H. L. Sheppard

                                                                                                         Bulletin

                                                                                                         October 2005

SILENCE IN THE

SANCTUARY

It always makes an inconspicuous exit.  There is never any hullabaloo or flamboyant fanfare.  Seldom does anyone immediately notice its absence.  In surrounding corridors, only the sounds of saint meeting saint, and the hellos and goodbyes of people in a hurry can be heard.

The Sanctuary is silent.  Inanimate walls that once were the sounding boards from which reverberated the echoes of praying intercessors, have once again become…just walls.  And eerie it is.  A grand hall was this sanctuary.  The prayers of praying people had anointed its very fabric with glory and infused every atom with the power of God.  Now, the prayers of the intercessors have all but ceased.  Apparently, people find the time to complete everything on their extensive “things-to-do” list, except pray.

After a while, “Prayer’s” absence becomes more and more obvious.  Saints begin harboring grudges that ultimately become bitterness.  Relationships between brothers and sisters in Christ, husbands and wives, parents and children, become fractured, some irreversibly so.  Altars that should be repair shops for the broken are less and less frequented.  Pews, that were once safe-havens where the weary found rest, are filled with listless, lukewarm, spiritually challenged Laodiceans of the rapture generation.

Where are the Weepers-those Prayer Warriors who make Satan tremble and demons shake with fear?  Where are the men, women and young people whose names are known in the halls of heaven, and in the courts of hell?  Where are the Intercessors who stand in the place of lost souls and petition God for their divine release from the Devil’s dungeon of death?

When you find them, please beg them to bring prayer back into the sanctuary.  The Sanctuary has been silent much too long!

REMEMBER that October is 'Prayer & Fasting' month. For the entire month special emphasis is placed upon the necessity of prayer and fasting. Ministers are asked to fast three days each week and pray one hour each day. All members are asked to fast two days per week and pray thirty minutes each day. Prayer has always been the prelude to Revival.

 If you do not have a regular daily routine of prayer, now is an excellent time to start. You are encouraged to discipline yourself to pray for five minutes each morning, or immediately after rising from sleep. It is a well researched fact that any activity performed consistently for thirty consecutive days becomes a habit. Prayer is a wonderful and fulfilling habit to develop. Not only is it pleasing to God, prayer enables men to access heavenly resources that are available only to those who give themselves to effectual fervent prayer: 

James 5:16  "Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much."