Lord's Day Devotion - Devotional Prayer - Afflicted

  Note:  This was written during the COVID-19 pandemic thus the references to it and its fallout.  Thank God we are getting clear of it now (January 2023).

Father, You told Your people to go home and shut their doors til Your fury had passed (Isaiah 26:20).  What a scary time that must have been. What was happening?  What tumult!  Hearts, minds and very lives, at risk.  All, kept in until danger had passed.

The children of Israel put the blood of the unblemished lamb upon the lintels and door-frame of their homes; shut themselves in, and ate their meal of unleavened bread and roast lamb.  The blood, so the angel of Death would pass over and move on.  Yet they were in a full force state of readiness to comply to their marching orders once the "all clear" and Moses', "March!" was heard in the streets.  In quietness, they marched right out of their Egyptian predicament.

Their cries had gone up to You.  You had heard them and delivered them from their degrading servitude.

Psalm 22:9 (ESV) comforts,

"The afflicted shall eat and be satisfied..."

Why?  It's because...

"...those who seek Him will praise the LORD!"

With courage and confidence we can then proclaim,

"May your hearts live forever."

Right now, Father, it's extremely good advice, to put it mildly, to shut ourselves up into our homes in a state of quarantine.  It is the 'era' of COVID-19.  The peoples of the world are sorely "afflicted".

May the peoples of the Earth turn in droves, to You, through Jesus, Father.  May they, "seek" You so they in turn, can praise You and their hearts live forever.

There's another group of people who are "afflicted," Father:  those routinely, mercilessly persecuted for their faith in Jesus and their trust in You.  I don't say this in an accusatory manner.  No, Father.  However, they are afflicted and they do seek You.  Be their Protector and Comforter as they face such constant danger.  Help them to break free, to find safe haven, lighten their path so they can grow to be strong in You and in their faith.

Even the children who live by terror day and night, cling to You, praise You.  May their hearts live forever.

Your Son, Jesus Christ, was afflicted for us all; on our behalf.  He took the punishment for our sin.  Your wrath, oh Father God, compounded upon Him in full-blast wrath.

For our (the whole mass of humanity) sake, He became poor that through His poverty we might become rich (2 Corinthians 8:9).

What sacrifice!  What affliction!  One of the cruelest deaths imagined!  

Hung upon that cross.  

The pain, the humiliation!  

The separation from You, the most excruciating affliction of all!  Father and Son ripped apart for our eternal welfare.

You allowed it for us!  So we could eat and be satisfied and have our hearts live forever!  What a mighty God You are!  It is truly good, then, that we continue to seek You, to praise You with our everlasting hearts.

From the bottom of our hearts then, we give You praise, adoration and thanksgiving.  All this, as, on a Lord's Day, we remember our Lord's affliction through the symbols of breaking the bread and drinking from the cup of wine.  These symbols of His undying, unconditional love that compelled Him to the cross with purpose and determination that He could bear our affliction upon Himself.

You have to pardon us, again, Father.  These few Lord's Days we can't gather together with our brothers and sisters-in-Christ to do this.  We are shut up in our homes--"social distancing," it's called-"hiding ourselves until the fury of 'corona' has passed."

Heal us, Father, as You have healed our hearts.

In the Name of Jesus Christ our Savior and Mediator, we pray.

                                              ~ERC  22 March 2020~

Prayer based on Psalm 22:26

Stricken, Smitten and Afflicted

Another version of Stricken, Smitten and Afflicted