Prayer Watch: They Lost Everything

Next week is Thanksgiving! Many American households are preparing large family feasts that often include sharing their thankfulness to the Lord. Churches have a Thanksgiving service followed by turkey and all the trimmings for their seniors or their communities. Others will take dinners to the homeless. And we Americans have so many reasons to be thankful.

This morning I watched the video of a chapel service at Wycliffe Associates. The Scripture read was Psalm 100, which reads,

Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth.

Worship the Lord with gladness;
come before him with joyful songs. 

Know that the Lord is God.
It is he who made us, and we are his;
we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.

Enter his gates with thanksgiving
and his courts with praise;
give thanks to him and praise his name. 

For the Lord is good and his love endures forever;
his faithfulness continues through all generations. (NIV) 

As I listened to the reading, I realized that all our thanksgiving, praise, and joyful songs are to go to the Lord God because He made us, we are His, He is good, He is faithful, and His love endures forever. Now, this is something I want to ponder, even as I prepare for Thanksgiving Day.

What about the rest of the world? Is this wonderful psalm available to everyone to think on the goodness and love of God the Father?

Not Yet!

I’m here today to ask you to pray for our spiritual brothers and sisters across the globe in dire need of our prayers: national Bible translators, working diligently to get God’s precious Word to their people. The news we’ve received about what they’re experiencing is shocking: warfare, violence, and their homes and churches being pillaged and burned to the ground.

Bible translation teams pray and work hard because they want their families and friends to know the love of God. Many have translated Mark’s gospel, and they desperately want to obey.

He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation.”
Mark 16:15 (NIV) 

Yet they are suffering in ways that you and I could hardly imagine. These faithful believers, even while hiding out in the jungles and forests, continue to work on their translations. Amid horrific conditions, they know—really know—that the Lord their God is good. For He is their refuge. 

Taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed is the one who takes refuge in him.
Psalm 34:8 (NIV) 

They ask us to pray and pray fervently. I believe that our prayers, together, may be the only hope for thousands of pastors, believers, national Bible translators, and all their families and communities. You and I know that we have a God who hears, who is powerful, and will do the impossible for the thousands living in harm’s way, still doing the work He has called them to do. 

The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.
James 5:16 (NIV)

Precious ones, we must remember that their struggle and ours, as we pray, is not against flesh and blood. It may seem so, but these precious people know the heinous acts they face are driven by great and evil spiritual forces.  

For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.
Ephesians 6:12 (NIV) 

I plead with you, my dear prayer partners, to take time to pray, to be in God’s Word, listening to the Holy Spirit, and to bring our own brothers and sisters, Christ’s own brothers and sisters, before the one and only good God.  

Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” Matthew19:26 (NIV) 

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. John 3:16 (NIV)

Together, let’s make the way for God to do the impossible so the gospel will be read and heard by “all creation” in everyone’s heart language. Then all the earth will shout for joy to the Lord. What a day that will be!