A brief story if I may: Two pastors’ wives were sitting mending their husbands’ trousers. One of them said to the other, “My poor Andrew, he’s totally discouraged in his work at church. He told me yesterday he was thinking of packing it all in. Nothing seems to go right for him.” The other replied, “Well, for my husband it’s the complete opposite. He’s so vibrant and on fire, it seems like the Lord is closer to him than ever before.” There was a subdued stillness as they continued to mend their husbands’ trousers – the first one patching the seat and the other the knees.
What a bother it is to get on our knees! I find encouragement knowing that even the disciples, when Jesus was at his darkest hour praying in Gethsemane, got a rebuke: “Could you men not keep watch with me for one hour? … Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation.” Matthew 26:40-41. Is one of the reasons we treat prayer so very casually, that we look at it more like a domestic intercom rather than a wartime walkie-talkie?
Are we typically asking, in the name of Jesus, that more pillows be dispatched to the sofa? Perhaps we should be calling for more air cover as we move forward into another spiritual offensive. Jesus reminded his disciples that they needed proper air cover lest they soon fall into temptation. The events that immediately followed: Jesus’ arrest by the authorities and the scattering of all the disciples, only served to prove his point. Is it time you got off the sofa and onto your “darn knees”? Know that God has great fire power that he urges us to access every day.