July 23, 2024

Ezekiel 22.30 (NIV)

“I looked for a man among them who would build up the wall and stand before me in the gap on behalf of the land so I would not have to destroy it, but I found none."

Intercessory prayer is . . . the one way that a single believer, limited to one place and one moment of time can affect ministries around the globe.*

The gap to which Ezekiel refers is in the “moral wall that protected Judah from judgment.”* He was looking for someone who was willing to stand in the weak place in the wall to keep sin out; but no one was willing. Whose job is it to guard the wall today?

Remember the recycling slogan: “Think globally; act locally”? It works that way in the Kingdom of God, as well. Each of us does what we can where we can, trying to make a difference within our own sphere of influence. Some are called to ministry beyond their corner of the world but some of us, in the words of another writer, “have been called to stand at the boundary between the church and the world, that place where the local congregation touches the local culture, and ensure that the culture feels the impact of the church and that the church feels the hurts of the world.”*

When we are trying to determine our calling, “border agent” isn’t a job that usually come to mind* but that is exactly our function if we are not called to “professional” ministry. We help to protect the church from the influence of the world while making sure that the world is influenced by the church. But more than that, we must be willing to stand in the gap and intercede for the sinners to God.

What was Jesus doing in the final hours of his life? What pressed urgently on his heart? . . . his final assault on the kingdom of darkness . . . was not a miracle or a sermon to the multitudes, but a prayer for the church.*