In his insightful book Thirsting for Prayer, Jacques Philippe notes that prayer can help us to replenish even physical energy.

God, he says, is “the only source of inexhaustible energy.”

Philippe offers two passages from Scripture that explain this phenomenon:

2 Corinthians 4:16

By prayer, “though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is renewed every day.”

And Isaiah 40:30-31

Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted; but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.

Tiredness, trial, and weariness remind us of our weakness and our need for God. He is Creator and we are merely creatures, utterly dependent on him for each breath of life.

But if we’re feeling weariness down to the soul, maybe it’s a sign that we haven’t tapped in to His “inexhaustible energy.”

Philippe says:

it is still true that in prayer God is able to give us the energy, sometimes including physical energy, that we need to serve him and love him.

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