PASTOR AUSTEN UKACHI: WATCHMAN BULLETIN NO 1, 2005

Pastor Austen Ukachi is one of the foremost teachers of the word of God in Nigeria. Many of us remeber him as one of the great ministers of the CSSM ministry along with Pastor Emeka Nwankpa many years ago. He now pastor a Church in Lagos, Nigeria, and he is involved in prayer seminars and mobilization in various countries of the world. Pastor Ukachi will be visiting the US in November of 2005. He has been graceous to let us have some of his teachings presented here below. May you be blessed by it as you read.


TITLE: " WHAT? COULD YOU NOT WATCH WITH ME ONE HOUR?”
AUTHOR: AUSTEN UKACHI

“And being in agony, He prayed more earnestly. Then his sweat became like great drops of blood failing down to the ground. When He rose up from prayer, and had come to His disciples, He found them sleeping form sorrow. Then He said to them, why do you sleep? Rise and pray, lest you enter into temptation. Lk.22: 44 - 46.

“Then Jesus came with them to a place called Gethsemane, and said to disciples, “Sit here while I go and pray over there” And He took with Him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and He began to be sorrowful and deeply distressed. Then He said to them “My soul is exceedingly sorrowful even to death. Stay here and watch with me.”

He went a little farther and fell on His face, and prayed, saying “O My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as You will.” Then He came to His disciples and found them sleeping, and said to Peter “What? Could you not watch with Me one hour? Watch and pray, lest you enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.” Again, a second time, He went away and prayed, saying “O My Father, If this cup cannot pass away from Me unless I drink it, Your will be done.”

And He came and found them asleep again, for their eyes were heavy. So He left them, went away again, and prayed the third time, saying the same words. Then He came to His disciples and said to them, “Are you still sleeping and testing? Behold, the hour is at hand, and the Son of Man is being betrayed into the hands of sinners, “Rise, let us be going. See My betrayer is at hand.” Mt.26:36-46

Above are two accounts by Luke and Matthew, of the same incident involving Christ and His disciples at the Garden of Gethsemane. The incident took place during the last few hours preceding the death of Jesus on the cross. In the two accounts we see the human weaknesses encountered in prayer as exemplified by the conduct of the disciples at the garden of Gethsemane. The passages further highlight the sharp differences between the attitude of Jesus to prayer and that of His disciples. While Jesus laboured in prayer with great intensity such that, “great drops of blood” fell from His body to the ground, the disciples were busy “sleeping from sorrow.” What was responsible for the difference in attitude to prayer between the Master and His disciples? What lessons can we learn from it about prayer?

Firstly, Jesus was carrying on Him the burden of the sins of humanity, which the disciples could hardly appreciate, thus they lacked the passion and zeal to pray. Matthew reports that He was “sorrowful and deeply distressed” Mt.26:37. Luke, on the other hand reports the feelings and agony of Jesus this way, “And being in agony, he prayed more earnestly.” The agony and pain Jesus experienced led Him into a more intense prayer time. Gethsemane means “Oil Press.” It was an olive orchard which included a press for crushing oil from the olives. The agony and pain Jesus went through in this garden was a practical demonstration of what Gethsemane meant. The reason why many of us find it difficult to pray is because of the lack of a burden. When we lack the Holy Spirit’s conviction to pray, then prayer becomes difficult. To have a meaningful prayer life we must ask the Lord to grant us a lasting burden for the needs around us. Pray for the Holy Spirit’s burden.

Secondly, our human frailties in prayer are evident in our passage. In Lk 22:45, the writer tells us the disciples were busy “sleeping from sorrow.” The sorrow they had was such that it could not arouse them to prayer, rather it lead them into drowsiness. Their kind of sorrow was different from Jesus’ sorrow. How sad, the disciples could not help Jesus in prayer at this critical moment of His life and ministry.

According to the account in Mt. 26 : 36 - 46, Jesus took them to the garden with the specific instruction, “stay here and watch with me.” Thrice He left them to go and pray, and each time when He came back, He met them fast asleep. There are problems we bear, or go through, which no one can appreciate and help us other than God. Expectedly, Jesus felt disappointed with His disciples failure to watch with Him in prayer. He did not fail to express it. He said to them, “What? Could you not watch with me one hour?” Not long after, we then read this shocking statement about the disciples of Jesus, “Then all the disciples forsook Him and fled.” How terrible! This was the climax of their weakness and prayerlessness. If only they had heeded to Christ’s command to “rise and pray” there reactions, perhaps may have turned out different. We are no better that these disciples. Like the disciples of old, many of us have equally forsook Christ and fled. We have broken our covenants and commitment to Him at various times.

The attitude and failure of Jesus’ disciples to prayer at the garden of Gethsemane is a perfect picture of many of our lives today. Their shortcomings dramatizes the shortcomings many of us have in the place of prayer. We find it difficult to pray due to the lack of the burden for prayer. Another reason is due to the weariness of the flesh and the daily stress we go through in life. Like the disciples, the sorrow we have are due more to the self-centered appointments and engagements we have in the course of our daily pursuits; they are not sorrows that are kingdom related. Like the disciples, many of us are in deep slumber, while the command is “Rise and pray.” To every one of us the command still rings out, “Rise and pray”.

AFTER PENTECOST
Now, the prayer lives of the disciples changed remarkably after their experience at Pentecost. Pentecost marked a turning point in the prayer lives of the disciples. They discovered the art and the limitless potential they had in prayer. Their dramatic transformation shows us what the power of the Holy Spirit could do in our lives if we submit to Him.

Shortly after Jesus ascended, born out of necessity, the disciples gathered for ten days to pray in the Upper Room. In fulfillment of Christ’s promise, the result of that prayer was that the Holy Spirit came down mightily on them on the day of the Pentecost. Consequently, prayer now became a routine and lifestyle of the disciples; daily it became, their first and last resort. Thus in Acts 3:1, we find the disciples going to the temple to pray at the hour of prayer. Right at the Beautiful Gate, a healing miracle took place. Again, in Acts 4:23-34 we see them involved in an earth-shaking prayer meeting which eventually led to a fresh Holy Spirit empowerment. In Acts 6:4, they accorded a priority place to prayer and the word of God, “But we will give ourselves continually to prayer and to the ministry of the word.”

Then in Acts 9:36-43, Peter raised Dorcas from the dead through the power of prayer. In Acts10:9-16, Peter fell into a trance when he went up to the house top to pray. At the place of prayer, God gave him a revelation to connect with the Gentiles, thus marking a new beginning in the history of the New Testament Church. In Acts 12, the Church discovered afresh the awesome power of prayer. When they prayed, God intervened and in a very amazing mannered released Peter from the prison. Then in Acts 13, we find the leaders of the disciples engaged in prayer that gave birth to Paul’s the missionary journeys. The prayer exploits of the disciples continued.

When we come to Acts 16:16-40, we read about another dramatization of the awesome power of prayer involving Paul and Silas. It all started when they “went to prayer,” a certain girl with the spirit of divination followed them, crying out, “these men are the servants of the Most High God, who proclaim to us the way of Salvation.” Her proclamation which lasted for some days was accurate, but the spirit that inspired her was demonic. After several days of her proclamation, Paul discerned that she was possesses with a spirit of divination. He cast out the spirit thereby provoking an intense persecution from her masters. Paul and Silas were immediately thrown into the prison. While in prison, they did that they knew best, they sang and prayed. Then at midnight, there was a sudden earthquake, immediately all the doors of the prison were flung open and everyone’s chains were loosed. Paul and Silas walked out of the prison freed by the power of God.

The testimony of the disciples of Christ shows us a people who started off as weaklings in prayer, but were transformed by the power of the Holy Spirit into prayer giants; a people who could hardly keep watch with the Master for one hour when it mattered most in the garden of Gethsemane, but who after the resurrection of Christ, tarried for ten days, and prayed down Pentecost. Their testimony gives us hope that our prayers lives could also be transformed if we take time to seek the power of the Holy Spirit.