Prayer For The Church As We Remain Separated And Worship Online
We pray for the church today - that we would be strong and allow God to use this time of meeting separate but together to grow us deeper in what really matters as individuals and "the people of God."
Even as many jurisdictions are reopening their economy, in this time of partial recovery in the season of COVID-19, in most places houses of worship are still shut. Where I live, the size of groups that can meet is still quite small – far below the average Sunday morning attendance. So, for the time being, it doesn’t seem like we’ll be gathering together to worship any time soon. I’ve seen protestors with signs in United States declaring the church to be an essential service.
While I agree with those protestors in one way – we are not to forsake meeting together. We are to love one another in the church and by working together and honouring each other’s ministry, build each other up so we can get out into the marketplace with the good news that Jesus Christ has come to save us and that He is the One Way, the One Truth, the One Life. There’s no time that this message is needed by the wider society than right now with all of the life and death situations – people are going out into eternity – are they going to God or are they going to an existence without God. God is always good and His love is unfailing. I would not want to be in an existence without goodness and unfailing love, would you? The foundation upon which the church of Jesus Christ is established is the truth that Jesus the Son of God came to earth and died for our sins and that in Him, and only in Him we have life.
So, celebrating that together and inviting God to reveal Himself to us and fill our every moment with His loving empowering presence IS ESSENTIAL. Meeting together in a comfortable building with several hundred people is not the only way to do this – and perhaps not even the ideal.
Around the world, and even in places where I have visited and attended, it is illegal for people to meet together to sing a song, read a Bible, offer prayer together, confess their sins, receive baptism in water and in the Holy Spirit. I can say that I’ve not known the joy and the love of love expressed in individuals and groups more than when sitting in a living room in an illegal gathering together with some people who had been detained and interrogated by police just in the days prior to my visit. They don’t live in a temporary situation where we can’t gather together in large groups to worship. They live in ongoing conditions where worshipping God is a risk to their safety, their freedom, and their very life. They find ways to gather together. They make a point of it and they do it with joy.
And there are those Christians who have to hide their Bibles and read them in secret and try to find ways to covertly get Christian teaching over the radio or the internet. They do this for months and sometimes years because God has revealed Himself to them and they recognize Him as the one true God.
And so today, I am praying and invite us to pray together for God’s church, both here in the western world and in other places where the church is persecuted.
Lord Jesus, You are the way the truth and the life. You are the one on whom our individual lives and our church lives are founded. You are building Your church and a short time of separation will not get in the way of what You are doing to raise up to new life a whole multitude of people who love You and who worship You as the Living God.
As You have loved us and given up Your life for us sacrificially, and pleased Your Heavenly Father in that gift, I pray now that we will live with grace and trust, as Your church, and please You with our worship individually, in family units, online with others, and in whatever small gatherings become available to us. It’s never been about mega-church gatherings to You, God. It’s about individuals being related to You and one another, using the gifts You have given them to support and encourage one another and reaching out to share Your love and grace with others. Oh God, give us eyes to see reality in these days and not be sidetracked by some kind of victim mentality or other kind of “me and my rights” agenda. Let us truly be followers of Jesus and do those things that honour You God without anger and manipulation. Forgive us for the shallowness of our commitment to You that gets sidetracked by our demand for what we like how we like it rather than sticking with the essentials of knowing You and making You known.
Thank you for the wake-up call here in the western world that has helped us refocus on what the essentials of the gospel and the church really are. You’ve given us such a remarkable example in the persecuted church and we want to take this time to pray for those who are having to live their faith in secret and gather in secret but who are taking risks every day to live for You and to invite others to do the same. In house churches across the globe we pray for a great outpouring of the Holy Spirit to comfort, strengthen, and give vision to each individual and group to know You more and to make You known with passion and energy. Bless family members who struggle while their loved one is imprisoned – often for years – for spreading the gospel. Bless the imprisoned one. Pour out grace and healing into all these heroes of the faith.
Lord, you love your church and You make your church complete in every way and that’s what we are asking in this time. Of course we know that it will be good to meet together once again, one day, but help us to experience the goodness of Your presence right now as we get our eyes fixed on what is eternal rather than on what is temporary.
We are to be washed and made pure by the power of You word and we open our hearts and lives to this cleansing by taking time to open “The Book – The Bible” and praying for Your Holy Spirit to reveal Yourself to us as we read and meditate. While you are happy to use pastors and prophets and teachers to equip Your people – and are doing so with so many of them adjusting their support to online offerings – we affirm that we are Your people and that You have taken on the responsibility to raise us up to be Your people and nothing will keep You from fulfilling this purpose in our lives.
So we ask for Your blessing today on pastors and church leaders and on all who are seeking to follow Christ as part of His church. In the words of a little chorus from the 1970’s and 80’s we affirm that
You are building a people of power, and You are making a people of praise.
That will move through this land by Your Spirit
and will glorify your precious name.
Build Your church Lord. Make us strong Lord
Join our hearts, Lord, through Your son.
Make us one, Lord, in Your body
in the Kingdom of Your son.
I want to end this time together with a
A husband should love his wife as much as Christ loved the church and gave his life for it. He made the church holy by the power of his word, and he made it pure by washing it with water. Christ did this, so that he would have a glorious and holy church, without faults or spots or wrinkles or any other flaws. Ephesians 5:25-27
And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it. Matthew 16:18
Do as God does. After all, you are his dear children. Let love be your guide. Christ loved us and offered his life for us as a sacrifice that pleases God. Ephesians 5:1-2
Ephesians 1:22-23 ERV - 22 God put everything under Christ’s power and made him head over everything for the church. 23 The church is Christ’s body. It is filled with him. He makes everything complete in every way.
But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. 1 Peter 2:9
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