all boldness while You stretch out Your hand to heal, and signs and wonders are performed through the name of Your Holy Spirit, Jesus. Holy Servant Jesus.” And when they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and they continued to speak the word of God with boldness. Isn’t it beautiful? Uh, th- the, it’s just such a beautiful scene. “Don’t preach in the name of Jesus any longer, or we’re gonna do worse to you. Thanks for the message. Go back to the church.” And the church goes, cries out, “God, grant us to keep speaking. Grant us to keep preaching. Grant us boldness and courage to declare Your word with fervor.” And what does God say? “I will answer that prayer. That’s a prayer I will answer every day of the week.” And they go forth and do it.

And then have a look at Chapter 12. Chapter 12, guess what happens again? Persecution. The Church of Christ is afraid. James has just been killed. James the fisherman, the brother of John. Herod cuts off his head and he realizes everybody loves him. And so he arrests Peter and plans to do the same. What is the church doing? Pick it up at verse 13. Oh, sorry, verse 12. “When he realized this”—That is, Peter. ” he went to the house of Mary. So he’s just gotten out of prison. He goes to the house of Mary, the mother of John, whose other name was Mark, when many were gathered together and were thinking of a really good strategy of how to get Peter out of prison, right? Planning out a great court case, thinking about how they can blow up the bars and get—No, they’re praying.

So, wh- what else are they gonna do? They haven’t got any money. They haven’t got any power. No one’s gonna care about their legal application. But they have God on their side. And so isn’t it a beautiful picture? Peter’s walking over, he’s already released, he’s wandering over free, and they’re all sitting there doing what? “God, free Peter! Please, free Peter!” He’s already out. ‘Cause God delights to answer the prayers of His people.

And then, in ver- Chapter 13, something completely different. Look at the very beginning. “There were in the Church of Antioch prophets, teachers, Barnabas, Simeon who was called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manaen”—a lifelong friend of Herod and Saul, and while they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, “Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I’ve called them.” Notice what they do. So, I mean, you don’t need to do anything at this point, right? Think about it. God’s just turned up and said, “Look, here’s the job description. Paulob- Paulobus? Barnabas and Saul, they’re going and doing my work. Send them off.” All right. All good. Thanks. We’ve got the job. Sign the document. Send them out. Prepare a call document. We’re done.

But what does the church do? Well, don’t look at me, look at the text. Then after fasting and praying, they laid their hands on them and sent them off. They go, “Well, we’re gonna send these 2 men off to do work. Well, we better not send them off without praying first, because they’re not gonna get anything done. Even though Saul’s pretty clever and Barnabas is an encouraging guy, they’re not getting anything done unless God does the work.” And so they pray and then send them out.

And, you know, we could go on and cite so many different examples. We could talk about Samuel. Remember that moment when the Philistines invade in the beginning of Samuel, and the people have no hope and they cry out to Samuel and say, “Samuel, please keep crying out to the Lord on our behalf.” And the Lord destroys the Philistines himself. Or we can think of Jehoshaphat or Hezekiah when the Babylonians come. We, we can think about men throughout church history and churches throughout church history.

William Carey, when he went to India, he said to Andrew Fuller and a little group of sending men, “I will go down the cave if you will hold the rope. Pray for me.” Or you could think of a man like James Fraser in China, who had a little prayer support group of little old ladies. You know the ones I’m talking about. You’d get these faithful groups of 5 little old ladies who gathered to- get together to pray for a missionary. And everyone thinks it’s not very important. And he would write to that little group and he would say to them, “I thank you so much for your prayers. If it was not for you, I would have given up and died a long time ago. Tell me if you stop praying, because if you stop praying, I will not carry on.” That’s how much he valued the prayers of 5 little old ladies.

And, you know, Spurgeon would say the same. He would stand up in his pulpit and he would say to his congregation, in the middle of a sermon, “Brothers and sisters, if you’re going to stop praying, please tell me, ’cause I’m leaving. Because there is no point in me giving this effort and laboring week in and week out if you will not pray, because we are wasting our time.”

And, and just one of my favorites is a man called Jim Cimbali. You’ve probably never heard of him. He’s a crazy Pentecostal guy and I love him anyway. You know, he, he served in a church where there was, like, 15 people. The pews were breaking down. He wasn’t even trained. His dad was just like, his father-in-law was just like, “Hey, you’d make a good pastor. Go run this church.” He was like, “Sure, okay, why not?” Went across to this church. Pews are falling over. They’ve got one deacon and he’s stealing from the offering box. It’s a quality situation, right? This is just what you want for a new church.

He goes there, he labors with all of his efforts and all of his strengths for, like, 3 years, and has more money missing out of the box than he started, and less people and less pews. And he’s heartbroken and distraught and broken, and he hops on a cruise ship and goes for a holiday. And while he’s on the cruise ship everyone’s partying at one end of the ship, and he’s at the polar opposite end of the ship just staring out over the ocean praying and saying, “God, what on earth am I doing?” This sh- j- Like, “This is just ridiculous. What am I doing? I’m wasting my time, I’m destroying my family for the sake of nothing. What are you doing?”

And out of nowhere the, the text came to mind, “You have not because you ask not.” And when you ask, you ask to spend on yourself. And he came home, and the first Sunday back he stood up in his pulpit and he said to his church, “Brothers and sisters,” and I now say this to you, brothers and sisters, he said, “Brothers and sisters, the barometer”—You know what a barometer is? Children, you know what a barometer is? It’s something that tells you what the weather is and what it’s gonna do. So he said, “The barometer of this church will be our prayer meeting. When our prayer meeting is healthier than our Sunday services, the Lord will be pleased to bless our church.”

“I will forever,” he said, “I will forever gauge our success not based off Sunday morning, not based off Sunday afternoon, not based off the size of the offering, not based off the roll, but based off how many people gather to pray on our Tuesday night prayer meeting.” And then there was a visiting minister there that Sunday who just happened to be there, never met him in his life before, and he said to the guy, “Do you wanna say something?” Turns out he was a Kiwi or an Australian, can’t remember. Maybe an Australian. We’ll say Kiwi ’cause it’s better.

So the Kiwi comes to the front, this minister, stands up and he says very simply, “You can tell how many people love the church by who’s at the morning service. You can tell how many people love Jesus by who’s at there Sunday evening. Sorry. You can tell how many people love the preacher by who’s there Sunday evening. And you can tell how many people truly delight in God by who’s at the prayer meeting.” And then he just walked out the door. He never saw him again in his life. Of course it’s an over-exaggeration, not necessarily true, but it’s an helpful illustration.

Brothers and sisters, I guess the question is, what about us? Do we expect to be blessed? Do we want to be blessed? Do we expect to grow? Do we want to see souls saved? Do we want to see Karaka and New Zealand transformed for the sake of Christ? I’m sure every one of your hearts says, “Amen, hallelujah, yes, bring it on right now.” Fantastic. Will we go to our knees? I mean that.

Uh, here’s a very simple practical application for you. When you get home, open up your calendar or your diary or your wall calendar or your phone app, whatever you use, go to Wednesday and whatever is on there, delete it. You might wanna send the person a message to be polite, but delete it, because you have a f- a meeting which is infinitely more important. You are going to go face-to-face and meet with the living God amongst His people.

And then skip across to Sunday morning and then into one for 10 o’clock. And any time someone contacts you and says, “Hey, there’s an amazing event on Wednesday night w- we’re, we’re actually having a private dinner” with someone that you really, really like. Your—Pick your favorite person in the world that you’re having a private dinner, say, “You know what? I’ve got a meeting that’s far cooler. Come and join me. I’m having a private meeting with the King of kings and Lord of lords, and everyone’s invited.”

Let me exhort you please, brothers and sisters, don’t miss the gathering of God’s people in their prayers. If you do that and you don’t, you don’t spend hours by yourself in prayer, you know, if all you manage to do is get along Wednesday and your life is super busy, I promise you, your heart will flourish in Christ and you will be spiritually nourished and wealthy.

Why? Why would we do this? Very briefly, one closing qua- quote from a man called David Dixon, my favorite book on how to be an elder. It says, “In every way, in every way”—So listen. This is the thing that elders must do. “In every way, let elders seek to stir up his people to pray. Prayer is the most practical and powerful thing in the world, for it moves the hand that moves the universe.”

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