Announcements

Weekly Schedule

1. Morning Revival: Monday – Friday at 6 AM, 8:30 AM, and 9 AM (Zoom)
2. Campus Bible Study: Mondays at 5:30 PM (In-person)
3. Bible Reading: Monday – Wednesday at 9 PM (Zoom)
4. Topstone Fellowship: Wednesdays at 10 AM (In-person: Houston Meeting Hall)
5. Prayer Meeting: Wednesdays at 7 PM (Hybrid) 
6. Small Group Meetings: There are several small group meetings throughout the week. Please contact one of the leading brothers to get connected to one.
7. College-Aged Meeting: Fridays at 6:30 PM (In-person) 
8. Corporate Morning Revival: Saturdays at 9 AM (Zoom) 
9. Young People’s Meeting: Saturdays at 6:30 PM (In-person)
10. Lord’s Day Meeting: Sundays at 11 AM (Hybrid) 

WATCH AND PRAY (5)

Scripture Reading

Eph 6:17 – 18 And receive the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which Spirit is the word of God, 18. By means of all prayer and petition, praying at every time in spirit and watching unto this in all perseverance and petition concerning all the saints,

Ministry Reading

 BEING WATCHFUL AFTER ONE PRAYS

A good doctor will not only be watchful about the medicine his patient takes, but he will also watch for any reactions in the patient after he has taken the medicine. He knows that if there is a reaction in the illness, there will surely be a change in the person’s physiology, and he must change his treatment accordingly. For this reason, all proper prayers are not only uttered by all means but at all times. They must not only be uttered once, but again and again. They must not be uttered by all means once for all, but by all means at all times. Therefore, after our prayers, we have to pay attention to any new developments, reactions, or attitudes. We have to observe if the person or things that we pray for show any new signs. Otherwise, even though we have prayed, we are not watchful; and our prayer is still futile. If we pray for a person, we have to observe his condition afterward. This is very important, for this will affect our prayer before God. Prayer alone will not work, for it is powerless. (Of course, we cannot make this a general conclusion.) For this reason, we have to be very watchful even after we have prayed.

Suppose we are praying for one who opposes the Lord. We pray that God will make him believe, and we pray for him by all means. Not only are we praying by all means, we are also praying at all times. At the same time, we believe in God’s promise and lay hold of His word. But after a few days, the situation becomes worse; he becomes more antagonistic. Many people do not understand this; they go on praying just the same. This is wrong. It is not enough just to pray. We must examine and present his opposition before the Lord and tell Him that this person has now become more antagonistic. At the same time, we have to ask God why his situation has become worse and what we should do. If we are watchful, God may give us the light and show us that our prayer has affected the enemy. Otherwise, there would not have been such a change. If the opposition has become particularly serious, it probably means that the prayer has touched him. The enemy is afraid that we will snatch this person away. This is why he becomes more antagonistic. When we see this, we can start praising the Lord. Although outwardly the person may be opposing us more fiercely, we know that our prayer has struck him, and the enemy is trying to guard him more closely. When this happens, we can change our prayer and cast another net. Perhaps after a while, he will become milder. In the beginning he ignored us. Now he begins to talk with us. At this point we should cast out another net in prayer. We have to change our prayer according to the situation. This requires that we be watchful. Being watchful is overseeing and observing. One thing is certain, our knowledge governs our prayer. The more we know about a matter, the easier it is to pray for it. Therefore, if someone asks us to pray for something, he must first explain the thing clearly to us. The amount we know is the amount we can pray.

Watchfulness enables us to know the direction of prayer, and it enables us to see the condition of the person we pray for and how much he has changed. For this reason, we must watch all the time, and we must find out what changes have occurred since we prayed. Has the situation become worse, or has it become better? Has it gone forward, or has it gone backward? We must watch closely. Many times, we have to keep watching a person, a work, a tribulation, or a brother. Not only must we be faithful, we must be prudent as well. Our eyes should be the same when they are open as when they are closed. Just as we have to close our eyes to pray faithfully for others, in the same way we should open them faithfully to follow all the changes. If we only close our eyes, the enemy will have many opportunities to deceive us. Ephesians 6 is a chapter on spiritual warfare. The most important thing there is the prayer at the end. But this prayer can only be maintained with watchfulness. Therefore, in our prayer, we must be watchful, for our prayers will only be effective when we are watchful.

Brothers and sisters, the basic need is that we pray. But if we want to be powerful in our prayer, we have to add watchfulness to our prayer. It is a pity that many people have not learned the work of prayer. They are unclear about the matter of prayer. We have no other goal today than that God would revive us to function in the work of prayer. Do not forget that for God’s children, the thing in their life that suffers the greatest attack is the matter of prayer. If we do not pray, we will not have the power. This is why Satan specifically tries to disrupt our prayer life, so that ¹we will not have the time or the energy to pray, so that ²we will use many useless words in our prayer, so that ³we will miss many items in our prayer, and so that ⁴we will become negligent after we pray and ⁵fail to note the changes that happen afterward. If we want to learn to pray properly, we must pay attention to these five things. By these, we will learn something in prayer. Although these five points are very simple, they are also very profound. Those who have prayed for many years have learned these five things, and those who are beginning their lessons in prayer should also take care of these five things. However, the more we go on in prayer, the more understanding we will have and the more experience we will acquire. May God give us the grace today to truly pay attention to these matters. (CWWN, Set 1, Vol. 11: The Present Testimony (4), Issue No. 33, Ch. 4, “)

Links for Prayer Burdens:

▪ Timely Prayer Burdens — beseeching.org 

▪ Lord’s Move in America — gtca.us 

▪ Lord’s Move in Africa — lmafrica.org 

▪ Lord’s Move in Europe — lordsmove.org 

1. Holy Word for Morning Revival: Crystallization-Study of 1 & 2 Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah, and Esther – Week 9

2. Bible Reading Schedule – Week 77; Download Bible reading schedule here.

3. Weekly Crucial Point of the Truth – Subscribe here for the weekly email.