Turn - Max Lucado [4]
“If my people, who are called by my name, are sorry for what they have done, if they pray and obey me and stop their evil ways, I will hear them from heaven. I will forgive their sin, and I will heal their land” (2 Chronicles 7:14, NCV).
In 1888 (or so the legend goes), a noted chess master named Paul Morphy attended a dinner party in Richmond, Virginia. During the course of dinner, the master’s attention was drawn to a painting on the wall of his host’s home. The scene portrayed a young man locked in an intense chess match with the devil himself. As the artist conceived the painting, the devil’s next move would claim victory—apparently entitling the evil one to the young man’s soul. For this reason, the devil wore a triumphant expression, while his young opponent seemed at his wit’s end.
After dinner, the famous chess champion walked over to the painting, studying the board and the pieces portrayed by the artist. After several minutes, Morphy turned to his host and declared, “I think I can take the young man’s game and win!”
“Why, that’s impossible!” his host replied. “Not even you, Mr. Morphy, can retrieve that game.”
“Yet I think I can,” the chess master answered. “Suppose we place the men and try.”
As the dinner party formed a circle around the table, the host set up the chess pieces precisely like the ones in the painting. After studying the board further, Morphy turned to the young man in the painting and smiled as if to say, “Young man, I have good news for you. He hasn’t won yet. After the devil makes his move, you will get the final move.”
To the surprise of everyone, Morphy bested the smug opponent in the painting. Victory was snatched from the devil and the young man was saved.
We sometimes feel like that young man in the painting.
We see Satan poised to claim victory. We feel something near despair as we watch our nation make wrong turn after wrong turn, wrong move after wrong move.
But in the darkest moment God whispers,
“I HAVE GOOD NEWS FOR YOU.
HE HASN’T WON YET.”
GOD GETS THE FINAL MOVE. AND WE CAN URGE HIM TO TAKE IT.
WE CAN PRAY.
We must envision ourselves on a rather vicious, cosmic battlefield. Our lives are not about ourselves. This life, the “three score and ten” we live here on earth, is not about our desires and dreams, our personal fulfillment, or our happiness. Our lives are part of a much larger reality—victory over darkness both in and around us. Your life is about nothing less than the glory of God.
—Stu Weber, Spirit Warriors, pp. 32–33
“If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.”
(2 Chronicles 7:14)
TURN # 2
Prayer couches two surprises.
First, God listens when we speak. Jesus Himself assures us of that. “Ask and it will be given to you,” He tells us. “If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer” (Matthew 7:7; 21:22).
The second surprise? We seldom pray. We have the greatest privilege imaginable—access to the very control center of the universe—yet rarely use it.
OUR LACK OF PRAYER SURPRISES EVEN GOD.
Through the prophet Ezekiel He lamented: “I sought for a man among them who would make a wall, and stand in the gap before Me on behalf of the land, that I should not destroy it; but I found no one” (Ezekiel 22:30, NKJV)
Upon learning that Sodom and Gomorrah were going to be destroyed, Abraham did not rush to warn the cities. He chose to “[remain] standing before the LORD” (Genesis 18:22).
When God told Moses that the golden calf warranted a nationwide death penalty for Israel, Moses interceded. One translation2 of Exodus 32:11 says, “Moses soothed the face of Yahweh his God.” (See also Exodus 32:14; Psalm 106:23.)
An obscure priest by the name of Phinehas begged God not to send a plague, and the plague was checked (Psalm 106:30).
Nehemiah learned that the city of Jerusalem had fallen into ruins.
But before he laid a foundation of stone, he