A Prayer For Fire In Our Bellies

 

 

God of grace and Lord of glory, creator of heaven and earth, Father of Jesus Christ and our father through Him, we approach Your throne with our hands folded, our heads bowed and our hearts broken.  Through Your Son Jesus Christ You have not only given us permission, but commanded us to be persistent when we bring our requests to You.  In Your love and mercy do not only hear us but receive us and claim us as Your own.

 

Lord Jesus, we confess that we eagerly read the stories of Your love, healing and forgiveness, but are slow to heed Your commands of obedience, to choose the narrow gate and the narrow way and to take up our cross and follow You.  Forgive us when our liberty in Christ leads us to live as we choose, often choosing self over service, and license over law and ingenuity over integrity.

 

God of light and source of truth, this morning we thank You for Your holy and inspired Word.  We thank You for the chosen fathers and the sacred prophets to whom You spoke Your truth and whom You inspired to record what they heard that it might be handed down to us.  We thank You that in Jesus the Word made flesh, we can behold Your Word in action.

 

We confess that we have not always treated Your Word with the respect and trustworthiness it deserves.  We often read it lackadaisically, dispassionately, even stoically and indifferently, more out of custom and habit than with a yearning to know its contents and follow its teachings.  We so often forget that it is like a two edged sword able to divide soul and spirit, joint and marrow.   We seldom have the experience of the prophet Jeremiah when he said of Your Words, “I ate them, they are my joy and my hearts delight.”  Nor do we exclaim with the Psalmist, “How sweet are Your words to the taste, sweeter than honey to my mouth.”  We have not heard Your word to Ezekiel when You said, “Do not rebel like that rebellious house.  Open Your mouth and eat what I give You.”  Nor do we heed the words of the angel to John who said concerning Your Word, “Take it and eat it.  It will turn Your stomach sour, but in Your mouth it will be sweet as honey.”

 

Father again and again we are told “to eat Your Word.”  It is not enough that we read it; we must digest and assimilate it that it may supernaturally transform us into the image of Your Son.   We must eat the Word until it becomes a part of us.  Did you not say to Jeremiah, “Is not my Word like a fire…and like a hammer that breaks a rock in pieces?”  O God, may Your Word be a fire in our bellies, setting our hearts a blaze for You.  Never has the church and the world needed people with the fire of Your Word in their bellies, as they need it today.  O Jesus, raise up a mighty army of devoted believers who give evidence that they know of an inner burning of Your Truth.

 

In Jesus Holy name we ask it.   Amen