By Ben Berto
James 1: 5, NIV
5 If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you.
EG White wrote these words about prayer. “Prayer is the key in the hand of faith to unlock heaven’s storehouse, where are stored the boundless treasures of omnipotence.” “Prayer is the breath of the soul”
God is the source of all wisdom in the universe. If we don’t know what to do in some situations, when we are between the “rock and the hard place”, when choosing a life partner, what to eat, whether to eat meat or be a vegetarian, et cetera, those are questions you could ask God for help in prayer, and we have to have faith that God would show us the right answer. However, there is a “but” in the next verse, in James 1: 6 -8, we read, 6 “But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea driven and tossed by the wind.
7 For let not that man suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord;8 he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.”
Some famous men like George Washington, Napoleon Bonaparte, and Isaac Newton, all believed in prayer. Abraham Lincoln, U.S. President, once said, said that ‘prayer and dependence on God were essential, famously noting’, “I have been driven many times upon my knees by the overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere else to go.”
Jesus, when He was on earth, was a man of prayer. In the Gospels, Mark 1: 35, we read, “35 Now in the morning, having risen a long while before daylight, He went out and departed to a [a]solitary place; and there He prayed.” Before Jesus ordained the twelve into the ministry, He spent the entire night praying for them, while his disciples were sleeping at the foot of the mountain. In the Garden of Gethsemane, the night before He was crucified, He told Peter, James, and John, “41 Watch and pray, lest you enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.” Even when the Roman soldiers were hammering nails into his hands to the cross, He prayed, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do. Luke 23:34
The Apostle Paul always prayed for his parishioners. He told them to “pray without ceasing.” And told them to “pray for each other.” Does Pope Leo the Fourteenth believe in prayer? “Yes, Pope Leo XIV strongly believes in prayer, placing it at the center of his daily life and actively urging Catholics and Christian families to rediscover and maintain traditional prayer practices”.
Friends, the only way we could communicate with our heavenly Father is through prayer. You could “talk to your Father as to a friend.” His line is never busy or “the person you reached is unavailable.”
To contact us: Our website is www.abundantlifeadventist.ca. Worship with us every Saturday Sabbath, the seventh day of the week. Genesis 2: 2, 3, Exodus 20: 8-10, Isaiah 58: 13, 14; Isaiah 66: 22, 23; Matthew 5: 17-19; Revelation 22: 14
John 14: 1-3
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