By Lilian Lee
I would like to share my personal journey into the area of prayer during the pandemic.
I began attending weekday morning prayer meetings in late January till February 2021, which I enjoyed these sessions. Participants were familiar to me and the format of prayer was good.
On 17 February 2021, PJEFC held the Ash Wednesday service. The theme was ‘From Ashes to Glory’. The service was conducted by Pr Yu Yong. He explained what Lent was, our purpose in life and touched on the disciplines of Lent, which encompassed fasting, praying and giving. At the end of the service, he challenged us to seriously commit to practising one of these disciplines. I then made a commitment to pursue the discipline of prayer.
That began my journey into prayer through the NECF 40-Day Fast & Prayer programme. With the help of the Holy Spirit, I managed to attend all the 40 days of daily prayer sessions from 7.00am to 8.30am. Faithfully I recorded the theme for each week, meditation for each day and items to pray over. When the 40 days ended, I continued attending the morning prayer, which changed to 2 days a week, i.e. Tuesday and Friday, from 7.30 to 8.30am, starting in May. I have continued with these weekly meetings till today.
What have I learned during this prayer journey?
1. Help of the Holy Spirit – He gives me the desire in response to the commitment I have made. He wakes me up early in the morning to help me plan my schedule each day. He is indeed my Enabler.
2. I see the Father heart of God – our prayers range from personal items to church, nation and world. He is not only my personal Lord and Saviour but also the God of the nations.
3. I have learned the attitude of surrender – committing all things to Him and trusting Him to work in the way that He knows best.
Witnessing God at Work
I’d like to share a testimony of my older sister Jenny who suffered a stroke in May 2020. Unable to care for herself, we moved her from Malacca to live with us in PJ. This necessitated her selling her house. She engaged a lawyer to do the transaction, but unfortunately the lawyer cheated her of RM340,000 (price of her house). Till today, she has not received any money despite having lodged a police report and engaging another lawyer to pursue her case. Many questions have crossed my mind over this matter. Where was God in all this? Why did He allow this to happen? Doesn’t He care at all?
These months of coming into prayer with fellow church members have taught me to allow God to take over all situations, big and small. My sister and I have experienced God’s peace and His abiding love. Jenny has accepted Jesus as her personal Lord and Saviour in the process, has experienced God’s peace and allowed God to be her Advocate and Defender. We are convinced that in all things, God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose (Rom 8:28).
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