Off-Bench, In-Game

When things show up twice or more often in different contexts, I usually take that as a sign from the Holy Spirit that I need to pay attention to it. I saw this video show up on Youtube when I was uploading a video from my daughter to her teacher, and I thought, huh, that looks interesting, but no time to watch right now. And then later, I saw that same video shared by a lady in my parents' church. So I watched it this morning.

It's a few years old, from Ravi Zacharias (whose mind, may I say, is one of the most incredible ones I've ever witnessed, right up there with C.S. Lewis) and Francis Chan (whose passion for the Lord is legendary). The video discussed unity in the church, and since that has been a prevailing theme of how I've been led to pray for quite a while now, I thought the things they said fit right in, particularly Francis' scripture he shared from Isaiah 55: "'For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,' declares the Lord. 'As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.'" 

As I was sitting with my Bible open to Isaiah 55, I glanced across the page at chapter 54 and read the Lord's promises to the nation of Israel. I took verse 17, though, as a promise for the church as a whole: "'No weapon forged against you will prevail, and you will refute every tongue that accuses you. This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord, and this is their vindication from me,' declares the Lord."

What a heritage to have! We have already won by Jesus's death and resurrection! The Spirit of God has already paved the way to salvation; nothing can stand against Him in us. No weapon, nothing that Satan brings against us. John 15:3-4: "You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in Me."

I recognized again this morning that I am not being led to pray for the comfort of the church, rather the opposite. Much as the earthly, mortal self wants to ask Jesus for physical protection, for everything to go back to hunky-dory, for potluck dinners and Sunday morning sunshine... I am not led that way, and the Lord showed me that very clearly. He impressed on my heart to pray continually for a great harvest, and in the picture that He showed me, there was a clear contrast between the pouring-in harvest... and the bare brown fields that were left behind, a clear rift between the ones who were brought in... and the ones who chose not to come.

This was so clear to me: refinement, either/or. No more bench-sitting, get in the game or get out. No more warm. Hot... or cold. Make your choice. “Look, I am coming soon! My reward is with me, and I will give to each person according to what they have done" (Revelation 22:12).

This is heavy on my heart. It brings me to my knees: I have many whom I love very much who are bench-sitting, and I am standing in the gap asking the Lord to move them into the game. I know that not everyone will.

The Lord reminded me this morning of the vision He gave me some months back of a flood engulfing the nation and the churches sheathed in the waterproof Truth. The church doors were flung open, and the helpers were pulling the lost inside. I prayed for an abundance of helpers, enough to be able to bring the lost in. "Pray earnestly that the Lord of the harvest will send out workers into the harvest field."

I thought about Daniel, and how he prayed earnestly, and the Lord sent an angel in response, but that angel was caught up in a fight against a demon for 21 days, until Michael the archangel was sent to fight him, after which the angel got through and came to Daniel. To me, this opens up a whole aspect of spiritual warfare that I often forget. We are called to earnestly seek the Lord, to earnestly pray as Daniel did. And if what we ask doesn't happen immediately, we sometimes give up because we think the Lord doesn't intend it to happen. But intercession is all about praying through to an answer, to release, to victory, if we pray in accordance with the Spirit (Romans 8:26-27).

It's so important to entrench ourselves in the battlefield, to settle in for the long haul. I know very little about military maneuvers, but I do know about fighting holes and trenches. Both engender this idea of digging in, fighting from a defensive position, remaining in a place of safety from which we can fight. We need to have our holes dug, our trenches in place as we settle in for the long haul, the "21 days" of Daniel.

I'm praying for trench warfare in the heavenlies today!