Prayers
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ANSWERED PRAYERS
Many books had been written in history about the everyday men and women that received answers to their prayers that are considered as prayer heroes today, but what many of us fail to understand that it took them years of submitting under the hand of Abba Father where they had to cultivate a dynamic prayer life in His presence.
This type of prayer life takes sometimes years to cultivate and uncountable hours in the presence of Abba Father in the holy of holies where huge amount of sacrifices needs to be made.
This is not a “fast delivery” prayer where you pray now and Abba deliver immediately. It is long strenuous hours wherein you have to trust Abba Father with all of your heart. Even when you receive no positive answers from heaven, the time spend in Abba’s presence will for certain force you to grow towards maturity in the Lord Jesus Christ while you learn endurance and patience.
The Word calls it waiting upon the Lord. Especially the Book of Psalms describes the term waiting upon the Lord with clarity. There are quite a few but this is my favorite verse:
“Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him; do not fret when men succeed in their ways, when they carry out their wicked schemes. Refrain from anger and turn from wrath; do not fret-it leads only to evil. For evil men will be cut off, but those who hope in the Lord will inherit the land.” Psalm 37v7-9 NIV
For most of us this is a difficult instruction. For to wait on the Lord for all practically sake means that we need to wait on the Lord before we act or do anything out of our ourselves. It is only through the impulse of the Holy Spirit that we can act in any situation that we bring into the throne before Abba Father.
It is in these prayer scenarios where we learn patience and endurance; and as it is with all things learning patience and endurance form us into spiritual giants. Paul describes it beautifully in this manner:
“If we are distressed, it is for your comfort and salvation; if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you patient endurance of the same sufferings we suffer. And our hope for you is firm, because we know that just as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our comfort.”2 Corinthians 1:6 NIV
The end result of waiting is remarkable as the believer in Christ Jesus is conveying the fruit of passing the test of endurance towards others around him/her. This kind of fruit brings new converts towards a relationship with Abba Father as well as encourages others to stand firm in their faith as they go through their own trials and difficulties.
The lesson of unity in the Body of Christ is once again of importance here. When we as believers of Christ goes through a tough time where we are waiting upon Abba Father to get our prayers answered other believers in Christ Jesus are also suffering with us in our trials and vice versa when other believers in Christ Jesus goes through trials and difficulties.
We cannot stay disconnected in this process of learning endurance and patience. We as believers are so uniquely linked in tune with each other through the blood of Christ Jesus and through the Holy Spirit that it is unavoidable what happen to the one believer in Christ Jesus will have an effect on the whole Body of Christ.
This spiritual fundamental truth is no truer in intercession. If believers in Christ Jesus unite inintercessory prayer miracles happen in any given situation, even if the given situation looks hopeless and beyond rescuing.
Countless members of the Body of Christ can tell testimony upon testimony of the helping hand of God in their lives as a result of God’s people praying in unison. Let’s look at it this way: TOGETHER WE RISE TO THE TOP AND DIVIDED WE FALL.
It is therefore the enemy’s mission to use whatever weapon he can to stop God’s people from praying together in unison prayer for he knows if God’s people pray together there is nothing what God cannot do in that given situation. Jesus Christ prayed the following in His last prayer towards His Abba Father before He was betrayed by Judas Iscariot in Gethsemane:
“My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one. I in them and you in me. May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. John 17v 20-23 NIV
MINISTRY OF UNITY
Unity is the fruit of continues prayer and standing on the authority in Jesus Name. In the above scripture Jesus revealed to us a little secret of long time success in intercession as well as in other ministries making up the Body of Christ:
BECAUSE ABBA FATHER, JESUS CHRIST AND THE HOLY SPIRIT OPERATES IN UNISON IN THE SPIRITUAL REALM THE BODY OF CHRIST CAN ONLY BE FUNCTIONING EFFECTIVELY WHEN IT OPERATES IN UNISON AS WELL.
It is well illustrated in the English proverb: A Family that prays together stays together.
As it can be expected unity in the Body of Christ is not not exactly promoted from the pulpit nor is it flexing its muscles in operating in unison in your everyday practicalities of life where believers in Christ Jesus should be living testimonies among the unbelievers.
This should be a concern for every believer who truly worships God with spirit and truth, for a dividing Church is a compromising church. The reality is that it in only in operating through unity that the Body of Christ can be immune against the teachings and values of false prophets and teachers.
A practical illustration of this comes from the Book of Galatians when Paul faced opposition from the false Jewish teachers that went among the church of that time and proclaimed that in order to get saved as an Gentile you need to get circumcised. This created havoc in the circle of the Gentile believers as Paul proclaimed the true gospel of salvation of grace through Christ Jesus alone.
Sadly even Peter succumb to the false Jewish teachers, so much so that Paul had to confront him in the true gospel of grace, because when Peter lost his focus because of the fear of man other Jewish believers soon followed his example, even Barbabas.( Galatians 2)
For Paul this was a matter of life and death; for he understood if the Body of Christ do not standtogether in unity in the grace of Jesus Christ , everything that Jesus Christ did for us and stand for gets nullify by the same group of people He gave His life for.
He said to Peter when he confronted him:
“For through the law I died to the law so that I might live for God. I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not set aside the grace of God, for if righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing. (Galatians 2: 19-21 NIV)
This scripture is regularly quoted by every believer and rightly so, but if it is understood in the context in which he answered Peter it gets a whole new meaning, making it much more meaningful for us in our daily walk in unity with other believers. For unfortunately the Body of Christ of today has caught the same virus; the virus of displacement.
Especially today where the New Age movement, the humanitarian movement and the modern science groups starts to influence the Body of Christ with its false teachings contrary to the teachings of Christ Jesus. The sad truth is that we are failing miserably; for if we cannot even unite in prayer and love each other despite our differences, how can we unite in standing for the fundamental truths and values of our faith?
The time is now that we need to wake up from our sleep before we as the Church of Christ totally are ravaged by this virus of displacement. We must repent of our ways doing and our ways of compromised thinking when it comes to the Kingdom Principles of Christ Jesus.
Time is not on our side as the circumstances around the world are clearly telling us. Paul stood up for unity and the fundamental principles of God’s Kingdom that did not make him popular among his own people, so much so that it cost him his life at the end. But because of his perseverance he left behind a group of believers that carried the torch of unity and truth to the next generations making it possible for us to carry the same legacy to our next generations.
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