Last night, my wife and I joined with 20~ people in prayer on the courthouse lawn. We began our meeting by singing a couple of hymns…sadly, I only knew one of them. The singing was followed by Dan Deckard, Sr. reading multiple passages from the Old Testament concerning prayer. The most relevant being:
2nd Chronicles 7:14 – if my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land.
After the reading of Scripture, we spent the next hour taking turns praying. All manner of things were prayed for: Leaders, Government, Community, Incoming students to the University, etc. It was a great experience.
I think it occurred to everyone present how rarely we as Christians gather together in prayer. It is not enough that we just meet on every Lord’s Day to sing songs of worship and listen to a 30 minute sermon. The Bible tells us in Matthew 5:14 that we are “the light of the world”. We are not suppose to hide that light in our churches, but we are to be out in the world letting everyone see our light; a light that is only available through the Grace of God. If Christians are not willing to risk a little bit of embarrassment to demonstrate their faith and spread the Good News of Christ, how then is the world going to hear the message? When you consider that all but one of the Apostles and a great majority of the early church leaders were all martyrs for their love of Christ, a little embarrassment doesn’t seem like that bad of thing. Perspective is an amazing…don’t you think?