My Earnest Prayer

(Note: Any earnestness you may read or feel in the prayer that follows is the work of the Holy Spirit. The reason I'm recording this prayer is because I acutely feel the lack of earnestness in my own praying. So today, I  am trying to heed the advice of the Puritans and pray until I pray.  SDG)

Father, what do I do when I read your Son's command in Mt 9 to pray earnestly for harvesters and when I close my eyes and bow my head there is nothing? Oh, you know the words are there. The thoughts, the ideas and even maybe the local and global needs flow through my mind. But where is my heart? Where is the ache? Why is there not even a drop in bucket of Jesus' passion and concern for the sheep who are without a shepherd?

O God, if I can, let me add to those questions the example of from Ezra 9. Why is my vision of my generation so myopic? Is it perhaps because I am in the same muck and mire? Is it because I've lost sight of how ugly sin is? Let me rephrase that. Is it because I've lost sight of how ugly my sin is? Have I forgotten the enormity of the salvation you have freely given me in Christ? You know I can say the words. You know I know and believe he truth. But maybe dear Father, I've forgotten its value and how desperately lost I was (and would be without your sustaining grace).

Dear God, I cannot pray earnestly without your Spirit breathing this earnestness into me. And my fear Lord, as you know, is that this kind of earnestness is not a common mark in the Church today. So, even as I pray for an earnestness like Ezra's and heart like Jesus expected of his disciples I'm scared. Not scared of persecution from outside the Church but rather I'm scared of ridicule from inside the Church. Father, help me to lay these fears at the foot of the Cross. Allow me to lean on Jesus, to draw from his power.and to trust his promise that he will never leave me nor forsake me.

And Father, I do ask and plead that you send harvesters into the field. Because you know the harvest is plentiful,


I now send forth this post with a deep sense of its many defects; but with an earnest prayer that it may do some good. (JC Ryle)

To God Alone be the Glory