Mark 7:24

The Lord Jesus took this very approach with God when He said, “Father, I want those you have given me to be with me” (John 17:24). Joshua used it during the moment of his greatest victory, when he lifted his spear toward the setting sun and cried aloud, “Sun, stand still” (Joshua 10:12). Elijah employed it when he stopped the rain from heaven and started it again after three and a half years. Martin Luther followed it when, kneeling by his dying colleague, Philipp Melanchthon, he forbid death to take its victim.

This is a wonderful relationship that God invites us to enter. We are certainly familiar with passages of Scripture like the one that follows the above verse: “My own hands stretched out the heavens; I marshaled their starry hosts” (Isaiah 45:12). But knowing that God invites us to command Him to act reveals a surprising change in our normal relationship!

As the apple tree among the trees of the wood, so is my beloved among the sons.

I sat down under his shadow with great delight, and his fruit was sweet to my taste.