Most of us pray for our families. We often pray for those who are sick or battling some kind of physical difficulty. We pray for safe travels, good test stores, thanksgiving for meals and blessings on those close to us. We pray for victims of natural or manmade disasters. We pray for comfort and peace. Many of us pray regularly for friends, neighbors or family members who don’t know Christ and that they would come to follow Jesus.
Think about your own prayer life or the prayer life of your local church body. What have you been praying for lately? What’s most important to you? What have you been taking to the Father because you want to see Him intervene?
I’m prone to make my prayers all about me: my provision, my healing, my guidance, my wellbeing, me, my, and mine. Lately I’ve been challenged on what I’m asking of the Father.
Recently I was convicted by how little effort or time I put into prayer, particularly in relation to the unreached parts of our world. There are enormous masses of folks throughout our world who have no knowledge of our Lord Jesus and no access to His Gospel; how often do I pray for the unreached people throughout the world? How often do I lift up our brothers and sisters working in CGGC fields in Bangladesh, India, Haiti, Kenya, Brazil, Sweden, the Dominican Republic, Venezuela, Mexico or Ethiopia? Some of these brothers and sisters are facing enormous opposition and even oppression because of their faith in Jesus. Some of them are seeing great fruit in the face of immense opposition thanks to God’s mighty action. How often am I personally asking for God’s continued work and blessing on their behalf?
God has been turning my heart to other nations beyond the good ole USA. The names He’s placing on my heart are harder to spell and pronounce than Tom, Larry and Bob. God loves our world and He loves the people of our world. I haven’t always had much of a heart of for the whole world, but God is changing that and my prayers are beginning to reflect that reality. The world and the people of this world are becoming more important to me.
What about you? If we believe that God loves our world and wants to see everyone have the opportunity to experience His Gospel, then maybe that should show up in our prayers a little more frequently. Are you asking God to move in our world in order to draw people to Himself? Are you praying for some of our brothers and sisters who are working elsewhere in the world to demonstrate and proclaim the Good News of Jesus? Are you praying for God to send His people to go to those places that have yet to be exposed to the Good News of Jesus?
I’d encourage you to ask God to increase your capacity to love and care for the whole world. If we’re serious about taking the Gospel to the whole world, we need to be asking our Father to open the doors and make things happen because the work is beyond our own capacity.
Christ’s Peace,
Lance