"Preparation"

"I prevented the dawning of the morning, and cried: I hoped in thy word." (Psalms 119:147)

  Well, this is a verses that I am seriously familiar with, as it has been a constant routine every morning for nine years, two months, and twenty eight days. Thankfully, it has not all been all that routine. There is hardly a morning that I do not experience something special in the way that God speaks into my heart; and yes, there are a lot of tears that get spilt between the hours of 4 and 7am. To truly get the just of what David speaking about, it is all about preparation for hearing from God. The main idea about the word, "prevented," is that of meeting or coming in front of, confronting or going before; as much as I can explain it, it is the dawning of a new day, that needs to begin communing with God. If you are like me, the morning is the time when fellowship is special with the Lord. Since the early eighties, 4am has been a special time between the Lord and me; between the hours of 4 and 6am, is usually devoted to prayer and communication with the Lord. Some mornings, I simply sit and listen between praying; just remaining still and waiting on God to speak to me. That is what I think is the most important part about prayer, listening to what God has to say! The "word" David is speaking of is just that, spoken word, as in God speaking to him; an utterance from his God, straight into his heart. To be prepared to hear from the Lord, you must be prepared to hear from the Lord! I am not talking about when God speaks on His own, because He does that all the time; I am talking about when we come before the Lord and want to hear on the behalf of ourselves. There is simply no other way to explain it, we must prepare our hearts to listen in order to hear. To put it into a better illustrated form, we must establish our heart and mind to respect God's holiness and might. This is pretty much what Jesus was showing His disciples when they asked Him to teach then to pray. You start your prayer by establishing who you are in relationship to your Heavenly Father, and what a privilege it is to be able to come before Him, knowing that He welcomes and loves to hear your voice. Once you have that kind of communication going, you are doing exactly what this verse is speaking of, preparation...

"Now when people take an oath, they call on someone greater than themselves to hold them to it. And without any question that oath is binding. God also bound himself with an oath, so that those who received the promise could be perfectly sure that he would never change his mind. So God has given both his promise and his oath. These two things are unchangeable because it is impossible for God to lie. Therefore, we who have fled to him for refuge can have great confidence as we hold to the hope that lies before us. This hope is a strong and trustworthy anchor for our souls. It leads us through the curtain into God's inner sanctuary. Jesus has already gone in there for us. He has become our eternal High Priest in the order of Melchizedek." (Hebrews 6:16-20) NLT