How to Persevere in Prayer

How do you persevere in prayer? You have to make an effort, because it is not easy. It is easy to start; the difficult part is finishing, because of the opposition that arises along the way.

The enemy will always oppose men and women of prayer. This opposition can happen in many ways: through pain in the body, through situations around us, and even through people close to us. People will be attacked, you will be saddened, troubled, distressed, humiliated, and persecuted.

So, do not forget: many of these struggles are part of the journey of a life of prayer. And this should serve as encouragement to warriors. You must keep going!

But how do you persevere?

Do what Paul taught: “Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training.” Many people want to pray while living according to the flesh, and because of this, the journey seems impossible. But when we are in the Spirit, when we walk and live in the Spirit, we receive life and have life to give.

We must make an effort and not be ignorant of Satan’s schemes. Yet, hallelujah, we must remain patient in tribulations. This is how we will continue.

If you do not renounce your own life and your own will, and if you do not enter this war determined to fight the good fight, you will give up. The burden will become too great, because sin brings bondage and weakness.

Therefore, it is necessary to renounce sin.

The Word says: “Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training.” And so you will continue fighting, abstaining from everything that weakens your walk and making every effort to remain steadfast.

Understand this: the struggles, adversities, and opposition you encounter are part of the journey of those who are true warriors.

But you have the armor of God in your hands!

So I challenge you: move forward against them! Glory to God! Go into battle as David went against Goliath.

Do not allow yourself to be intimidated by the Goliaths of life, nor by the Sauls who may cross your path.

You need to have the same attitude as Caleb when he returned from spying out the land together with Joshua and the other men. Caleb said, in other words: “They will be our bread. Let us only be strong, and the Lord will deliver them into our hands.”

Hallelujah!

This is the secret to perseverance.

If I do not tell you the truth, you may become frustrated. The battles will come because of your prayer life. The counterattacks will come, and they may be very intense, because the devil does not want anyone to persevere in prayer.

That is why you find many people who started but did not finish.

Jesus taught that when someone goes into battle, they must first count the cost, to determine whether they have what it takes to see it through to the end.

In the same way, when someone is going to build a house, they must calculate the cost to determine whether they will be able to finish it. Otherwise, they will begin building and will not be able to finish. And everyone who passes by will begin to mock them, saying:

“This man began to build, but he was not able to finish.”

The world is full of people who began building their houses but did not finish. Many ended up becoming a source of shame and disgrace.

No!

You must be a courageous man! You must be a giant in faith, able to face the giants of this world and overcome the Sauls who arise along the way.

Do not be afraid. Do not give up. Do not abandon prayer.

Keep fighting. Keep praying. Keep persevering.

Because the one who perseveres to the end will see the hand of God.

We frequently encounter the metaphor of God’s “eyes” in Scripture, symbolism that speaks of His attentiveness to us. Before the Israelites entered the promised land, Yahweh told them: “If you then become corrupt and make any kind of idol, doing evil in the eyes of the Lord your God . . . you will quickly perish from the land that you are crossing Jordan to possess” (Deuteronomy 4:25-26). Centuries passed, and the people indeed became corrupt. God responded, “I will keep my eye on them for harm and not for good” (Amos 9:4). However, this “harm” (His discipline) ultimately was for their good. Although Yahweh said, “The eyes of the Sovereign Lord are on the sinful kingdom,” He also said, “I will not totally destroy the descendants of Jacob” (v. 8). God’s correction is for our benefit and intended to bring about our repentance. He’s quick to forgive and restore us.

HONEY DROPS FOR EVERY SOUL


Tuesday, August 25


Read: Joshua 24: 13-24


REMOVE ALL IDOLS FROM YOUR LIFE

"You shall have no other gods before me." (Exodus 20:3)

The Lord wants us, His children to be holy. He spoke to the Israelites many times that they should set right everything in their lives. In Deuteronomy 4:22-23 before the Israelites crossed Jordan, Moses told them, "Do not make for yourselves an idol..." After distributing the land of Canaan to tribes of Israelites, Joshua addressed them at Shechem thus: "Fear the Lord and serve Him with faithfulness. Throw away the gods your forefathers worshipped beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the Lord." In these verses we see God telling His people to mend their ways and cease to follow other gods. In the lives of believers there may be strange gods, although they may appear to worship the true God. These gods may be persons or possessions. When a thing or a person takes the place of God in a believer's heart, and if he constantly thinks of that person or thing, it means that he has a strange god in his heart. Unless he realises it and changes his ways he cannot be perfect.

Dear friends, you may think that you do not worship any idol. Spend some quiet time in God's presence and listen to His still small voice. Repent and get rid of everything that contaminates you. Give God the first place in your life. Then surely His blessings will be upon you forever.

PRAYER: Heavenly Father, there are some things which I cherish and some people in my life whom I love more than You. Please forgive me. Let me love You more than everything. Let me reform my ways and change my actions. In Jesus' name I pray. Amen.


For contact: EL-SHADDAI LITERATURE MINISTRIES TRUST CH-59
94444 56177
Our website https://www.honeydropsonline.com

Be Careful Who You Follow

Scripture

Judges 18:30 (NKJV)

Then the children of Dan set up for themselves the carved image; and Jonathan the son of Gershom, the son of Manasseh, and his sons were priests to the tribe of Dan until the day of the captivity of the land.

A False Religion Can Never Replace True Worship

Judges 18 continues the spiritual decline that began in the previous chapter. The tribe of Dan had not fully taken possession of the inheritance God had given them, so instead of trusting the Lord, they sought an easier path. Rather than depending on God's promises, they relied on human wisdom and military strength to secure a new territory.

As the men of Dan traveled, they came to Micah's house, where they found the Levite serving as a priest over Micah's private shrine. Instead of rejecting the idols and false worship, they stole Micah's carved images, household idols, ephod, and priest, believing these things would bring God's blessing wherever they went.

The Levite willingly abandoned Micah because serving an entire tribe seemed like a greater opportunity than serving one family. His decision was motivated by personal advancement rather than faithfulness to God.

After conquering the peaceful city of Laish, the tribe of Dan established idol worship there and appointed the Levite and his descendants as priests. What began as one family's compromise became the official religion of an entire tribe.

This chapter demonstrates how compromise spreads. One person's disobedience influenced a family, then a priest, and eventually an entire tribe. When God's truth is abandoned, false worship quickly takes its place.

Believers today face similar dangers. Culture continually offers substitutes for true worship—success, possessions, popularity, pleasure, and personal opinions. Yet anything that replaces complete devotion to God becomes an idol.

God calls His people to remain faithful to His Word, even when compromise appears easier or more successful. True worship is not determined by convenience or popularity but by obedience to the Lord.

Reflection Questions

1. Is there anything in my life competing for the place that belongs only to God?

2. Am I making decisions based on God's Word or on what seems easiest or most beneficial?

3. What kind of spiritual influence am I leaving on my family and those around me?

Prayer

Heavenly Father, keep my heart devoted to You alone. Protect me from compromise and from anything that would become an idol in my life. Help me to seek Your will instead of the easiest path. May my life point others toward faithful worship and obedience to Your Word. Give me discernment to recognize false teaching and courage to remain faithful to Christ. In Jesus' name, Amen.

QUICK READ

But a certain man named Ananias, with Sapphira his wife, sold a possession, and kept back part of the price, his wife also being privy to it, and brought a certain part, and laid it at the apostles' feet. But Peter said, Ananias, why hath Satan filled thine heart to lie to the Holy Ghost, and to keep back part of the price of the land? Whiles it remained, was it not thine own? and after it was sold, was it not in thine own power? why hast thou conceived this thing in thine heart? thou hast not lied unto men, but unto God. And Ananias hearing these words fell down, and gave up the ghost: and great fear came on all them that heard these things. (Acts 5, 1-5)

EZEKIEL 36:17 “Son of man, when the people of Israel were living in their own land, they defiled it by the evil way they lived. To me their conduct was as unclean as a woman’s menstrual cloth.

LETS PRAY: OUR DEAR HEAVENLY FATHER, RECOGNIZING THAT WE HAVE SINNED AND FALLEN SHORT OF THE GLORY OF GOD, WE HUMBLY COME BEFORE YOU BEGGING FOR YOUR FORGIVENESS, WE HAVE WRONGED YOU THROUGH OUR WORDS THOUGHTS AND DEEDS. PLEASE WASH AND CLEANSE US IN THE BLOOD OF YOUR SON JESUS CHRIST OUR LORD. PLEASE GUIDE & HELP US TO LIVE RIGHT HOLY SPIRIT, BECAUSE YOU SAID IN YOUR WORD THAT IT IS NOT BY POWER NOR BY MIGHT, BUT IT IS BY YOUR SPIRIT. THANK YOU SO MUCH. WE PRAY ALL THESE THINGS IN THE MIGHTY NAME OF JESUS CHRIST OF NAZARETH AMEN 🏿.

Note





The Stick You Write With



When we read the bible,what do we think about? Do we think about the writer being inspired by the Spirit of God? Do we look to the setting it was written in, the culture of the times, etc? Do we look at the style of writing as some scholars teach us to do?

These and more are often taught as the way to read the bible. In more modern education we are taught to think critically and what is being said and written. In other words what can we infer or deduce from the text we are reading?

Questions such as these, more often than not lead to an overly complicated mess of confusion that is sometimes hard to navigate. Complicating the simple way the people of the day actually thought. What is more is that the New Testament was written in Koine ( common Greek).

This Greek as written in the NT is often studied by scholars, pastors and laymen alike, searching for a clearer picture of what the biblical writers were intending. And in this way, we may more accurately discern the truth that God, through His servants, is trying to convey to us, 2,000 years later. Mind you in a culture that is very far removed from the culture it was written in.

In short a lot has happened in 2,000 years, and some ideas just don’t translate well. To make up for this, scholars have tried hard to come up with different and new translations, paraphrases etc, that are everything from absolute trash, to literal word for word hard to read versions of the bible.

Many popular bible translations we read are something of a dynamic equivalent, that’s thought for thought. Others are word for word. And still others are a paraphrase giving the general sense of what is being spoken of. Yet, for all this we seem to lose a little or a lot depending, when we try to bring this all into a culture, language and thought process that is far removed from the original.

So we dig, scholars and laymen alike, dig. We dig into the language it is written in. We find meanings to words, and their roots. Sometimes we look at the society and culture around them and it brings out even more. Yet for all that, it seems we still come up short and we wonder why.

In my own life, the more I dug into some limited Greek studies, the more I saw it was not really going too far, so I stopped looking. I would only look up what I was curious about or led to. If I am honest at times, I would remember my pastor who told me of his friend who was a biblical Greek scholar, who said it really doesn’t do you that much good to know Greek. As I studied I could see that, but why. Aren’t we taught to look into the language? Isn’t that the example that is set by many, if not most pastors and writers of biblical material? Look into the Greek to find the meaning of the words used in the NT, so we can understand a bit better? But its really not helping that much so what am I missing?

What I found was not intentional. I was not looking for it. At all.

I found where Jesus wrote about being the bread of life In John 6:35:

“And Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst.”

In our minds we wonder what that means so we dig. And that is just what I did. I wanted to find out what that meant, exactly. My research led me to the cultural life of the Jewish people. And I found out that they, without a long explanation, knew that Jesus was saying, without bread, you die, you have no life.

That may seem obvious and overly simplistic, yet for a people who lived in the desert, to not have bread and water, was a fact of certain death. Biblically the principle stems back to the time in the wilderness when God supplied bread for them in the form of mana. Again, this may seem obvious, but it’s not something most in western culture know very much about.

We don’t know starvation as a possibility as well as they did then, we don’t know the waterless tracts of land they made their home in for thousands of years. They knew intimately the slow agonizing death by starvation and thirst, in a land where water is a commodity. Unlike us who just go to the faucet or by another water bottle at the nearest grocery store. These things were their reality, unlike ours.

Finding this set me on a journey of sorts to looking into their culture more. As I did I began seeing things that we don’t often talk about. Then one day I realized that almost every NT writer with the exception of Luke was born Jewish. That meant that they came from a Jewish background, culture, traditions and language.

Then I began to wonder how come we are looking at the NT from a western outlook, through the Greek language, when we should possibly be looking at it from a more Hebraic outlook? Why weren’t we looking at what they were saying through the culture, history etc of the person who was speaking it? They knew the language and ideas of the OT far better than we do.

So, again I began digging. What I found was that as a general rule, the Jewish people of that day, had gained some complexity of thought because of outside influences, such as the Babylonian captivity, the Roman occupation etc, they still retained much of their original simplicity and straightforward thinking. In fact, without going too deep in this, most Jewish men at the time had at least some knowledge of the OT scriptures and how they were written and the thoughts behind them. This is due to the fact that they would teach the fathers trade to the children and were required to teach them the word of God as well.

For them, things were relatively simple. Their culture and thought process, at least so far as these things are concerned, was simple compared to the Romans, or Greeks where we in the west get much of our way of thinking.

To see the difference when we describe something, such as a pencil, we say its long, often yellow, with lead or graphite inside, it has an eraser on one end and the other is sharpened to a point so you can write with it. In ancient Hebrew, it’s literally a stick you write with, that is the description.

To us, who habitually over complicate everything, even a bowl of Cheerios, this seems way too simplistic. Truthfully one may be right with that assessment. But that does not negate the fact that they understood things far different than we do.

Now, I am doing more digging. Looking into the Hebrew language and looking at the NT from somewhat of a different angle. What happened is the truth we all see, written within the pages, started taking on a deeper meaning. Instead of looking at the Word through the lens of our culture or even the Greek, I began to see things that way I think the biblical writers were seeing them, and thus seeing the intent of God through them. Regardless of how it was written.

When we look at the bible in this way it seems to take on new life. It doesn’t change the meaning, but deepens it, brings a fuller, more clear revelation, and application to our lives and ministries.




I write my own writing, I do not use AI to write. All my writing is my own and can be scanned for AI content as well as plagiarism.

Guidelines for living.
August 24th, 2026

Your Prayers Can Start Revival

If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land. 2 Chronicles 7:14



Ezekiel was a priest who had been carried away by King Nebuchadnezzar and forced to settle in Tel Abib on the Chebar Canal in Babylon. As this man grew older, he grew both hungry for God and lonesome for his homeland, one that we know as Israel today.

God revealed Himself to Ezekiel and told him of great things which were in the future for Israel. He explained, “The hand of the LORD was upon me, and he brought me out by the Spirit of the LORD and set me in the middle of a valley; it was full of bones. He led me back and forth among them, and I saw a great many bones on the floor of the valley, bones that were very dry. He asked me, ‘Son of man, can these bones live?’“ (Ezekiel 37:1-3). Talk about having to answer the Teacher! What do you say when God asks you a question? Dead bones are lifeless, hopeless—they’re finished.

Yet, and this is what Ezekiel knew, God alone can reverse the hopelessness of dead bones, and wisely, very wisely, Ezekiel answered, “O Sovereign LORD, you alone know!” Good answer! He passed the test. Then God told him to prophesy that breath would enter into them, tendons would be attached, then flesh, then life. Re-creation! It was a picture of Israel’s restoration. It is also a picture of what God does individually and corporately when He chooses to revive His people.

While revivals—genuine spiritual renewals born of the Holy Spirit—have been milestones of the church from the days of the book of Acts to the present, they are the exception, not the normal, day-by-day, year-by-year sort of thing. Question: Is it possible that in the immediate future, God may again bring revival to His people around the world?

Ezekiel called God, “Sovereign.” He knew that God answers to none, and that He is the one who responds to the cries of His people, asking Him to revive them and to restore them to the place of joy and service they once had.

A history of revivals shows that while a Sovereign God does revive His people, they come in response to the cries of His people. Long ago God outlined the conditions which are necessary for revival. He said, “If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sins and will heal their land” (2 Chronicles 7:14).

Are revivals simply a display of emotionalism or fanaticism? Not at all. They are displays of repentance, a searching for God, and the desire to be rejuvenated spiritually.

In the early 1900’s, a revival swept the little country of Wales—it was birthed in a prayer meeting. An 18-year-old girl stood to her feet and she said, “I do love Jesus …” Starting to weep, she repeated those words, then sat down unable to speak. In the 1960’s, a spiritual awakening began at the FEBIAS College of the Bible, when missionary Chuck Holsinger spoke in the chapel and said, “The love of God, I cannot understand it,” and like a tidal wave which came from above, something swept over the students, who were confronted with the reality of God’s presence. What should have been a 50-minute service became an all-day prayer meeting that began something with far, far-reaching consequences.

If your church is a valley of dry bones, there is hope.



Resource Reading: 2 Chronicles 7:1-22

The Story Behind the Hymns
THE STORY BEHIND "GUIDE ME, O THOU GREAT JEHOVAH"

Few hymns capture the journey of faith with the vividness of “Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah.” Written out of the rich Welsh Christian tradition, the hymn turns the biblical story of Israel’s journey through the wilderness into a deeply personal prayer for God’s guidance, strength and provision.

The original hymn was written in Welsh by William Williams Pantycelyn (1717–1791), one of the most influential hymn writers of the Welsh revival. The Welsh title, “Arglwydd, arwain trwy'r anialwch” meaning “Lord, lead me through the wilderness” first appeared in 1745.

Williams drew heavily on the story of the Israelites travelling through the wilderness under God’s direction. The hymn speaks of a believer who recognises that the journey ahead cannot be completed by human strength alone. God is asked to lead, sustain and provide until the traveller reaches the promised destination.

The English version familiar to congregations today came through the work of Peter Williams, who translated the hymn in 1771. It was subsequently adapted and revised in English hymnals, helping the hymn move beyond Wales and into the wider Christian world.

Its imagery remains striking: the believer is a “pilgrim through this barren land,” dependent upon the “Bread of Heaven” for spiritual nourishment and upon God’s presence for every step of the journey.

The hymn became especially associated with Welsh Christianity and eventually found a powerful musical setting in the tune “Cwm Rhondda,” composed by Welsh musician John Hughes in 1907. The combination of Williams’ words and Hughes’ stirring melody transformed it into one of the best-known hymns to emerge from Wales.

“Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah” has since been sung in churches, at major Christian gatherings, at national occasions and in moments of remembrance and celebration. Its enduring appeal lies in its simple but profound message: life may lead us through wilderness seasons, but the believer does not have to walk through them alone.

The final destination is not the wilderness. The prayer of the hymn is that the Great Jehovah will continue to guide His people until they reach the promised land.