BECOMING, SURRENDER-READY.

Garden Power Struggles…..becoming "surrender-ready"...
I love early morning prayer and Bible time, especially during the days leading up to Palm Sunday, the Garden of Gethsemane, Good Friday and Easter. My heart goes to the garden almost every time I pray, in order to set my heart right, in posture, like His, surrender-ready. What a fight of flesh and spirit! Faith fights. God wins. So do we. Prayer is weaponized. Oh Lord, teach us how to pray….Amen

Read Matthew 26:36-56….the following thoughts may ensue, like they did for me.

Perhaps the greatest power struggle in history took place in the garden. Demonic influences must have saturated the garden, seeking to stop Jesus from saving the world from sin. Jesus won. Sweating blood, He prayed, trusted our Father's will, and surrendered all in the name of love, perfect love.  He and his apostles were then fugitives from men or Rome. The atmosphere was one of treachery, being hunted, eminent betrayal, arrest, humiliation and unimaginable suffering all of which Jesus already knew was going to happen and still, He went to the cross. He loves us this much and more. Am so grateful for the greatness of salvation. Daily and especially, this time of year, He reminds us, how to fight and win over sin. The power of prayer is available to us. It is His weapon of choice. We must learn how to wield mighty prayer. He'll see to the yield, and be our shield! Becoming "surrender-ready" involves warfare awareness, obedience and faith. Even faith the size of a mustard seed! 

As Christian soldiers, "little Christ's in battledress" we are already enlisted and trained to fight. We need only to volunteer for daily orders. We ask and receive by prayer. We see in prayer. We hear in prayer.
We serve a revealing, listening, moving, living God. His, is the invisible reality, outside time, with us, in it. Let us fear, walk, love, serve and love. Let us not retreat or shrink. Not now. Not ever. We see a turbulent road ahead laced with much grace and miraculous giftings. God help us.

Lord, teach us how to pray this day and forevermore. May our prayers be formed and informed by You. Please accept and allow our prayers to flow into the continual intercession flowing from You. May we be allowed to splash into Your most holy prayers. Move us. Let us depend more wholly, on the Holy Spirit. Build our faith that we may live it out in such a way that other's see You in us, over us, behind us,  with us and that we are seen standing in Your word, Your way. Keep our eyes on Jesus, remembering His praying form in the Garden and how that posture is to be ours. May we be prayer aware. In the name of Jesus and for His sake, Amen.