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To Aid and Protect

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“And I sought for a man among them who should build up the wall and stand in the breach before me for the land, that I should not destroy it, but I found none.” Ezekiel 22:30 ESV

Do you find that your prayers tend to be reactionary?

Mine used to be. I’d offer grateful prayers at dinner and sweet nighttime prayers with my children, but it took something unpleasant happening to bring me to my knees and make me cry out passionately to God. I’d pray in response to things I didn’t like or understand.

I didn’t want it, so I’d ask God to change it. Sound familiar?

What if God offers something so much better than help out of our present messes? What if He wants to help us avoid some of those messes all together?

We’ve spent the last couple of weeks digging into some biblical principles about prayer. John 10:3 revealed a simple but profound truth. Jesus doesn’t open His own gates.

Instead, He seeks gatekeepers—or watchmen—to listen at His gates and open them through prayer. Unlike our enemy, Jesus doesn’t just force His way into our present circumstances; He only ever enters by the door (John 10:1-2). And He waits patiently for a gatekeeper to respond to His call and open the gate, inviting Him in.

Blessed is the one who listens to me, watching daily at my gates, waiting beside my doors. For whoever finds me finds life and obtains favor from the Lord. Proverbs 8:34-35 (ESV)

Today I’d like to dig a little deeper into the role of the gatekeeper or watchman. Consider this description of John 10:1-5 from the Bible Knowledge Commentary.

Verses 1–5 describe a morning shepherding scene. A shepherd enters through a gate into a walled enclosure which has several flocks in one sheep pen. The enclosure, with stone walls, is guarded at night by a doorkeeper to prevent thieves and beasts of prey from entering. Anyone who would climb the wall would do it for no good purpose.

10:3–4. By contrast, the shepherd has a right to enter the sheep pen. The watchman opens the gate, and the shepherd comes in to call his own sheep by name.

Can you picture it? Now let’s zoom in on the tasks of the watchman. I see two primary roles.

  1. The watchman guards against enemy attacks on the flock.
  2. The watchman opens the gate for Jesus to enter in.

Let’s examine each one to see how they apply to us.

The watchman guards against enemy attacks on the flock. I don’t know about you, but this one gets me excited. When the watchman does his or her job, the enemy’s plans get thwarted.

Maybe you need to take a moment to let the idea settle on you. If you choose to accept the role of watchman and exercise the authority given to you through prayer, you can stop enemy attacks before they ever take place. You and I don’t have to just keep reacting to bad stuff getting heaped into our laps, dear one. We can listen at the gates of God and stop some of it from ever getting there.

Don’t believe me? Consider these amazing promises from God’s Word.

…the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words… the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. Romans 8:26-27

It’s the Holy Spirit’s job to help us pray. What does He tell us?

… he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. John 16:13

The Holy Spirit carries the voice of Jesus calling out at the gate. He declares only what He hears from the Son, and He will even reveal things that are to about to take place.

Amazing, isn’t it? In Christ, we have an early warning system. Trouble is, most of us don’t tune in.

But what happens if we do? What happens when a child of God draws near to Jesus with a submitted heart, listening at His gates?

The watchman opens the gate for Jesus to enter in. When we sense the Holy Spirit leading us to pray for something and we choose to give voice to the thought in agreement with God’s will, our prayer becomes an invitation for God to enter in and alter the course the prince of this world has set.

A few months ago while praying over my younger son, I felt prompted to pray for my oldest. I asked God to ensure that Austin would live out every bit of his inheritance in Christ.

I had no way of knowing at the time that a few weeks later during a routine doctor visit for his eleventh grade physical, the doctor would find a mole on his back that would make her request a follow-up visit with a dermatologist. When the dermatologist agreed with the assessment and requested it be removed and tested, we received assurances that it was all routine and we likely wouldn’t hear anything back. No news is good news.

I have to admit, I felt a little unprepared for the call I received on the day of his sixteenth birthday. The office informed me the pathology report revealed the cells were changing and had a mild to moderate chance of becoming cancerous later on. They wanted him to see another doctor to have a larger area removed.

The hardest part was telling him that night that he had to go back. I could see the fear creep into his eyes as the same realization dawned on him that had settled on me during that phone call. Sixteen year olds aren’t supposed to have to worry about cancer.

I assured him God had this. His words, however, pierced my heart. “What if God wants me to die?”

I refused to entertain that line of thinking. God had, after all, allowed us to find it early, before any real damage had been done. And that’s when my thoughts returned to a day weeks before when I felt the Spirit prompting me to pray for my son to live out every bit of his inheritance.

You see, it was during that time that God was beginning to teach me about the watchman. The watchman stops enemy attacks and invites Jesus to intervene.

And I realized. What if the prayers of a mother listening at the gate stopped the enemy from stealing from my son’s life and invited Jesus to show a doctor something previous visits to the dermatologist had missed?

Wisdom cries aloud in the street…at the entrance of the city gates she speaks. Proverbs 1:20-21

Beloved, who will be the watchman for your family if not you? There’s only one requirement. You must be willing to listen at the door, ready to open the gate.

Who’s Leading Whom?

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Let me hear in the morning of your steadfast love, for in you I trust. Make me know the way I should go, for to you I lift up my soul. Psalm 143:8

It wasn’t exactly the morning we’d planned.

Summer had changed things for my prayer partner and me. Life took us in separate directions, and our weekly time of kneeling together at the mercy seat had been relegated to a few catch up phone calls and some prayer texts. We decided to break our summer rut of not seeing one another by meeting at a local park for a walk.

Great plan. Until my friend suggested I bring my dogs.

I knew they could use the exercise and would love the adventure—they love going anywhere in the car or on a leash. I could picture our little Jack happily bounding along with his heart full of wonder on only his second time exploring a trail.

But I also knew having my little darlings along would greatly alter the dynamic of our time together. I wasn’t sure. She said bring them. I brought them.

Excited is a bit too small a word to describe Jack’s mood.

All his lessons of heeling calmly at my left vanished as though they’d never taken place. I guess he couldn’t make the connection between the sidewalk and the woods.

I found myself severely tempted to take him off the leash. He repeatedly bounded ahead up the trail, darting from one side to the next sniffing everything, often tying Jen and me up with crossed leashes. And there seemed to be some discrepancy between the dogs over who deserved the right to lead. Let’s just say Jen and I didn’t set our pace.

We told ourselves they were just excited and would soon calm down and keep pace with us. It was a good thought.

Little did we know that half way around the loop the trail would narrow to single file, only intensifying their bids for first place. Up and down they pulled us, over fallen limbs and through leaning branches. But that wasn’t the worst part. The spider webs were.

I guess that part of the trail isn’t traveled much. Every few steps I felt thin strands of webbing stretched across the path breaking against my face. I could never see them, but I always felt them.

Through lots of laughter and panting breaths, we managed to share a bit about what God’s been teaching us. I love that He sits at the center of every thing.

But I can’t help thinking how much more enjoyable our time would have been without all the tugging and straining. Not just for us, but for the dogs.

By the time we made it back to the car, the thick, soft fur under their chins was soaked and stringy, coated in drool from excessive panting. Exhaustion had so overtaken Annie that she missed out on one of her ultimate joys: feeling the wind on her face as she rides with her head jutting proudly out the window. Apparently after all that exertion, it was too much effort to sit up and rest her head on the car door. Instead, she lay sprawled on the seat, panting and drooling.

I had a mess to clean up when I got home.

We may chuckle at the silly antics of lesser creatures, but God’s been showing me lately that we humans are a lot like those dogs. We insist on striving and straining for more, always tugging at God, trying to pull Him in the direction we want to go. And we want to get there fast. But all our tugging only pulls us further away from Him.

Funny, isn’t it, how instead of simply receiving and enjoying the blessings God gives us, we toil and strain, even in the midst of them. Instead of reveling in the moment, we dart ahead to see what’s coming around the next corner.

God isn’t holding back from us, dear one. He’s always giving. That’s His nature. God is love (1 John 4:8, 16), and He loves so deeply that He gives (John 3:16). He’s simply waiting for us to receive. Yet instead of resting in what God is giving, we strive and strain, trying to force our way into grace.

I’ll let Paul ask you the question God’s been asking me.

Let me ask you only this: Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law or by hearing with faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh? Did you suffer so many things in vain—if indeed it was in vain? Galatians 3:2-4

Beloved, no amount of striving on our part will usher us into what faith alone can reach.

While I can know that truth in my head, I still often find myself compelled to want to do something to catch myself in the flow of His grace. Reason suggests: If I … then God will … So I weary myself proclaiming scriptures and asking God for His promises I’m desperate to see lived out in my life.

Yet God’s Word shouts the simplicity of grace freely given, and beckons us to believe it.

Two nights ago something happened that threatened to rob me of peace. Climbing into bed, I settled under the covers, fully aware that I was entering my weakest hour. The enemy loves to attack with raging thoughts when I’m supposed to be at rest.

Normally, I would pray something like, “Lord, help me to rest. Quiet my mind. I need your peace. Please, God, grant me rest tonight.”

That night I offered a different prayer, a simpler one. I simply stated my belief in what God has already given me through Jesus.

“Lord, you have given me peace. I receive your peace. I have the mind of Christ. I receive your thoughts. Thank you, Lord, for the gifts of grace you’ve lavished on me.”

That night I slept like a baby, and I don’t mean the kind who wakes up screaming every hour.

You and I don’t need to keep striving after the things we’ve already been given, dear one. We just need to believe God when He says that we have them and press in close. Exercising that faith ushers us into His abundant grace.

Oh, how I love Jesus.

The Power of One

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“I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one:  I in them and you in me.”  John 17:22-23a

Feeling stirs my heart as I ponder the words of our opening Scripture today. They flowed from the mouth of Jesus on the night of His arrest. You just read some of the last recorded utterances of the Word made flesh before His body dangled for you from a bloody cross.

We observe an intimate moment between God the Son and God the Father, the heart of God laid bare before us in His perfect Word. Did you know Jesus’ final prayers were for you?

Jesus had just finished praying for Himself and the disciples He would leave behind. Then in verse 20 He adds, “My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message.” That’s you and me.

What did He pray for, dear one?

 “… that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me.”  John 17:21

Witness the Father’s revealed will spoken through the voice of His Son. His highest priority? Unity within the body of believers. Jesus prayed that believers would be one with each other in the same way that He is one with the Father. The resulting unity would cause the world to believe that Jesus did indeed come from God.

How is that possible?

Jesus and His Father are completely one in every way. Jesus declared it in John 10:30, “I and the Father are one.” They share the same thoughts and desires; their actions flow from the same perfect will. So how can men and women with very different preferences and desires, longings, and needs truly share one mind . . . one heart . . . one will?

They can’t, at least not within the realm of the natural. But those who believe in Jesus and have received the seal of His Spirit within them aren’t limited to the natural. They possess the very glory of God.

Look at Jesus’ words in our opening verse. “I have given them the glory that you gave me.” According to Jesus, that glory will enable us to become one.

John 17:23 reveals His purpose in uniting us:

 “May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.”

Unity within Christ’s church will reveal two things to the world.

  1. Jesus did indeed come from God
  2. God loves them

I have to ask you to consider something, dear one. Is our generation giving Christ what He asked for? Are we allowing His Spirit within us to crucify the desires of our flesh and unite us with His glorious will so that we can become one with our brothers and sisters? Or do we hold tightly to our own desires and allow our differences to separate us?

Beloved, our unity in Christ will release the glory of God.

Let’s visit a prayer meeting that took place in the early church after Peter and John had been arrested for preaching about Jesus. Upon their release, a group of believers united together in fervent prayer with spectacular results.

Here’s how they began.

“Now, Lord, consider their threats and enable your servants to speak your word with great boldness. Stretch out your hand to heal and perform miraculous signs and wonders through the name of your holy servant Jesus.”Acts 4:29-30

Do you notice anything significant about their prayer? Is that how you have prayed?

Let your thoughts settle on the words you speak when you approach God in prayer. When I did, the Spirit revealed one obvious difference about their request. Instead of asking God to rescue them, they asked God to reveal His glory.

Amazing. They didn’t ask God to take away the danger, stop the persecution, or even to protect them from the threats coming against them. Instead, they asked Him to empower them to boldly stand for Him in the midst of it. They asked for strength to speak His word with boldness in spite of the threats. They asked Him to reveal the power that comes through the name of Jesus.

These believers had one, single-minded purpose. They desired to see God reveal His glory through them. In spite of the danger, in spite of their fear, they cast aside their own desires to exalt His. And how did God respond to His humble, unified servants?

After they prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly.  Acts 4:31

Oh, that we would once again become a body so united in heart and purpose that our prayers shake our meeting halls! Notice that God granted their request. He filled each of them with His Spirit to empower them and equipped all of them to speak His Word boldly. Not one of them was exempt from the gift.

Dear one, when you submit your heart to the Father’s will instead of your own, neither are you.