Falling on Our Faces

Numbers 16:41-45 says, “But on the next day all the congregation of the sons of Israel grumbled against Moses and Aaron, saying, ‘You are the ones who have caused the death of the Lord’s people.’ It came about, however, when the congregation had assembled against Moses and Aaron, that they turned toward the tent of meeting, and behold, the cloud covered it and the glory of the Lord appeared. Then Moses and Aaron came to the front of the tent of meeting, and the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, ‘Get away from among this congregation, that I may consume them instantly.’ Then they fell on their faces.”

I lack knowledge when it comes to the power of prayer and even more so when it comes to the power of God. Sometimes I read different passages and think different things about prayer. When I read this, I think it’s one of the most impactful things. Looking at things in the Old Testament is so hard because Jesus doesn’t always come out to say whether what happened was wrong or not. All we get are the stories and the after effect. But honestly right now, I’m not too worried about the morality of the matter.

The truth is that Moses and Aaron fell on their faces and pleaded with God to save the Israelites. Because of the constant rebellion of the people of Israel, God burned with furry against the Israelites and came to the point where He wanted to smite them. Moses responds by throwing himself on the ground to pray for the sake of his people. If you look abroad in the book of Numbers, you’ll find that this is not the only time Moses falls on his face. Nor is this the only time God has wanted to smite someone.

What does this mean for us? I don’t think we understand the fullness of what prayer can do. As I said earlier, I hardly know anything about prayer and what it can do besides what I read in the Bible. Shouldn’t that be enough though? If we believe that God is omnipotent and if prayer is taking the keys out of our hands and giving them to God so He control the situation, than isn’t prayer a way for amazing things to be done? I recently met with a youth minister that told me about the success of Charles Spurgeon. One of the things I’d never heard before about him is that when he preached in the London Tabernacle, he had a hundred people praying underneath the floor of the chapel. No wonder God used him to change the hearts of hundreds and still millions even today.

I remember when I held my first pistol at a father/son campout. Some of the dads brought their own guns for us to shoot at an on-site range, and so I went to go try them out. At age 8, my only experience shooting was shooting a BB gun and a 22. My friend’s dad handed me a small revolver, which thinking back was actually pretty big when I held it in my hands. I wasn’t intimidated as I pointed it down the range. I slowly pulled back the trigger, waiting for the gun to go off. After a certain point, it went off and the kick was more powerful than I thought. Instead of keeping the gun pointed down-range, the kick propelled my hands to point the gun in the air at about 60-degree angle. However, I brought it back down to fire a few more times. As you might be able to guess, the owner of the gun was not in any hurry to grab it out of my hand as he ran in fear for his life.

I didn’t know the power of the gun would be able to do what it did, and was truly surprised by what it could do. Isn’t the prayer similar? We don’t know the power of it until we try it out. If you read my last post, you know my previous experience with prayer and how it kind of surprised me that it worked. Think about how dangerous it would be for the devil to see us wield prayer like a professional marksman.

This is my prayer: for us to pray. When we lift our hands and ask for God to take our situation and show up in amazing ways, we can pray for God to show us something new. If God truly is endless, shouldn’t we pray that He would show us something different every moment? I think of the Casting Crowns song from what seems like ages ago (Which is just a few years but also equates to half my lifetime) that says, “What if His people prayed?” I heard that and walked away thinking, “Yeah, that’d be cool.”… I pray that we aren’t content with just hearing about the need for prayer. Right now, it might be good for you to “fall on your face” for a situation in your life.

Prayer is a weapon that no government can take away, yet ten times as powerful – Forsake All