Prayer is Essential

Day 7 - March 13

Seek the LORD while he may be found; call on him while he is near. Let the wicked forsake his way  and the evil man his thoughts.Let him turn to the LORD, and he will have mercy on him, and to our God, for he will freely pardon. —Isaiah 55:6

Only God can show you the priority you need for prayer. God desires that first and foremost we be people of prayer. I believe the greatest sin in the church today is our prayerlessness. The focus in our churches should be on spiritual vitality, and therefore, we need to remember that the power plant of the church is our prayer life.

We see in Acts 1 that the church of Jesus Christ is the church of prayer. The disciples joined together constantly in prayer, along with the women and Mary, the mother of Jesus, and the brothers. At Pentecost (after they had been praying for 50 days), Peter got up to preach, and he preached a very short sermon. So the disciples prayed for 50 days, Peter preached for perhaps 50 minutes, and 3,000 people were added to the church that day!

Richard Pratt, in his book Pray With Your Eyes Open, says, “We should stop viewing prayer solely as an obligation …if we fully consider our absolute dependence on God, prayer becomes…a way to acknowledge the One who provides for all our needs. Given this perspective, we can remove prayer from our list of boring chores, and begin to rank it where it belongs, among the essentials for meaningful existence.” First and foremost we must be people of prayer.

Pray for God to help you be consistent in making prayer a daily priority. Pray for God to give your church true spiritual vitality.