The Glorious Pursuit - Day Three

In these days of preparation for revival God continues to gently but consistently reveal sin in my life. Today the focal point of my sin has been my lack of persevering in prayer when the answers have been delayed. God has identified several areas where I used to pray fervently but when the answer delayed in coming I lost heart. I have up and quit. God never told me to quit or to cease believing. I became disheartened and threw in the towel on these prayer concerns.

[Luke 18:1] "Now He was telling them a parable to show at all times they ought to pray and not to lose heart." The parable is the story of an unjust judge and a widow who kept coming to him for justice. Eventually her persistence paid off. God is more willing to answer our prayers than the unjust judge was to help the widow. Our challenge is to persist in prayer until the answer comes. At all times we are to persist and not lose heart. When I feel like praying and even when I do not feel like praying I must persist. When my faith is strong and even when my confidence in God wanes I must continue to pray. There can be no giving up.

Do we really want revival? It seems to me all of us have been pretty content to live without it by the lack of our praying for it. Have we lost heart because the revival has not come in our lifetime. How often do you ask God to quicken the hearts of the people you attend church with? How often do you plead with God to turn the hearts of Christians back to Him and the hearts of the lost to trust the Lord for salvation. When you do not see the results are you not tempted to give up?

I read a story this morning about how George Muller had a burden for five friends to be saved. He began praying for those friends everyday. That is not figurative. Muller's on account testified to the fact he prayed for them each and every single day without fail. Eighteen months passed before the first was saved. He continued to intercede for the other four. It took five years for the second person to be converted. Muller kept on praying undaunted. Six years passed before the third person trusted Christ for salvation. Before the fourth person was saved Muller had been praying for him a total of thirty-six years! Muller died before the last person was saved but his prayers lived on past his life and eventually the fifth person was saved as well.

How easily we give up when the answers to our prayers are delayed. I have been asking the Lord to save four people for only a few months and I get discouraged. I have been asking God to sell my house in Seminole and to allow us to buy a house here in Paradise for eleven months and I lose heart. Muller prayed every day for thirty-six years for the salvation of his friends. Do I love people that much? I prayed today for S.R., S.R., V.W., K.W. and C.L. Will I stay the course with them and pray until they are all saved? If I love them I will. I will not give up no matter how long it takes. If I truly trust God I will stay the course for decades and even a lifetime if it takes that long knowing God will convict, draw, and save those.

No matter how long it takes to see revival will we keep asking and trusting God for it? Revival meetings may come and go without real revival but will we quit asking? Many meetings have come and gone in our communities. We are asking God for a fresh outpouring of His Spirit. We are asking for more than a few days of meetings. We are asking for transformation of hearts, churches, and communities.

Many years ago I was invited to preach a youth camp for a friend at Camp Chaparral near Wichita Falls, TX. Before the camp began my friend and I went into the worship center for a season of prayer. We fell on our faces and cried out to God not only to move in that camp but to send revival to our churches and across the land. We pledged ourselves to pursue God for revival the remainder of our days. That was thirteen years ago and I still long to see God send it. I still ask for it. I cannot say I have asked Him for it everyday. I cannot even say I have asked God for revival every month. There have been many times when I have been distracted by other concerns. There have also been times when I accepted the spiritual conditions of the communities I lived in and the churches I served. That has been sin on my part. I repented today and have a new focus.

There are three things I must devote my praying for continually. One is the desire for more of God in my life and the life of our congregation. We can never get enough. We must ask God for more encounters with Him and more revelation of His character. The second thing I must pray for are the names of the lost. I need to keep an ongoing list and pray diligently until all accept Christ. God will continually add others to the list so I will have lost to pray for all my days. The other thing I must keep praying for is revival in our church and community as well as in the nation. I pray revival kindles a third Great Awakening in the United States that has not been seen in over a century.

I have to trust God to keep these burdens on my heart and to keep my eyes, ears, and heart bent to Him in prayer. I have to trust God will keep me burdened and give me the persistence and discipline to keep asking Him for these things no matter how long it takes to see them answered. This is the next step in the glorious pursuit of God and revival.