PRAYER ROOMS

• 9am – Tuesday, online only

PRAYER GUIDE

1 How lovely is your dwelling place,
    Lord Almighty!
2 My soul yearns, even faints,
    for the courts of the Lord;
my heart and my flesh cry out
    for the living God.
3 Even the sparrow has found a home,
    and the swallow a nest for herself,
    where she may have her young—
a place near your altar,
    Lord Almighty, my King and my God.
4 Blessed are those who dwell in your house;
    they are ever praising you.

5 Blessed are those whose strength is in you,
    whose hearts are set on pilgrimage.
6 As they pass through the Valley of Baka,
    they make it a place of springs;
    the autumn rains also cover it with pools.
7 They go from strength to strength,
    till each appears before God in Zion.

8 Hear my prayer, Lord God Almighty;
    listen to me, God of Jacob.
9 Look on our shield, O God;
    look with favor on your anointed one.

10 Better is one day in your courts
    than a thousand elsewhere;
I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God
    than dwell in the tents of the wicked.
11 For the Lord God is a sun and shield;
    the Lord bestows favor and honor;
no good thing does he withhold
    from those whose walk is blameless.12 Lord Almighty,
    blessed is the one who trusts in you.

Psalm 84

The psalmist longs for the presence of God. The word used here for longing carries with it a sense of absence. “My soul yearns, even faints for the courts of the Lord,” he writes. The psalmist looks with holy jealousy at the birds who are able to build their nest at the altar. He dreams of making his home in God’s presence like the sparrows and swallows. 

God, of course, longs to dwell among us. From the beginning (Genesis 2) when God walked with Adam and Eve in the garden. At the end (Revelation 21:3) a voice from the throne will rejoice that “God’s dwelling place is now among the people.” At the center of history, the infinite God took on human flesh and came to dwell among us (John 1:14) and soon thereafter, the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost made it possible for the infinite God to make his dwelling in human hearts. 

Sadly however, so many of us have had such limited experience with the presence of God. We dabble in his presence. We rarely dream as the Psalmist does of living in unbroken communion with God. We are unaware that it is possible for him to flood our hearts and our lives with his glory. 

One of the hallmarks of every revival is a return of God’s manifest, royal presence to the church. And to the human hearts within the church. And this happens when God’s people begin longing for his presence and asking for his presence, and cleaning out our hearts to make room for his presence. 

The driving principle behind every revival is this: God comes where he is wanted. His presence, like a helicopter, comes down wherever people have cleared a landing pad. He will pass over 99 lukewarm Christians to touch a heart that is longing for him. He will pass over 99 churches to find one where his presence is wanted. During the 1949 revival in the Hebrides in Scotland, God literally touched every town on the island except the town of Stornaway. That is because the two pastors in that town resisted and critiqued the revival. God skipped over that town. 

This Psalm is in the scripture to show us what a heart that wants God’s presence looks like. Better is one day in God’s courts than a thousand elsewhere. And if we want renewal and the glory and presence of God in our lives, the main question is this. Do we long for God’s presence? God can do more in a day, to renew a heart, a family, a church, a city, even a nation when he shows up than in decades of humans laboring in their own strength. The question is do we want him to show up? 

For Reflection

Read through the Psalm. 

• What strikes you? Notice the Psalmist’s heart toward God and his presence. How does it compare with your own? What are the other lesser loves in our lives that compete with our love and longing for Jesus to take up residence in our hearts?
• What rooms and places in our hearts and lives do we need to prepare for Jesus? So that he can feel at home in our hearts and lives? Ask the Spirit to reveal to you how to be a host to Jesus?

For Prayer

• Begin to pray phrases of this Psalm that stand out to you. Consider praying these ideas in your own words. 
• Ask God to reveal to you the beauty of his presence and its worth and value in comparison to the other things we love and long for. 
• Ask God to stir up holy hunger and longing for his presence. Ask God to for this heart cry: “God we want you here!” In your life, in your family, in the church, in Providence.

Next Steps

• Where in your life is God asking you to carve a highway to Zion – a pathway into his presence? What is your next step to say yes to that?
• If there are lesser loves in your life that are competing with Jesus for your affections…confess this to someone and ask God to rearrange and reorder your desires and longings!

PRAYER ROOMS

Tuesdays (online only today)

• No 7:30am Prayer Room
• 9am – Zoom Room

PRAYER GUIDE

30 Then Elijah said to all the people, “Come here to me.” They came to him, and he repaired the altar of the Lord, which had been torn down. 31 Elijah took twelve stones, one for each of the tribes descended from Jacob, to whom the word of the Lord had come, saying, “Your name shall be Israel.” 32 With the stones he built an altar in the name of the Lord, and he dug a trench around it large enough to hold two seahs[a] of seed. 33 He arranged the wood, cut the bull into pieces and laid it on the wood. Then he said to them, “Fill four large jars with water and pour it on the offering and on the wood.”

34 “Do it again,” he said, and they did it again.

“Do it a third time,” he ordered, and they did it the third time. 35 The water ran down around the altar and even filled the trench.

36 At the time of sacrifice, the prophet Elijah stepped forward and prayed: “Lord, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel, let it be known today that you are God in Israel and that I am your servant and have done all these things at your command. 37 Answer me, Lord, answer me, so these people will know that you, Lord, are God, and that you are turning their hearts back again.”

38 Then the fire of the Lord fell and burned up the sacrifice, the wood, the stones and the soil, and also licked up the water in the trench.

39 When all the people saw this, they fell prostrate and cried, “The Lord—he is God! The Lord—he is God!”

1 Kings 18:30-39

In times of spiritual decline, such as that Elijah faced in Israel under the reign of Ahab and Jezebel, what the mass of the people needed was to see God. They needed to see His Fire fall from heaven in order to repent from their apostasy and idolatry and return to the Living God.

It is no different in our own time. Our culture has turned away from the LORD. But what will bring people back to the LORD? Is it clever strategies for marketing? Is it our clever words? Is it free food? Is it anything we have to give them at all? No. 

What people need is God’s own presence. And in times of revival, this is what they feel, when they come into the house of God…or even when they don’t. During the revivals of the early 1970s, I had a friend at a former church who met Jesus on an acid trip at a rock concert. God doesn’t just show up in church, but what people need is for God to show up. 

But when does God show up? Like he did in Elijah’s time? God shows up when Elijah built an altar and called on him. As Jon Tyson says, “God comes where he’s wanted.” Building an altar, as Elijah did, is an outward and visible sign of a deep and painful level of longing for the living God to manifest his presence and glory.

We can’t make fire fall from heaven, we cannot cause God to show up. But what we can do is what Elijah did. What men and women have done before every great and glorious revival in the history of God’s people. We can build an altar. An altar is a space and a culture of extraordinary, Kingdom focused prayer (and worship). Where we set aside time and space to seek God for his presence and will. 

On the one hand, building altars of prayer and worship feel like an incredibly non-strategic activity for a Western Church that is hemorrhaging members. Couldn’t we do something ‘practical,’ like plan or research best practices, or raise funds, or something? And yet, if we look at the scale of the problem we are facing, there is only one answer, friends. It’s time to get busy building altars, like Elijah did on Mt. Carmel. It is time to build a landing pad for the Holy Spirit. To create spaces that are hospitable for God. Where Jesus is welcome to come in all his fullness and be and do exactly what He is and does. 

For Prayer:

As we press deeper into the fall, let’s pray for altar-building in the Western Church and in our own local church. 

Let’s pray for spiritual hunger to develop in our own hearts and among God’s people. The awareness that “there is more” to God than we have seen. Let’s stand in the gap for sleepy and apathetic believers (which we all have been at one time or another)…asking God to stir and awaken our spirits to love and long for him. 

Let’s pray for faith to put weight on this Biblical principle that “God comes where he is wanted.” James 4:8 says “draw near to God and He will draw near to you.” Let’s pray for the priorities of God’s people and our church and our lives to shift around to make room for creating spaces and cultures of extraordinary, Kingdom-focused prayer and worship.

PRAYER ROOMS

Tuesdays (online only today)

• 7:30am – Zoom Room
• 9am – Zoom Room

PRAYER GUIDE

“This kind only comes out by prayer and fasting” – Mark 9:29

The disciples had just returned from a successful mission trip in which, among other things, they cast out all sorts of demons. But in this instance, they were not able to cast this demon out of this young boy, whereas Jesus casts it out with a word. Later, in private, the disciples ask Jesus, “Why couldn’t we cast it out?” Jesus’ response is that “this kind…only comes out by prayer and fasting.” 

At the gym, most of us are able to lift a 10lb weight, but a 200lb weight is a different story. It is the same in the spiritual world. Some breakthroughs do not require a great deal of spiritual power or authority. But a major breach of the spiritual status quo certainly does. The disciples were able to cast out lesser demons with a word, but this kind of demon required more power. Certain breakthroughs in the spiritual realm require a spiritual upgrade. Revival is one of these. To see our city or region renewed by God, we need more spiritual power than we presently have.

This is where prayer and fasting come in. Seasons of prayer and fasting are a form of consecration that increases and deepens our level of spiritual engagement with our lives and the world around us. Fasting with prayer was assumed by Jesus as a regular discipleship practice for his followers and it was a staple in Jesus’ life and the lives of the people of God throughout history. In our time many of us, especially in the evangelical stream of the church, have lost touch with these practices. When we fast and pray, we make room for God to pour out his power and blessing in our lives. It is a way to clear out space and set ourselves apart for more of God. It is a way of raising the sails of our souls and lives so that the wind of God can fill us with fresh power and move us into a new spiritual season. 

Every September, the Sanctuary leadership community steps into a season of preparatory prayer and fasting. We invite you to join us. The fall is a time to hit reset and refresh and move into a new season. It is a time for us to launch or relaunch home churches, to prepare to reach out to newcomers, and to restart many important ministries in the church. We want to move into this season with our sails up, seeking God, ready to be filled with his power. Fasting and prayer are an important way to do this. And specifically, in this season, as we start the fall and pray into the plans and ministries of Sanctuary Church, we are also seeking him for revival. For a season of breakthroughs of God’s Kingdom in our lives, families, home churches, and our city. 

Next Steps

• Consider what holy longings God is placing in you in the next season that you want to ask Him for as you fast and pray. Remember, fasting without prayer is just a diet. Our job is to bring purpose and intention into fasting. 
• Consider how and when you’d like to fast. At Sanctuary Church, our season of First Seek will run from Monday 9/11/23 to our Conference on 9/16/23. Here are some ideas:
  • skip a meal, or two a day for first seek.
  • consider a one day fast.
  • consider a longer fast – ask the Lord how long he is inviting you to fast.
• Block off 30 minutes each day for prayer during First Seek – follow the prayer prompts on the website.
• Pray this morning for God to lead our church into a time of consecration, to be set apart for his use during this Fall Season.
• Pray for God to reactivate hunger and faith in your life for more of Him and more of His Kingdom.