Praying and not Fainting

Joshua 6:1 NOW JERICHO [a fenced town with high walls] was tightly closed because of the Israelites; no one went out or came in.

Jericho is a famous story in many modern day sermons! But its conquest was a tiring one as we are about to see! The journey the Israelites took wasn’t as light as the sentences we read.

Jericho is known to have a circumference of 13.4km (8.3 miles) according to an online source. Now, the priests carried the ark of covenant while blowing trumpets, while walking a whole 13.4km around Jericho.

To those living in Kampala, Uganda, here’s how long that journey was starting from Naalya to Kyaliwajjala to Kira, Najjera, Ntinda and back to Naalya;

It’s a 20 minute drive, but a 3 hour estimate walk—which we’ll consider since they were on foot. This was done daily for six days, and just as if that wasn’t enough, on the seventh day, they walked this journey SEVEN TIMES! That’s 91km, and 21 hours!

This was work! A lot of WORK!

Can you imagine yourself taking this walk?

In today’s setting, God would contrast this with prayer. If Jericho was a city that was to be overcome by prayer, that meant 3 hours of fervency daily, and 21 whole hours of prayer for the final day!

In case my source was not accurate, we’d still — give or take — claim the journey was 2 hours. Thus 14 in total for the seventh day!

Can you hang in for a total of 14 hours in case it was prayer!?

If the city was smaller, then we’d say it took an hour thirty minutes to go round it. That’s a total of 10.5 hours! Basically we’d say a whole day’s worth of prayer. Can you picture yourself standing that long?

Since the journey was so long, they even had to begin moving early morning…

Joshua 6:15 On the seventh day they rose early at daybreak …

The question is, can you pray and NOT FAINT? Jesus said men ought to pray and not faint! (Luk 18:1) Other versions say ‘men ought to pray and not lose heart.’ Others say, ‘men ought to pray and not give up!’

I know some Israelites nearly lost heart on that journey… Just like we would in the waiting. But God wants you to know that He won’t give you more than you can handle. You can pray! You will stand! Just like He enabled the Israelites to walk, He’ll provide the grace you need to stand.

And eventually…

Joshua 6:20 So the people shouted when [the priests] blew the trumpets. And it happened when the people heard the sound of the trumpet, and the people shouted with a great shout, that the wall fell down flat. Then the people went up into the city, every man straight before him, and they took the city.

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Just to back track a bit, we still see an allegory of Jesus’ mantra of us not letting the right hand know what the left is doing and ‘shutting our doors and praying to our father in secret…’when Joshua said,

“You shall not shout or make any noise with your voice, nor shall a word proceed out of your mouth, until the day I say to you, ‘Shout!’ Then you shall shout.” (6:10)

These thirteen walks remind me of Elijah praying for the rain to return.

1 Kings 18:42-43 So Ahab went up to eat and drink. And Elijah went up to the top of Carmel; then he bowed down on the ground, and put his face between his knees, and said to his servant, “Go up now, look toward the sea.” So he went up and looked, and said, “[There is] nothing.” And seven times he said, “Go again.”

Many of us would have found an excuse on the third or fourth time. But we should learn the art of ‘not leaving a place until God moves’. The last time fever hit me, I tried to buy medicine, but it was too high for my budget. I locked myself in and vowed not to stop praying until I felt better.

I literally felt the fever lift from my feet, my loins, my stomach up to my head! I pushed on until I felt all of it go out from the head! That’s praying without fainting! Many of us start with prayer, and we don’t persevere long enough to see it produce fruit!

It’s like saying there’s no baby at 8 months, yet if one more month was given wait, we’d find that there was a child. We have in other words been aborting many babies of prayer!

But if we could stay crazy, and a little more persistent, even if the baby took 10 months in, we’ll have the results of what we pray for;

1 Kings 18:44-45 Then it came to pass the seventh [time,] that he said, “There is a cloud, as small as a man’s hand, rising out of the sea!” So he said, “Go up, say to Ahab, ‘Prepare [your chariot,] and go down before the rain stops you.'” Now it happened in the meantime that the sky became black with clouds and wind, and there was a heavy rain. So Ahab rode away and went to Jezreel.

Don’t lose heart!

Don’t faint!

Don’t give up!

PRAY! We have to get back to the place of persevering in prayer, just like Jesus did in Gethsemane and in the wilderness.

PERSEVERE! You have the fruit of long suffering at your aid!

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1 Thessalonians 5:17 Be unceasing in prayer [praying perseveringly] AMP