What Should I Pray For?
“Then the apostles returned to Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives, a distance of half a mile. When they arrived, they went to the upstairs room of the house where they were staying… They all met together and were constantly united in prayer, along with Mary the mother of Jesus, several other women, and the brothers of Jesus.” - Acts 1:12-14
When all hell is breaking around you, it is in prayer that you will find strength. It is in prayer that you find hope, and courage, and confidence to endure. This is what the apostles and followers of Jesus did as they returned to Jerusalem just days after watching their Savior, the man they had followed for more than three years, crucified by the Roman government.
Despite their circumstances, they prayed. Prayer is the spiritual discipline and practice we undertake to remove all of the clutter from our lives so that we can talk to and hear from God. This story teaches us that prayer puts us in a position to receive the power of God, and the believers in the story did not let their predicament take precedent over the priority of prayer.
What did they pray you might ask? Well, the text doesn’t actually say, but given the circumstances it is very likely they prayed that God would make them resilient and that God would replenish them, and that He would give them revelation on what they should do next. That is what we should pray for when we do not know what to do; we should pray for resilience, the ability to recover quickly from difficult circumstances. We should pray to be replenished, that is restored of everything that was taken from us. And we should pray for revelation or insight on what God would have us do next.
That kind of prayer ensures that your circumstances do not take away your strength. When you ask God for these three things, He will respond. God wants you to see Him over your circumstances, and when you do so, when it is the hardest to pray, and you still pray, you will receive a power from God that goes beyond your circumstances. It will change your perspective, and it just might change your life.
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