It is possible to love God and still fall asleep in places where you were once spiritually alive. You may still believe. You may still attend church, listen to worship, read Christian posts and know exactly when to say “Amen.” Nothing dramatic may have happened between you and God. Yet somewhere beneath the activity, something has become quieter. Prayer that once felt like communion has become occasional. The Word that once arrested your heart is now sometimes hurried through. You still love God, but perhaps you are no longer as conscious of His presence as you once were.
Spiritual sleep does not always announce itself. Sometimes you only realize you have been sleeping when God begins to wake you. Paul writes:
“And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep…” — Romans 13:11 KJV
What fascinates me about this verse is that Paul is writing to believers. These are people who belong to Christ, yet he tells them to wake up. Apparently, it is possible to be spiritually alive and yet become sleepy in your sensitivity, hunger and communion with God. And perhaps the first miracle of awakening is simply recognizing that something needs to awaken.
Knowing the Time Paul does not begin by saying, “Awake.” He first says, “knowing the time.” There are moments when spiritual maturity means recognizing what season you are in. You stop explaining everything away. You stop calling prayerlessness busyness. You stop surviving on memories of encounters you had with God years ago. Yesterday’s fire may be worth remembering, but it cannot become today’s communion.
There comes a moment when your spirit says, I cannot continue living on what I used to know of God. Paul calls it “high time.” Not next month. Not when life becomes less demanding. Not when the children behave, the workload disappears, the business settles down, examinations finish or everybody finally stops needing something from you.
Now. Life has a funny way of promising us that next week will be quieter. Then next week arrives carrying its own suitcase. If communion with God must wait until nothing else requires your attention, you may wait forever. The secret place must become something we deliberately protect. When Christian Activity Hides Spiritual Sleep One of the most deceptive forms of spiritual sleep is being busy with spiritual things.
You can listen to sermons without listening to God. You can post Scriptures without allowing Scripture to search you. You can serve people while neglecting your own inner life. You can become very knowledgeable about prayer while rarely praying. We live in a remarkable generation. Within seconds we can find sermons, devotionals, worship playlists, podcasts and videos explaining ten signs that God is calling us deeper. And sometimes, after watching all ten signs, what we really needed was to put the phone down and go deeper.
Christian content can feed us, but it cannot have communion with God on our behalf. David said:
“O God, thou art my God; early will I seek thee: my soul thirsteth for thee…” — Psalm 63:1 KJV
Notice what David thirsted for: “thee.” There is a difference between wanting something from God and wanting God. Of course we should bring our needs to Him. Jesus taught us to ask the Father for daily bread. But if the only thing drawing us into prayer is crisis, we have reduced communion to emergency assistance.
The secret place is where God Himself becomes our treasure. What Has Fallen Asleep? Perhaps this is the uncomfortable question Day 1 must ask: What has fallen asleep in me? Maybe your prayer life has become mechanical. Maybe your hunger for Scripture has weakened. Perhaps worship has become music playing around you rather than something rising from within you.
Maybe there was once a tenderness toward the Holy Spirit that made you quick to respond when He corrected you, but lately you have become less sensitive. Or perhaps disappointment exhausted you. You prayed. You believed. You waited. Nothing seemed to change, and somewhere along the way you protected yourself from disappointment by expecting less.
Whatever brought you here, do not misunderstand God’s call to awaken. Awakening is not God’s rejection of you. It is His invitation to you. If He is calling you, He has not abandoned you. The conviction that says, Something needs to change, may itself be evidence that the Holy Spirit is already stirring something inside you.
Philippians 2:13 says: “For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.” Even your desire to desire Him can become a place where His grace begins working. “But I Don’t Feel Hungry” Then tell Him. You do not have to manufacture spirituality for God. There is tremendous freedom in coming before Him honestly and saying, “Lord, my hunger is not what it used to be.” Sometimes we wait for hunger before we return to the table, but I have discovered something about spiritual appetite: sometimes hunger returns while you are eating.
Open the Bible before you feel inspired. Begin praying before the emotion arrives. Sit before God even when your thoughts seem determined to visit every subject except the one you are praying about. Bring your attention back. Then bring it back again. Prayer is relationship, and mature relationships cannot survive only on moments when we feel emotionally enthusiastic.
There will be mornings when your spirit is willing and your body has apparently filed a formal complaint against 5:00 AM. Come anyway. You are not seeking a feeling. You are seeking Him. And often, somewhere in the seeking, the feelings catch up. Who Is the Woman of Prayer? She is not a special category of woman. She does not have to be a pastor, missionary or someone who can pray for four hours without checking the time.
She can be young or older, single or married, a mother or not a mother. She can be studying, employed, building a business, serving in ministry, searching for direction or rebuilding after a difficult season. A woman of prayer is simply becoming a woman who has discovered where her life comes from. She knows there are places nobody can enter for her. People can pray for you, but nobody can know God for you. Nobody can build your history with God for you. Nobody can hear every whisper He intends for your heart, surrender what He is asking you to surrender or develop your sensitivity to His presence on your behalf.
There is a secret place with your name on it. Awakening Begins With Me We want God to awaken nations. We want revival in churches. We want our families transformed and the next generation set on fire for God. Those are beautiful prayers. But Prayer Awakening begins somewhere closer. Lord, awaken me. Before we spend thirty days asking God to change everything around us, we begin by allowing Him to search what is happening within us.
Perhaps nothing spectacular needs to happen this morning. Maybe your awakening begins with an honest whisper: “Lord, I miss You.” Maybe it is: “Father, I have allowed too many things to compete with Your presence.” Or perhaps all you can say is: “Awaken me again.” That is enough to begin. Tomorrow we will talk about the altar and the fire that must never go out. But today, we recognize the condition of our own hearts and respond to the call of Romans 13:11: It is high time to awake.
Declarations
◆ My heart is awake and responsive to the presence of God.
◆ My spiritual hunger is being renewed, and I desire God above every distraction.
◆ I will not live on yesterday’s encounters; I will know God freshly and personally.
◆ My secret place is being restored, and prayer is becoming a living part of my daily life.
◆ Every place of spiritual dullness within me is giving way to sensitivity to the Holy Spirit.
◆ I refuse to allow busyness, disappointment or distraction to steal my communion with God.
◆ The Word of God is becoming alive and precious to me again.
◆ I am awakening to God’s voice, God’s presence and God’s purposes for my life.
◆ I am becoming a woman whose life is rooted in prayer and communion with God.
◆ My altar is awakening, my hunger is returning, and my heart belongs wholly to God.
My Prayer For You
My prayer for you today is that this will be more than the beginning of another thirty-day programme. I pray that God will awaken something within you that continues long after September has ended. May the Holy Spirit gently uncover every place where spiritual sleep has entered without filling you with condemnation. May He restore your hunger, sharpen your sensitivity and make the presence of God precious to you again. I pray that prayer will cease to be something you remember only when life becomes difficult and become the place where you delight to meet your Father. May Scripture become alive in your hands again. May worship rise freshly from your heart. May distractions lose their power over your attention, and may disappointment no longer determine the depth of your expectation.
And as you answer God’s invitation over these thirty mornings, may you discover that the Father you are returning to has never stopped calling you closer. Awake, woman of prayer. Your altar is calling.
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