Are you too proud, busy, distracted, or independent to pray lately?
Don't be.
Believer, ya gotta know deep in your "knower" that prayer to God through Jesus Christ positively affects the flow of history…yes, and it impacts those in it whom God dearly loves!
Simple as that.
For sure, us prayin’ alone or all together ..biblically.. can mightily impact history forever, even if some of what we request obtains an answer in the negative.
Would you like to be a part of impacting history?
“God shapes the world by prayer. Prayers are deathless. They outlive the lives of those who uttered them!” ~E.M. Bounds
Hey, it’s God who knows best and goes to work to bring about change for good, not us. “Speakin’ it into existence” as many preachers insist that we do like we are the boss of it all, that ain’t really our biz. It’s His biz cuz He is sovereign and we can’t ever take that from Him. I’m not talkin’ about Word-faith blab it and grab it type of strangeness when I speak of prayer here. But God has simply wired His people and His world for His power if you will, and He wants us to regularly call on His Name whole-heartedly to flip the switch ..that needs flipping.
“Non-praying is lawlessness, discord, anarchy.” ~E.M. Bounds
Our passionate fervent prayers literally move the heart of the Lord. That’s still true!
The Bible tells us that "The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much" (Jam. 5:16). Sure, think about Elijah a normal human at that time, prayin’ against.. and then for rain (vv. 17-18). The change in the heavens happened. Why? Well, because God wanted it to happen and guided Elijah in prayer.
Are there sins that you need to confess.. that hinder your prayers? Are there directives from the Lord that He’s still waiting on you to do? Have you given up on prayer completely? Hey, it’s too early for that! Look at the world headed south around you. You have a part to play ..so to speak.
We mighty wrestle or struggle with this whole concept of prayer too much and make it more complicated than it really is. The Bible doesn't do that. Keep it as simple and God does in His Word. When you call a loved one on the weekend, do you make it all complicated? Naww, I doubt it. You know you keep it pretty simple, even when you talk about hard issues. It really ain’t a religious practice, this thing called prayer, though many religious people can regularly "say their prayers." God thought of praying before stiff religious folk did - it for His kids. So don't "say your prayers," just go pray to Him in your natural voice that He gave to you.
We, as His beloved children, might at times run out the door in the morning to get doing, doing, doing stuff ..and totally forget our important time alone with Jesus in prayer. Who hasn’t done that? But we can do better and re-prioritize today.
Sometimes our prayer time might seem uber-rushed, frustrating (maybe because we are demanding our way or throwing a fit to try and manipulate God like we are His Lord [that's laughable]..) or we are too hurried to listen to His Word when praying (even though His mouth still works).. so we just get it over with at times, so we can get on to other fun things that we "feel" are better. They aren't better, and praying in faith is still the true priority for all believers.
I really don’t think that Mr. Lu-Cifer ..you know, the devil and his creepy buds - those fallen angels.. get too troubled or panicky inside when most believers visit a church, but I do think his (and their) ugly knobby knees shake radically together and tremble when we saints (as the Bible calls us..) stop all the secondary periphery stuff and get down to prayin’ right ..the way we were meant to pray. Don't you also believe that?
You of course know that ministering, witnessing, reaping people into the Kingdom for Christ, and seeing Him change things long term that need changing; that’s all just the easy outflow of time spent with Jesus in prayer. You also know that when preachers and Christians start to get carnal, mean, puffed up, and spiritually weird—that’s just the easy results of time spent away from Jesus and biblical prayer. So what do we do? Let’s get back to look at prayer in God’s love letter, the Bible, and get to praying. He will strengthen us again!
Do you have even one relative or friend left, who doesn’t yet know Jesus in a personal way, and hey, if they were to suddenly drop on the ground and turn stiff and cold today (pardon my form of bluntness..), they’d split Hell wide open? If so, your prayer assignment as a believer ain’t complete.
Do you currently need to see some change happen and you feel it already should have ..yesterday? Been there. How are you going about getting serious with God to ask Him to intervene? When we get back to applying Bible principles even in the area of prayer, we will start to see Bible results.
“We can do nothing without prayer. All things can be done by importunate prayer. It surmounts or removes all obstacles, overcomes every resisting force and gains its ends in the face of invincible hindrances.” ~E.M. Bounds
Do you remember when Jeremiah was locked away in the court of that dingy prison? What a miserable spot to hang out at. Well, that’s where God commanded him, “Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know” (Jer. 33:3, nkjv). Did Jeremiah stay in that horrible place? Nope. : )
