Sunday Devotions: Prayer Warrior

Today's Lectionary Psalm 145:4 - One generation will commend your works to another; they will tell of your mighty acts. (NIV)

My great-aunt Cissie was a prayer warrior. Her family had belonged to a Temperance Society in Scotland called the Rechabites. They were named after the devoted Kenite clan mentioned in Jeremiah, chapter 35. She was born before World War I and dedicated her life to the Lord as a teenager. For decades she prayed for her whole extended family, daily asking God to raise up a minister amongst them.

I knew her as a gentle old lady, and when I became a minister in the mid-1980s, her seventy-year-old prayer had been answered. Her immediate family told her the good news, and because God had fulfilled her hopes, they expected her to stop praying for a pastor. But she continued each day, and when asked why, she simply said, "After John's generation comes and goes, the people will still need ministers." She kept praying into her nineties before the Lord took her home.

We need to do the same; after all, who is going to minister to our people when we are gone? If we commend God's works to those in the generation being born, telling them of His mighty acts, and if we pray for their pastors, they will achieve far more with their faith than we have ever done.

Prayer: Lord God, raise up pastors among us who will lead our people in faith, hope, and love. Let the women and men who minister to Your Church throughout this 21st century be strong, dedicated, and compassionate. May they accomplish great things, bringing glory, honour, and blessing to Your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. In His Name, we pray. Amen.