A Secret Foundation (Part 1)

Learning to Pray

by

K.P.Yohannan

(Gospel For Asia)

A few years ago, I heard the story of one missionary serving with our organization who, in a short time, had planted five churches in a difficult part of Northeast India. Curios of how this young brother did it, I called one of our senior leaders and asked him if he could tell me more about this brother's ministry.

All that I knew was that he was from a tribal background and didn't have any college education, yet regardless, it seemed that God was with him in a remarkable way. The first church he planted began with the healing of a Hindu priest who was paralyzed. Then, one after another, four more churches were born. I was more th

Our senior leader said he would check into it and let me know what he found out. When he called to tell me, he said, "There is nothing unusual about him. I found nothing special except for one thing --- he gets up very early each morning and spends two or three hours in prayer and then an hour or two reading the Bible. This habit began while he was studying in one of our Bible colleges."

Let me give another example. One morning I was talking to a senior leader in our work on the mission field. He was traveling throughout North India to meet with many of our leaders and appoint new workers to projects that had recently been started. In our conversation we were discussing who might be able to take a certain new position. I asked him, "What do you think about this particular brother? He seems to be a really godly man. Why don't we think about putting him in that position?"

We talked back and forth about this brother's abilities, his lack of experience and the seriousness of the challenge in this new area of work. But finally we both agreed to trust him with the particular job. There was something about him that caused us to make that decision: He spends nearly four hours in prayer each day.

Our decision was not based on the fact that he had started a dozen churches or that he was able to oversee a large region of the country quite well. Our decision was based on the fact that God was with him and that he knew how to pray.

You see, prayer is God's Method of carrying out His purposes upon this earth. There is a mystery to the truth that God waits to hear and answer the prayers of his people. Remember what Jesus said in Matthew 9:37-38? " The harvest truly is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest" (emphasis added).

TO BE CONTINUED......