Prayer, power, authority, witchcraft, leadership, the church, and cardinal flower... how do all these topics converge!? Sheeeeeesh. This was an interesting woods walk!
I didn't think today's audio had anything to do with being in the woods to be honest. I figured I would include a photo I took of a cardinal flower, not thinking it was related at all. I was just thrilled to see this native beauty in a swampy area of our woods walk. The blooms are such a bright, almost iridescent red, the color is hard to capture in a picture; these flowers are truly best enjoyed in person!
As I later considered the flower a bit more as I was putting together the post- and how it was actually named after the vibrant red robes of the cardinals in the Roman Catholic church, it began to fit today's topic of prayer, authority, leadership and the church a bit more! Then-- reading a bit further I find it was used as a love charm and in potions (control and manipulation) to make them irresistible to their love interest! I couldn't have picked a better plant as a visual if I tried!
Here are a few resources that have inspired some of these thoughts and contemplations:
What is causing the quarrels and fights among you? Don’t they come from the evil desires at war within you? You want what you don’t have, so you scheme and kill to get it. You are jealous of what others have, but you can’t get it, so you fight and wage war to take it away from them. Yet you don’t have what you want because you don’t ask God for it. And even when you ask, you don’t get it because your motives are all wrong—you want only what will give you pleasure. James 4:1-3 NLT
But Jesus called them together and said, “You know that the rulers in this world lord it over their people, and officials flaunt their authority over those under them. But among you it will be different. Whoever wants to be a leader among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first among you must become your slave. For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve others and to give his life as a ransom for many.” Matthew 20:25-28 NLT
When he had entered Capernaum, a centurion came forward to him, appealing to him, “Lord, my servant is lying paralyzed at home, suffering terribly.” And he said to him, “I will come and heal him.” But the centurion replied, “Lord, I am not worthy to have you come under my roof, but only say the word, and my servant will be healed. For I too am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. And I say to one, ‘Go,’ and he goes, and to another, ‘Come,’ and he comes, and to my servant, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.” When Jesus heard this, he marveled and said to those who followed him, “Truly, I tell you, with no one in Israel have I found such faith. I tell you, many will come from east and west and recline at table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven, while the sons of the kingdom will be thrown into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” And to the centurion Jesus said, “Go; let it be done for you as you have believed.” And the servant was healed at that very moment. Matthew 8:5-13 ESV
The commentary on these verses give some incredible context!
https://biblehub.com/study/matthew/8.htm
When God delays in fulfilling our little thoughts,
it is to have Himself room to work out His great ones.
-Lilias Trotter
Praying down rather than praying up - that is the summing up... that the velocity and power of anything that comes down, gains in a ratio of high proportion with the height from which it drops: Even from an aeroplane, a pencil falling will take on the force of a bullet. What might not our prayer power be if it comes down from the throne of the Priest.
https://unveiling.org/lily/lily7.html
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