Confession time: I just killed off a slice of peach pie large enough for two. Yep. I wish I could say I stopped there. I also may have had a little bit of fudge to go with that, and a large, very large cup of coffee. The indigestion is real. This isn’t standard practice for this momma, but it’s been one of those weeks. OK, maybe one of those seasons. A rat-race, get your coffee hot but drink it cold an hour later kind of season. Busy, straight-up busy. You know, the kind of busy you walk in the front door from, carrying way too many bags while not having enough time to put them down. So you improvise by throwing said bags anywhere, everywhere. The laundry load grows magically, messes multiply with a mind of their own as you lose a little of yours. I get it, I do, oh I really do.
So we pray for more strength, right?
We need strength to not only get through the day but sometimes even start the day. There is prayer for more wisdom, more grace, more of everything this busy season lacks. If we are honest, most days focus more on what is lacking, which seems like a lot. The word failure is worn on our heads and played on repeat. Epic failure in epic proportions. It’s a season of tired, a season of weak. There is not enough, so we pray for more. We pray underwhelming prayers for more as we fail to comprehend that we already have more, abundantly more. Enough.
Go read it for yourself.
Head on over to Ephesisans 1 and read the complete chapter. Stop from the busy long enough to look closely at Paul’s prayer in verse 17 for us as believers. Paul prays not that we would have more wisdom, but rather that we would have a better and deeper understanding of what we already posses in Christ as his adopted children.
“I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers, that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the working of his great might that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come.” ~Ephesians 1:16-21
That’s a lot, I know, but don’t miss it, don’t you dare.
Oh that we would have a more complete understanding of the greatness of God’s power and that we would better and more fully know the greatness of God’s person and authority! You see, as God’s adopted children, Paul wants us to grasp the depth of security we have in Christ and that we have been given so much, so very much.
How much?
More than enough. Our son Aaron is adopted. On the day we stood before the judge and Aaron legally became a Brungardt, the judge asked if we knew the full breadth of what we were walking into and that there was no turning back. At that point in time, everything that myself or my husband possessed also became and will become our son’s one day. Our name is an inseparable part of who he is. You see, for Aaron to pray to be “more of a Brungardt” would be foolish, because he already is one. All that my husband and I are or have are also the blessings bestowed to Aaron because he is our heir, our namesake, our son. John McArthur states it beautifully this way:
“Today many Christians spend a great deal of time and effort vainly looking for blessings already available to them. They pray for God’s light, although He has already supplied light in abundance through His Word. Their need is to follow the light they already have. They pray for strength, although His Word tells them they can do all things through Christ who strengthens them (Phil. 4:13). They pray for more love, although Paul says that God’s own love is already poured out within their hearts through the Holy Spirit (Rom. 5:5). They pray for more grace, although the Lord says the grace He has already given is sufficient (2 Cor. 12:9). They pray for peace, although the Lord has given them His own peace, “which surpasses all comprehension” (Phil. 4:7). It is expected that we pray for such blessings if the tone of the prayer is one of seeking the grace to appropriate what is already given, rather than one of pleading for something we think is scarcely available or is reluctantly shared by God.”
So how are you praying?
In the busy, in the crazy, in the season that dusts with weakness and blankets us with tired, how are you praying? Do we pray to realize the light and strength we already have or do we plead, faulting God as a reluctant provider? Truth is, He’s already done the providing.
So, I pray, but my prayer is changing.
It’s a prayer to be able to comprehend how much God has already given me as his daughter, how much He has already strengthened me with and for. It’s a prayer for the ability to be able to walk and camp in that truth daily. Especially when the coffee goes cold and the laundry runs away from me. Let’s not pray starved, underwhelming prayers, but rather, let us pray as one’s adopted into a rich inheritance. An inheritance that has already equipped us in all things and for all things.
Pictures courtesy of https://www.pexels.com/
MacArthur, John. The MacArthur New Testament Commentary:Ephesians. Chicago, IL: Moody, 1986.
