2017 40 Days of Prayer, Day 25
The Abiding Presence of God:
A Life of Complete Dependence
Day 25
“But if we hope for what we do not see, with perseverance we wait eagerly for it.” Romans 8:25
We Wait Eagerly
Creation longs for freedom from futility. For now, the creation perseveres in this period of waiting. We also experience the frustration of this life. However, given our relationship to God through Christ, how much more should we persevere than the creation? We have been given much more than the creation. We have received all of the blessings of adoption into God’s family. These blessings should help to quiet our restless hearts. Through the Holy Spirit, we received the first taste of our eternal reality. If eternity consists of an unending experience of the glory of God, then we who experience the Spirit of God’s work have already tasted of this future reality. Our hope must be so firm and God’s presence must be so precious to us that we cannot give up. A taste of our everlasting glory comes through the indwelling Holy Spirit. This taste leaves us longing for the fullness of glory. Our eager anticipation cannot wane just because we still do not see it yet. We must persevere by having our hope fixed upon our destiny in Christ. We must persevere in our eagerness. Our eagerness to experience God in all His fullness will sustain us through the greatest trials.
Prayer Focus
God, sustain within me a desire to see You face to face. I long to experience the power of Your Holy Spirit right now. I long to experience the fullness of my salvation when I come into Your presence forever. I know that Your Spirit is working in my life to produce fruit. Lord, please bring forth a great harvest of righteousness and good works in my life so that You will be glorified. As I submit my life to the leading of Your Spirit, increase my hope and eagerness for heaven.
From DL Moody’s Secret Power
GREATER WORK
The witness of the Spirit is the witness of power. Jesus said, “The works that I do, you shall do also, and greater works than these you shall do because I go to the Father.” I used to stumble over that. I didn’t understand it. I thought, what greater work could any man do than Christ had done? How could anyone raise a dead man who had been laid away in the sepulcher for days, and who had already begun to turn back to dust; how with a word could he call him forth? But the longer I live the more I am convinced it is a greater thing to influence a man’s will; a man whose will is set against God; to have that will broken and brought into subjection to God’s will - or, in other words, it is a greater thing to have power over a living, sinning, God hating man, than to quicken the dead. He who could create a world could speak a dead soul into life; but I think the greatest miracle this world has ever seen was the miracle at Pentecost. Here were men who surrounded the Apostles, full of prejudice, full of malice, full of bitterness, their hands, as it were, dripping with the blood of the Son of God; and yet an uneducated man, a man whom they detested, a man whom they hated, stands up there and preaches the Gospel; and three thousand of them are immediately convicted and converted, and become disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ, and are willing to lay down their lives for the Son of God. It may have been on that occasion that Stephen was converted, the first martyr, and some of the men who soon after gave up their lives for Christ. This seems to me the greatest miracle this world has ever seen. However, Peter did not labor alone; the Spirit of God was with him; thus the marvelous results. The Jewish law required that there should be two witnesses, and so we find that when Peter preached there was a second witness. Peter testified of Christ, and Christ says when the Holy Spirit comes He will testify of Me. And they both bore witness to the truth of our Lord’s incarnation, ministry, death, and resurrection, and the result was that a multitude turned as with one heart to the Lord. Our failure now is, that preachers ignore the Cross, and veil Christ with sapless sermons and superfine language. They don’t just present Him to the people plainly, and that is why, I believe, that the Spirit of God does not work with power in our churches. What we need is to preach Christ and present Him to a perishing world. The world can get on very well without you and me, but the world cannot get on without Christ. Therefore we must testify of Him, and the world, I believe, today is just hungering and thirsting for this divine, satisfying portion. Thousands and thousands are sitting in darkness, not knowing of this great Light, but when we begin to share Christ honestly, faithfully, sincerely and truthfully; holding Him up, not ourselves; exalting Christ and not our theories; presenting Christ and not our opinions; advocating Christ and not some false doctrine; then the Holy Spirit will come and bear witness. He will testify that what we say is true. When He comes, He will confirm the Word with signs. This is one of the strongest proofs that our Gospel is Divine; that it is of Divine origin; that not only did Christ teach these things, but when leaving the World He said, “He will glorify Me,” and “He will testify about Me.” If you will just look at the second chapter of Acts - to that wonderful sermon that Peter preached - the thirty-sixth verse, you read these words: “Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God has made this same Jesus whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ.” And when Peter said this the Holy Spirit descended upon the people and testified of Christ - bore witness in signal demonstration that all this was true. And again, in the fortieth verse, “And with many other words He testified and exhorted, saying, ‘Save yourselves from this corrupt generation.’” With many other words He testified, not only these words that have been recorded, but many other words.