When Prayer Loses its' Voice.
by Scott Phillips
04-12-06
or
When your house of prayer is a den of thieves.
The story that provides a grand contrast of Jesus and his manner is the story where He is eaten up with zeal the Lord and cleanses the temple. It is interesting to consider what he said, and how it applies to us as individuals.
“And said unto them, It is written, My house shall be called the house of prayer; but ye have made it a den of thieves.”
What happens when your “house of prayer” is a den of thieves? Let us examine your prayer life for a just a few moments. The House is You, God does not dwell in a temple made with hands, but he dwells in you. So, if you are the house, “How much prayer is going on inside of you?” Or, are we like they were in that day, we have allowed other pressing issues to steal the voice of prayer and replace it with other pressing matters.
Lets look at the Thieves and examine their meaning.
He found those that sold oxen and doves.
He found those who were there to sell a sacrifice that meant nothing to the buyer. In the Bible, they were to choose out of their flock; instead they were able to purchase something that they had no attachment to.
You can’t purchase someone else’s sacrifice with money. We see it today in the Church, people think they can benefit from another mans anointing by giving money or just being around their ministry. God don’t won’t a sacrifice that means nothing to you.
HE DROVE THEM OUT. We must drive out the idea that we can give God less than what comes from our flock and fold. What was used in an emergency, had become away of worship. You know what we do? Rather than tapping in and walking with God for ourselves, we let others make the sacrifice and we just hang around for the benefit.
We have got to drive this out of our way of worship and walking with God.
He found those that would take one currency and exchange it for a currency that could be used in the temple. You cannot use carnal currency for spiritual benefit.
The word means, “to cut into bits, and means therefore small coin; “small change,” of which the money-changers would require a large supply. Hence changers of money means, strictly, dealers in small change.” This gave people the opportunity to convert large currency into more convenient sacrifice.
“All I got is a hundred, can you break this for me and give me five ones?”
Now, we could hunt this down and talk about giving money to God. But lets break it down in our lives… you are the House of Prayer and what does it mean for us to take the currency and break it up in bits so that we are not giving God as much?
Jesus called them thieves. These entrepreneurs of business, enterprise and thrift were robbing people of Gods blessing in their lives. What great idea is robbing you of Gods benefit in your life? I must confess, I choose often to invest my time in things that I can do, rather than give myself to prayer as much as I should. “Well, I better hurry up and get through praying, so I can go visit some people and invite them to church.” “I better hurry up and pray, so I can study for my message on Sunday.” So, we break into bits our prayer time, so we can spend that time doing other things that have tangible quantifiable measurements. I know we have to do these things, but what is more important?
Moneychangers. Do we really think that physical, tangible, carnal things will translate into spiritual harvest and blessing? Yes, sadly, of sinners I am chief, we do.
Jesus turned the tables over. What does that mean. The money was still there. It still had value, but they had to gather it back up and put in order and use it in a different way. We must not let great ideas steal the voice of prayer in our lives. He brought reorganization and new purpose to the currency. He did not take away its value, but changed its role.
Turn the tables over and lets make an altar.
And finally he comes to those who sold doves. He did not break the cages, he did not set them free, but he recognized that they were in the wrong place, serving the wrong purpose.
What are your doves that God wants you to move out of your “house of prayer”? A dove represents peace. Using the law of first reference, they were used to see if it was safe to come out of the ark. They were used to test to see if it was time to step out. When was the last time you sent a dove out to find out if it was time to step out? Sometimes we get so comfortable with our doves in the cages, that we don’t realize that they are there to help us know when it time to get out of the Ark of Safety and go out and do the will of God.
When was the last time we prayed for the will of God? When was the last time we asked God, “Lord am I doing what you want me to do, and am I where you want me to be?” Do I have the right spirit? Did I handle that right. It is easy to keep our peace locked up and not question Gods purpose and manner for things. You send the dove out, and if it comes back you stay. But if it goes out and don’t come back, it is time to get out of the comfort zone of your little surroundings and step into a whole new world. When you give your “Peace” a chance to leave you, and if your peace does not return, it is time to move to another dimension and maybe location.
Take these hence. Get them out of your house of prayer. Doves are meant to be loosed, not caged for convenience and circumstance. Get them out of the cages.
Who was doing the Wrong? Both the Sellers and the Buyers.
So, here we see, chosen people selling and the chosen people buying. As long as you got people willing to buy, you will have people willing to sell. If we are not careful, we will take what we had meant to give to God and we will sell it to worshippers. How many preachers, how many singers, have sold their songs and their gifts to worshippers when it was meant to be their sacrifice and service to him.
They received it freely, but now it is simply merchandise in the House of Prayer.
There is a whole lot of merchandise in the House of Prayer today. We like the merchandise, because it is bought with money. But, sacrifice, you can’t sell it and you can’t buy it, not sacrifice that is For God. Oh we can traffic in this area, because it meets the need. The lust for money and the lust for the easy way out, are symbiotic partners in the realm of religion.
But what God wants is a house of prayer. Say it out loud, “A house of prayer!” We have got to quit taking the easy road toward the blessings of God. We have got to quit thinking that we can soak up and have imparted into our lives gifts others have fasted for.
Some things are only found at an altar you die on. Some things are only found in a place where you pray. Shortcuts at some point leave you empty. When we realize the emptiness, we reach for more, we purchase more, we go to more conferences and the great emptiness and ritual frustrates us.
We must drive them out,
Turn over the tables
And take the caged doves out
These are words, simple but powerful, I feel the Lord is saying to me. I believe there is an echo chamber of the spirit. If you can hear it, let us together cleanse our temples of the trite trinkets of truth and convenient prescriptions of purpose, when what God has for us is so much greater.
Lets get out of the Religion Business and let us bring ourselves into a place of honest, sincere searching of the soul and bringing ourselves to a place of offering that sacrifice that only we can give.
Here is the Clincher.
Look what happens when
Jesus gets rid of the thieves.
When you remove the hindrances and recover the voice of prayer, notice what happens.
“And the blind and the lame came to him in the temple; and he healed them.”
God will bring sight to those areas you have been blind in, and will bring mobility and ability to those crippled areas of your life. However, the blind spots and the lame excuses are going to be in your temple as long as you let thieves silence prayer in your life.
Drive the Thieves of True Worship out of your life.
Clear your throat and lets Recover the Voice of Prayer in your life!
In Him, By Him, Through Him,
Scott Phillips
Observations, Comments, Feedback?