Starting the New Year on a Positive Note.

Dear COAH, 

Many of us begin the year with an emphasis on prayer. We attend the early rise prayer meetings, join in the relay prayers, and partake in the churchwide prayer at 9 pm daily. We are off to a great start! Brothers and sisters, we need to pray a lot in 2023. As I mentioned several times, the Pastoral Search Committee members will start looking for the best candidate for our church. We must support their efforts with sincere prayers.

We are by nature NOT interested in prayer. We believe in the importance of prayer. But when it comes down to doing it, we find many competing reasons not to pray. I wish our prayers would happen as naturally as breathing, but it is always a challenge to pray for a few minutes every day. We are, for whatever reason, constantly busy or preoccupied with something. To pray is to fight the moment of distraction and temptation.  

The story of Daniel is for us to remember. Daniel made sure that he prayed when his enemies hatched a plot to make him not pray to his God. For him, prayer times were sacred and never to be negotiated. But when we sincerely pray, God begins to work many wonders.

“When Daniel knew that the document had been signed (an injunction that forbids prayer to any god or man except to king Darius for 30 days), he went to his house where he had windows in his upper chamber open toward Jerusalem. He got down on his knees three times a day and prayed and gave thanks before his God, as he had done previously” (Dan. 6:10).

The phrase ‘as he had done previously’ stands out for me. Daniel had been a prayer warrior, and nothing could change him. So, too, should be our commitment to prayer. As we begin the new year, let us invest a lot of time and effort in prayer. Let us remember: when we pray, God works.

Blessings,

Pastor Minho Song