I am so convinced that we are in the battle of our lives!  As we are called more and more as individuals, as families, and as a church to share the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ in our world, we are getting deeper and deeper into the battle.  I see it all around us… and prepare yourselves… more is coming.  And you can’t go to battle if you don’t know your weapons.  And in this battle, since it’s not against flesh and blood, but against the evil one himself and all of his wicked forces of death and darkness (read Ephesians 6:10-12), our weapons are supernatural.  And first among those weapons is PRAYER.

Here’s a call to the utter urgency of prayer for the mission of Jesus from Pastor John Piper:

So I do not tire of saying to our church, The number one reason why prayer malfunctions in the hands of a believers is that they try to turn a wartime walkie-talkie into a domestic intercom.

Until you believe that life is war, you cannot know what prayer is for. Prayer is for the accomplishment of a wartime mission. It is as though the field commander (Jesus) called in the troops, gave them a crucial mission (“Go and bear fruit”), handed each of them a personal transmitter coded to the frequency of the general’s headquarters, and said, ‘Comrades, the general has a mission for you. He aims to see it accomplished. And to that end he has authorized me to give each of you personal access to him through these transmitters. If you stay true to his mission and seek his victory first, he will always be as close as your transmitter, to give tactical advice and to send in air cover when you or your comrades need it.’

But what have millions of Christians done? They have stopped believing that we are in a war. No urgency, no watching, no vigilance, no strategic planning. Just easy peacetime and prosperity. And what did they do with the walkie-talkie? They tried to rig it up as an intercom in their cushy houses and cabins and boats and cars – not to call in fire power for conflict with a mortal enemy, but to ask the maid to bring another pillow to the den.

The battle is on!  Don’t stay on the sidelines, continuing to pray with a domestic intercom.  Pick up the wartime walkie-talkie, praying to God for souls won back to Him!  Pray for protection as He uses us, His soldiers, to go fight the battle of faith in a world that is sick, dying, and desperately in need of Jesus Christ.

Pastor Jonathan
a fellow soldier in the battle…