HOT BURNING PRAYER

HOT BURNING PRAYER
How many times have we sat down to pray and ended up falling asleep? How many times have we been praying and not truly expected God do what we request? How many times have our prayers been a process of just going through the motions? I have to admit that for myself, too many times the answer to these questions has been a reality. In all honesty, most times when I pray, I really don’t expect God to show up. Shame on me! And right now, I sit in my office asking God to forgive me of my unbelief.

Yesterday, my prayer was different. In staff meeting, as I was praying for a friend of mine who is gravely ill, God hit me with a 2x4 and convicted me of my prayer for him. It was at that moment that emotions overtook me, and I began fervently praying. Never before had I prayed like that for my friend. The Lord wants you and me to pray with this much passion all the time. It has been a theme of mine this year to worship passionately. Prayer is meant to be a major part of our worship, yet we too often weakly pray, and then when nothing happens, we are surprised. Why are we surprised? We should expect no other outcome when we don’t come with passionate prayer.

In James 5:16b, James writes “the effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.” Let’s break that down into bite sized pieces. First of all, James says that our prayers should be effective. I like one of the definitions I found for effective. It says that in order to be effective, we must be equipped and ready for combat. When we come to God in prayer, we must realize that we are in a battle with the forces of darkness. Satan does not want us to pray because he knows that prayer changes things and defeats him. He will do any and everything in his power to distract us during prayer. Therefore, we must be ready for battle when we come to God in prayer. Next, James points that our prayers must be fervent. In order to be fervent, our prayers must be hot, burning and with intense earnest. We must never come to God in a half-hearted attempt at prayer, but instead we must come to God with a passionate, energetic expectation. Finally, in order for our prayers to avail much, we must strive to be righteous. This is not self righteousness; instead, it is the righteousness we have because of our redemption by the Lord Jesus Christ. He is our righteousness, and we should come in prayer thanking him for His sacrifice, making it possible to come directly to the Father. King David knew how to pray in the way James taught us. His intensity was always equal to his need.

But I pray to you, O Lord, in the time of your favor; in your great love,
O God, answer me with your pure salvation…
Answer me, O Lord, out of the goodness of your love; in your great mercy turn to me.
Do not hide your face from your servant; answer me quickly, for I am in trouble.
Come near and rescue me: redeem me because of my foes.
Psalm 69:13, 16-18

Aaron