ESOCS Devotional 19 February 2026 – Help is on the Way
MEMORY VERSE: “And it shall come to pass, that before they call, I will answer; and while they are yet speaking, I will hear.” Isaiah 65:24 KJV
TEXT: ISAIAH 65:17-END
“For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth;
And the former shall not be remembered or [f]come to mind.
18 But be glad and rejoice forever in what I create;
For behold, I create Jerusalem as a rejoicing,
And her people a joy.
19 I will rejoice in Jerusalem,
And joy in My people;
The voice of weeping shall no longer be heard in her,
Nor the voice of crying.
20 “No more shall an infant from there live but a few days,
Nor an old man who has not fulfilled his days;
For the child shall die one hundred years old,
But the sinner being one hundred years old shall be accursed.
21 They shall build houses and inhabit them;
They shall plant vineyards and eat their fruit.
22 They shall not build and another inhabit;
They shall not plant and another eat;
For as the days of a tree, so shall be the days of My people,
And My elect shall long enjoy the work of their hands.
23 They shall not labor in vain,
Nor bring forth children for trouble;
For they shall be the descendants of the blessed of the Lord,
And their offspring with them.
24 “It shall come to pass
That before they call, I will answer;
And while they are still speaking, I will hear.
25 The wolf and the lamb shall feed together,
The lion shall eat straw like the ox,
And dust shall be the serpent’s food.
They shall not hurt nor destroy in all My holy mountain,”
Says the Lord.
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The answer to our prayers is prepared before we pray. The desire to talk to the Lord about our needs comes from Him. Prayer begins in the mind of God, invades our minds, is formulated into a clarification of what He wants to do or give, and then is articulated in our words. He is more ready to hear than we are to pray!
The response of grace was mediated through the prophet. There will come a time when not only will the Lord answer, but His answer will precede the petition, and prayer will be the response of God’s call, rather than just His response to our call. This prophetic revelation of the nature of prayer is in anticipation of the messianic age when God Himself would come to reconcile and redeem His people.
It is after we have been transformed by the cross and filled with the Spirit that we can experience the enlivening of the “native and deep impulse” to pray. And even after we’ve been born again, it is the Lord who motivates us to pray. It is part of His prevenient, beforehand grace. Not even the longing for God is our accomplishment. The Lord who created us for communion with Him births it in our souls.
Our assurance that He hears us is that He is the one who asked for the conversation. He would not call us to prayer and then refuse to listen or be inattentive to our prayer. That’s the confidence, boldness, we have: prayer is our response to His call. In the time of face-to-face communion, He makes clear what it is that we are to ask for in the needs He has come to us to help us solve. So, when we do ask, it is with the confidence that we are asking for what He is prepared to release for us.
Dear believer, God knows the pleadings of our heart before we translate them in prayer. His answer speeds on its way before we call. He responds to our cry, while we are calling and His answer will always be delivered in His way, in His time, and for His eternal praise and for our eternal benefit.
Reflections
- Do you doubt the efficacy of prayer due to challenges that you face?
Prayer
- Lord Jesus, teach us how to pray.
Further Reading: Isaiah 45:18-End; Luke 7:27-39; 1 Corinthians 7:1-24
ESOCS Devotional 19 February 2026
