Feeding Your Spirit with Prayer

IWM Devotion: Feeding Your Spirit with Prayer  
Key Scripture: 1 Thessalonians 5:17,  “Pray without ceasing.”

Word For Today

I believe I can be honest with us ladies? Most of your moods are not random. No, they’re messages. You see that anxiety, that short temper, that heaviness you can’t explain, it’s your spirit telling you, “I need more prayer.” No one survives without prayer sisters. That's just the truth. You will not survive spiritually without prayer. You might function, you might post, work, and smile. But survive? No.  

Luke 18:1 says Jesus told them a parable to show “that at all times they ought to pray and not lose heart.” Prayer is not a spare tire for emergencies. It’s oxygen. When you stop breathing, you don’t notice at first. Then the dizziness comes. Then the collapse. That chaos in your head? That confusion that won’t leave? It won’t leave until you visit the place of prayer and tend to your altar. 

Most of us don’t have a prayer life, but the truth is, we do need one. Some of us don’t have a consistent prayer life. We have prayer moments, prayer emergencies, prayer leftovers. But if you’re on this journey of motherhood, womanhood, and as a believer, prayer is not optional. It’s part of what will keep you. When the kids are loud, when the marriage is hard, when the money is funny, when your mind is tired, you need a place where heaven touches earth. And that place is your altar.  

Like we read in our key scripture this morning, in 1 Thessalonians 5:17. It says “Pray without ceasing.” And that doesn’t mean 24/7 on your knees. It means your spirit stays connected. That prayer is your atmosphere, not your event. And we cannot achieve much without fanning into flame, like 2 Timothy 1:6 says, “Fan into flame the gift of God which is in you.”  Please listen, you have gifts. You have callings. You have purpose. But gifts don’t run on autopilot. They run on fire, and fire goes out when it’s not tended.  

You can’t achieve much while your altar is cold. You can’t birth what God put in you if you’re dwelling in ashes. Ashes are what’s left after the fire. Some of us are trying to live off yesterday’s encounter. But God is calling us to fresh fire. I mean daily fire. It's time to stop dwelling in ashes. Pray for rain, pray for fire.  
Leviticus 6:13 shows us something powerful, “The fire must be kept burning on the altar continuously; it must not go out.”  

So stop dwelling in ashes and pray for the fire of God on your altar. That’s why I love that song by Paul Wilbur, “Holy fire burn upon my altar” That should be our daily song. Our daily cry, not just on Sundays. And also not just when we feel like it. But everyday. Because a woman with a burning altar is a woman hell is worried about. 

Last week we talked about starving the flesh. But let me tell you how, and that's you do it by feeding your spirit on what matters most. You don’t fight distraction by fighting distraction. You fight it by praying. You don’t fight anxiety by analyzing anxiety. You fight it by praying. Philippians 4:6 says “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer…”  

Beloved, when you feed your spirit with prayer, your flesh loses its grip. When your altar is burning, your appetites change.

  Prayer  

Father, forgive me for every cold altar. Forgive me for dwelling in ashes when You’ve called me to fire. Today I acknowledge that i cannot survive without prayer. My moods are crying out for Your presence. Let holy fire burn upon my altar and never let it die out. Send Your rain. Send Your fire. Let my prayer life be the place where chaos breaks, where confusion leaves, where strength comes.  

I’m a woman, a mother, a believer. I need You. I choose to feed my spirit with prayer. In Jesus name, Amen.

  Challenge For Today

Beloved take 5 minutes now, Just you and God. No script or perfection. Tend your altar.