“David built an altar to the Lord and offered burnt offerings and peace offerings.
THUS, THE LORD WAS MOVED BY PRAYER FOR THE LAND
AND THE PLAGUE WAS HELD BACK FROM ISRAEL.”
2 Samuel 24:25 (NASB)
Unusual times call for unusual actions!
Our country and all the inhabited world are in the throes of dealing with a virus for which there is currently no known vaccine and no cure.
When unusual affliction comes to the people of God, God’s people are to respond, and to do so together. Extraordinary methods must be employed.
God warned His people of what to do should trouble come, in a dream to an ancient king. When things were very good, God spoke to Solomon of what to do should things become very bad...
“If I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or if I command the locust to devour the land,
or if I send pestilence among My people,
IF...
My people who are called by My name
humble themselves and
pray and
seek My face and
turn from their wicked ways,
THEN...
I will hear from heaven, will forgive their sin and will heal their land.”
2 Chronicles 7:13-14 (NASB)
We are also shown example after example in the Bible of people deciding to lay aside eating to draw near to God in times of crisis or urgency. This discipline is called fasting.
• Moses fasted as he was receiving the 10 Commandments.
• Elijah fasted when he sought God after his nation abandoned God’s Laws.
• David fasted to avert a plague that killed 70,000 in three days.
• Esther and her maids fasted for 3 days to avert the destruction of her people.
• The Lord Jesus did not even begin His ministry until he stared down the powers of darkness through fasting and prayer over 40 days.
• The Early Church prayed and fasted to launch Barnabas and Saul as apostles.
God has so ordered the universe that every created thing responds to the prayers of God’s people—and when praying includes the element of personal sacrifice, (including abstaining from food) in holy mystery, the power released through that intercession is amplified.
While our world is taking drastic measures and using all their powers to end a pandemic, we are to call upon the name of the Lord for mercy to flow in response to prayer and Jesus’ sacrifice.
If you are unable to abstain from eating due to a medical condition, the command to fast may be obeyed using the same methods as Daniel the Prophet: He ate plainly and simply; he ate only the minimum, and did not eat to enjoy the meal. He would eat quickly, then use the time allotted to an ordinary meal to pray into whatever purpose was involved in his prayer time.
If you have never fasted before, skip one meal—go off to a private place, and use the time usually allotted for eating to pray. You may drink plenty of water. If this is your first fast, you may drink clear juice. In place of eating, seek God. Each time you experience a hunger pang, let it call you to fire off a sentence prayer for God’s grace to flow.
If you have fasted before, but not often, skip two meals. Use the two times of not eating to pray for your church family, for your city and region, and the cause of the gospel across theearth. Let each hunger pang become a prompting to be present to God and praying into God’s purposes to buy back this event for His glory.
If you are more seasoned in fasting and praying, begin your fast at the end of your supper time on the evening before. Deliberately lay aside eating for a 24 to 36 hour period. If you sense a calling to pray longer, you already know that you will need to lessen your physical activity. Adjust accordingly and allow the Lord’s Spirit to “pray through” you (Romans 8:26).
Whether this is your first fast, or this is a regular discipline, it is important to draw no unnecessary attention to your action. In a public, communal fast (in which large groups of people are joining in the discipline together), we are seeking God together around a shared purpose. We are asking God to intervene to end the pandemic and to guide us concerning how we are to walk through it. Fasting is always accomplished without show or pretention. Because this is a communal fast, you may tell those affected by it, i.e. your spouse or your children. No one else need know.
Please receive this resource as a guide to enable you to pray. You may use this approach or lay this aside for another method. The goal is that we are praying and fasting together, that the Lord’s power intervenes to alter the course of history.
For this one day of communal fasting and shared intercession we are using Psalm 95 as our focus for the day. It includes three sections: two are celebrating God’s goodness, the third is a word to pay heed as we discern God’s voice, and contains a warning for those who do not heed when God speaks—and we are asking Him to speak to us.
We are recommending that this day have three dedicated sections, in 20-minute blocks (though you may do this in a single concentrated hour). For example, you may pray 1) at the beginning of the day, then 2) at noon, and then 3) at your usual supper hour, or at any time you may choose. Meanwhile, you will go about your day as always, with each hunger pang calling you to remember the purposes for which you have been praying.
Psalm 95 is before you in two translations. We are recommending that you keep a notebook.
The Bible passage will help you focus on the Lord. The notebook is there to write down any impressions that come to you in your time of prayer. Begin your day of communal fasting by reading the Psalm aloud in one or both translations.
PSALM 95 (ESV)
PSALM 95 (MSG)
Oh, come let us sing to the Lord;
Let us make a joyful noise to the Rock
of our salvation.
Let us come into His Presence with thanksgiving
Let us make a joyful noise to Him with songs of praise!
For the Lord is a great God, And a great King above all gods!
In His hand are the depths of the earth
The heights of the mountains are His also!
The sea is his, for he made it,
And his hands formed the dry land!
Come, let’s shout praises to God,
Raise the roof for the Rock who saved us!
Let’s march into his presence singing praises
lifting the rafters with our hymns!
Why? Because God is the best,
High King over all the gods!
In one hand he holds the deep caves and caverns,
In the other hand grasps the high mountains!
He made Ocean—he owns it!
His hands sculpted Earth!
Oh, come let us worship and bow down!
Let us kneel before the Lord our Maker!
For He is our God.
And we are the people of his pasture
And the sheep of his hand.
So come, let us worship: bow before him.
On your knees before God who made us!
Oh yes, he’s our God.
and we’re the people he pastures,
The flock he feeds.
Today, if you hear His voice,
do not harden your hearts as at Meribah,
as on the day at Massah in the wilderness,
when your fathers put me to the test
and put me to the proof,
though they had seen my work.
For forty years I loathed that generation
And said, “They are a people who go astray
In their heart,
And they have not known my ways.”
Therefore I swore in my wrath,
“They shall not enter my rest.”
PSALM 95 (ESV)
Drop everything and listen; listen as he speaks!
“Don’t turn a deaf ear as in the Bitter Uprising,
As on the day of the Wilderness Test,
when your ancestors turned and put me to the test!
For forty years they watched me at work among them.
as over and over they tried my patience.
And I was provoked—oh was I provoked!
‘Can’t they keep their minds on God
For five minutes! Do they simply refuse to
walk down my road?
Exasperated, I exploded,
“They’ll never get where they’re headed,
Never be able to sit down and rest.”
PSALM 95 (MSG)
Oh, come let us sing to the Lord;
Let us make a joyful noise to the Rock of our salvation.
Let us come into His Presence with thanksgiving
Let us make a joyful noise to Him with songs of praise!
For the Lord is a great God, And a great King above all gods!
In His hand are the depths of the earth
The heights of the mountains are His also!
The sea is his, for He made it, And His hands formed the dry land!
Come, let’s shout praises to God,
Raise the roof for the Rock who saved us!
Let’s march into his presence singing praises
lifting the rafters with our hymns!
Why? Because God is the best,
High King over all the gods!
In one hand he holds the deep caves and caverns,
In the other hand grasps the high mountains!
He made Ocean—he owns it!
His hands sculpted Earth!
Throughout the First Third of the day...
As your day unfolds, the most important thing is to keep focused, not on a pandemic, but on a Majestic Sovereign Creator God who, in Holy Mystery, is working out His purposes. Make a joyful noise! Sing! Remember His power first and place the pandemic under His Sovereign Hand. Sing! If “He grasps the deep caves...” and “holds the high mountains” He can take hold of a viral infection, use it for His deeper purposes, and then bring it to an end. We are asking Him to do both. Remember your favorite hymn and sing it as you ask Him for mercy.
Oh, come let us worship and bow down!
Let us kneel before the Lord our Maker!
For He is our God.
And we are the people of his pasture
And the sheep of his hand.
So come, let us worship: bow before him.
On your knees before God who made us!
Oh yes, he’s our God.
and we’re the people he pastures,
The flock he feeds.
Throughout the Second Third of the day...
Remember that kneeling and bowing is a reflection of being yielded to God’s Voice. Tell God you will obey whatever you know of Him as soon as you know it! Every time a hunger pang is felt, ask God what He might be speaking. Then ask God to redeem our culture, even as He heals the pandemic.
Today, if you hear His voice,
do not harden your hearts as at Meribah,
as on the day at Massah in the wilderness,
when your fathers put me to the test
and put me to the proof,
though they had seen my work.
For forty years I loathed that generation
And said, “They are a people who go astray In their heart,
And they have not known my ways.”
Therefore I swore in my wrath,
“They shall not enter my rest.”
Drop everything and listen; listen as he speaks!
“Don’t turn a deaf ear as in the Bitter Uprising,
As on the day of the Wilderness Test,
when your ancestors turned
and put me to the test!
For forty years they watched me at work among them.
As over and over they tried my patience.
And I was provoked—oh was I provoked!
‘Can’t they keep their minds on God
For five minutes! Do they simply refuse to walk down my road?
Exasperated, I exploded,
“They’ll never get where they’re headed
Never be able to sit down and rest.”
God is speaking, and we need to pay attention—and to do it together. Have we been guided of late, and then wondered whether God was still with us? This Psalm brackets the fact that Israel was miraculously guided—and fought the Lord the whole way! It underscores Israel’s consistent resistance over the time between leaving Egypt and the spying out of the Promised Land. 40 days turned into 40 years. The sin at Massah (Testing) and Meribah (Quarrelling) is in Exodus17—after God brought Israel through terrible trials and guided by miracles, they didn’t simply ask God to save them. Instead, when trouble came, they fought Moses, slandered God, and by extension, fought the God who sent him to save them. It ends in their tenth consecutive resistance at Numbers 14—followed by 40 years of constantly bickering and contention.
Throughout the Final Third of the day...
Pray for the great Church and for our denomination, that we will pay heed to what God is saying. Pray that we will pay attention when God is sending a signal for us to be at His work. Ask God for mercy to fall, for the scientific community to be guided, for governments to be directed into how to care for their people, for healing to be given the afflicted ones, for church pastors and leaders to know how to lead their people, for national leaders to be given guidance, and for the Lord to be glorified. Additional
Prayers to Consider.
1) Pray that our eyes be lifted from above the headlines and fixed on who our Lord Jesus is, and what He is doing through this (Hebrews12:2).
2) Pray that we operate by faith and not fear (Romans 3:11)
3) Let’s believe that our Lord reigns over this pandemic and that He is our refuge (Psalm 11)
4) Let’s be confident that our God will accomplish His purposes through this crisis (Romans 8:28)
5) Pray that we set an example of calm assurance, faith and hope in the living God (Isaiah 41:28-29)
6) Pray for the front-line health care workers tirelessly tending to the afflicted.
7) Pray for the protection of the vulnerable—the elderly, the homeless, the poor, those with pre-existing medical conditions, and remote populations, with little means to obtain care.
8) Pray for the grieving people who have lost loved ones to this virus.
9) Pray for the physical, emotional and financial repercussions for individuals, families, cities, churches, ministry agencies, and nations.
10) Pray for wisdom for the scientific community striving to find a treatment and a vaccine.
11) Pray for those unable to leave in foreign countries who are desiring to return home safely and quickly.
12) Pray for the salvation of huge numbers of people in Canada and around the world during these uncertain times.
13) Pray for wisdom for local, provincial and federal government officials taking decisions and giving direction to contain the spread of the Covid-19 virus.
14) Pray for the media to provide the needed information without inducing anxiety or fear.
15) Pray for pastors, church leaders, International Workers, District Superintendents, National Ministry Center officials, the Board of Directors, and all leaders, to give wise guidance for the C&MA family of churches, as well as the leaders of other movements.
16) Pray for business leaders making tough decisions affecting the future of their employees.
17) Pray for parents who cannot stay at home from work but must find appropriate childcare.
18) Pray that believers and local congregations will show compassion toward neighbors in need and engage in acts of kindness.
19) Pray that God works sovereignly through this pandemic, and that He brings this affliction to a complete end.
20) Pray concerning any leading that you might receive.
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Developed and compiled by Alliance Pray!
Team (APT)
