3-Minute Call to Prayer

I want to be honest. I've looked across the world for 50 years for men and women of prayer. Men and women who take verses like this seriously.

And I have not found many. Again, I'm sure many of them just keep it secret, and there are men and women of prayer that I have met that I wouldn't know. I'm sure many of you are men and women of prayer.

I wouldn't just know that through talking to you for a few minutes. So bless every one of you who are men and women of prayer, who are praying on all occasions, who are praying for all kinds of people, all kinds of situations. I'm reminded of Thessalonians, pray without ceasing.

And many of the setbacks in the American church, and there have been many, even in these great famous churches, have been ripped apart by every kind of sin, every kind of transgression. And I believe much of it is linked with prayerlessness. It's linked with the fact that thousands of pastors threw the prayer meeting out the window 30 years ago, when a theologian in a famous book said, anything in the church you have to push, like the prayer meeting, forget it, it's not worth it.

And 1,000 prayer meetings across America, from Maine to California, were canceled. And today we are largely a prayerless church. And then we wonder why our young people are in such a mess.

And so much, so much unnecessary divorce, so much immorality, so many people, even leaders, caught up into the world of pornography. We are paying a bitter price in our country for the laying aside of spiritual warfare and the ministry of prayer. I know these words are strong.

I don't say them lightly. Let us pray. Our God and Father, we thank you for your holy word.

Like a two-edged sword, it cuts in to the very inner being of our heart. And we come, we come in brokenness and surrender, realizing we have failed, realizing at times we have not worn this whole armor. We've left the shield of faith to one side and left the sword of the Spirit back in the closet.

And we come to you somehow to recommit our lives, to be your men, to be your women, to go where you want us to go, to do what you want us to do. And Lord, even as we receive this, we're still vulnerable. We're still very human.

We may not even know what to say to one another throughout this day because there's been a strong word to our hearts. But, O Lord, enable us not to be hearers of the word, but doers. For we ask in Jesus' name.

Amen.