Sanctuary

[Rowan]

SEPTEMBER 26

FUELED BY PRAYER

EPHESIANS 6:18
[Pray] always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit.

I once borrowed a car and as a favor to the owner filled it with gas. That big Oldsmobile station wagon had an ornament on the hood that said “diesel,” a sticker on the rear gate that said “Oldsmobile Diesel,” and a note on the fuel gauge reading, “Diesel Fuel Only.” So naturally I put diesel fuel in the tank. Big mistake, since the owner had recently converted it to gasoline. When it broke down on the main street of a village in New York, I had to explain why I had put diesel fuel into a vehicle with a gasoline engine.

I don’t think I’ll ever live that down, so I use it as the perfect illustration of Christians. We are human beings, and we have “Human Being” written all over us, but we’ve been converted into something else. If you try to run your new spiritual self on the old kind of fuel, it won’t work. There are a lot of Christians who haven’t figured that out yet. The fuel for the Christian life is prayer. Prayer is the energy that makes it possible for the Christian warrior to wear the armor and wield the sword.

You cannot fight the battle in your own power. No matter how talented you are, if you try to fight the spiritual battle in your own strength, you will be defeated.


David Jeremiah, Sanctuary: Finding Moments of Refuge in the Presence of God

 

[Rowan]

SEPTEMBER 27

REPENT WHERE YOU ARE

REVELATION 2:5
Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent and do the first works.

Perhaps we walked with God early in life, or even got all the way through college with our faith intact. But then, through small concessions in our lives, our walk with the Lord began to erode. Little by little we slipped away from the things that once had been important to us.

What should we do today? How do we get back? We must remember from whence we have fallen. Repent where we are. Go back and repeat the first works. Confess our sin. Acknowledge who we are. And then remember that God loves us.

The good news of the gospel, my friend, is that before the prodigal ever turned his heart toward home, the father had been praying and waiting for him, thinking of what it would be like to embrace him again in his arms.

God will not force Himself upon us. He will not come and drag us out of our situation. But if we will return, He will love us all the way back home.


David Jeremiah, Sanctuary: Finding Moments of Refuge in the Presence of God