Wondering How to Pray

Royal Priesthood, Holy Nation                                          Acts 1:7

Wondering How to Pray

by Robert T. Cooper

There have been a lot of distressing times throughout the centuries, times when believers wondered whether the end of the age was at hand. Many-a Sunday morning a couple of us sit around and discuss whether the Lord might send another Great Awakening to our nation or whether God’s judgment will require Him to bring about the conquest and enslavement of our country. Then ruminating over world conditions we wonder whether He will raise another nation or whether He will bring about the Day of Judgment and the Glorious Appearing.

In our hearts, we don’t particularly want the second option, the conquest of the United States. I guess our preference is the Great Awakening as we know so many who need Jesus and salvation. We aren’t selfish; we’d be happy for the Great Awakening to spread across the entire world and last longer than any previous Awakening. But we would also be excited to be the generation that sees that Great and Glorious Day. We would love to experience God’s Kingdom in its fullness.

But just like the Eleven did not know and could not know whether Jesus would bring about God’s Kingdom in the days following the Resurrection, so can we not know what our Lord intends, neither in the short term or the long term. This may be the year the Chinese or the Muslims or the Hispanics take over America. On the other hand, the US may last 200 more years or even 2000 more years. Jesus may come at any moment, or it may be 20,000 more years. We just have to be ready as though it will be today.

So how is one to pray? For the most part we have settled for expressing to God the Father those things that are the options that we know about, assuring our commitment that His will be done, but then mentioning our preferences if only for the record. Ultimately the prayer boils down to, “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”

Questions: How do you pray regarding the end of the age? Does this approach to prayer apply to anything besides Judgment Day?