I’ve spent a couple of weeks meditating on ‘rejoice evermore, pray constantly and in everything give thanks.’ I’ve taken it apart, found the same three point pattern of Paul’s thought here also in other scriptures, moved pieces, compared verbs and reassembled it into all sorts of different shapes. In all of that, it still holds together just as it’s written here.
Though it’s not exactly the same word for ‘ceasing’ in the phrase “pray without ceasing” the thought reminded me of Luke 18:1 where Jesus said “men ought always to pray and not FAINT” This word ‘faint’ carries the idea and is translated ‘fail’ in Luke 22 in Jesus’ admonition to Peter in verse 32 that he’d ‘prayed that his faith FAIL not.’ This fainting is apparently more than growing tired. It’s some kind of failure. That’s even worse.
I once heard someone say there was ‘a difference between tired and weary.’ If a person is tired, rest will rejuvenate him.’ If one is weary, he’s broken down and all the rest available can’t restore him into a previous condition.
So, Jesus in the two verses just mentioned, told us that our prayers and our faith can fail and be broken down. That’s a frightening thought. There is hope though.
I’ve noticed at times in my life that I didn’t want to believe any more towards a certain faith goal. It makes it awkward to not believe when you’re surrounded with people who do, and/or who do want to believe. One’s tempted to change his theology a bit to justify his exhaustion.
For example, “ if it’s God’s will, it’ll happen.”
I’ve certainly encountered times that I was weary of praying. Of course I was, I’d ceased- or at least let things I had been carrying fall to the ground and be forgotten. The only reason I know of that I’d do such a thing would be, as Jesus warned of in Luke 18, I’d given up hope of being answered. After all, there’s only so much rejection and disappointment a person can bear.
Wonderfully, the remedy for all this is in the passage concerning Peter’s faith failure in Luke 22. Jesus said ‘and when you are CONVERTED…’ Conversion is the solution and conversion is simply a course reversal. The proverbial 180 degree turn about.
In Peter’s case, that conversion was associated with all sorts of failures within and around him, forcing him to take another look at himself. That still happens today, but thank God there is an easier way.
Jesus called it in another parable ‘sitting down and counting the cost.’ There are times to sit and think before acting any further. Weariness can be overcome but to be overcome it requires more than ceasing from action. It requires renewal.
That renewal takes the shape of making sure one is putting more truth into his soul about whatever he may be believing or praying than he is sending forth into the air around him. Spiritual overdrafts come in different sizes. If my spiritual overdraft has an allowance of 2,000 faith units, putting a 20 unit deposit back during a tv commercial wont change much, quickly. Frankly, a chapter of the Bible a day wont likely do it either.
The more you spend, the greater your income must be. In these days requiring great spending of soul in faith and prayer, I choose to be mindful I need to maintain a pretty large spiritual income.