Why more information doesn’t always lead to better intercession
I urge you, my brothers and sisters in Christ, to lean more into the promptings of the Holy Spirit than you do into media in all its myriad formats.
Misinformation, bias, selective reporting and manipulation taint media across the spectrum. Mainstream news, alternative news, blogs, podcasts, social media, websites and independent commentators are all capable of it.
Yes, even the ones you heartily agree with.
So, what do we do?
Take action and join God’s army of intercessors. Don’t worry, our Commander-in-Chief has a training program out of this world. He loves to take raw recruits and transform them into spiritual powerhouses.
God loves teachable hearts!
Stop obsessing over media reports.
Unless we remain alert, Christians can easily fall into the enemy’s hamster wheel of fear and obsession.
When we’re fearful and uncertain, we look for any way we can control the situation. If we can’t control it, we try to flee from it. We mistakenly believe that if we gather enough information, we’ll gain a semblance of power over that which we fear.
So we spend our days scouring dozens of news outlets, podcasts, social media feeds and commentators. Instead of calming our fears, they often fuel them as everyone spins events through their own particular lens.
I suggest we skim the headlines to get the basic facts and then head to the prayer closet.
Ask God how He would like us to pray about that situation, and then pray accordingly.
Prayer takes fear out of the driver’s seat. A surrendered heart, praying from the position that God is bigger than any terrorist group, government or political agenda, is far more effective than a heart cowering in fear and speculation.
“We are on slippery ground. Only intercession will avail. God is calling for intercessors — men and women who will lay their lives on the altar to fight the devil.”
— Rees Howells
I highly recommend Rees Howells, Intercessor. The final chapters contain accounts of the intercessors praying during the Second World War.
Rees Howells and the community of intercessors learned to wait on God for His strategies and pray accordingly. They spent more time seeking God than obsessing over newspapers and radio, the primary forms of news media available to them.
Their dated prayer records document remarkable instances when, while major battles were taking place, they were praying with striking specificity about events as they unfolded. Their prayers weren’t vague or general. They believed God was giving them strategies for intercession, and they prayed accordingly.
They understood their prayers to be every bit as important to the battle as what was happening on the battlefield.
They had far less access to information than we have today, yet they didn’t believe more information was the source of the road to victory in prayer.
They believed God’s voice was their source.
Be informed enough to pray.
But don’t become so consumed with the need to know that you forget to pray. But don’t become so consumed with the need to know that you forget to pray.
You can read the book online for free here.
Read 2 Chronicles 20 for further study.
Until next week,
2015 Katherine Walden
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