Prayer is hard work. Not because you get paid for it, but because of the effort required to set aside all other priorities and focus on the Kingdom Agenda at hand. It may seem more boring than a board meeting, but that would only because your board (you, any angels or friends you may invite) have lost sight of the vision or have displaced the Chairman of the Board of prayer: Jesus. Wiithout Jesus chairing the meeting and the Holy Spirit leading the discussion, you are bound to accomplish nothing. The Father is waiting to hear your requests.

So ask!

And keep asking and focus!  Focus means that when something distracts you from asking, you set the distraction aside and ask again for the same thing, though perhaps with different words. You address the same issue until it is resolved.

You are on a long journey in prayer: You want God to accomplish something. You cannot do it on your own, so do not pretend that you can! You MUST seek. Look intensely for what God is doing. Don’t lose heart if at first it doesn’t seem to be revealed where God is at work. Keep looking. Keep searching.  If you don’t find food in the fridge, you go to the cupboards. If it is not in the cupboards, you go to the store. If the store is too expensive, you go to the food bank. If the food bank is closed, you ask your neighbor. You may fast for a while, but you will die without food. God doesn't want you to die, so He will feed you ... with Manna if necessary! Likewise, you must seek God for His answer to your present situation.

Maybe your dreams have been deferred. Maybe you seem to have conquered nothing. Maybe your speeches are the summaries of silence. Go knocking on doors. Pound the pavement! Hit the road! DON”T GIVE UP! God will answer when you knock on His door. The gates of hell themselves shall be opened before you and you will be able to see captives go free, but you must ask and ask and ask and ask and ask … and keep on asking until God shows Himself mighty on your behalf!

So what about those Gates of Hell? What if you are knocking in Jesus Name and you happen to be knocking on the gates of hell? Guess what, the Good News is that God will not loose snakes and scorpions on you.  No, He will tame them and enable you to trample on them. Beasts will submit to you. You will marvel at the Lord’s doing.

You say, ah, I have a few neighbors whose doors are surely the gates of hell. I should go trample on them. I’ll pray that my neighbors will submit to me & my ways.

Watch out! In the same way you judge others you will be judged. The moment you go trying to trample on them you will find yourself being trampled upon. and that would be no fun.

No, we must bless others in our prayers and actions … and then we ourselves will be blessed. Give and it will be given unto you. We are called to live in a mutual benefit society.

Love.

How sweet life smells when offered up in prayer!

Dear brothers & sisters in the Arabian Peninsula,

I wish I could be there with you because I wish to share in some small way in the celebration and seeking aking place in the region.  While I have a deep burden for the land there and have spent myself for our cousins locally, I am not a leader of any work, but the least servant of all. Yet I venture to share a word that has been regularly bubbling up within my heart.  I have shared it with others and they have been encouraged, though puzzled at first, so I will put my head on the block and share it with you as well trusting that a gift will be imparted.

            In Isaiah 21 there is a passage which I am sure is familiar to all of you:  Within exactly one year all the splendor of Kedar will come to an end.  Initially, the time of prayer for PTAP was set @ 1 year, then the leadership wisely took counsel and expanded this emphasis to an until … emphasis. It has been fruitful: churches have begun, boldness has increased, and governments are in transition. Humility is coming … but there are also elements that are opposed to the freedom we celebrate in God’s Gift.  As the prophecy says before that,  Here is a message about Dumah: (Which when translated means Silence) Someone calls to me from Seir, (at the north west part of Arabia.) “Watchman, what is left of the night? Watchman, what is left of the night?” The watchman replies, “Morning is coming, but then night. If you want to ask, ask; come back again.” Notice that morning is coming.  This is good news to us all.  God is prophesying about silence here and night is the time of silence. Morning is coming with all the air is alive with sound and waking.  When the vendors are selling and the birds are singing. Jesus himself may have ventured out to Seir at one point. Herod was from that area, and Jesus was reclaiming the lost sons of Abraham. Seir is Edom is Esau. Esau is from the seed of Abraham, though in terms of blessing he was silent, he cried to no avail. But we are not of the seed of Edom, but of Christ—not of the seed of flesh, but of the seed of faith.  What is this word then? What is the hope for those who want to see the pride of violence fall? We ask the Lord, we ask the watchman on the walls, even Jesus who guards our souls in the night: what is left of the night? “How much longer?” cried out the saints from under the altar, beneath the castle [qasr] walls & streets.  Here is the word of the Lord: Morning is coming!  Oh, we see the sun coming on the horizon! The Sun will rise with healing in His wings! The broken cisterns will be mended. The polluted wells will be redug.  The confused cities will be ordered in the way of the Lord. The sick will have a Holy Hospital. The dead will be raised to life again. Oh, but caution, night too is coming. With the sifting out & storing of the wheat, we know that the chaff and stubble will be burned.  The fields must be plowed up season after season. The prunings must be thrown into the fire. Night also is coming, after the morning and noon. Everyone who wants to live a life of godliness in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. Be alert & watchful … and pray.  Are you inclined at all to pray, then pray. Do you want to ask? Ask, and keep on asking. Then ask some more until the day dawns when there will be no more night and no more moon. For the Lord God Almighty will be the Light of that great City and the Lamb will be the lamp. The bride is being prepared to inherit in the Castle. She must be clean,  so let her anoint and cleanse herself with Castile Soap, by C.onfessing, A.doring, S.upplying our needs, T.hanking, I.nterceeding, L.istening, and E.during in prayer while S.eeking O.ut A.bundant P.romises. If we do, then we will find a fortress for our soul to be held holy within. And the gates of hell will not prevail as we go out in glad parade for the bride of Christ to come into the castle of His home.                https://net.bible.org/#!search/Isaiah 21:11-17

Kindly & calmly, your fellow saint and servant,

Merton J. Hershberger, engkh