This post originally appeared at https://wifamilycouncil.org/radio/the-humility-of-prayer/
2025 | Week of April 28 | Radio Transcript #1616
This Thursday, May 1, is National Day of Prayer: a congressionally declared and presidentially proclaimed day for the United States to join in prayer for our country.
Days set aside for prayer have been a part of American history since before our birth as a nation. In 1623, just three years after arriving in America, the pilgrims endured a severe drought. Pilgrim Edward Winslow recorded their response to this crisis: “Drought and the like considerations moved not only every good man privately to enter into examination with his own estate between God and his conscience, and so to humiliation before Him, but also to humble ourselves together before the Lord by Fasting and Prayer.”[1]
Since these early colonial days, our presidents have called our nation to prayer on many occasions: war, sickness, natural disasters, and modern-day terrorist attacks. These examples from the past inspire us to keep up the spirit of prayer in our nation.
The need to gather in prayer is certainly just as vital today as ever before. But the call to prayer runs contrary to our nation’s hyper-individualistic bent. We like to believe we are self-sufficient. We don’t want to call on anyone for help—especially God. But God understands our natural human tendency toward self-sufficiency; so in the Old Testament he commanded His people Israel to humble themselves before Him when asking for His help. 1 Chronicles 7:14 says, “If my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land.” Prayer takes humility. It requires letting go of the illusion of self-sufficiency. Like the Israelites, we must let go of our pride and humbly ask for God’s help.
At times in our nation’s history, our presidents have recognized the need for humbling ourselves and calling upon the Lord. At the beginning of the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln set aside the last Thursday in September 1861, as a “Day of Humiliation, Prayer, and Fasting.” In his proclamation, Lincoln wrote, “Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us. It behooves us, then, to humble ourselves before the offended Power, to confess our national sins, and to pray for clemency and forgiveness.”[2] Lincoln’s heartful encouragement for national humility is a far cry from our culture’s current state. But our culture desperately needs Lincoln’s spirit. As in Lincoln’s time, we must feel our need for God’s help. We must humble ourselves and pray.
In keeping with the tradition of setting aside days for prayer, in 1988, President Ronald Reagan designated the first Thursday of May as an annual National Day of Prayer. Like Lincoln, Reagan recognized our need to humbly petition God for help. Reagan wanted to ensure that the tradition of prayer would carry on in times of distress and in days of plenty.
This Thursday provides a wonderful opportunity for individuals, families, and churches to carry on our nation’s tradition of humble supplication to God. As humility in any form grows increasingly counter-cultural, we must kneel before God on behalf of our nation. We encourage you to set aside time to pray for our nation this Thursday. Gather your family for a special prayer time or plan to meet with other believing friends. Pray that our leaders will rule with justice, wisdom, and righteousness. Pray that they will recognize their need for salvation and come to Christ. Pray that our churches will be faithful witnesses of the gospel message in our godless culture. Pray that the hearts of Americans would turn back to God. And pray that God will raise up the next generation of leaders for our churches and our nation.
The task of prayer requires diligence and effort, but it is our solemn responsibility as God’s representatives in a fallen world. Rather than giving in to despair as we view the sin and corruption around us, we should fall to our knees and earnestly confess our sins and plead for God’s mercy on our land. As we bow in prayer, may we see God’s hand at work in our churches, communities, state, and nation. Ultimately, we know our citizenship is in Heaven, but, while we are here on this earth, let us labor and pray for a nation that honors God.
For Wisconsin Family Council, this is Julaine Appling, reminding you that God, through the Prophet Hosea, said, “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.”
[1] https://www.nationaldayofprayer.org/about/history_of_prayer_in_america
[2] https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/proclamation-97-appointing-day-national-humiliation-fasting-and-prayer
Haylee Lawver