Calvary Chapel Palm Harbor

I want to share with you some stories from our “Half Day of Prayer” (HDP).
My desire is to bring clarity and understanding so your next HDP will be even richer.
My motivation for telling you about these prayer experiences is to communicate God’s character and grace to you. I want to bring vitality to your prayer life.

Beth Wallert shared about her family's testimony from the HDP:

"On Saturday, our church, Calvary Chapel Palm Harbor, had a half-day of prayer event. Since we could not meet together physically, our Pastor encouraged us to still join in this in our homes. What an amazing time! At 9am, my family each picked a quiet space in our house or yard to study The Word and spend personal time with Jesus. At noon, we came together to share what God had shown us. With Ben in the book of Matthew, Alex in the book of Nehemiah, Jordan in 1 Samuel, Savannah in Jeremiah, and I in 1 Kings, we shared for nearly 2 hours afterward. It was truly a blessing and powerful time. I can’t wait for the next one!!"

So encouraging!

Now, my testimony:

This past Saturday, I got started early on my HDP. The house was still quiet as I began to pray. I ended up using two patterns of prayer. First, I followed the pattern of the Lord's Prayer, and then later I worked through the pattern of the Tabernacle (I don't normally do two different ones, but this time I did).

So beginning with the Lord’s Prayer, I stopped on "Our Father" and talked with the Lord about being my Father and our Father. I asked for understanding about His fatherhood in my life.
I praised Him for it. I continued to step through the Lord's Prayer.
Slowly considering each word and phrase.
Interacting with the Lord through the whole prayer.

As I came to the end of the Lord’s Prayer, I began to listen to some worship music that I had selected ahead of time. Phil Wickham has been recording some songs from home, and posting them on his Facebook page. I was really blessed by his rendition of “The Blessing."
It comes from this Scripture:

“The Lord bless you and keep you;
The Lord make His face shine upon you,
And be gracious to you;
The Lord lift up His countenance upon you,
And give you peace.”
|Numbers 6:24-26|

This blessing always strikes me as speaking of Jesus. The actions of God described here require a body. The embodiment of God is Jesus. Worshipping with this Scripture-song enhanced my sense of His presence.

I turned from worship music to the worship of studying His Word. I felt led to continue my regular reading plan.

One of the verses that leapt out at me was Deuteronomy 32:13.
The whole chapter speaks of how God took care of His people as they wandered through the wilderness. In this verse, 13, there is the phrase, "He made him draw honey from the rock."

I love that phrase "honey from the rock."
But even though I have read it in multiple Scriptures and heard it for years in different songs, I never thought, what does it actually mean?

So I looked up a few online resources to check. I gathered that "honey from the rock" connects with the idea of "the land of milk and honey."
The Promise Land was lush.

I also learned that bees would build their hives in the crevices of the rocky terrain.
In those times, these hives would produce some of the best honey. Verse 13 is saying that God fed and nourished His people with the best of honey—from the rock.

I was taking these thoughts in, and asking the Lord to direct my study.

The next thing I learned is that it's also a picture of God's grace. He can take something that is hard, barren, difficult, and unproductive like a rock, and He can bring forth sweet honey.

My heart was beating faster with excitement.

I was talking to God about these hard times we are in. He was telling me, "Son, I can bring honey from the rock!" My spiritual appetite was awake and I was hungry for more.

At this point, I started to pray through the pattern of the Tabernacle (which you can find here).
As I prayed through that pattern, I felt energized and I couldn't sit still, so I decided to go for a walk. Walking through my neighborhood, I was praying with the menorah in mind and asking for illumination from the Holy Spirit. This Scripture came to mind from 1 Corinthians 10:4, "and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them, and that Rock was Christ."

There, in that moment, God was impressing on me:
Out of the hardship, difficulty, and the suffering of the cross, Jesus redeemed me.
Just in that moment, I needed this—ultimately Jesus is my honey from the rock.
If God can bring victory from the hardship of the cross, He can surely work in the difficult times of my life, even now.
When we find ourselves in rock-hard times, the sweet nourishment of Jesus sustains us.

Honey from the ROCK.

My prayer time didn't end there, but I will spare you and stop writing now.

I can't wait for my next "Half Day of Prayer!"

Carve out some time and set a date on your calendar for your own "Half Day of Prayer" with the Lord soon.