Grace for Your Day June 21

In the 1800’s, a young preacher in Philadelphia was forced to resign from his church for speaking out against slavery. His name was Dudley Tyng and, shortly afterwards, he was involved in a horrible accident which cost him his life. Before he died, however, someone asked him if he had a message for his friends and he said, “Tell them to stand up for Jesus.” Upon hearing of that, one of those friends was so moved that he wrote a hymn called “Stand Up, Stand Up for Jesus.” Here are some of the lyrics:

Stand up, stand up for Jesus,
Ye soldiers of the cross;
Lift high his royal banner,
It must not suffer loss.
From victory unto victory
His army shall he lead,
Till every foe is vanquished,
And Christ is Lord indeed. 

Stand up, stand up for Jesus,
Stand in his strength alone;
The arm of flesh will fail you,
Ye dare not trust your own.
Put on the gospel armor,
Each piece put on with prayer;
Where duty calls or danger,
Be never wanting there.

Those lyrics echo what Paul says in Ephesians 6. They echo what he writes about concerning the armour of God because, after describing the armour in detail, Paul tells us to put each piece on with prayer. He tells us strap them on by asking the Lord for help. In other words, we do not wear this armor in our own strength. We wear it in the strength of God as verse 18 says:

With all prayer and petition pray at all times in the Spirit, and with this in view, be on the alert with all perseverance and petition for all the saints.

The word “all” is repeated multiple times in this passage. We see it over and over again to remind us of the importance of prayer because we are not to pray once or twice. We are to do it “at all times” and we are not to pray for one or two people. We are supposed to pray “for all the saints.” We should pray for everyone that we know but the point is that prayer is a vital part of the Christian life. It is a vital part of our battle with sin. As one Commentator said, “It is the greatest weapon in our arsenal” which is what we are going to talk about this week at Grace Fellowship Church.

This week, we are going to study the subject of prayer. We are going to look at the greatest weapon in our spiritual arsenal. The sermon will be preached at our 8:15, 9:45, and 11:15 services. It will also be available Sunday morning on our You Tube Channel and website for all who cannot be with us in person. Please join us as we take a look at this important topic. Join us as we look at the source of our power as Christians. A Christian will never rise above his prayer life. He will never go beyond it and it is the same way with the church. Nothing says more about us than our prayers which is why we want to make it the focus of our attention this Sunday. Have a great week and I look forward to seeing you then! – Jeremy Cagle