MAKING TREMENDOUS POWER AVAILABLE

Hi guys, first I should apologize for my rarity on this blog. My schedule has gotten a whole lot tighter than it used to be. It has been a challenge and I’ve had to reorganize things. I’m working to ensure that I don’t slack too badly on here. I sincerely apologize.
 

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The Senior Pastor of my church once said, “There is no prayer God does not answer. The only reason it seems God does not answer sometimes is because we get tired of praying.”

For so long, I wondered what He meant by that, because I felt I prayed long and hard for the things I desired. I felt. However, thankfully to God, I came across some scriptures about praying / asking God for things that made me begin to agree with Him.

Mark 11:23-24 – “For verily I say unto you, That whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that those things which he saith shall come to pass; he shall have whatsoever he saith.”

John 14:13-14 – “And whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If ye shall ask any thing in my name, I will do it.”

1^st John 5:14-15 – “And this is the confidence that we have in him, that, if we ask any thing according to his will, he heareth us: And if we know that he hear us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we desired of him.”

Well, so I knew that if this is God’s word then it is not a lie. So yeah, I agreed with our Senior Pastor, but I still did not understand it.

God wasn’t finished with me. He opened my eyes through some preaching and personal study/meditation to His truth in James 5:16_b; and even better to the Amplified Classic translation of the Bible.

James 5:16_b (AMPC) – “The earnest (heartfelt, continued) prayer of a righteous man makes tremendous power available [dynamic in its working].”

While meditating on this portion of James 5, I began to analyze it and break it down in bits. And the little revelation (“little” because I know God’s got more for me from here) I got on it has helped improve my attitude towards prayers.

So what is it about this kind of prayer that I love so much and makes me confident that God answers prayers?

Let’s break it down.

1.       It is earnest: It is serious, intense and deep. AMPC further breaks down “earnest” into “heartfelt” and “continued”.

It is heartfelt. You see, this isn’t the kind of prayer you make that has no basis or meaning to you. It must mean something deep for it to be described as heartfelt. It must be genuine, sincere. It is not one that is made amiss or with ulterior motives or with shallow mindedness.  It must mean something to you. Little wonder why sometimes when prayer points are called out in churches or other Christian gatherings, one does not see the effect. It’s simply because many people just attend prayer services as part of their routine activities. It really means nothing to them; even when they are asked to pray for themselves. The effectual fervent prayer is a heartfelt one. The one making the prayer takes it very personal and passionately.

It is also a continued one. When the Bible says “pray without ceasing”, it means pray without ceasing. When it says “ask until your joy is full,” it means exactly that. And when it says “continued”, it means continue, don’t stop. A prayer that yields result isn’t one that is made once and forgotten about. Don’t mind those people who tell you that the time you spend praying doesn’t matter. Prayer is about quality and quantity. They both matter. I agree with my Senior Pastor and I understand him now. Indeed, the reason why lots of us do not receive answers to prayers is because we stopped praying. We didn’t “pray through” as Dad Hagin puts it. And because we didn’t, the power needed to deliver the fruit of our prayers was not made available. So we go around saying God didn’t answer our prayers. He did. We just didn’t receive it. 

2.       It is “prayer” not “complaint”: Prayer, in its simplest definition, is having a conversation with God. In this conversation, we make clear, unambiguous statements and we receive clear, unambiguous responses from God. Many times, our prayers do not yield fruit because we moan and complain rather than ask. You rehearse your situation to God and remind Him of how unfair it is and how you’re suffering and why it is not your place to suffer, etc. whereas, God has asked us severally in His word to “ask”. Talk to Him. Make a conversation. Don’t complain. Ironically, our complaints to God may indeed be heartfelt and very continuous, but because we complain rather than pray, we don’t receive. Mark 11:23-24 gives us a very good example about a clear straightforward request – “whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea”. In prayers, state exactly what you want to happen. Don’t rehearse the entire sad situation to God; He knows about them well better than you do. Be clear with your request. Pray. Don’t complain. 

3.      It is offered by a righteous man: Now this is where we may want to shoot ourselves in the leg, because we think of our inadequacies. But according to God, a righteous man is anyone who has accepted Christ.

2^nd  Corinthians 5:21 – “For he hath made Him (Jesus) to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him”

Jesus took our place and justified us before Father. He took our sin and gave us His righteousness. Therefore, before God every believer is righteous, that is, in right standing with God.  So it means that as long as we are all Born again, any prayer we offer to God is a prayer of a righteous man (and the Holy Spirit through John tells us in 1^st John 5:14-15 that we have an unwavering confidence in God that when we pray, He hears us and because He hears us, we will receive what we have requested of Him). It’s important to note that when we set ourselves to pray, Satan will attempt to remind us of our shortcomings in order to discourage us from praying. Don’t give in to him. It matters not what the devil says about you. What matters is how God sees you. And praise His name, He sees you as righteous – one who can approach Him boldly (Hebrews 4:16).  

[Let me quickly point out here that our justification through Christ doesn’t give us license to sin, rather it takes the sin license away from us. So if you’re living continually in sin and enjoying it and you call yourself a believer – righteous and heaven-bound, I honestly really do not understand your own kind of salvation. Be saved!] 

4.      It makes tremendous power available: There is no distance in the spirit realm. As we pray, things are being effected as they need to be; especially when we pray in tongues. One thing we must know is that God has done all He needs to do concerning a looooooot of things. What brings them to manifestation is the prayer of faith. When we refuse to pray, we dull God’s ability to act on our behalf and we allow the powers of darkness take over our situation. An earnest, heartfelt, continued prayer of the righteous man makes tremendous power available. This tremendous power healed that woman with the issue of blood, raised Lazarus from the dead, won the heart of Saul-turned-Paul over to Jesus, and ULTIMATELY, raised Jesus from the dead. It is the resurrection power (Romans 8:11; Philippians 3:10). It is the power that will raise us again on the last day. And according to Ephesians 3:20, it is already at work in us. Prayer only makes it available. So why won’t you pray?

5.      This tremendous power is dynamic in its working: That is, it is active, it is vigorous, it is forceful, it is effective and it is energetic. There is no telling where this power can go – what direction it can run in. No matter how difficult or far-fetched we may think our requests are, this tremendous, dynamic power of God is more than capable enough to turn every situation around. I mean, if it can raise Jesus from the dead, it can do anything. Something we should understand about Jesus’ resurrection is that it was different from every other resurrection before then; in that Jesus wasn’t just raised from the physical dead, but more importantly from the spiritual dead (having taken the sin of the whole world upon Himself); hence Colossians 1:18 declares Him “Firstborn from the dead”. Romans 8:29 says He is the “Firstborn among many brethren”. It is a marvelous great power, and it is only wise that believers do not slack in putting it to work. 

 

The effectual (earnest, heartfelt) fervent (continued) prayer of the righteous man availeth much (makes tremendous power available, dynamic in its working). – James 5:16b (KJV/AMPC)

IN HIS LOVE – No Rules, No Limits!

Everyday of our lives, God wants to have a very personal relationship with us – very personal. You know the way you relate with your sisters who are your besties (like how Komi, Fiyin and I relate)? God wants a 100 times more personal, more intimate relationship than that with us. It may seem strange because we have often dealt with God as that Big Guy up there that we must not offend if we don’t want to have his big stick whacking our heads. That’s what we have been taught, that’s how we have related with God all our lives.

Yes! We call Him Father. We sing His beautiful songs; get in the motions; preach of His love, tell people that He wants a personal relationship with us; many times, even think that we have a personal relationship with Him. But truly looking at it, we realize that many of us still see God as a manager – a manager of life, of the good book, of the evil book, of accidents and safety, of the roads, of those who go to heaven and those destined to hell. Seeing Him as a manager, we become managers of God ourselves. We deal with Him too “softly” so He doesn’t hurt (or get angry) – like an egg, we treat Him like He is so vulnerable. So we ask Him for the big things only, pray mechanized prayers (using ten or so rules of highly effective prayers), study the Bible because we’re told that God expects us to. We mechanically deal with a God who is so versatile, mysterious, and oftentimes unpredictable in His working. This is a thousand miles from how God intends our relationship with Him should be. God desires a love relationship – one that isn’t boxed by rules.

When I first got married (only 3 months ago), I wanted to begin to act by the “rules”.  You know how we constantly hear of roles of the man and the wife, what is expected of the man, what is expected of the woman, etc. I wanted to be the “good wife”, flawlessly playing my duties right. Thankfully, my husband kept ringing it in my head with love that our own marriage should not be defined by rules. I gradually relaxed and praise God, I enjoy a love marriage – not a “rules” marriage. I have come to realize that it is the love we share that makes us do the things we do for each other, not out of obligation, but out of love. God expects even better.

A love relationship with God is not controlled by rules. No! It is intimate, dynamic, full of life, and liberating. That’s how God wants us to be with Him this year and every day of our lives.

First Corinthians Two is one of the over a thousand passages I really love in the Bible. It talks about the Spirit of God knowing perfectly the mind of God just like the spirit of man knows the things of man. But because we have the Spirit of God in us, we can also know the things of God. In fact, verse sixteen tells us that we have the mind of Christ. That thrills me! 

However, I’ve thought about this, “If this is indeed true for every believer, why do we still struggle to know God’s will concerning situations of life? Why do we feel a need to consult several people before we make decisions on critical issues? And having done that, why do we still make grave mistakes for making the wrong choices?” I mean if I have the mind of Christ, I should be undoubtedly sure about what is right and best all the time. So why do I often struggle? I believe this has a loooot to do with the relationship we share with God. A love relationship is what makes spouses of many years to begin to look alike, talk alike and complete each other’s sentences. The more we treat God like a manager and manage Him alike, the farther from Him we get.

The kind of relationship God wants from us is that where because we are in constant commune with Him, we know the exact route to take to avoid traffic or dangers while driving, the exact clothes to put on that will endear interviewers to us when we go job seeking, the exact words to say that will bring comfort to a troubled heart. Since we have the mind of Christ, it means that we know His will as regards any and every decision we have to make. You won’t need to go around asking other people’s opinions; you won’t need to ask for a sign or seek confirmation from anywhere. You just know what to do because He tells it to you.

Imagine how amazing our Christian walk will be if we indeed related with God in love and intimacy – like He desires. Of course, we can never attain this without constant fellowship with Him in worship, prayers, Word study, and testifying of Him. So yeah, the rules are good, but our relationship with Him should not be controlled by them. It should be controlled by love.

I look forward to a new level of intimacy with the LORD this year 2017. How about you?

Happy New Year 2017