Summer Prayers: Lord, send your power toward me!

Did you enjoy praying, “Lord, give me beautiful feet!” last week? I sure did!

This week’s prayer inspiration springs from a Bible Study session that started at my church this week, The Armor of God by Priscilla Shirer. I think it is going to be life-changing and have asked God to make it so. One thing that struck me this week was the reality that many think we know the famous list of the armor of God as listed in Ephesians 6. (I am including myself in that many.) Here is the list of the full armor of God: belt of truth, breastplate of righteousness, shoes of the gospel of peace, shield of faith, the helmet of salvation and sword of the Spirit (which is the word of God).

The list is complete, right?

WRONG!

I was reminded that the last piece of armor is not the sword of the Spirit. The sentence is not finished after naming the sword of the Spirit. There is a comma after “sword of the Spirit,” not a period.

The last item of the list of the full armor of God is (drum roll please),

praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication.

Priscilla explained in her video that it is possible to put on the full armor of God but never activate it.

GULP.

It is possible to just stand there donned without power until we pray; until we invite our heavenly realities into our earthly realities.

I SUDDENLY FELT SO TIRED.

You see, I have a lot of faults but I have never been accused of laziness.

I work hard.

I WORK SOOO HARD.

Worse yet, I have slipped into working more than I pray.

NOT ANYMORE.

I don’t want to be one of those Christians who has donned the armor of God without activating the armor with prayer.

Are you feeling powerless in any way? Am I the only one prone to forget the last piece of the armor of God?

Let’s pray at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication.

LET’S ACTIVATE OUR ARMOR!

If we pray more, we will have to work less at fixing our problems because God’s power will get some stuff done for us! In Ephesians 1:19 Paul prays for believers to understand

what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe…

I have been picturing the immeasurable greatness of his power suspended up there in the heavenlies, amazed that God wants to throw it toward me (and all of His children)! I have been doing too much standing around with my armor on wondering why things don’t change. I think God is asking me to keep standing around (standing firm) but start inviting His immeasurable power down into my struggles.

This week I have been inviting Him in. Standing firm, armor on, arms outstretched…

beckoning, inviting…

expecting the immeasurable power to come on down, enter in, and produce change.

So we have two choices:

Don’t pray, then work tirelessly and powerlessly.

OR

Pray, and then stand firm while God has room to get some stuff done for us, stuff we can’t accomplish ourselves.

I choose the latter.

Join me in praying this week…

Lord, send your power toward me!

This week’s pictures: At 12:00 this past Saturday, my husband left for the store, purchased food, arrived home, cooked, and served guests in style at 5:30. What a magnificent man to marry. I told everyone they were lucky because I would have ordered out pizza and held a Sequence tournament. (The guests were thankful hubby cooked instead.) Good time had by all.

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