Some advice stands the test of time. It's not always eloquent or elegant but the truth just needs to be plain, such as when a youth pastor gave his young charges the following words of wisdom: " Stay on your knees and keep your pants zipped."

If we could simply practice prayer and purity, it would turn our lives upsidedown -- for the good! Our failing in either or both of these areas undermines us substantially.

We're usually great on discussion but light on accountability. We'll talk endlessly about prayer but rarely pray. Richard Foster gently reminds us, "It is good to debate the mysteries of prayer, to ponder the profundities of prayer, to learn the methods of prayer. It is better to pray."

Too often, we give priority to our feet over our knees. We rise and race long before we have humbled ourselves and heard God. Prayer becomes perfunctory-a ritual to check off-rather than powerful. We place great confidence in our own abilities to change the world, to develop property, to attract crowds, to raise money. Yet, the prayerless life betrays a Christless life; not that He ever abandons us but that we relegate him to observer status.

Stay on your knees.

If our prayerlessness erodes our spiritual formation, today's hyper-sexualization destroys our moral formation. And the two experiences can render us virtually impotent for the purposes of God.

The exhortation to "keep your pants zipped" has wide application-to those who would brazenly seek real sexual partners outside the boundaries of marriage, but also to those who would solicit virtual sexual partners through pornography, explicit videos, or strip clubs. Some homes get leveled by wrecking balls, but far more homes are destroyed by termites.

The path of purity is deeply obscured by our cultural mores. Inappropriate clothing, highly suggestive emailing and text-messaging, blaring billboards and crude humor make the pursuit of purity seem, well, puritanical. Yet our failure to heed this youth pastor's time-worn wisdom is reaping the whirlwind not only within our own souls but also within the kingdom of God.

Keep your pants zipped.

Our prayerlessness deafens our sensitivity to the Spirit of God while our immorality deadens our hearts to a holy God. I cannot think of two more sinister and pervasive afflictions among us. We face our greatest danger not from forces beyond us but from the primal-and unsanctified-forces deep within us.

Those of us who desire the deeper things of God, who yearn for abundant life, who long for wholeness, who hunger for healing and thirst for joy, would do well to start with this simplest of admonitions: Stay on your knees and keep your pants zipped.

May we grow in prayer and purity this week.

In HOPE -

David