Today’s Scripture Threshing for Thursday, March 14, 2019
Today’s Text: Luke 18:1-10
Key Verse: Luke 18:1 (KJV): ”And he spake a parable unto them to this end, that men ought always to pray, and not to faint.”
Whatever happens to prayer in our lives and in most worship services is a question before us today. Where have the prayerful men gone? Where is the promised spirit of supplication and grace? Where is the spirit of Elijah? It has been given up for fainting. That’s why prayer is no longer on the agenda of most Christians and their services. When Jesus was here on earth, He seems to me fully aware that days are ahead of His resurrection and ascension to heaven when prayer would become an occasional or emergency matter — something that believers would treat like a spare tire that we pull out of the trunk when some others have gone flat! He saw our generation and possibly those that we are now raising; in which the major missing key elements in our worship and living will be prayer. So, he contrasted praying with fainting.
Our spiritual life fails, faints and dies out when not fed by prayer in the same way as our physical body faints without oxygen. The elder apostle who probably saw Jesus more closely admonished us to “Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour (1 Peter 5:8) Oh, how we need to realize this: our adversaries would want to hinder and stop us from praying. He is set many important things before us that would make us fail and faint to keep us from praying.
Our Lord’s understanding and definition of prayer are clearly laid out in the word He used for prayer in this text. The word is “proseuchomai.” The prefix “pros” is a preposition of direction towards and “eucomai” means desire. It is desire directed toward God! When we faint in prayer we do so in our desire towards our means of life.
We are inexcusable from praying no matter where we are. Jonah was in a whales’ belly but he prayed. Hezekiah was fainting in body, on a sick bed but not in prayer. Jeremiah was in a dungeon but he prayed. Peter prayed on a roof top. Jesus, our Lord, was facing His darkest hours in the garden, yet He didn’t faint in prayer. Daniel was I n a lions’ den, yet he did not faint. Regardless or what, when and where; as long as you’re a man (generic), Jesus warns: you ought to pray, and not to faint.
Quote for the Day: “A prayer-less Christian is provoking an emergency; because prayer is the believers’ native air.” (Simon Olatunji)
Prayer: Dear LORD, help us so that we may not this day fall into the temptation to trust our strength, but that in all our things—thoughts, words, and works—we may direct our strength and self to You, in Jesus’ name. Amen.
With all my Love and Prayer,
Simon Wale Olatunji, PhD
The Darling Bishop (DaBishop),
2321 S Belt Line Rd., Suite 144,
Grand Prairie TX 75051 USA
Email: reachingout@hopeforallnations.org
BBMme: E3F988D2
[Today’s Scripture Threshing is a devotional guide of The House of Prayer Evangel Church USA. Feel free to use it in your family altar and personal quiet times; and to contact us for further enquiry, help and partnership.]
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