“Do you think that you can reprove words, when the speech of a despairing man is wind?” (Job 6:26)
The Lord has really been speaking to me about what kind of voice we are to this world? All through this year and beyond I truly want to stay a mouthpiece or a trumpeter for my Father. Are we just another voice in the wind as the book of Job describes? Are you still singing the “old song” of this world? Yelling at the tv, traffic, our bosses like everybody else? And let’s not forget our kids, and even our pets? I shudder looking back raising my kids and the frustration that grew within me at times. If only I could have put the apron over my head like Susannah Wesley did and lift my voice to God instead of my circumstances! Thank God my kids laugh when we talk of those days! But in 1994 at a young age of 37 the Lord arrested me and took me down into the ocean of his love and begin a slow reboot and rebuild in my life. Today I find myself still walking out that touch in my life. I want to open my mouth wide so he will fill it.
I love the story of Blind Bartimeus—”And blind Bartimaeus, the son of Timaeus, sat by the highway side begging. And when he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to cry out, and say, Jesus, thou son of David, have mercy on me” Mark 10:46-52.
Spurgeon elegantly says, “Me thinks we hear his shout. It is not to be imitated; no artist could throw into an utterance such vehemence or such emotion as this man would cast into it.—”Thou Son of David, have mercy on me ” Every word would tell, every syllable would suggest an argument, there would be the very strength, and might, and blood, and sinew of that man’s life cast into it; he would be like Jacob wrestling with the angel, and every word would be a band to grasp him that he might not go. “Thou Son of David, have mercy on me.” The gate of heaven is to be opened only in one way, by the very earnest use of the knocker of prayer. Thou canst not have thine eyes opened until thy mouth is opened. Open thy mouth in prayer, and he shall open thine eyes to see; so shalt thou find joy and gladness. It is the burning lava of the soul that hath a furnace within—a very volcano of grief and sorrow—it is that burning lava of prayer that finds its way to God.”
Yes the Master Jesus stops and looks our way! Let your mouth become a burning lava of prayer flowing to the throne room of God. For we know “The kingdom of Heaven suffers violence and the violent take it by force.” Cold prayers never win God’s ear. Draw your bow with your full strength if you would send your arrow up as high as Heaven. Go ahead and blow that trumpet!