My House Shall Be Called A House of Prayer

 

“My Temple will be called a house of prayer.”  Matthew 21:13

I spent 8 years of my life struggling with my move from New York to Florida.  I was so hurt deep within because I missed what I left behind for what seemed like chasing after my husband’s dream.  What he wanted was not wrong.  It just wasn’t what I wanted.  My heart was in a selfish place, and I got spiritual about it too.  All I kept saying (in my head) was “I bet he didn’t even pray about this.”   We can get ugly in our hearts when things don’t go the way we want.  But I kept remembering what my former pastor told my friend.  “You’ve got to let your husband lead, even if he leads you to a ditch.  He’s accountable to God as the head of the home.”  Change is not easy, and I was dragging my feet on this one. 

Throughout these 8 years I have found something wrong in every single church I went to.  Well, you know what they say when there’s always something wrong everywhere you go– you must look at the common denominator!  Hey, let’s keep it real.  I went to every church setting the expectation that they needed to be just like my home church.  And disappointment set in every time.  My poor husband.  How I cried that he didn’t bond with other men at church.  How could he?  Every time it seemed that he was settling in, we were up and about looking for another church because I threw a big enough fit. 

New York is big for churches that meet weekly for prayer, and I was one of those who ran to church come rain or snow!  If the church was open, try to stop me!  But rare these days is the church that has weekly prayer service that includes the whole congregation.  Jesus said, “My house shall be called a house of prayer.”  One day, God spoke those very words back to my heart.  “My house shall be called a house of prayer.”  He didn’t say anything else, and I knew exactly what He meant.  “We… are the temple of the living God.” (2 Corinthians 6:16)  All those years I spent complaining to God should’ve been spent in prayer to God.  It was as if God were saying to me, “Jackie, you are MY house.  I called you to pray.  Stop criticizing what others are doing and not doing.  You focus on what I called you to do.”  That is the only way I can explain what I felt impressed on my heart. 

Does this mean we settle in a church that we believe is not preaching the Gospel?  Absolutely not!  Maybe the church you currently attend doesn’t have everything you would like.  No church will ever be perfect.  Find a church that does not bend, fold or compromise when it comes to what the Word of God says.  And if there is something you would like to see different, then I encourage you to pray.  Perhaps, God will use you to be the change agent in that place.

 

“And who knows but that you have come…for such a time as this?”  Esther 4:14