Hey Covenant Groupies,
Today I had a crisis of spiritual proportion. Mind you, before I read and prayed this morning I asked God to expose and reveal His word to me in a way like never before. As I read my devotional, today’s scripture was Philippians 4:6, “To be anxious for nothing; but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your request be made known unto God.” Like with other scriptures I’ve read many times before, there was some revelation that I missed before. The word “supplication” caught my attention and sent me on a search. I sat with a King James Bible, a New Living Translation Bible and a Matthew Henry Commentary on the entire Bible. I needed answers and if I couldn’t get it from these resources, I’d have to pull out the other five Bibles.
Why was this word piercing me so?
The King James Bible defines “supplication” as: more than petitioning, but suggests an intensity of earnestness in extended prayer – not to gain merit by many words, but to fully transfer the burden of one’s soul into God’s hands. For several months I’ve been struggling in the “prayer” department. I’ve been praying, but it’s lost something; maybe an intensity of earnestness, maybe urgency? As I read those words, “intensity of earnestness,” I think this just may be it. I may have just found out what’s been going on.
The Thesaurus says some nouns that describe intensity are: strength, power, passion and force; whereas, some adjectives that describe earnest are: serious, sober, deep and sincere. I honestly believe that I’ve lost all of these, except sincerity. So what does this say about my prayer life when I do pray?
Nonetheless, this lost feeling was the catalyst for Kevin and my intense fellowship several weeks back. (Refer to blog entitled: “Intense Fellowship” and you’ll see what I mean.) I had even gotten to the point where praying about some very important things, that were once REALLY significant, were now falling by the way side.
As I sat reading God’s Word back to myself and welcoming His revelation into my life this morning, Kevin walked in and asked what I was reading. I told him and began to share with him my lack of intensity of earnestness in prayer and how, after reading Phil. 4:6 in Matthew Henry Commentary, he says,”…We must likewise persevere in particular requests, not withstanding some present discouragements and repulses.”
Not only was I not praying with intensity of earnestness, but I wasn’t persevering despite my discouragements and repulses; I had given up.
What happened next further expresses the love of the God we serve. Kevin, taken aback by the fact that I wasn’t really praying and that I was discouraged, had this look of sadness on his face. I asked him what was wrong and he said, “Babe, I didn’t know you were struggling with this. If you’re having an issue with praying, then I must carry this burden and help you through this." He said that my burden was now his burden to carry. Here I was thinking I was going to be able to leave my burdens with God and God graciously allowed my husband to offer to carry them as well. I now have my two heros, not only responding to my cry for help, but coming to the fight ready and fully loaded.
Needless to say, prayer after that was on fire! The strength of God and my husband helped me to overcome my crisis. The Bible does say that, “A cord of three stands is hard to break!" Eccl. 4:12.
The enemy got whooped this morning!!!!!
Praise God!
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