Prayer

¹ What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you? ² You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel. You do not have, because you do not ask. ³ You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions. ⁴ You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. ⁵ Or do you suppose it is to no purpose that the Scripture says, "He yearns jealously over the spirit that he has made to dwell in us"? ⁶ But he gives more grace. Therefore it says, "God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble." ⁷ Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. ⁸ Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. ⁹ Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. ¹⁰ Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you. ¹¹ Do not speak evil against one another, brothers. The one who speaks against a brother or judges his brother, speaks evil against the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge. ¹² There is only one lawgiver and judge, he who is able to save and to destroy. But who are you to judge your neighbor? James 4:1-12 (ESV)

Everytime I read the Bible, there isn’t an account where the “heroes” of the Bible was able to do great things without asking God first. When you read the accounts of the prophets, apostles, and even JESUS Christ. In every single aspect of their ministry they pray. Jesus prays after a long busy day of ministry. Even before He was crucified, Jesus was found praying to God. In every single letter written by the apostles, they never cease to remind us to pray.

So why is prayer so important?

There are two things that I’ve learned about prayer and ministry:
1. Ministry is not what we do but who we are. Ministry is NOT what we do every Sunday / Saturday, ministry is our life and what we do everyday 24/7. the ones we serve in ministry is not Om Joni or Om Joe but God- Jesus Christ. Our calling to ministry is to LIVE AS A CHRISTIAN.

One thing that we always forget is that God lives in us. We are God’s holy place. We are the church! Not this building! Now just take the world’s logic, if the world says that people go to temples / holy buildings to pray. How much more should we pray knowing that WE ARE that temple! That our body is the place where God lives! How can we desecrate the temple of the Lord by doing things that are displeasing to Him?

2. This brings to the second point. IF the ones that we serve is the Lord, how can we not pray? How can we possibly know how to serve someone that we don’t know anything about?

Prayer is the only proof that we believe in Him, that He is the source of everything. Prayer is the only weapon that we have against our enemy.

The worst temptations that we can ever get are those out of the heart; the temptation to be selfish, prideful and self-righteous. And prayer is the only weapon we have against this temptation. Prayer takes away that selfish pride that deceives us. Prayer is a way that we acknowledge that God is God and our ministry is God’s ministry. It reminds us that we belong to God not vice versa. It brings our life back to God. The Spirit uses prayer to remind us of who we are before God. It humbles us. It changes our selfishness into selflessness. Prayer is the only thing that enables us sinners to live as holy saints.

I remember a time when I was serving in a ministry. I was too caught up with thinking about what to do, where to put this and that etc. that I actually forgot to pray. The end I didn’t really know whether I did a good job or not, but I know inside me was anger. I wasn’t edified by what I did. All I have in me was disappointment and frustration. Ministry to me became a burden

What God wants from us is not our ability, our talent, our possession or our sacrifice. God does not need us to do His ministry. But He chooses to include us in His plan anyway. He chooses us because He loves us and He wants to enjoy a loving relationship with us. What God wants from us is not our ability but our availability. Our abilities are about ourselves—we can see ourselves doing this or that for God. In contrast, our availability is about God alone—we can only imagine how God will use us in his service. How can we possibly do the works of the Lord without walking alongside of the Lord? How can we walk alongside of the Lord if we are never available for Him?