A Reason to Pray

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Acts 1:4-5 "On one occasion, while he was eating with them, he gave them this command: 'Do not leave Jerusalem, but wait for the gift my Father promised, which you have heard me speak about. For John baptized with water, but in a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.'"

Think

Your ride is on the way. You know this. You got the text. It says fifteen minutes.

So what do you do? You get your shoes on. You find your charger. You start moving toward the door. You look out the window twice for a car you know is not there yet.

Nobody who is genuinely expecting a ride keeps lying on the couch in their socks. Knowing it is coming is exactly why you are ready.

Which makes what happens in Acts 1 a little confusing at first.

Jesus tells them plainly that the Holy Spirit is coming. This is not a maybe, and it does not depend on how hard they pray. “The gift my Father promised.” “In a few days.” This is a guarantee from the mouth of the risen Son of God.

And then in verse 14, knowing all of that, they all joined together constantly in prayer.

Why? He already said it was happening. They could have taken the ten days off. They could have said, “Well, God said he is going to do it, so let us just wait around and see.” Nobody would have blamed them.

They prayed instead. And the reason they prayed is the same reason you find your shoes.

The promise of God is not an excuse not to pray. It is a reason to pray.

This matters because you probably have a version of this in your own head, even if you have never said it out loud.

“God already knows what I need, so why say it?”

“God is going to do what he is going to do, so what difference does my praying make?”

“If it is meant to happen it will happen.”

Those thoughts sound humble. They are actually a way of staying on the couch.

Look at how Jesus taught his own disciples to pray. He told them their Father already knows what they need before they ask, and then in the very next breath he taught them to ask. Both. God knowing is not a reason for silence. It is what makes asking safe.

Because prayer was never mainly about informing God. Prayer is about being with God. When you pray for something God has already promised, you are not updating him. You are agreeing with him out loud. You are lining your heart up with what he already said he would do.

And something happens to you in the process. Ten days of asking God for the Holy Spirit is going to do something in a person that receiving him instantly would not have.

Now bring it to your life.

God has promised he is near to the brokenhearted. He has promised he will never leave you. He has promised that anyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. He has promised he is patient, not wanting anyone to perish.

That last one has your friend’s name attached to it. The one you have been quietly worried about for two years.

You are not talking God into caring about them. He already does. He wants them more than you do.

That is not a reason to stay quiet. That is the best possible reason to pray.

The people in that upper room did not pray because they were unsure. They prayed because they were sure, and the surer they got, the harder they prayed.

Get your shoes on.

Apply

Pray a promise – Find one thing God has already promised in Scripture and pray it back to him today for a specific person by name. Do not ask him to want it. Agree with him that he already does.

Pray

Father, thank you that you keep your promises and that you are not waiting on me to talk you into anything. I am asking you today for what you have already said you want to do. Make me somebody who prays because I believe you, not because I doubt you. In Jesus’ name. Amen.