Sweat

I just finished my daily work out. I pushed, pulled and contorted my body until the swea glistened and poured. It dripped down my arms and off my finger tips into little puddles on the floor. The more I worked the more the sweat oozed from my pores. At the end I sat in a chair winded, exhausted and dripping. Puddles formed from the sweat dripping from my arms and nose. Each puddle the testimony of the work put in.

That is not the point of this blog. My mind is not on the sweat from working or working out in the heat. My mind is on the soul sweat poured out from deep within when we pray. The kind of praying where you pray with all your might, all your faith and all your earnestness. The kind of soul sweat that is produced from travailing in prayer. In agony of soul with hard pressing the requests are petitioned to God.

Soul sweat praying is work. This is no casual stroll down a park path. This is hard, agonizing, intense labor likened to a woman giving birth. Only soul sweat praying is giving birth to miracles. It is trusting God to turn the impossible into reality. It is beiieving Yahweh to move the biggest mountains out of our way. It is travailing over the souls of the lost wayward. It is standing in the gap for an immoral nation to turn back in repentance. It is pleading with God to revive the dead bones of churches on the brink of death.

This kind of praying is taxing. It is laborious. It is determined relentless resolve to get a breakthrough. This is not the kind of praying found at the local prayer meeting where fifteen minutes will be used to take prayer requests and only thirty seconds to actually lift those requests up in prayer.

We need soul sweating followers of Jesus. We need congregations who put in soul sweat for their communities. We need pastors who'll give soul sweat for his flock. We need parents who'll will give soul sweat for their children. Teachers who'll give soul sweat for their students.

It is hard to find a prayer meeting these days. Many prayer meetings are disguised as fellowships. People gather to eat and socialize more then they gather to pray. Some gather to gossip in the form of prayer requests more than they intercede for others. Some prayer meetings are made up of empty cliches and vain repetition. Such people think they will will be heard for their many words. Some pray to please the listeners around them more than to gain the ear of God. None of the above is soul sweat praying.

Soul sweat praying begins with a burden. Something a person is convinced God wills to happen. Then the soul sweat begins. The asking. The believing. The standing in faith. The perseverance. The travail. The resolve to keep asking, to keep seeking and to keep knocking. When the people of God get to this point God intervenes. He works. He lifts burdens. He saves the lost. He brings the prodigals home. He revives the weary. He renews those about to quit. He convicts of sin. He calls others to pray. In this way Great Awakenings have been birthed. The glory of God followed.

Surely we need that again today. O Lord, please give this burden to pray with soul sweat. A real fervency and earnestness. Please produce perseverance in your people to keep praying no matter how the answer is delayed. In Jesus name, amen.

1 John 5:14-15 (NKJV)
14  Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us.
15  And if we know that He hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of Him.

Matthew 7:7-8 (NKJV)
7  "Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you.
8  For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened.

Luke 18:1 (NKJV)
1  Then He spoke a parable to them, that men always ought to pray and not lose heart,

James 5:16 (NKJV)
16  Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.