Covenant Reformed News – December 2023 • Volume XIX, Issue 20
This article provides an exegetical and devotional study of Nehemiah's prayer life, particularly examining how his brief "ejaculatory prayer" in the Persian palace (Nehemiah 2:4) was grounded in four months of prior intensive prayer and fasting. The author uses Nehemiah as a model for Reformed Christian practice, demonstrating the complementary necessity of both sustained closet prayer and spontaneous prayer in the believer's spiritual life and witness.
The Background of Nehemiah’s Ejaculatory Prayer We are not to think that Nehemiah’s ejaculatory prayer in the palace (Neh. 2:4) had no background or that it came completely out of the blue. It was preceded by four months (1:1; 2:1) of prayer with fasting (1:4) “day and night” (6). Before his spontaneous, short and silent ejaculatory prayer (2:4), Nehemiah engaged in closet prayers that were deliberate, lengthy and (probably) vocal (1:4-11). These closet prayers were also fervent and...