33 REAP IN PRAYER WHAT YOU HAVE SOWN IN THE SPIRIT.

“Remember now, O LORD, I pray, how I have walked before You in truth and with a loyal heart, and have done what was good in Your sight.” And Hezekiah wept bitterly.

     —2 Kings 20:2–3

Confession isn’t just a litany of past sins and failure. In Greek, the verb for “confess” means to “agree with” and “say the same as.” In other words, we confess who we are from God’s perspective. He sees both our strengths and our weaknesses.

Hezekiah confessed to God his strengths. God didn’t need to be reminded. So why did Hezekiah bother? Was he trying to earn God’s favor? Unlikely. Did he think that God had abandoned him? Possibly.

One thing was certain: what Hezekiah had sown he would reap. (Read Galatians 6:6–10.) What you sow in life, you can reap in prayer. Hezekiah had sown goodness, faithfulness, truthfulness and a heart full of love for God. He prayed what he had lived and he received a harvest:

Thus says the LORD, the God of David your father: “I have heard your prayer, I have seen your tears; surely I will heal you. On the third day you shall go up to the house of the LORD. And I will add to your days fifteen years. I will deliver you and this city from the hand of the king of Assyria; and I will defend this city for My own sake, and for the sake of My servant David.”

     —2 Kings 20:5–6

Recall in prayer what you have sown so that you can both break past curses and confess your coming harvest.

Lord God,

Bring blight and ruin to whatever I have sown to the flesh. Bring a bountiful harvest to whatever I have sown to the Spirit. Amen.