Ever since Ike and I became engaged we started working out together. I should note that I did not go to the gym regularly at any point in my life until I married someone to whom it was important, so I’m still adjusting to this new activity in my schedule. For the most part I really enjoy it, but there’s one thing that is kind of frustrating about it–you can’t take a week off. At least, not really. As you probably know, muscle strength isn’t something that you can store up. If you don’t continue to build your strength, or at the very least maintain it, you’ll lose it. So while a week off won’t erase ALL the work I’ve done, I can’t expect to return to the gym with quite the same degree of strength. There will be a small amount of deterioration.

Interestingly, our spiritual lives are a lot like that. We tend to think of spiritual knowledge as something that we learn and then file away in the same way that a computer stores data. But spiritual growth isn’t really like that. It’s more like building muscle. If you step away from communing with the Holy Spirit, your spiritual growth will stop, and then start to whither.

Another helpful way of thinking about this is to remember the Israelites in the desert. In Exodus 16, God sustained the Israelites by providing them with a funny substance to eat called “manna.” Here’s an excerpt from the story:

Then the LORD said to Moses, “I will rain down bread from heaven for you. The people are to go out each day and gather enough for that day. In this way I will test them and see whether they will follow my instructions. On the sixth day they are to prepare what they bring in, and that is to be twice as much as they gather on the other days.” Then Moses said to them, “No one is to keep any of it until morning.” However, some of them paid no attention to Moses; they kept part of it until morning, but it was full of maggots and began to smell. (16:4-5, 19-20)

Our time with the Lord, our spiritual bread, is just like that manna. While we can certainly store away knowledge about God, it’s our intimacy with Him and our growth in the Spirit that doesn’t keep. It’s essentially got an expiration date on it–not in the sense that you will lose your salvation if you go too many days without spending time with God–but you can’t expect to experience the fruits of God’s presence if you’re never actually in His presence.

That’s one of the traps I hear a lot of Christians fall into when they remove themselves from Christian fellowship and time in the Word, claiming, “I was raised in the church. I already know all of that stuff.” Unfortunately, that knowledge is about as useful to you as knowing that manna is nourishing, yet refusing to eat it.

That is why it is crucial to spend time with God every day, reading His Word and talking to Him in prayer. The main point of your quiet time is not learning some new insight or blessing. Yes, those things may come, but if that’s your main goal then a quiet time will seem like wasted time when you don’t glean those things. The main point of a daily time with God is just that–time with God. God, not knowledge about God, is your spirit’s daily manna. If you skip a day you may not notice a difference, in the same way that someone can skip a meal without much fuss. But if you skip too many meals your spirit will eventually starve, no matter how much knowledge about God you might have.

Yesterday Cas spoke at WBS about the second half of Philippians 3 and knocked it out of the park! (I’m still working on posting the audio but we’re having technical difficulties. I’m probably the difficulty, but I’m working on it.) Since I can’t post the audio, I wanted to highlight something she said that has not only captivated my imagination but given me new direction in my prayer life.

As Cas recounted the conversion of Paul, she pointed out something rather remarkable. In chapter 3 of Philippians we get to witness firsthand the dramatic change between Paul “pre-Christ” and Paul “post-Christ.” In verses 4-6 he describes his previous status as the ultimate Jew and persecutor of the church, but in the rest of the chapter we encounter evidence of a dramatic transformation. Rather than persecute the church, he now builds it up.

What Cas pointed out that I had never heard before is that the Greek word for “persecute” (v. 6) is the same word used in verses 12 and 14 to mean “press on:”

Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.

The Greek word there is dioko, and like many Greek words its meaning changes somewhat depending on the context. Clearly, there are two different contexts between verse 6 and verses 12-14, given that they are translated so differently. The irony is that both uses occur within the context of Paul’s life. Paul’s life changed so dramatically that dioko took on a completely different meaning when applied to his converted life.

In practical terms, this means that the same zeal with which Paul persecuted the church was now redirected toward growing the church. And when I think about it, that makes sense. God had created Paul with that passionate drive, but because of his fallen nature he was using it for evil. The zeal was good and God-given, but the aim was wrong. So God changed Paul’s life, and changed Paul’s aim. He saw the potential in Paul to use his gifts for the good of the Kingdom, and He used them.

This story should challenge us in the way we see non-Christians in our lives. It’s so easy to take an adversarial stance, getting defensive or pointing out the things about them that are wrong. But what a terribly hopeless perspective!

Instead, the story of Paul should spark our imaginations. Rather than condemn people or judge them, dream on their behalf! Look for their strengths, the things about them that were clearly given to them by God but have simply been misdirected, and then pray for their Christ-like potential.

Maybe you have a friend who excels in the business world but is consumed by the drive for success. What would their life look like, how could they use their gifts, if God got a hold of them? Maybe you know someone who, like Paul, is extremely critical of the Christian faith and enjoys debating all the reasons that God can’t exist. Just imagine if that same passion to engage issues of truth with fervor and zeal were harnessed on behalf of the Gospel?

God has the ability to redeem ANYONE, so it’s important that we pray with that perspective in mind. Rather than simply dislike unbelievers or see them as lost causes, dream God-sized dreams on their behalf! Imagine what God could do with their gifts, and then pray for those things to happen! Such a perspective will help to stave off the us versus them mentality that we so easily sink to, but it is also far more faithful to the redemptive character of God, with whom we ALWAYS have a reason to hope.

Acts 12 has single-handedly transformed my prayer life. But before I explain how, let me share with you a story I recently came across that is both funny, challenging and relevant:

There’s a story of a young girl who wrote a letter to a missionary to let him know that her class had been praying for him. But evidently she’d been told not to request a response to her letter because the missionaries were very busy. So the missionary got a kick out of her letter. It said,

“Dear Mr. Missionary, we are praying for you. But we are not expecting an answer.”

For many Christians, this girl’s letter is an analogy for their prayer lives. We pray all the time for the healing of a loved one or the reconciliation of a broken marriage, but we secretly believe it’s too late. We think we already know what God is going to do. So we pray, but we don’t expect a positive answer.

And that is exactly what happens in Acts 12. Peter is in prison awaiting his near certain execution. Verse 5 tells us that his church was earnestly praying for him, but they probably felt hopeless. Their brother James had been executed just days before.

Fortunately, God hear their prayers and delivers Peter. And He does so in a pretty extraordinary way. He sends an angel to wake Peter in the night and lead him out of the prison. Peter himself can’t believe what’s happening. He thinks it’s all a dream.

Ironically, his friends have the exact same reaction. Once he arrives at the house of Mary, they can’t believe it. The servant girl who answers the door and claims to have seen Peter is immediately dismissed. “You’re crazy!” They say.

They can’t possibly imagine that God would actually answer their prayers.

But He did. And He does. Not only does God answer our prayers, but He can do so in the most miraculous, mind-blowing ways. We rarely see this happen because our prayer lives are so faithless. We are like the man in James 1 who asks but does not believe. Scripture warns us that such people “should not think he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all he does.”

I challenge you to test God in this. The next time someone calls you with a prayer request that you immediately think you know the answer to, resist that reflex. Instead turn it over to God in genuine trust and see what happens. If God can send an angel to bust Peter out of prison, then I feel pretty confident about what He can do with my requests.