Write Non Fiction In November : #WNFIN Day 12
At the present time I don't have any one or any group to pray regularly with. Yet the need for prayer is urgent, and so many good things are delayed due to lack of prayer. So this one's going to be a bit like the long prayer of Daniel (cf Daniel 9), and I invite you to pray it with me:
Dear Holy Spirit, You have promised us that the floodgates of heaven would open and that the outpouring of grace would be greater than that of the flood of water in Noah's day that took 40 days and 40 nights to expend itself. Since You love to do Your great wonders with us rather than without us, You have invited us to pray from the depths of our hearts for this great outpouring of grace.
If we are honest, we prayed a bit at the beginning, and we prayed more intensely as Pentecost neared, and we've continued to pray at a regular level although it has been more through habit and gritted teeth than anything else. It has been the prayer of the long haul and each day the faith in Your promise gets tested when we observe no change. Please forgive us for giving up hope and becoming more and more half-hearted about our prayers.
In the beginning we thought all we had to do was to pray once and it would all unfold as You promised. If there was a message about praying in perseverance until it happened, well we didn't pick up on that one.
We don't get why you would test us with such a long delay, but You are God and You know best. If we had a better comprehension of how big the movement of Your grace is going to be, then maybe we would understand why it needs our hearts full of longing and our prayers full of trusting perseverance.
We confess that we have failed on both counts. Forgive us. We kid ourselves that things are okay as they are, and that a new move of Your grace would be a lovely bonus, because our hearts are paralysed with fear that if we risk our hearts in faith again that they will be broken beyond mending.
Only You can fix us and heal us so that we can begin to pray in true expectant joyful faith and not just in dry obedience.
Without You Holy Spirit we can do nothing.
Later at Pentecost You encouraged us that the harvest was both ripe and massive and that we would see You move in ways beyond all our hopes and imaginings, if only we were docile to You, and prompt in obedience. Our track record of docility to Your will, even of docility to the teachings of Your Church, is a poor one. Help us! Only if we know Your will can we begin to fulfil it, and how can we know Your will unless there are trustworthy prophets among us? Please send out charisms of prophecy, that we may have Your orders for our specific situations. Without Your guidance and Your strategies for the harvest, we will get nowhere.
O Holy Spirit, please grant that we would see what You want us to see, to hear what You want us to hear, to feel what You want us to feel and to dream what You want us to dream.
Without You Holy Spirit we can do nothing.
We can't even get others interested in praying that Your promised tsunami of grace would happen as You have said.
Only You can put into us both the motivation to pray and the commitment to pray on our own and with others. We could begin to see hope if there was a committed prayer group dedicated to praying for unity and for the massive outpouring of Your grace. But we don't even have that. Only You Holy Spirit can draw people together for prayer. All of our efforts up to this point have been in vain. Only You can bring together the prayer groups and prayer communities that will intercede for breakthrough and act as lightning rods to bring down Your grace upon our neighbourhoods and cities and nations.
Without You Holy Spirit we can do nothing. Please come!
Without You there is no thirst for holiness. Without You all preaching lacks power and effectiveness. Without You all of our evangelistic efforts come to nothing. Without You all of our catechetical efforts fall on stony hearts and yield nothing. Without You the weak and vulnerable cannot forsake the lures of the world and walk the way of righteousness. Without You nothing changes for the better.
Without You Holy Spirit we can do nothing. Please come!
Without You we have no hope of persevering. Without You we have no hope of healing. Without You the bound cannot be set free. Without you we are as uncoordinated and ugly as meaningful lyrics drowned in an inappropriate melody and chorus of silliness. Without You we cannot stand up to the forces that want us to deny God's plan for life, marriage and family from conception until natural death.
Without You Holy Spirit we can do nothing. Please come!
Without You all we yield is mediocrity and no excellence. Without You our young people only get rock concert festivals and social activities and no true sustenance for living out the Gospel of Jesus. Without You the unity that Jesus prayed for is impossible. Without You our days pass in barrenness and fruitlessness. Without You we have no hope of bringing a heart which hasn't given God a serious thought in decades back into the fold of Your family. Without You all we have are the ashes of our wasted efforts.
Without You Holy Spirit we can do nothing. Please come!
When will You at last come with power? When will we at last see Your signs and wonders? When at last will we see the sick healed and the dead raised? When at last will we see the missing generations return? When will we see Your people fully armed, and fully equipped for the battle to take back the gates of Hell and release the seats of government, media, culture, entertainment, sport, commerce, education and justice back to God's rule?
Without You Holy Spirit we can do nothing. Please come! Delay no longer. Amen.
At the present time I don't have any one or any group to pray regularly with. Yet the need for prayer is urgent, and so many good things are delayed due to lack of prayer. So this one's going to be a bit like the long prayer of Daniel (cf Daniel 9), and I invite you to pray it with me:
Dear Holy Spirit, You have promised us that the floodgates of heaven would open and that the outpouring of grace would be greater than that of the flood of water in Noah's day that took 40 days and 40 nights to expend itself. Since You love to do Your great wonders with us rather than without us, You have invited us to pray from the depths of our hearts for this great outpouring of grace.
If we are honest, we prayed a bit at the beginning, and we prayed more intensely as Pentecost neared, and we've continued to pray at a regular level although it has been more through habit and gritted teeth than anything else. It has been the prayer of the long haul and each day the faith in Your promise gets tested when we observe no change. Please forgive us for giving up hope and becoming more and more half-hearted about our prayers.
In the beginning we thought all we had to do was to pray once and it would all unfold as You promised. If there was a message about praying in perseverance until it happened, well we didn't pick up on that one.
We don't get why you would test us with such a long delay, but You are God and You know best. If we had a better comprehension of how big the movement of Your grace is going to be, then maybe we would understand why it needs our hearts full of longing and our prayers full of trusting perseverance.
We confess that we have failed on both counts. Forgive us. We kid ourselves that things are okay as they are, and that a new move of Your grace would be a lovely bonus, because our hearts are paralysed with fear that if we risk our hearts in faith again that they will be broken beyond mending.
Only You can fix us and heal us so that we can begin to pray in true expectant joyful faith and not just in dry obedience.
Without You Holy Spirit we can do nothing.
Later at Pentecost You encouraged us that the harvest was both ripe and massive and that we would see You move in ways beyond all our hopes and imaginings, if only we were docile to You, and prompt in obedience. Our track record of docility to Your will, even of docility to the teachings of Your Church, is a poor one. Help us! Only if we know Your will can we begin to fulfil it, and how can we know Your will unless there are trustworthy prophets among us? Please send out charisms of prophecy, that we may have Your orders for our specific situations. Without Your guidance and Your strategies for the harvest, we will get nowhere.
O Holy Spirit, please grant that we would see what You want us to see, to hear what You want us to hear, to feel what You want us to feel and to dream what You want us to dream.
Without You Holy Spirit we can do nothing.
We can't even get others interested in praying that Your promised tsunami of grace would happen as You have said.
Only You can put into us both the motivation to pray and the commitment to pray on our own and with others. We could begin to see hope if there was a committed prayer group dedicated to praying for unity and for the massive outpouring of Your grace. But we don't even have that. Only You Holy Spirit can draw people together for prayer. All of our efforts up to this point have been in vain. Only You can bring together the prayer groups and prayer communities that will intercede for breakthrough and act as lightning rods to bring down Your grace upon our neighbourhoods and cities and nations.
Without You Holy Spirit we can do nothing. Please come!
Without You there is no thirst for holiness. Without You all preaching lacks power and effectiveness. Without You all of our evangelistic efforts come to nothing. Without You all of our catechetical efforts fall on stony hearts and yield nothing. Without You the weak and vulnerable cannot forsake the lures of the world and walk the way of righteousness. Without You nothing changes for the better.
Without You Holy Spirit we can do nothing. Please come!
Without You we have no hope of persevering. Without You we have no hope of healing. Without You the bound cannot be set free. Without you we are as uncoordinated and ugly as meaningful lyrics drowned in an inappropriate melody and chorus of silliness. Without You we cannot stand up to the forces that want us to deny God's plan for life, marriage and family from conception until natural death.
Without You Holy Spirit we can do nothing. Please come!
Without You all we yield is mediocrity and no excellence. Without You our young people only get rock concert festivals and social activities and no true sustenance for living out the Gospel of Jesus. Without You the unity that Jesus prayed for is impossible. Without You our days pass in barrenness and fruitlessness. Without You we have no hope of bringing a heart which hasn't given God a serious thought in decades back into the fold of Your family. Without You all we have are the ashes of our wasted efforts.
Without You Holy Spirit we can do nothing. Please come!
When will You at last come with power? When will we at last see Your signs and wonders? When at last will we see the sick healed and the dead raised? When at last will we see the missing generations return? When will we see Your people fully armed, and fully equipped for the battle to take back the gates of Hell and release the seats of government, media, culture, entertainment, sport, commerce, education and justice back to God's rule?
Without You Holy Spirit we can do nothing. Please come! Delay no longer. Amen.