In the space of one and a half months, our hemisphere has suffered two immense killer quakes
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In the space of one and a half months, our hemisphere has suffered two immense killer quakes—the 7.0 magnitude quake that leveled Port-au-Prince, Haiti, January 12, and left 230,000 dead and an entire country in economic ruin; and the magnitude 8.8 monster that ravaged Chile last Sabbath morning, unleashing destructive tsunamis in its wake (one eyewitness reported a wall of water “fifty feet” high). While the Chilean death toll was a small fraction of that in Haiti (because of enforced earthquake construction codes), the energy released by the Chilean quake was so immense scientists are now telling us it knocked our planet 3 inches off its axis, thus shortening our day by 1.26 microseconds. Our hearts and our prayers (and our financial gifts—go to www.ADRA.org to make a much needed contribution) reach out to the sufferers in both regions of our home hemisphere.
But while the Apocalypse predicts an earthquake on the eve of Christ’s return that apparently will be off the magnitude charts in its destructive energy (see Revelation 16:18), could it be that the church today in fact suffers in need of a spiritual earthquake? Of the infant church in Acts, it is recorded: “After they prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly” (Acts 4:31). An earthquake of epic spiritual proportions—that’s what we, too, need, isn’t it? The moving and shaking power of the mighty Third Person of the Godhead, sweeping over a praying congregation, desperate for God’s outpouring. How else shall the 6.7 billion inhabitants of this planet be reached—without the earthquake of the Spirit?
So what if we added this prayer to the PRYR 101 strategy we shared last week (you may download the PRYR 101 podcast @ this website)? What if we quoted Jesus’ words back to him? What if we asked him every day to fulfill their promise where we live, study and work? “‘But you will receive power [Gk dunamis, “dynamite”] when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth’” (Acts 1:8). You don’t believe Jesus’ promise has been diminished by the passing of time, do you? Then can you imagine a more earth-shaking promise with off-the-chart possibilities than this one?
7.0—8.8—before the “big one” strikes, isn’t this the right time for God’s people to be in fervent prayer for the spiritual earthquake the Spirit has promised? After all, the two seismic temblors in our hemisphere already this new year are a somber reminder that life as we know it simply can’t go on, won’t go on indefinitely, will it?