"Pray always. Pray in the Spirit. Pray about everything in every way you know how! And keeping all this in mind, pray on behalf of God's people. Keep on praying feverishly, and be on the lookout until evil has been stayed. And please pray for me. Pray that truth will be with me before I even open my mouth. Ask the Spirit to guide me while I boldly defend the mystery that is the good news - for which I am an ambassador in chains - so pray that I can bravely pronounce the truth, as I should do." (Ephesians 6:18-20 voice translation).
In my last post I talked about the armor of God and the sword of the Spirit that Paul describes in Ephesians chapter 6. I mentioned before that words of the truth of God are powerful and can help us to shift our perspective so that we have strength to keep standing in the midst of adversity. Today I would like to focus on another weapon that Paul says we should use on the battlefield in partnership with the sword of the Spirit. Prayer.
The Sword of the Spirit is the word of God that we use to change our focus from the feeling of hopelessness that we feel in our situations, towards the truth of God that gives us hope. So then if the sword of the Spirit is the word of God, then prayer is the action, the active step of being a doer of the word. I love how the book of James describes this concept of putting the word of God into action:
"Put the word into action. If you think hearing is what matters most, you are going to find you have been deceived. If some fail to do what God requires, it's as if they forget the word as soon as they hear it. One minute they look in the mirror and the next they forget who they are and what they look like. However, if is possible to open your eyes and take in the beautiful, perfect truth found in God's law of liberty and live by it. If you pursue that path and actually do what God has commanded, then you will avoid the many distractions that lead to an amnesia of all true things and you will be blessed." (James 1:22-25 voice translation)
So how do we put the word of God in action? We pray. Not only pray, but as Paul puts it, we must pray in the Spirit. But what does it look like to pray in the Spirit? For me, it is as simple as asking the Holy Spirit to guide me in prayer. I ask him to teach me the words to pray and to align my thoughts and words with what he would like me to pray about. It is important to ask the Holy Spirit to give me the words to pray because sometimes I don't have the words to describe what I need to tell God in order to process the grief I am going through. And it is also important that I lay down all of my emotions and thoughts that are on my heart so that God can bring healing to my heart and mind. Have you ever been in a place where you were so heartbroken and the heaviness of grief was so heavy that you couldn't even open your mouth and speak the words out loud that you needed to get off your chest in the refuge, in the safety of God's presence? That was me this past week.
But God is so good. Because even in my pain I know that God sees me. He knows what I have been going through because he has been walking through it with me. He is standing in the midst of the hardship with me and is holding me up with his love and compassion in the valley that I am walking through right now. On the battlefield, in the middle of the war. Can I give you some encouragement today? God has not abandoned you on the battlefield. It is okay to bring your brokenness to Jesus in prayer. It is okay to acknowledge your feelings in the safe space of God's presence. Actually that is the best place to put it. Because if we try to process everything in our own strength, and in our own understanding that is when we crumble under the heavy weight of grief. But if we take all of our thoughts and emotions to God and combine that with praying in the Spirit then we can see what God sees and get his perspective. I don't know about you but I really like the thought that I can come to Jesus and simply lay my thoughts in his hands.
I want to leave you with two tools as we close our time together here today that have been helpful to me when processing my pain. The first tool is to practice using the sword of the Spirit, the words of scripture from the Bible, to prepare your heart and mind to do battle against the enemy so that you can continue to stand and be strengthened and encouraged by the words of God's truth. I find that it is helpful for me to spend time with a piece of paper, a pencil, and my Bible and simply write down scriptures that God lays on my heart. Then I will read the words God has given me in that moment out loud in practice and preparation of using the sword of the Spirit. The second tool is to then take the scriptures that you have written and pray with God about them. What this looks like for me is to pray in agreement with the words of God, and ask him to help me apply it to my current situation. And sometimes I even just use the scriptures so that I can tell God what I am feeling and ask him to help me process my pain in the safe place of his presence. The words that God has given me to process my emotions the last few days is a lament written by David in the Psalms:
"My soul is dry and thirsts for You, True God, as a deer thirsts for water. I long for the True God who lives. When can I stand before Him and feel his comfort? Right now I am overwhelmed by my sorrow and pain; I can't stop feasting on my tears. People crowd around me and say, "Where is your True God whom you claim will save?" With a broken heart, I remember times before when I was with Your people. Those were better days. I used to lead them happily into the True God's house, singing with joy, shouting thanksgivings with abandon, joining the congregation in the celebration. Why am I so overwrought? Why am I so disturbed? Why can't I just hope in God? Despite all my emotions, I will believe and praise the One who saves me and is my life. My God, my soul is traumatized; the only help is remembering You wherever you may be; from the land of the Jordan to Hermon's high place to Mount Mizar. In the roar of your waterfalls, ancient depths surge, calling out to the deep. All your waves break over me, am I drowning? Yet in the light of day, the Eternal shows me His love. When night settles in and all is dark, He keeps me company - His soothing song, a prayerful melody to the True God of my life. Even still I will say to the True God, my rock and my strength: Why have you forgotten me? Why must I live my life so depressed, crying endlessly while my enemies have the upper hand? My enemies taunt me. They shatter my soul the way a sword shatters a man's bones. They keep taunting me all the day long, "Where is He, your True God?" Why am I so overwrought? Why am I so disturbed? Why can't I just hope in God? Despite all my emotions, I will believe and praise the One who saves me, my God." (Psalm 42 voice translation)
Dear Lord, thank you for your words. Thank you that we can come and lay all of our emotions and thoughts in your hands. Thank you for walking with us and seeing us right where we are right now in our hard season. Please help us to remember to not only hear the word of God, but to put it into action through praying in the Spirit what you would have us pray. Thank you for giving us the words to speak when our souls are heavy with grief so that we can continue to stand strong in the middle of the spiritual war that we are fighting. In Jesus name, amen.
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