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My House Shall Be Called a House of Prayer / Pastor Wade Everett
"The three secrets to successful ministry are: prayer, prayer, and more prayer." --Billy Graham.
Let's read what Jesus said about prayer in Matthew 21:12 Jesus entered the temple area and drove out all who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves. 13 "It is written," he said to them, "'My house will be called a house of prayer,' but you are making it a 'den of robbers.'" 14 The blind and the lame came to him at the temple, and he healed them. 15 But when the chief priests and the teachers of the law saw the wonderful things he did and the children shouting in the temple area, "Hosanna to the Son of David," they were indignant. 16 "Do you hear what these children are saying?" they asked him. "Yes," replied Jesus, "have you never read, "'From the lips of children and infants you have ordained praise'?"
As we read this scripture, we realize a calling to a particular description, a progression of events, and the present day application of the text. Jesus had entered the temple and driven out the crooks and the retailers using God's house to exploit people and rip them off. He was outraged at the perversion of God's house. It seems as though under the sacrificial system only the well to do could afford to worship God. Jesus then gives a particular description of what God's house is to be. My house will be called a house of prayer, not a house of networking with the most affluent and prosperous families so that you can get elected, make money, influence people, and get in with the in crowd. He did not call it a house of entertainment, with the latest light shows, paid talent, and the finest musicians money can buy. He called it a house of prayer for all people. He did not call us to be a house of preaching! He calls us today to be a house of prayer! Then we see the transformational progression of events. First, God's house became a house of purity. Jesus drove out the moneychangers. Whatever is impure must go. Sanctify your hearts before the Lord God, for today, God will do mighty things among you. Secondly, God's house became a house of power, for he healed the blind and the lame. Only when God's house becomes a house of purity and prayer will the mighty power of God be released in the Church. Thirdly, the children began to glorify God, as they were shouting in the temple area, "Hosanna to the Son of David! God's house will become a house of perfected praise and worship as we allow the grace of God to work in us this divine progression of prayer, purity, power, and praise.
We know it is God's will for God's people to be the Church known as a House of Prayer for all people. Finally, prayer is spending time with the one you love. We are called to love God above all else. Having a love relationship with someone means communication. Prayer is the communication part of that relationship with God, and it is a dialogue, not a monologue. In other words, if we will be quiet and listen, God will talk back to us as we read the Bible, and as we wait upon the Lord. Let us resolve to become a praying Church where the palpable presence of God is so real that you can feel His presence as soon as you walk in the door! 1 John 5:14 This is the confidence we have in approaching God: 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 what we asked of him.
P.S. I am praying for you. Love, Pastor Wade Everett.