Prayer and Faith

Back in the 1950’s and 60’s car and truck engines didn’t have the perfectly fitting bearings and piston rings and high quality filters that to-days vehicles have.

Therefore it was very common to see vehicles like these ones driving down the street with a considerable amount of blue smoke coming from their exhaust pipe indicating worn piston rings and possibly worn bearings. To prevent this happening prematurely, the car companies gave instructions to new vehicle buyers not to exceed 30 miles per hour for the first 1,000 miles. They called this “the running in period” so that all those parts would gently wear in to the shape of their component parts. However “people being people” they often became impatient and drove too fast too soon and then made a warranty claim. The International Motor Company got sick of this and fitted “Governors” to their new utilities which had to remain in place until the 1,000 miles was reached, at which time the agent removed it.

I know this from experience as I had to go to Sydney and collect a new A.R.110 utility in 1954 and drive it the 500 miles back to Bourke and no matter what I did it wouldn’t exceed 30 miles per hour, talk about testing a young man’s patience. (That’s it in the photo).

As I look around the world at present I have a tendency to wish that God had made people with some type of “behavioural governor” so that they would have no choice but to behave kindly and “Love their neighbour as they love themselves”(Matthew 19:19). Oh how wonderful that would be. Of course that would have turned us into some sort of Robot and God didn’t want that, and I guess we really wouldn’t like that either. Freedom of choice makes life much more interesting doesn’t it? Fortunately though God has given us a very detailed instruction book called “The Holy Bible” to guide us and if we pay particular attention to the “New Testament” section we will not only get the best out of our life but will also have “Roadside Assistance” (the equivalent of a Spiritual N.R.M.A.) for free. Don’t get me wrong though, when I say “free” because this actually cost a lot. It is a little like the Medical benefits Scheme for us, where although our medicine may be very costly the Government pays most of the bill and we only have to pay a relatively small amount of the cost. The Christian life is similar to this as Jesus took the cost of our sin on himself and the only cost we have to pay after repenting is to live a righteous life and do His will in a society where that doesn’t always fit very well. I know it may seem a “little unrealistic” to imagine that everyone would be willing to adopt this Christian thinking so that the Kingdom of God would be established on earth, here in our day, and life would be as it is in Heaven. However If you have ever repeated the Lord’s Prayer then you must think this is a possibility. After all, Jesus, when teaching his disciples to pray to God, told them to say, “Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven” (Matthew 6:9). So this is not just a “pipe dream” that some old person might think up whilst sitting on their front door step, watching the clouds drifting past. On the contrary, this is a prayer that the Son of God said we should make as a request to 0ur Heavenly Father. And we are told that a ‘PRAYER OF FAITH” to Him can achieve anything!

The trouble is that although thousands of people around the world recite that prayer daily, they hardly think of what they are saying as it has become a ritual and a “vain repetition” and therefore isn’t powerful. (Jesus warned in Matthew 6:7 that this can happen) but He confirmed in Matthew 21:22 that “all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive”. So the Lord’s Prayer repeated meaningfully with absolute faith could achieve anything and change the course of history. God is willing to change things if we co-operate with Him: For example, when He decided to destroy the city of Sodom he said he would spare it if he could find 10 righteous people (Genesis 18:32) but he only found 4, so Sodom was destroyed. But when, in Jonah Chapter 3, God said He would destroy the city of Nineveh with its population of 120,000 in 40 day’s time, Jonah went there under sufferance, and preached to them and they all repented, so God spared them. James 5:16 says “The earnest prayer of a righteous person has great power and produces wonderful results”. If you are a Christian you are righteous in God’s sight, so let us pray the Lord’s Prayer in faith and see what can be achieved. Our country has problems, but when praying don’t look at the problems, look to “Jesus the author and finisher of our faith” (Hebrews chapter12 verse 2).   Best Wishes, Tom.