Topic: Pray For The People [TREM Devotional 6 May 2019]
“Cease not to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers.” – Ephesians 1:16 (KJV)
Another thing you must learn to do is to pray for those God has committed into your hands. This is not limited to the Church. The truth is that everything you are learning is applicable to every sphere of human endeavour, not only the Church because people are people everywhere.
Jesus was a man given to prayer; when you read the Gospels, you see Jesus Christ constantly praying. He took time to pray a great while before the day in Mark 1:35 (when others were sleeping) but in Luke 22:32, He gave us an insight into His prayer for Peter, when He said: “But I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not …”
Make it a duty to pray for your people. If you are leading a small team, pray for them individually. Be concerned about the things that bother them. That does not mean you go about announcing to people that you are praying for them. No! Whatever you do in secret, the Lord knows how to reward it openly.
Also, when you pray for people, prayer has a way of divinely connecting people. Somehow you are connected to them in such a way that they find it easy to come to you and confide in you. The same is true when you pray for people genuinely, you will not be quick to spread wrong words about them. When you pray for people, even when you see their flaws, you want to help correct them. When you pray for people, you are also sowing seeds of prayer and God will also raise others to pray for you.
Life is all about seed time and harvest; develop the habit of sowing seeds of prayer and God will always cause you to reap a massive harvest too. Prayer cannot be a once-in-a-while activity for a leader, every leader must know how to pray and pray without ceasing.
Further Reading: Ephesians 1:15-23
Daily Bible Reading: Morning- 1 Kings 21-22; Evening- Luke 23:26-56
Written by Dr. Mike Okonkwo; Is the Presiding Bishop of The Redeemed Evangelical Mission (TREM); a versatile man of God with over 30 years of dedicated service unto the Lord.
