The Problem w/ Prayer!

The problem with prayer is, for the most part, we have reduced it to a program, a meeting, a conversation or a concept! I am stirred this morning by Luke 18:2-8, the story of the persistent widow who kept "bothering" the judge until he gave her justice. Jesus then earths it for us wonderfully by saying "And will not God bring about justice for His chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night". Now we would be in bondage if we made this about our prayer, our effort! The point is simply that prayer is one of the most powerful tools in the hands of believers and leaders! This is what Leonard Ravenhill has to say about it in his book Why Revival Tarries. "The pastor who is not praying is playing; the people who are not praying are straying." He goes on to say ... "We have many organizers but few agonizers; many singers few clingers; many Pastors few wrestlers; many fears few years; much fashion little passion; many interferers few intercessors. Failing here we fail everywhere"  As I read this scripture and these words I am challenged to take prayer out of the "program", to take prayer out of the meeting, to stop talking about and conceptualizing it and to put prayer back in its rightful place as the language and culture of every believer and every church!