Without their prayer there would have been no unction or the anointing of God to preach the word. They had had the best example of prayer and anointing ever; Jesus himself!
When we forget or are hazy about what church should be we should look at the book of Acts. Smith Wigglesworth said that it is called the ‘Acts of the Apostles’ because they acted. Faith, too, is an action word.
Where are we in our churches today? Are the leaders giving their lives to prayer and the preaching of the word? I believe that is a very important question. Revival came to Leeds, in Britain, many years ago because there was a little, unlettered man with a burning heart. He had two physical breakdowns from fasting, but revival came. That burning heart moved God.
Leonard Ravenhill says an interesting thing about revival and the church which stirs my heart.
“We are trying to marry Christianity to prosperity, popularity and personalities.”
He says that preaching material prosperity feeds the carnal man. It has been said that the self-satisfied don’t need to pray, the self-sufficient don’t want to pray and the self-righteous cannot pray, but the man who realises he needs something outside of anything that is human bathes his soul in prayer.
Again we must say this. The weakest meeting in any church group is the prayer meeting. We have to rediscover two things in the church today. One is the majesty and Holiness of God and two, the sinfulness of sin. Ravenhill says this in his “Weeping between the porch and the altar” sermon: ‘Preachers need to hit the altars and weep because they have no tears; groan because there is no moving of the Spirit of God.’
One day Napoleon ran his finger round a great country whilst talking to his generals. He said that there lies a sleeping giant and to let it sleep because if it should ever awaken it would shake the world. He was talking about China. Well, Satan is standing there running his finger around the Church of Jesus Christ and he is saying, ‘let it sleep! Because if ever it awakens and rediscovers the power of the Holy Spirit, and if it ever rediscovers the resurrection power of Jesus, it will shake the world.’
“All earthly things with earth will fade away, but prayer grasps eternity.” (Montgomery)
Post published in: Faith