Think Long

Think Long      July 22/23

Scripture: Daniel 10: 1-14

Today we are continuing the Circle Maker sermon series, and I hope you’ve been just as inspired and challenged as I have. This series is meant to deepen our prayer lives and add an element of boldness to our faith. We’ve been learning to make big, bold requests of God because we believe God gets the glory when those big prayers are answered. And so as we continue today, we’re going to add in a final element to our prayer lives: praying with long-term vision.

In his book, The Circle Maker, Mark Batterson recounts another story of Honi the circle I’d like to share with you. One day, “Honi was walking down a dirt road when he saw a man planting a carob tree. Always the inquisitive sage, Hone questioned him. ‘How long will it take this tree to bear fruit?’ The man replied, ‘Seventy years.’ Honi said, ‘Are you quite sure you will live another seventy years to eat its fruit?’ The man replied, ‘Perhaps not. However, when I was born into this world, I found many carob trees planted by my father and grandfather. Just as they planted trees for me, I am planting trees for my children and grandchildren so they will be able eat the fruit of these trees.” And Honi’s prayer life changed after that. After that, he started to view praying like planting seeds.” [1]

Praying bold prayers is like planting a garden, which requires a long-range view. And that really is the nature of faith. Faith requires a long-range view of God’s activity. Without this perspective, we’re bound to experience disappointment. I often use the metaphor of a journey to describe the life of faith, because a journey is filled with ups and downs, mountains and valleys. Without a long-range view, we can trick ourselves into believing that it’s all valleys and no mountaintops, or that the valleys will never end. But long-range praying helps us focus on the ways of God even when life is filled with struggle. It’s helpful to remember that with God a day is like a 1,000 years and 1,000 years are like a day. God has a plan and we have to trust that plan, which is what allows us to be bold! If we keep praying hard and circling the dreams God has placed in us, those prayers will come to pass in God’s good timing. We might not reap the fruit of prayers, but maybe our children and grandchildren will.

One man who learned the practice of praying with long-range vision was Daniel. Now, we know Daniel mostly from the familiar lion’s den story, which is a fascinating story. Growing up, it was one of my all-time favorite bible stories. That story lifts up the deep and bold faith of Daniel, a faith he often expressed through his unwavering commitment to pray. In fact, Daniel ended up in the lion’s den because of his prayer habits. He refused to quit praying, defying the king’s edict. He was another one, just like Honi, who seemed to have a direct line to God. When he prayed, things happened. Except for the story we read today.

In this story, we’re kind of receiving an all-access, back stage pass into prayer realities that most of the time we don’t even think about! I mean, we are so present day focused that at times we forget about the spiritual side of things. Well, after Daniel has spent time wrestling with God in prayer, he has a vision of an angel. And the angel tells him that from the moment the words formed in Daniel’s heart, God heard them, knew them and was determined to answer him. Now, that should give us pause. When you pray, God hears. And when you pray, God is not slow to answer. Remember, he’s a good Father who loves to bless his children. But something happened as God’s answer was being delivered to Daniel- the messenger, the one bearing God’s answer to Daniel, faced opposition. For 21 days, spiritual oppression put up a fight until breakthrough finally happened.

This is an important word for our “instant gratification” culture. Sometimes our prayers seemingly go unanswered because there is opposition to God, and that opposition doesn’t want to see our dreams realized and certainly doesn’t want to see God’s plans unfold! Sometimes we get a little squirmy when we think about realities that we can’t see, but you know, we can’t avoid it. A quick look at Scripture, and even a quick look at our lives, tell the truth: there is an enemy of God, and that enemy will put up a dogfight to keep God’s plans from moving forward. When we pray, we need to keep praying until we feel confident God is on the move. The old-timers called this “praying through,” or praying until that moment when you can get up off your knees and say, “It’s done. It’s finished.” This angelic encounter is a helpful reminder that “our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.” Those are words Paul writes to his church in Ephesus, to help them keep the main thing the main thing. Humanity was not the enemy; the enemy was and is the spiritual forces of darkness that want nothing more than to kill the hope and joy Jesus brings. This is why Daniel had to keep on praying. It wasn’t just about saying his prayers at night; it was about entering a spiritual battle and praying until spiritual breakthrough. And when there’s spiritual breakthrough, eventually there will be physical, tangible breakthrough as well.

Now, Daniel goes down in history as an extremely intelligent man. As a man taken captive by the Babylonians, he won their favor with his wisdom and discipline, and earned a powerful seat in King Nebuchadnezzar’s palace. But what set Daniel apart was not his intellect, but his commitment to prayer. He was a man who would pray three times a day and fast faithfully, even if it meant disobeying the king’s orders and getting tossed into a den of lions. But was makes Daniel’s praying even more astounding is that he knew some of his prayers would not be answered in his generation, yet he continued to pray with urgency. That’s impressive. He looked beyond the rebuilding of Jerusalem and the end of Babylonian captivity, which he knew were never going to come to pass in his lifetime, but he still prayed for that day when his people would be set free. And one day, through the work of Jesus on the cross, his people and ALL people would be set free in a way not even Daniel could fathom. Daniel’s prayers became the seeds through which we enjoy salvation. It took longer than a lifetime, but eventually Daniel’s prayers were answered!

Your bold prayers are seeds through which God will further His kingdom. Every time you pray, you are making a deposit, an investment, in the work of Jesus. And that’s a tremendous legacy to leave. Like a carob tree planted long before our time, yet we enjoy it’s fruit, our prayers, dreams and risks will bear fruit as we continue to circle them. And here’s something else to consider: the bigger the vision and the bigger the dream, the longer you’ll probably need to pray and allow God to give you eyes to see new realities. But at some point in time, they will take root and God will give birth to possibilities that eclipse even our greatest hopes.

I want to conclude today with a simple story Jesus tells about seeds in the Gospels. It’s called the Parable of the Sower, and I think it’s a powerful illustration of praying boldly and thinking long-term. Close your eyes and listen to these words:

13 That same day Jesus went out of the house and sat by the lake. ² Such large crowds gathered around him that he got into a boat and sat in it, while all the people stood on the shore. ³ Then he told them many things in parables, saying: “A farmer went out to sow his seed. ⁴ As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. ⁵ Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. ⁶ But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. ⁷ Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants. ⁸ Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop—a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown. ⁹ Whoever has ears, let them hear.”

Plant your seeds of prayer. Keep circling, or maybe better yet, keep sowing your dreams. And trust that God, in God’s good timing, will produce a crop, a hundred, sixty or thirty times what you’ve prayed, even if you can’t see. Amen.

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[1] The Circle Maker, pp. 135