On the seventh day you are to march around the city seven times.
Joshua 6:4
Can I ask a counterfactual question: what would have happened if the Israelites had stopped circling Jericho on day six? The obvious answer is this: they would have forfeited the miracle right before it happened. The wall of Jericho would not have fallen and the promise would have remained unclaimed.
Nothing has changed.
I wonder how many of us have forfeited promises, forfeited miracles, forfeited dreams because we quit circling too soon. Please don’t read that and get depressed. God is the God of second chances! It should inspire us to pray through. Or to borrow vocabulary from The Circle Maker: keep circling!
Let me share a prayer testimony from someone who attended NCC for many years while they lived in DC. They just read The Circle Maker and shared a few of the prayer circles they’ve drawn over the years. This one involves a piece of legislation. See if it doesn’t inspire you to keep circling!
In 1994, I authored legislation that forced the cable industry to fully scramble their pornography channels. In our community, the Spice Channel was just one click away from the cartoon channel. Congressman Duncan Hunter allowed me to use his office as a base camp as I prepared to personally visit all 435 Congressional offices and all 100 Senate offices. It took me a week to visit all 535 offices, delivering the legislation and video evidence to each one. Every morning before starting my trek I did a prayer walk around the US Capitol 7 times and prayed for the spiritual walls of evil to come down. And on the last day, at the end of the last circle, (a little concerned about how the Capitol Police would respond) I shouted loudly for the walls to come down.
A few days earlier I was in the Longworth Congressional Building and had just left the220th Congressional office totally depressed. In almost every office that I visited I was told that I was too late; Chairman Dingle had finished the Telecommunication’s Bill and there was no way that he would ever reopen it for an amendment, because if he opened it for mine, it would open it for everyone else’s, and that wasn’t going to happen. I was in the lobby on the second floor of the Longworth, went over to a window, sat on its cold marble sill, and hung my head in defeat. I said to myself, I should stop wasting my time and go home to San Diego.
Never before, and never since, has God spoken to me so clearly. While I sat there looking down at the marble tiled floor, totally dejected, these words were spoken to me as clear as a bell, “Who is doing this, you or Me?” I can’t explain how I felt when I heard those words, but I straightened up and responded, “You are Lord!” Instantly I was filled with more excitement than when I had first begun and at each of the following 215 offices, my presentations were given with power and faith.
I was in the Canon Congressional Building, and had just made my last presentation to the last Congressional office (I am not exaggerating when I tell you this); as my leg crossed the threshold as I exited the 435th office, my pager rang. Chairman Dingle had just agreed to allow my amendment to be added to his Telecommunication’s Bill.
Maybe you’ve been praying for the salvation of a loved one what seems like an eternity. Maybe you feel like you can’t handle the financial stress or relational tension any longer. Maybe you feel like your dream is as distant now as it was a decade ago.
My advice? Keep circling!
What other option do you have?
To pray or not to pray.
That is the question, isn’t it?
Don’t just pray. Keep praying. Then pray some more!
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