Dare to Enter
Some years back while window shopping on the popular, boisterous Oxford Street in London, I came upon a door extremely grotesque in structure and decor. It had this inscription written above the door, ‘Dare to Enter.’ I can be quite brave sometimes, but that day I told myself, “Hands off! Curiosity killed the cat!” My point is that the key to that door was to ‘DARE.’
Keys open the lock to doors, gates, boxes, cases, windows sometimes, whatever, you name it…ultimately a key when it unlocks gives access through a particular barrier at an entrance which might lead to a space in a literal sense. Sometimes one particular key may have been designed to open a door or doors that have the same type of lock so that if you were to try to use that key for a lock that it was not designed to open, the result would be inaccessibility. Consequently, failure at entrance. Mission unaccomplished. However, technology today makes it possible for a singular key to have the ability to open lots of locks irrespective of how intricate they are or whether defenses have been built in to deter unlocking. This singular key may be called a master key, whether it is a tangible, electronic, or digital object. The importance is that it is capable of unlocking doors.
What is the equivalent of this singular all accessible instrument that can open all doors in the realm of the spirit. What spiritual discipline can give you unlimited access and accomplish missions? My response is prayer. Prayer is ‘the master key’ which gives the believer access to God. This song is a essential for the young believer striving to grow and mature in Christian faith.
Prayer is the key
Prayer is the key
Prayer is the master key
Jesus started in prayer
And ended in prayer,
Prayer is the master key
As a young child growing up in the Church in Africa, I was taught this song to instill and encourage the discipline of prayer as an important Christian lifeline. Christians need to remember, as if it were the letters of the English alphabet, that prayer in the life of the believer is the key that accesses the gateway to the “throne of grace.” The Apostle Paul therefore encouraging the brethren “to enter God’s rest, so that no one will fall” pleads with them to “draw near with confidence.” (Hebrews 4:16a).
Spurgeon says,
When we pray, we are standing in the palace, on the glittering floor of the great King’s own reception room, and thus we are placed upon a vantage ground. In prayer we stand where angels bow with veiled faces; there, even there, the cherubim and seraphim adore, before that selfsame throne to which our prayers ascend. And shall we come there with stunted requests, and narrow and contracted faith? Nay, it becomes not a King to be giving away pence and groats, he distributes pieces of broad gold; he scatters not as poor men must, scraps of bread and broken meat, but he makes a feast of fat things, of fat things full of marrow, of wines on the lees well refined.
Therefore, Paul in 1 Thessalonians 5:16 says, “pray without ceasing.” Prayer is an invaluable tool for growing in the likeness and image of Christ. Prayer refines us. What did Jesus do at the beginning of His ministry after He was baptized? He went into the wilderness and remained there forty days in fasting and prayer. Prayer kept Jesus Christ focused on His mission thus Satan could not distract Him with the enticement of the physical and earthly. In the place of prayer Christ received the strength He needed to overcome the devil. Imagine if the Son of God needed mercy and grace to help Him in the time of need, how much more help we would be requiring. (Hebrew 4:16b)
A persistent culture of prayer results in receiving answers to our desires that are according to the will of God. Therefore, the widow who cried out to Jesus begging for healing for her demon-possessed daughter would not give up despite the discouragement. This teaches us that whereas we are not always deserving of the King’s attention and favor, when we persist in the place of prayer in humility and genuineness of heart, our Father who is in Heaven bails us out of the quagmire of the issues of life while giving us myriads of blessings. (Matthew 15:22–25)
The bottom line is that a Christian who relies on effectual prayer as the master key opens the door to access faith, grace, mercy, strength, favor, healing, and spiritual growth. That Christian knows that without a close fellowship with the LORD, the key to their life lock is broken and their story is controlled not by the will of God but by the earthliness and emptiness of this world.
Our LORD Jesus on the cross while ending His sojourn here on earth ‘crying out in a loud voice, said “Father INTO YOUR HANDS I COMMIT MY SPIRIT.” Having said this, he breathed His last.’ (Luke 23:46). May we be Christians who DARE to approach Our Father from the beginning to the end of our lives in “ unstaggering confidence.”
