牧者心聲  Pastor's Message

06/14/2009


      During my daily devotional last week, I was reading the ODB again (Our Daily Bread) and read about Philip Yancey's experience of “holy fools”--dreamers with ridiculously strong faith. He, on the other hand, stated that he usually came to decisions with consideration and logic rather than faith.

      In the story, he wrote about how his church in Chicago had planned an all-night prayer meeting regarding a major crisis. While discussing the logistics of the event, he was also planning how to shuttle the senior citizens, the poorest members of the congregation, back from the event. Upon asking if they were planning to stay an hour or two, they responded with: “Oh we'll stay all night.” A woman in her 90s stated, “We can pray. We got time, and we got faith. Some of us don't sleep much anyway. We can pray all night if needs be.”

      Yancey and “a bunch of yuppies in a downtown church” discovered two important things from this meeting. That these elderly people had probably been praying for this event for years, but also that faith can often be lacking where it should be, and thriving in unknown locations.

      After reading this, I felt shamed by these senior citizens. It struck me that I am often like Yancey, as maybe some of us are as well. How does my prayer life reflect my faith? Are the things that I do dependent more on myself or on God? I want you to ask yourself these questions as well (even if John is preaching at the moment). How often have you asked others at church, both young and old, what their prayers are? Are you willing to pray for the church, and not just for 1-2 hours, but all night?

      When, how long, for what, are you willing...



      Brother Benjamin Chung