Thought of the Week- Week Beginning 3^rd. September, 2023.

“Call to me and I will answer you, and will tell you great and hidden things that you have not known” - Jeremiah 33:3 (ESV).

Dear Brethren, Grace, Mercy and Peace from God our Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ be with us all. Amen.

The background to the Bible verse quoted above from Jeremiah was the sinfulness, wickedness and idolatry of Israel and Judah leading to Jerusalem falling into the hands of King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon. God however, assures Jeremiah- God's spokesman or prophet at that time, He will show him and Israel great and mighty things (that is cleanse or redeem Israel of their past sins and restore their fortunes) if they call on Him.

What does call to me mean? Call to me-means pray to God. The Greek word for prayer is proseuche- a compound of two words- pros meaning to or towards and euche meaning a desire or wish. When these two are compounded, prayer comes to mean coming into intimate contact with God and surrendering our requests to Him for something. In prayer therefore, we submit our desires to God to receive an answer. Prayer is thus not a soliloquy where we only speak out our intentions but we must be ready to listen and hear what God's response to our intentions are. Prayer does not mean using long fanciful words extolling our attributes like the Pharisee in Luke 18:9-14, but a conversation with God, speaking to Him from the heart about our innermost desires, even though he knows them before ask. Prayer is the pulse of our spiritual life as a Church or as Christian community and the “secret of all true worship”.When we come together in worship as a church our primary functions like:  reading the Bible, singing, conversations should be underlined by prayer- calling on the name of God and all(in Greek pantes- that is without the exclusion of any one) should and must be included in this. The laity are to pray for each other and the diokoneo or minister called to zealously serve the community to the blessing and power of God, to pray for the laity or the church. We should not find it burdensome to pray, but, can we as Christians at any point pray for someone who calls on us for a prayer? If we cannot do this, then it is with deep thought that I say, our prayerlessness become a sin and a reproach to God; because we are after all created in the God's image and He wants us to come to Him and converse with Him so that through Him we can attain our salvation and our highest glory, so how can we not call to Him in prayer? How can we say we have find no time to pray or say we cannot pray for our brothers and sisters and delegate that to someone else? Do we not disrespect and dishonour God by saying we have not got the ability to fellowship with Him in prayer? These questions posed above should give us something to ponder about.

Jeremiah's quote above also says- God (I) will answer us when we call on Him. But, how do we know our prayers are being answered? God answers our prayers individually or as a church in various ways. Some of the ways are:

a) as see in 2. Corinthians 13:1is, when 2 or 3 other people also confirm to us the answer to our prayers.

b)  as we see in 1. John 5: 14-15, by the word of God, the Bible. God's answer to our prayers is normally confirmed by his word.

c) through the Holy Spirit. In Romans.  8:14, we see God leads those He calls his sons.

d) through the voice of our heart or conscience. When God wants to direct us to something, it burns in our hearts – Psalm 34: 7

e) through the voice of faith. We see in Romans. 14:23 that, what is not of faith is sin. God normally give us the faith to pursue His will, else it may not be His will.

f) through the voice of circumstance- when one see doors are closing on ones plans then one can discern what one is praying for may not be God's will.

Lastly, the Bible verse from Jeremiah also speaks of great and hidden things that we will see. What are these great and mighty things, for this I point to Acts 2 where Jesus' disciples (120 people) were gathered in the Upper Room after his resurrection. That gathering of ordinary people who were engaged in fervent prayers in obedience to the command Christ. Suddenly, the might of God come upon them at Pentecost making them speak in different tongues and perform mighty tasks not seen before like establishing the church (of which we are members of today) and  also going out to do great and mighty things like: healing the sick, raising the dead and establishing the church near and far at great cost to their lives.

Brethren in concluding, we like Jeremiah and the people of Israel should, call to God and He will surely answer us and show us great and mighty things. The way to the great and mighty things might not all be rosy at times but, let us remember the Christian life is not a journey on a cruise liner where everything is served for us but it is a journey on a battleship. With, a life of a battle ship we are called to fight in various battles on our journeys which we can only win by praying without ceasing and never giving up for Christ's sake. Thanks be to God. Amen

Prayer:

Lord, we thank you for the grace to come to You at all times in prayer and to be able pray to You without ceasing or restriction. Teach us to know that, prayerlessness is sinful and a reproach to You because You created us in your image and want to have an everlasting relationship with us. May we seek Your guidance, leadership, counsel in our prayer life so that our spiritual life may be well built on You. Father, give us also, the ability to listen and hear Your voice as You answer our prayers. We ask  all this in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Clement Arde-Acquah