Rudderless On The Atlantic Theatre

Therefore, I exhort first of all that supplications, prayers,

intercessions, and giving of thanks, be made for all men.

1 Timothy 2:1

History has revealed that, there are different types of government. Examples include: revolutionary, monarchical, republican, aristocratic, autocratic, democratic, and democratic-republican, etc. All of the aforementioned systems have either positively or negatively contributed to the sustenance of a nation. These systems notwithstanding, they have failed to give a perfect and comfortable government to mankind. There are perceived universal failures in economic, political, social, educational, moral, and judicial situations. The reason is because, government are being implemented by either individuals or group of people who are neither committed nor willing to pay the cost of their leadership demands. These accounts for perennial national and global leadership suddenly slipped into rudderless in the Atlantic theatre. However, since no comfort is born without hidden effort, there are no shortcuts to these systemic leadership failures except to turn to God.

Christians are to be people who exemplify lives of continual communication with God. The contemporary Church desperately needs to respond to a serious call for extraordinary prayer at such an extraordinary time as this. This prayer is such that can bring God’s hand to bear on a world that is faced with uncertainty, famine, fear and war. That is why Apostle Paul admonished Timothy to engage the church in giving priority to diverse kind of prayers I exhort first of all that supplications, prayers, intercession and giving thanks, be made for all men (1 Tim. 2:1) …so that we may lead a quiet and peaceful life… (1 Tim. 2:2). It is therefore the pertinent responsibility of the church to pray for the salvation and deliverance of all men …Who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth (1 Tim 2:3, 4).

The house of Abraham typified believers of his generation at Gerar. His negligence to pray for peaceful coexistence nearly snatched his wife away from him …Because I thought; surely the fear of God is not in this place… (Gen 20:11), until God intervened and commanded him to minister deliverance through prayer to the household of King Abimelech So Abraham prayed unto God: and God healed Abimelech, and his wife… (Gen 20:17, 18). In another generation, Isaac’s inability to learn from the experience of his father made him negligent to pray for the same Gerar, and this lead to hatred, abduction and envy despite God’s blessing upon Isaac’s household and business, until he prayed for peace reign and they rose up betimes in the morning…and they departed from him in peace (Gen 26:31). Examples abound of generations in Israel who refused to pray for their leaders, consequence upon which they suffered political instability and war until they learnt to return unto Yahweh for Divine intervention.

The fact here remains that people don’t learn from history. Imagine after the death of Joshua, the people of Israel turned their back on God and began to do whatever they wanted. They forgot God’s commandment to their fathers and kept their lives on auto pilot of events and activities being carried away by the excitement of their inheritance and victories And when the Lord raised them up judges, the Lord was with the judge, and delivered them out of the hand of their enemies all the days of the judge: for it repented the Lord because of their groanings by reason of them that oppressed them and vexed them… when the judge was dead, and they returned, and corrupted themselves more than their fathers… (Judges 2:18, 19). The pages of the Old Testament books are characterised with times of national and individual prayers for Israel’s leaders and authorities. In essence, they learnt how to pray in a very hard way And when the children of Israel cried unto the Lord… (Jdgs 3:9; 3:15; 4:3; 10:6; 1 Sam 7:8).

The nation continues to exist only if she remains faithful to God. Times of chaos, famine, and hardship are signals for national revival and restoration. As loyal citizens of Nigeria and witnesses to generational leadership crises, it becomes an imperative duty for us to be awaken unto our God given responsibilities. It is time to pray for our country! Believers are to bear the flaming torch of God into the heart of every man, especially; the personnel in the helms of affairs The king’s heart is in the hand of the Lord, as the rivers of waters: He turneth it whithersoever He will (Pro. 21:1). The Church is to make petition unto God for the presidents, senates, honourables, kings and all men so that both the present and oncoming generation may experience peace.

It is not always easy to trust in politicians. Even when we exercise people power to vote for a change, we may be deceived. Bills and laws are made with the well-being of the population in mind. But, often times, these are manipulated because; some of the laws may even go against our faith and profession. Committing our trust to humans can sometimes lead to frustrations. But, prayer changes things! Through supplication we can make our requests known to God