RELUCTANT PROPHETS AND RELUCTANT PRAY-ERS

Some consider the book of Jonah with its story of the whale swallowing Jonah an allegory or a myth. The only problem with those views is that in several other places in Scripture Jonah is referred to as a real person—and one of them is by the Lord Jesus Himself (see Matthew 12:38-42 and Luke 11:29-32).

What we do know from the story is that the prophet Jonah was running away from being obedient to direction he had received from the Lord. God spoke to Jonah and instructed him to take a message of judgment to the city of Nineveh and Jonah’s response to His instruction was to run away. Jonah did not want to do what God had instructed him to do.

Jonah’s disobedience propelled him into a downward spiral. Each step he took in his disobedience was a descending step.

“He went down to Joppa and found a ship . . . and went on board, to go . . . away from the presence of the Lord” (Jonah 1:3, ESV). The ship was sailing in the opposite direction from Nineveh.

“But Jonah had gone down into the inner part of the ship and had lain down” (1:5).

“So they picked up Jonah and hurled him into the sea. . . . And the Lord appointed a great fish to swallow up Jonah. And Jonah was in the belly of the fish” (1:15-17).                                                                                                                                               

I think we can correctly assume that Jonah’s being thrown overboard and into the sea was another step down.

Finally, Jonah hit the bottom of his disobedience in the belly of the fish, in the depths of the sea.

I don’t know if this was a real fish or if the fish represents the rebellion that had taken Jonah to rock bottom. Whichever it was, it was about to take his life, and without a miracle there was nowhere else to go.

It was there in the belly of death that Jonah finally cried out to God (2:2).

Isn’t tragic that when we are in disobedience, when we are not doing what He has instructed us to, we often stop praying completely? Jonah took a trip to Joppa where he got onto a boat and went to sleep. And then he even tried to have the sailors assist him in committing suicide— “Throw me overboard.” In all of this, he did not pray once—not once!

We cannot wait until our circumstances are desperate to develop a prayer life. Prayer should be as much a part of our daily lives as eating and sleeping. One of the great tragedies of the American church is the abandonment of prayer, and it’s largely because many of our pastors are not praying men. As the old saying states, “As the head goes, so goes the body.”

Hitting rock bottom is when you get completely swallowed/covered up by a problem. The problem becomes so overwhelming that you end up despairing of life itself. In such a situation, your options are limited:

1.  You can try to just “survive” in this “hell” of a circumstance.

2.  You can just give up and die. Jonah had essentially reached this point when he told the sailors to throw him overboard.

3.  The third option is the one that Jonah reached after despairing of the first and the second; he finally “called out” to God in repentance and asked for help.

When Jonah finally awakened to his error and called out to God, he was delivered from the belly of the whale. Actually, he ended up on the beach in a pile of whale vomit. We don’t know if he changed his clothes or took a bath before he proceeded into Nineveh, but his call to repent and turn to God was powerfully received by the whole city. “So the people of Nineveh believed God” (Jonah 3:5).

I call Jonah the “reluctant prophet” because after he had visited Nineveh and the city had repented, Jonah was unhappy with what had happened. Apparently Jonah wanted Nineveh destroyed and he was disappointed with the spiritual awakening that occurred. Listen to what Jonah says when God confronted him with his bad behavior.

“This change of plans greatly upset Jonah, and he became very angry. So he complained to the Lord about it: ‘Didn’t I say before I left home that you would do this, Lord? That is why I ran away to Tarshish! I knew that you are a merciful and compassionate God, slow to get angry and filled with unfailing love. You are eager to turn back from destroying people. Just kill me now, Lord! I’d rather be dead than alive if what I predicted will not happen’” (Jonah 4:1-3, NLT).

The Bible account finishes with Jonah’s anger over what happened being unresolved so we don’t know what happened next to him.

One of the lessons that flows out of this story of the reluctant prophet is the modern-day issue of “reluctant pray-ers.” Let me see if I can explain what I mean by this. A lot of us pray only for things that interest us or somehow affect us. We pray for God’s blessing on people, on churches, on issues that we like. We claim God’s promises for our needs and for those we associate with. This is the narcissistic/selfish spirit of the church of Laodicea (Revelation 3).

So what about those people that we don’t like? Do we ever pray for them? What about the Muslims, radical Jihadists, Hindus, Buddhists, atheists, those whose political views are different from ours? Do you ever pray for them?

Do you ever ask God to minister to and reveal Himself to those who anger and frustrate you? Or are you a “reluctant pray-er” in the way that Jonah was a “reluctant prophet”?

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

  

Christmas can be a frustrating time of year for many Christians. We know it’s our time of the year to celebrate the birth of Christ and yet it has become so commercialized that sometimes a feeling of guilt gets in the way of celebrating. We struggle with how to celebrate the birth of our Savior and not let the commercial aspects of Christmas cheapen the celebration. If that describes the way you feel, please know that you are not alone.

Yes, Christmas is our time of the year but one almost feels that the Christmas of today was dreamed up in a smoke-filled room deep inside a sleazy Hollywood advertising agency for the benefit of “retail establishments and the economy.” Several years ago there was a very strong push by liberals and atheists to change the name of Christmas to Holiday Day. Some cities no longer have Christmas trees in the city square, or nativity scenes; instead, they have holiday trees and Frosty the snowman.

Christmas will always be Christmas for me, not Xmas, not Holiday Day. It will always be Christ’s birthday and if that is offensive to anyone, I really don’t care! The very fact that you feel the slightest discomfort with the commercialized and secularized aspects of Christmas means you are on the right track.

We love to give gifts, in moderation, in our family every year. But we have also chosen to keep Christ as the focus of Christmas and to give gifts and do things for people less fortunate than we are. One year, when our daughters were younger and we were living in Los Angeles, we spent Christmas Eve at the Fred Jordan Mission on skid row in downtown Los Angeles. Several of our friends and their families also went and together we spent the evening out in the streets with the homeless, giving out blankets (it was cold in L.A. that Christmas) and hot food. It was a memorable evening for all of us from the suburbs as we got to share with people and distribute gifts, food and a brief witness for Christ. My wife and I still remember it and so do our children. Every year we give to others we have never met and probably never will; we try to “send portions to those for whom nothing is prepared!” (Nehemiah 8:10). There are several fine ministries that you can have confidence in and give through them to the needy around the world. World Vision, Compassion, Samaritan’s Purse, and Somebody Cares America are just a few. It’s not too late to get a gift in the mail before the end of the year.

The apostle Paul never seemed to be at a loss for words about anything. By far the most prolific of the New Testament writers, he was well educated and had a wonderful freedom with words. He seemed to enjoy being able to describe the great doctrines of the faith in writing.

One of the absolute gems of Paul’s writings almost seems to be an afterthought, as if it’s in the wrong place. In 2 Corinthians 9, Paul spends the first 14 verses commending the Corinthians and encouraging and teaching them about giving. Then comes verse 15 and Paul drops this absolute diamond into the teaching: “Thanks be to God for His inexpressible gift!”

Paul, of course, is describing the Father’s gift of love in sending His Son to

earth. “For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16).

The Apostle goes on to say that the magnitude of the gift is not just breathtaking in scope but it leaves him speechless, incapable of adequately describing the meaning of “the gift.” The original word here translated inexpressible means that mere words fail him; it is indescribable, a gift that is beyond description.

Two thousand years later the meaning of “the gift” is still being revealed in hundreds of millions of lives worldwide. It was as though by the eye of faith Paul saw that “the gift” would bring the touch of grace upon millions and millions of people over several thousands of years and the sheer magnitude and beauty of what would happen left him speechless with gratitude. And then there was the understanding that “the gift” would be freely available to all who would receive it, and that makes it “priceless” and far beyond the capacity of human conversation to describe it.

Recipients of “the gift,” we wish you a Merry Christmas!

IT'S TIME TO STRETCH

A few days ago Carol and I were at a weekly prayer meeting here in our community. A group of 10 to 15 gather in a home on Wednesday evenings to pray for the needs of our world.

As we were gathering, I conversed with one of the couples; the husband is ninety-four and his wife is in her late eighties. The wife excitedly told me that they are building a new home in the area, and my first reaction was, “Oh, you’re downsizing, right?” After all, they’re both advanced in age, and don’t you normally downsize when you get older?” The wife’s response left me speechless. “No” she said, “we’re building a bigger place. We need more room!”

The more I thought about this conversation, the more I realized how it illustrates an important spiritual principle that has been largely forgotten.

Most Christians, once they hit middle age, go into neutral as far as spiritual growth goes. And then, after a few years in neutral, they begin a slow slide downward as they prepare for eternity. I’m not saying they are backsliding, I’m just saying they stop pressing on, stop pushing for spiritual growth. They are downsizing or just maintaining . . . and that’s a mistake.

Let’s talk for a minute about spiritual growth and how it happens.

I like real easy growth. I enjoy being able to stay in my comfort zone, in my spiritual easy chair, without ever having to put forth any kind of effort to grow.

Say it any way you want and talk as euphemistically as you can, but putting forth an effort/stretching to grow is now, and always will be, a painful process. I am honest when I tell you that I think I have been through enough pain, and the thought of going through more does not thrill me. I think much of my apprehension of stretching/expanding is the fear of giving up my hold on the familiar, the comfortable, and stepping into the unknown of the new.

Two hundred and twenty years ago the Church was largely dominated by extreme Calvinism that said, “If God wants the heathen to be saved, He will do it without any help from us.” But swimming against the tide of prevailing thought came a young Baptist preacher who delivered a message that has become known as “the sermon that will not die.” The young preacher’s name was William Carey and his sermon text was Isaiah 54:2-3 (NIV):

 "Enlarge the place of your tent, stretch your tent curtains wide,
       do not hold back; lengthen your cords, strengthen your stakes.

 For you will spread out to the right and to the left;
       your descendants will dispossess nations and settle in their desolate cities.”

Carey’s message was very simple, with only two points:

One:  EXPECT GREAT THINGS FROM GOD

Two:  ATTEMPT GREAT THINGS FOR GOD

William Carey’s message ignited a worldwide flood of missions and evangelism, and he became known as the Father of Modern Missions. It was his faith, vision, and personal sacrifice that opened nations such as India to the Gospel, and his dedication and commitment that inspired thousands of others to leave their home countries, step out in faith, and follow his example.

So when Isaiah said, “Enlarge, strengthen, lengthen and stretch,” just what was he talking about?

I believe that Isaiah was talking about the conscious desire to grow as a follower of Christ, to improve oneself, to step out in faith. Conscious growth is a choice that you make about your personal limits, about how big you want to grow in Christ. 

Unconscious growth is what happens naturally and without your decision-making process being involved. I didn’t make a decision when I was a child to grow to be six feet three inches tall. It happened naturally. Isaiah is challenging us on the level where we can choose to grow—to grow in faith and in our knowledge of God. We can choose to expand our vision. We can choose to expand our levels of commitment. Isaiah is saying, “Grow in God, grow in faith, grow in good works because you choose to. Set some new personal markers farther out than you have ever gone before and then step out and go for it.”

These areas of growth are our choice. The Apostle Paul was talking in this same way when he said, “Forgetting what lies behind and straining (stretching) forward to what lies ahead, I press on” (Philippians 3:13-14, ESV). Paul was using the illustration of a runner who leans forward and stretches toward the finish line. The Apostle was indicating that he had made a personal choice to press on, to stretch toward the goal.

I have never seen this portrayed more dramatically than during the 2004 Olympics. Michael Phelps, the champion swimmer, was in one of his final races and as the swimmers came to the finish line, it was anybody’s guess who would win. The camera shot we saw was from underwater and it looked like the swimmer on Phelps’ left was a tiny bit ahead of him. Both Phelps and the other swimmer reached for the electronic pad at the finish line at virtually the same time, but Phelps was able to push himself and stretch just a little quicker and farther than the others—and he won. It was incredible!

William Carey heard the call to stretch, and because he responded to the call, the era of modern missions in the Church was born. What area of your spiritual life is the Lord speaking to you about? Listen to Him and respond, as He says, “It’s time to step out; it’s time to stretch!”

CAN I PRAY EFFECTIVELY?

“The effective fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much. Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed earnestly that it would not rain; and it did not rain on the land for three years and six months. And he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain, and the earth produced its fruit” (James 5:16-18, NKJV).

These are verses that I sometimes find myself being intimidated by, especially when I’ve been praying over a particular issue and there seems to be no answer forthcoming. The first sentence is challenging enough but then James adds the illustration of Elijah. He prayed and it didn’t rain for three and a half years and then he prayed again and “the heaven gave rain.” The part that is most intimidating to me is, “Elijah was a man with a nature like ours.” Really? When was the last time I prayed and it didn’t rain for forty-two months . . .  or even forty-two minutes?

Let’s take a look at these verses and see if we can’t find the keys that will help us to be more like Elijah in effective praying.

“The effective, fervent prayer” 

The word in the original for fervent is the Greek word “energeo,” from which we get the word energy. This word literally means “to put forth power.” This is speaking of prayer that is focused and passionate, not a generalized prayer, “Oh, Lord, bless everyone in Canada today.” This prayer is very focused and is a cry to God for something that matters to the person praying. James is speaking of intensity in prayer, of very strong pleading and crying out to God. “This poor man cried, and the Lord heard him, and saved him out of all his troubles” (Psalms 34:6).

“Of a righteous man”

Righteousness is the primary key to effective praying and is not something that we can achieve on our own. We can’t make ourselves righteous. Going to church doesn’t make you righteous; reading your Bible doesn’t make you righteous; being a nice person doesn’t, either. We are righteous because of Christ’s sacrifice on the cross for our sin. The moment we acknowledge our need of Him as our Lord and Savior and ask for forgiveness of our sin, God declares that we have been made righteous by the shed blood of Christ. In other words, we stand in God’s courtroom and He declares us “not guilty,” not because of anything we have done but because of what Christ did for us! We are righteous because of the grace of God!

As a result of God’s declaring us righteous, when we pray He hears us! “The eyes of the Lord are on the righteous, and His ears are open to their cry” (Psalm 34:15, NKJV).

“Avails much”

The word “avails” finishes this statement James is making. In the Greek, the word avails is “energoumene” and again we recognize the word energy in this word. The Greek verb means “power that produces results.”

What is James saying? I believe he is saying that God always hears His children when they pray and He always answers. Perhaps the answer will not come exactly the way I want it to but it will come.

“Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of Him” (1 John 5:14-15, NKJV).

Why does James finish his thought on effective prayer by using the illustration of Elijah?

It is my personal belief that James was using a timeless literary technique called hyperbole to get our attention. Hyperbole is an obvious and intentional exaggeration and is used to draw attention to a story, a statement or a truth. It’s not that James was lying about Elijah’s prayers, it’s that he took an extreme example to grab our attention. The chances of any of us ever praying and shutting up the heavens for forty-two months is very remote (see 1 Kings 17 and 18).

James’ use of hyperbole is having the effect that he wanted it to have. Two thousand years later we are talking about the power of prayer and how one dedicated prayer warrior can make a difference. We are talking about how Elijah prayed this unusual prayer and God answered him.  The use of hyperbole draws us to reexamine a truth that, frankly, has fallen into disfavor with many. Much of the contemporary church has discarded as old-fashioned the truth that “prayer is powerful and that powerful prayer changes things!” Much of the contemporary church has put prayer in the closet and closed and locked the door. It’s time to bring prayer out of the closet!

I don’t have any idea what you are facing in your life, what your family is going through, but I do know what God’s Word teaches us. I do know the answers we have seen and are seeing in our impossible circumstances, answers that are coming through prevailing prayer.

“The effective fervent prayer of a righteous man (or woman or young person or a group) avails much.”  

ON THE ROAD TO SYRIA

The Lord spoke to one of His followers through a vision and gave him explicit instructions, but the man resisted the Lord. The Lord wanted him to go and pray for someone and the man argued, “I’ve heard about this man and he is evil. I really don’t want to be anywhere near him.” The Lord spoke again to the man and insisted that he do as instructed.

Acts 9 is where this incident is recorded and it’s integral to the story of the Apostle Paul’s salvation. Paul, known as Saul before his conversion, was a terrorist devoted to destroying the newly birthed Church of Jesus Christ. Our first glimpse of Saul is in Acts 7:58 where we read that he was present when Stephen was killed and was acknowledged as one of the leaders of the murderous crowd. Acts 9 begins with the chilling statement, “Saul, still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord” (verse 1). The terror campaign, led by Saul, had caused much of the Church to flee Jerusalem and many of the new believers had settled in other cities such as Antioch and Damascus. Saul asked the high priest in Jerusalem for permission to go to Damascus and arrest any followers of Jesus that he found there.

It was on the road into Syria that Saul was suddenly and unexpectedly apprehended by the Lord Jesus Himself. The men traveling with him did not know what was going on as Saul fell to the ground surrounded by an intense light from heaven. Saul saw a person in the light and immediately asked, “Who are You, Lord?” (Acts 9:5). The response was, “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting.”

Saul rose from the ground, temporarily blinded by the intense light—a much different man from what he had been just moments earlier. The men with him took him on into Damascus, where the blindness continued, but then the Lord spoke to Ananias and told him to go and pray for Saul. Reluctantly, Ananias obeyed. Saul’s blindness lifted and he was filled with the Holy Spirit (9:17-18). A terrorist had been converted through a vision!

The world is on edge right now because terrorism has raised its ugly head again and much of it is coming right out of the part of the world where the Apostle Paul first came into contact with Jesus. Ananias, when he laid hands on Saul, said, “Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus who appeared to you on the road by which you came . . .” (Acts 9:17). The road Saul was on was the road of terrorism!

I need to ask you a very personal question. Are you praying for the terrorists? Are you praying for them to have an encounter with Jesus the way that Paul did on the road to Syria? 

I think it’s time for the Church to remember that God has given us a powerful long-range weapon and it’s called prayer. The effectiveness of prayer is not hindered by distance. We can pray in Texas and the Holy Spirit can reveal Jesus to someone in Iran. Has the Church forgotten the power of prayer?

We are so steeped in our Western ideas of how evangelism should happen (we think) that we need to step back, pray, and let God show us what He is doing.

As the Lord began to speak to me about this understanding, I found myself wrestling with the whole idea of how to participate in reaching these Muslim terrorists. It wasn’t until I started praying for them that I finally began to understand how God was already reaching them and that they are not impervious to His message of salvation.

Does the Lord Jesus reveal Himself today through dreams and visions as He did with Saul—or has John MacArthur put a stop to that, too?

Here is a passage the Spirit-filled Church has laid claim to as they talk about a last-days outpouring of the Spirit. I believe it means that and much more.

In the last days, God says,
    I will pour out my Spirit upon all people.
Your sons and daughters will prophesy,
    Your young men will see visions,
    and your old men will dream dreams. . . .

 And anyone who calls on the name of the Lord
    will be saved. (Acts 2:17-18, 21, NLT) See Joel 2:28-32 also.

There are many reports that large numbers of people in the Muslim world are coming to salvation as they encounter Jesus in dreams and visions. It’s happening in nations all throughout the Muslim world. No terrorist is immune to the work of the Holy Spirit, just as Paul wasn’t. If Jesus can reach him, He can reach any member of any terrorist or political group.

Our responsibility is to pray. It’s time for the Church to break loose of the narcissistic Laodaecian spirit and give herself  to prayer the way the early Church did when it was being persecuted. Read Acts 12 again, especially verses 5 and 12.

It’s time to pray!

(For anyone who is interested, here is a link to a very encouraging article about the growth of Christianity in a large portion of the Muslim world.) http://worldrevivalnetwork.blogspot.com/2015/09/the-underground-revival-in-middle-east.html?m=1)