Prayer Journal
Friday, December 8, 2000
A financial crisis in America created panic in most everyone's heart in 1857. No one knew with certainty what was ahead and the spiritual and moral decline of the country affected everything - in a negative way!
A man named Jeremiah Lamphier of New York longed to see God turn America back to God. So he began a simple noonday prayer meeting for men on September 23, 1857. It's said that he sat alone until 12:30 on that day when six other men joined him. By the end of the next week, twenty men attended and after six months, ten thousand men were praying at noon in New York.
That spiritual awakening that began as a result of a prayer meeting literally reached hundreds of thousands of people in America and abroad. People were saved in the meetings on a regualr basis. Many of them, such as D.L Moody, would become famous men of faith. A show salesman by profession, Moody attended the prayer meetings and is known today as one of the greatest evangelists to have lived.
Hudson Taylor, another prayer meeting attendee, was inspired to begin a missionary movement to reach the world for Christ. He did and it did! That prayer meeting became known as the Great Awakening of 1857, when in fact it is more properly called the Prayer Revival of 1857. (1)
It's amazing what God does when his children decide to pray. It's during those times that God's Spirit moves and the world is never the same by virtue of it. What's more amazing, however, is that many of us call ourselves Christian and don't even spend a single minute in prayer in the course of a day.
What will
it take for us to see revival like the Prayer Revival of 1857? What will
it take for us to see our need to humble ourselves and pray? What will
it take for us to see the need of a lost world?
Are you willing to let God change you - no matter the cost?
There's an old song that says, "Whatever it takes to draw closer to you, Lord - that's what I'm willing to do." It taks a lot of guts to sing a tune like that. But I can say with confidence - if you're willing, God is ready!
"And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work." 2 Cor 9:8
(1)The Prayer Factor by Sammy Tippit;©1988
by The Moody Bible Institute of Chicago
(2) Scripture comes from the Holy Bible, New International Version; (c)1978
by New York International Bible Society
(3) The images used
herein were obtained from the Learning Company's ClickArt Christian Graphics
Deluxe product, (c)1999 The Learning Company, Inc and its subsidiaries,
88 Roland Way, Novato, CA 94945 USA. All Rights Reserved.
