Thursday, February 16, 2012
Day 13
The
effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.
James 5:16
Before there was a Mother Teresa
there was a Mother Dabney.
In 1925, Elizabeth J. Dabney and her
husband went to work for a mission in the city of brotherly love, but there
wasn’t much love in her neighborhood. It
was a hellhole. Her husband was called to preach. She was called to pray, but
she didn’t just pray, she prayed through.
One afternoon she was thinking about
a bad situation in their North Philly neighborhood and she asked God if He
would give them a spiritual victory if she covenanted with Him to pray. He promised that He would and she felt the
Lord prompting her to meet Him the next morning at the Schuylkill River at 7:30
AM sharp. Mother Dabney was so nervous
about missing her prayer appointment that she stayed up all night crocheting.
The next morning she went down to the river and made a prayer covenant with the
Lord.
Lord, if You will bless my husband
in the place You sent him to establish Your name, if You will break the bonds
and destroy the middle wall of partition, if You will give him a church and
congregation—a credit to Your people and all Christendom—I will walk with You
for three years in prayer, both day and night. I will meet You every morning at
9 AM sharp; You will never have to wait for me; I will be there to greet You. I
will stay there all day; I will devote all of my time to You. Furthermore, if
You will listen to the voice of my supplication and break through in that
wicked neighborhood and bless my husband, I will fast 72 hours each week for
two years. While I am going through the fast, I will not go home to sleep in my
bed. I will stay in church, and if I get sleepy, I'll rest on newspapers and
carpet.
As soon as she made that prayer
covenant, the glory of God was poured out in a new way! Every morning at 9 AM,
Mother Dabney greeted the Lord with a hearty, ”Good morning, Jesus." She
wore the skin off her knees, but God extended His powerful right arm. She fasted seventy-two hours a week, but the
Holy Spirit was her direct supply.
Soon the mission was too small to
accommodate the people. Her husband
asked her to pray for another meeting place nearby. She prayed, and a man who
had been in business for 25 years closed up shop so they could rent the
building. Mother Dabney would not be
denied. She was a circle maker and
circle makers have a sanctified stubborn streak. When they know something is in the will of
God they won’t take no for an answer!
Mother Dabney’s prayer legacy would
be a long forgotten footnote if it weren’t for one headline. The Pentecostal Evangel published her
testimony under the title What it Means to Pray Through. That one article sparked a prayer movement
all around the world. Mother Dabney
received more than three million letters from people who wanted to know how to
pray through.
Our generation desperately needs to
rediscover the difference between praying for and praying through. Praying through is grabbing hold of the horns
of the altar and refusing to let go until God answers. Like Honi the Circle Maker, you refuse to
move from the circle until God moves.
You intercede until God intervenes.
In the grand scheme of God’s story,
there is a footnote behind every headline.
The footnote is prayer. If you focus on the footnotes, God will write
the headlines. And your prayers will change the eternal plotline!
Mark
Batterson-Circle Maker
