Day 10 - The Early Morning Prayer
O God, You are my God; Early will I seek You; My soul thirsts for You; My flesh longs for You In a dry and thirsty land. Where there is no water. Psalm 63:1 (NKJV)
I used to be a spontaneous & conditional prayer- I’d pray randomly throughout the day, and then, of course, whenever I needed something. As I went through difficult times, I saw my prayer life grow slowly. God called me to start going to intercessory prayer meetings at church. I saw real and amazing results when I prayed. But, I still felt like someone was missing. Then my son went through a season of waking up at 5 AM. I was becoming more and more frustrated every day. One Sunday morning, I woke up with my anger on level 10. I was about to stomp off to his room, when God checked me and said, “Amanda, I’ve been using him to wake you up – you need to start praying early to prepare for what I have for you.” That’s all it took; the next day my alarm was set for early morning prayer.
But ya’ll, I am NOT a morning person. God is STILL working on me with this one, because the snooze button exists. Clearly the Bible says “Early will I seek You” not “Whenever I wake up, I will seek you.” So, this is one area that I’m really focusing on for 2019. Because of how my body operates, lack of sleep means more pain. Plus, some of my medications tend to make me groggy in the morning. But, this year, I’m done using my illness as an excuse for laziness and disobedience. Even this past week, I took a step towards my goal, and began taking my meds and going to bed earlier so that I have no excuses come morning.
God’s call to rise early to pray was a wake-up call (pun intended). I have too many people, opportunities, and goals to pray for to be disobedient in this area. The same is true for you. What if someone’s, or even your own, breakthrough was tied up in ONE early morning prayer? I don’t know about you, but I’m not risking it anymore.