HOW DOES A SPIRITUAL AWAKENING BEGIN?
It begins with sowing into Gods kingdom, Gods way. It begins with letting go of self:
Self righteousness
Self sufficiency
Self reputation
Self pride
Self promotion
and all the like, instead, putting the Will of the Father
above all other considerations.
It isn’t about methodology, programs, following steps, saying
of certain prayers in certain ways at certain times within certain contexts.
It is a HEART ATTITUDE of total submission and a boldness to
dare to be broken and needy before the Father no matter who may be in witness
along with a desperate, almost insane craving to be heard and filled by Holy
Spirit.
David Thomas, in an address to the 2015 New Room Conference, called
it TRAVAILING PRAYER.
“And ever since I looked into the eyes of those people
who once saw what we so passionately want to see, I’ve come to believe that the
true seedbed of awakening is the plowed-up hearts of men and women willing to
receive the gift of travail.
“Those who sow with tears will reap with songs of joy”
(Psalm 126:5)”
It is a groaning of Holy Spirit working in and through us,
with NONE OF US IMPEDING, to do the will of God Almighty and none other.
It is a pleading with God that withholds nothing, seeks
nothing of one’s own, and abandons self to the greater glory of the Lord.
It is prayer such as Jesus prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane.
IT IS THE PRAYER OF ONE WHO HAS NOTHING TO LOSE AND ONLY
SOMETHING GLORIOUS TO GAIN!
It is prayer that comes not from our thoughts, our needs,
our wants that results only in lips forming words of little or no consequence,
but prayer that comes from deep, deeper still from within the heart of hearts
where Holy Spirit dwells in us and there may not always be words of our
language to express the depth of the desire, need and urgency.
It is prayer that is beholden to no clock, no building made
with human hands, no fleshly agenda of any kind save that of bringing flesh and
spirit together in the harmony we call Salvation and any other desire of our
Lord He chooses as a response to such abandoned prayer.
In his treatise, David Thomas reveals “The goodness and
burden of awakening is not for careerists. Awakening is sown by the company
of the misunderstood, the downwardly mobile, the unthanked, the obscure, and criticized
and burdened. Awakening is messy and costly to people who love it and long for
it. Reputation is the first thing to go in this kind of praying and
leading. Jesus taught that our seeds have to die before anything will grow
(John 12:24).”
Concern for what people may think of you, how your
reputation or character may be perceived by others who witness this abandonment
to the sovereign will of the Heavenly Father who will share the glory with no
flesh whatsoever will stop any real, true or powerful move of the Father from
ever occurring. At best you may feel an
emotional jitter from such strenuous activity but no supernatural occurrence
that eternally changes the hearts of self or others.
Weeping may last for the night but joy comes in the morning –
and a true giving away of self over to the power of praying by the Holy Spirit
will indeed result in a joyful expression of thankfulness at some point.
But first comes the weeping, the setting aside of self, the
loss of “my, mine, me” to result in the gain of FRUIT, BORNE TO THE FATHERS
GLORY FROM WHICH YOU RECEIVE GREAT BLESSINGS!
Every good and perfect gift comes from the Father, and the
prayer warrior who is watching and praying fervently without regard of any kind
for any reward will discover the Father’s rewards are mighty and perfect
without you ever having known or understood how desperately you needed them!
This Thanksgiving our prayer for you is that you experience
the peace and joy of a heart abandoned to Gods perfect ways, that you also
enjoy the blessings in full of your FREEDOM IN CHRIST!
