A Happy New Year (Off to a prayerful start)

Our church concluded its time of 24 hour prayer this afternoon at 2pm. By the grace of God, we had full coverage of all hours during the 24 hour period. It was an absolutely blessed time. It was also the first time that I was able to participate in something like this where a part of my time was spent in prayer, reading and reflection between the hours of 2am to 5am.

While I know that God hears prayer at whatever hour of the day it is offered, I think that there may be a special blessing for those who are crying out to the Lord in prayer when the rest of the world around us is dark and our community is asleep.

I think that those who participated had a sense of what the peace of heaven must be like. We hope to do this again (perhaps annually). In a few hours that I had at home earlier today (I've been rather busy with the 24 hour event itself in not only praying but helping to work through some of the logistics), I came across the text of a Watch Night service conducted by Charles Spurgeon in London on December 31, 1855 (Text here). It is a solemn reminder that our fund of time on this Earth is limited and to learn to pray and cry out to God to "Teach us to number our days aright, that we may gain a heart of wisdom."(Psalm 90: 12 NIV). I suggest reading it today on New Year's Day (even though any day of the year would be a good time to read it and take its' message to heart).

Happy New Year from the School of the Solitary Place!!!