Daily Devotions
Why Do We Not Pray This Prayer?
Title: Why Do We Not Pray This Prayer?
Reading for April 8: 2 Samuel 23-24
Weekly reading for April 8-14: Luke 10-14
And he said to them, "The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest."
Luke 10:2
Why is that I seldom hear this prayer ever prayed? This is one of the few prayers that we are told to pray in scripture. We're told to pray for "kings and all who are in high positions" (1 Tim 2:2 - *see note below), and I hear that prayed for a lot. But I rarely hear this prayer.
Jesus not only told us to pray for the Lord to send out laborers, but he told us to pray EARNESTLY for this. Why was this prayer so important to Jesus? Because it was Jesus' mission "to seek and to save the lost." (Lk 19:10) Nothing was more important to Jesus than this. Not even His own life!
So why don't we pray this prayer? Could it be because we're afraid of what God's answer to this prayer might be? Could it be because we think God might be looking back at you and me as part of the answer to this prayer?
Father, send forth laborers into your harvest. And don't just send others... Send me!
*Note also the context of Paul's command that we pray for kings and others in authority in 1 Timothy 2. It's not just so that we might lead "a quiet and peaceable life," but it is because God desires that "all men be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth." (v 4) We should pray for peace not just because it makes our lives more comfortable, but because it serves God's purpose of spreading the gospel so that men might be saved.
