Digging Prayer Week.pdf

Having observed John Calvin’s 500th birthday this past year with a special conference in the Fall, I want to invite the long-dead (yet still living) reformer to guide us through our new year’s eight days of Prayer Week (January 3–10). Calvin marked a clear trail to follow on the subject of prayer, not only with a three-volume commentary on the Psalms, but also with a 70-page section in his Institutes of the Christian Religion titled, “Of Prayer—A Perpetual Exercise of Faith & The Daily Benefits Derived From It.” It is one of longest sections in that massive multi-volume work—which historian Will Durant called, “one of the ten books that shook the world.”

Calvin introduced prayer by pointing out first that in ourselves we are “destitute of all good” and “devoid of every means of gaining our own salvation.” But he goes on, saying that in prayer ... “the Lord kindly and spontaneously manifests himself in Christ, in whom he offers all happiness for our misery, all abundance for our want, opening up the treasures of heaven to us, so that we may turn with full faith to his beloved Son, depend on him with full expectation, rest in him, and cleave to him with full hope.”

With another metaphor, Christ is called an “inexhaustible fountain” in whom all the fullness of God dwells whom we are compelled to seek in prayer, especially because God both invites and commands us to present our requests to him:

• “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.” (Philippians 4:6)
• “Call upon me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you shall glorify me.” (Psalm 50:15)

Calvin ridiculed the neglect of prayer, comparing it to being told where to find a fabulously rich buried treasure, yet foolishly allowing it to remain buried in the ground. In contrast, he said that real faith and relentless prayer fit together: “Call upon him in whom you have believed” (Romans 10:14). Such “calling” is thought of as the most profitable kind of “spiritual prospecting” imaginable because, as Calvin put it, “Prayer digs up those treasures which the Gospel of our Lord discovers to the eye of faith.”

Consider Jesus’ parable of the hidden treasure ...

“The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.” (Matthew 13:44)

At the outset of Prayer Week, look at the bounty that lies within our grasp! Calvin’s call is to get on our knees and dig up promised treasures, the treasures of …

• Our heavenly Father’s providence to watch over our interests (“Fear not, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand,” Isaiah 41:10).
• God’s power to sustain us when we are weak and almost fainting (“For God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control,” 2 Timothy 1:7).
• The goodness of the Lord to receive us into his favor, though we are miserably loaded with sin (“Oh, how abundant is your goodness, which you have stored up for those who fear you and worked for those who take refuge in you,” Psalm 31:19).

Every weekday morning and at midday, January 4–8, we will convene half-hour “treasure hunts” for God’s providence, power, and goodness on all the campuses. These gatherings for prayer will be in addition to the steady-state pre-service prayer times that happen all year long before the Saturday night services (4:45pm at the Downtown Campus, 5:15pm at the North Campus) and before the Sunday morning services (8:15am) at all three locations. Our most extended expedition in prayer will be the All Night of Prayer, beginning at 10:00pm on Friday, January 8, at the Downtown Campus—when you are invited (commanded) to, in Calvin’s words, “call upon [God] to manifest himself to [you] in all his perfections!”

Great God,
In public and private, in sanctuary and home,
May my life be steeped in prayer,
Filled with the spirit of grace and supplication,
Each prayer perfumed with incense of atoning blood.
Help me, defend me, until from praying ground
I pass to the realm of unceasing praise.*

Poised to prospect in prayer for all of God with all of you!

David Livingston,
Pastor for Shepherd Groups & Adult Ministries

*Taken from "Meeting God," The Valley of Vision.