Prayer That Shows You Care!

Join us as we study a new character in our prayer journey, Nehemiah. He was in the house of the king, but ready to pray and leave his own comfort behind him when the people needed him.  Guest host Zia, leader of one of the high school PRESS clubs, joins us for this look at the heart of an intercessor and the prayer he prayed.

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Transcript

Press means to apply force.

When God said press, prayer reaches every single situation.

He gave us permission to apply force to every situation that we will go through. And in this podcast, we are going to learn to apply force to what's applying pressure to us. Greetings everybody and welcome to the press podcast.

I'm so glad that you're able to join us today.

Yay!

I have Zisa here with me.

And Zia is a press leader at her high school.

Well, she's graduating just in a couple of weeks, but she's been leading a press club on her own, I might add, for two years. I'm super proud of this young lady and the growth she's shown and she's probably hating all of this right now.

But Zia, welcome to the press podcast.

Thank you.

So, I have been doing press for two years.

I'm actually graduating Wednesday.

Yay!

But it's been a pretty great experience.

Um teaching and just meeting a bunch of different people.

I most certainly didn't expect to be here teaching, especially because it's something most definitely out of my comfort zone.

But yeah, this is something very different for me.

What was the most memorable thing you saw in leading this press club?

I would say it was a time I actually had everybody come together and just a time of reflecting and also it was a time of repentance as well.

We were talking about the topic of repentance.

And so, as everybody was going to their own place, they were praying and really just reflecting on the things that they needed to turn from.

And because it's there are people who never really had a walk with God. It was something very moving to see because after a while, there was these two guys and they came together and they just started praying with each other. And I thought that was really moving.

I actually started crying because whenever I see stuff like that, it always moves me to cry. And so, when I seen that, it was just knowing that God really does move in in like anyone and everyone. And so, it was really touching just to see that.

Yeah, I agree.

I think it's amazing just to know that God really wants to use you, use work in your school, work through you, work in your family. But it is incredible to see somebody really meet God for the first time.

So, I think it's amazing that you are ushering people to him, Zia girl.

Yes!

I know you don't like that, but it is amazing.

So, I'm happy to have you today.

I believe we're going to Nehemiah chapter one, right? Yeah, Nehemiah chapter one, it's verse five through eleven.

So, I had to get background on this because I cannot go further without getting background. So, I went back to Second Chronicles chapter 36 to see what was going on concerning the children of captivity. So, the way that they were brought to captivity, there was a bunch of different kings and they were doing evil in the sight of the Lord. And God, he seen all these things because the people they started doing the sins, the abominations after the heathens would do.

And so, before he even did anything, God had compassion first.

He sent these people to send his messages and to, you know, try to move them from doing what they were doing. But instead of the people actually responding to repent from it, they decided they were going to mock and they were going to misuse them.

And so, that moved God's wrath because he showed compassion first. And so, that really shows that God is really slow to anger.

And so, going further when he was showing wrath, King of the Chaldeans, it was Nebuchadnezzar, they killed the people, not all of them, but they killed a good number of them. And the people that weren't killed, they were sent to be prisoners or servants to the king and his sons. And so, that brought them into the captivity. But along the way with the King of Persia, God gave a message to the King of Persia to build the house of God.

And so, that's what they did. And that's what Ezra pretty much covers. But going into Nehemiah because that's not what I'm covering. Nehemiah, he received a message about what happened that the wall of Jerusalem, it was burned down and that the house of God, it was completely gone. And so, looking into Nehemiah chapter one, verse three, you see that he was really moved by it. And so, when he was moved by it, he went to prayer.

And do you mind if I start?

Well, hold on a second.

Let's stop because I think you said a couple of really neat things.

One, you mentioned that the people started doing like the heathens did.

That stands out to me because it relates to church people today.

That when we start acting like the world, there can be a serious God problem, right?

Yeah.

Did you catch that or what do you think?

You see throughout the Bible in the Old Testament that the children of Israel, they kept doing so many wrong things, but God, he still showed mercy towards them. When you think about it, they are doing the things that you see today. You know, there are people, there's people in the church, they do things that are of the world and they stay in it.

But at the end, God, he still wants us to repent and turn to him and he still shows that mercy. Because I remember I was reading, I think it was Judges, and you just see on and off how they kept turning even though God kept delivering and saving them, they still kept turning back to that sin. But God, he kept just dealing with them over and over again, showing them mercy.

And so, that really stuck out to me concerning that.

I agree. I agree.

The other thing you said was about God being compassionate. And I thought about how many times people take advantage of his compassion and I believe you used the words slow to anger.

Because in looking at the scripture or it just in life now because I like to relate as much as I can to today. And looking at today's day and time, some people are like, well, if God is really going to come back, well, he hasn't come yet or I haven't seen him judge XYZ.

So, their logic is until he destroys me, I won't believe I could be destroyed, which doesn't make much sense. Or until he reacts, I'm not going to believe he's reacting.

But God is compassionate and long-suffering.

He's patient, slow to anger.

And he shows that time and time again in the Bible, but also in our lives. And so, I love this time period. It's actually my favorite time period in the Bible, the captivity.

And as we get to Nehemiah, definitely going to let you take it.

But I think it's cool that they knew they could go to him even though he was in the king's house. That says a lot about him because it wasn't exactly a him problem. I understand the prayer that he was saying because one thing that we talk about a lot in press for some reason it was always repentance.

It always came back up over and over again.

And I love that that was the message because you see how there's actually beginning understanding of it. Even when I first started, we were talking about repentance and it was something that still really stuck with all of us.

When I made a mistake one time, I said, oh, repentance is a 360.

She was like, no, it's a complete 180.

And so, she corrected me.

I was like, oh my gosh, yes.

And so, I love that it really does stick.

Did you want me to read? Yeah, you can read it.

Okay.

So, going with Nehemiah and verse five, it says, and said, I beseech thee, oh Lord God of heaven, the great and terrible God that keepeth covenant and mercy for them that love him and observe his commandments. Let thine ear now be attentive and thine eyes open that thou mayest hear the prayer of thy servant which I pray before thee now, day and night, for the children of Israel thy servants, and confess the sins of the children of Israel which we have sinned against thee, both I and my father's house have sinned. So, just stopping in verse six, the first thing that really sticks out to me is how he's saying, let thine ear now be attentive.

Going into that word attentive, it's being deliberate in listening, like you're actually intentionally listening.

And this makes me think that God, he doesn't really have to listen to our prayers. He doesn't have to be there when we are praying to him. And so, when he was praying this, he recognized that. And so, that really did stick out to me, how he was asking, please listen and please open your eyes to what I'm saying. He's recognizing that he's God and he doesn't have to do anything that he's doing. But going further, he begins to tell God what they did wrong.

He said, we have dealt very corruptly against thee and have not kept the commandments, nor the statutes, nor the judgments which thou commandedst by thy servant Moses. Remember I beseech thee, the word that thou commandedst by thy servant Moses, saying, if ye transgress, I will scatter you abroad among the nations. But if ye turn unto me and keep my commandments and do them, though there were of you cast out unto the uttermost part of the heaven, yet will I gather them from thence and will bring them unto the place that I have chosen to set my name there.

Now these are thy servants and thy people whom thou hast redeemed by thy great power and by thy strong hand. Oh Lord, I beseech thee, let now thine ear be attentive to the prayer of thy servant and to the prayer of thy servants who desire to fear thy name and prosper. I pray thee, thy servant this day and grant him mercy in the sight of this man, for I was the king's cupbearer. And so, I really do love this because talking about repentance, we also talked about the posture when you are approaching in prayer, you are humbling yourself. And just reading this, you do see a sense of humbling.

One, he's saying thy servant. He's recognizing that he is the servant, that he's not God. And that we can't just come to him any sort of type of way, but we have to come humbling ourselves, recognizing that we need God and that we can't just do whatever we want, but we have to do what's right.

So, yeah, that's what I got from this.

No, you're doing amazing.

So, I was really just listening.

I love this prayer too for a few reasons.

Nehemiah, his name means Jehovah's consolation.

And the Lord really did allow Nehemiah to be born and elevated in a time where the people would need hope. And I love that he carried the people in his heart. He was in the king's house, he was fine, he was trusted. He's not looking at a wall. Yet, God had a remnant that was there at the wall and a remnant in the king's house.

God has preserved people everywhere and positioned them for whatever he wants to do next. And with that, he gave him the heart to hear. And so, with repentance particularly, he didn't just look at it and say that's your problem. He didn't say it wasn't really affecting me right now.

He repented on behalf of them all.

In leading your press group and watching them repent, did it ever affect the way you pray about them?

Do you ever find yourself crying out like, Lord help us?

I really do a lot because there are a lot of things that teenagers do go through. Some people may look over it, but there are so many things that I also recognized I was in myself. Being a freshman to being a senior graduating, I've really broke out in prayer, just really just thanking God for the years that he's been helping me through and that he saved me while I was still in high school because because high school, there are so many battles that come through. There has been a lot of terrible things happening within our school, considering fights, suicides, and so many different things that are really hard for just teenagers to go through. And so, considering where they're coming from, I'm grateful that they come to press club because it's a club about prayer, why we need to pray, why God wants us to pray and just having a relationship with God. And although, you know, I'm not seeing things the way I wanted to go, God is still moving and that's something that he's helping me see as well. So, in prayer, um I actually have their names on my phone and just a thing that tells me to pray for press. And I really try to push myself more to pray for them and to really care for them because yes, I'm done, but I still want them to receive what I have received. And it's something that I think about them all the time. I even had a dream about one of them like last night.

And so, I really do hope that they just keep pressing forward.

And I know you don't even know how much you're exemplifying a good leader right now that you carry the people beyond what they see. It's not because you're at front. It's not even because you're going to be at school anymore.

But that reminds me of Nehemiah too.

It wasn't because they could see him. It wasn't because he was in front of them. It was because he loved them. And so, when he turned to repent, it wasn't his mistakes. Like you said when you started responding to the question, you said, I think about me and I was going through and we go through a lot.

And that's just true. Whenever we as people consider ourselves and look at our own state, it is easy to empathize then and war and pray for the people who have not escaped where we once were.

Yes.

If you had to leave the people today with something concerning prayer or just God, something you've learned, what would you say to them, Zia? I would say that God is really worth it. Even though there's so many tempting things in this world, God, serving him is really worth it.

Considering all that I have been through, yes, it may have been sad, but God, he strengthens and helps me endure the battles.

And so, praying really does reach every single situation, especially when you're letting God in it. So, I do encourage praying more and just really pushing to grow in it.

Wow, and I pray that you continue to let God use you. You continue to grow in the confidence that he wants to and that those of you listening today were blessed. I know I was and I do mean that sincerely. And remember as you go about your day that prayer reaches every single situation.

God bless you. Thank you, Zia.

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