All Things Are Possible    Devotion for Tuesday , May 13, 2008

Previous   Next Selection Taken From: All Things Are Possible: Meditations on Biblical Prayers for God's Help by Daniel Partner Scripture tells of many prayers--urgent requests to God for help. In All Things Are Possible, author Daniel Partner tells of devotional meaning in seventy-five of these prayers. Partner's insightful, accessible readings show that no human problem is unique and that God hears believers' prayers. Not only can the answers be miraculous--prayer itself is a miracle. While reading All Things Are Possible, Christians will see their own struggles in the prayers of biblical characters, be encouraged to lift their voices to heaven like the saints of old, and embrace Jesus' promise: "All things are possible to him who believes" (Mark 9:23 NASB). This devotional employs various translations of Scripture. Soft cover from Barbour Publishing, Inc., copyright 2002

"DAY FORTY-THREE"

I have set watchmen upon My walls,
O Jerusalem, which shall never hold their
peace day nor night.- ye that make mention
of the Lord, keep not silence, and give him
no rest, till he establish, and till he make
Jerusalem a praise in the earth. - ISAIAH 62:6-7

In the days of ancient Israel, the time between sunset and sunrise was divided into three watches: the beginning of the watches (Lamentations 2:19), the middle watch (Judges 7:19), and the morning watch (Exodus 14:24; 1 Samuel 11:11). A city's watchmen relieved each other at each of these periods. Their purpose was to keep the city safe from its enemies (2 Samuel 18:24-27; 2 Kings 9:17-20; Isaiah 21:5-9).

"I have set watchmen upon thy walls, 0 Jerusalem" (Isaiah 62:6) is a famous declaration of the existence of watchmen in the spiritual sense. These are not the actual watchmen who kept vigil over the physical city of Jerusalem; they are believers who pray until God makes Jerusalem gloriously renowned all over the earth. Isaiah says that this glory is like a marriage: "You shall be called My Delight Is in Her, and your land Married; for the Lord delights in you, and your land shall be married. For as a young man marries a young woman, so shall your builder marry you, and as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so shall your God rejoice over you (vv. 62:4-5 NRSV).

I would like to be a watchman like those in Isaiah 62:6-7. Wouldn't you? They are not required to shout cries of alarm. Instead, they are preparing for a wedding. They give God. “no rest, till he establish, and till he make Jerusalem a praise in the earth." These watchmen are on the lookout for love, not war.

The church is like a bride to Christ. Their relationship is one of eternal love: "Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it" (Ephesians 5:25). Today there is need of watchmen to pray that Christ "might sanctify and cleanse [the church] with the washing of water by the word, that he might present it to himself a glorious church" (vv. 26-27). This will hasten the day when the voice of many waters and of mighty thunderings will say, "Let us be glad and rejoice, and give honor to him: for the marriage of the Lamb is come, and his wife hath made herself ready" (Revelation 19:6-7).

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