Great Answers to Prayer Often Require a Sense of Urgency

Great Answers to Prayer Often Require a Sense of Urgency

by | Oct 4, 2017 | Prayer, Spiritual Warfare

Great Answers to Prayer Often Require a Sense of Urgency

 “Therefore I say to you, whatever things you ask
when you pray, believe that you receive them,
and you shall have them.”

Mark 11:24 

This promise is a continuation of Jesus telling us to speak to our mountains in faith and they will move. There is something both fascinating and critical I want you to understand about this promise. The word “ask,” or “desire” as some versions use, is different from what we might suppose. The word Jesus used, aiteo, includes the idea of a craving that might cause one to beg.

The point is not that we must beg God in the sense that we’re trying to get Him to do something He doesn’t want to do. It is that when we pray we need to understand that what He considers asking may be quite different than our definition.

Window Shopping Is Not Praying

For instance, a young child may walk down the aisle of a store and see the bright colors and point to item after item saying, “I want that!” The smart parent keeps walking until the interest dies down. Adults have fleeting interests, too. Have you ever gone window shopping? “Oh, that’s beautiful. I’d love to have that,” you say, but you keep walking.

When God says we can get what we desire through prayer, He specifically excluded window shopping type prayers. This doesn’t mean He won’t often lavish you with a love gift that’s way out of proportion to your obedience, faith, or prayer. (I mean, my goodness, what is salvation?) But as a general rule, He doesn’t answer prayers that don’t originate from a strong desire. There are a few reasons for this.

First, mountains or strongholds by definition are too stubborn to yield to prayers that lack a desire strong enough to keep the praying person praying. Think of Daniel needing to hold on in intense prayer for twenty-one days before the answer came (Daniel 10:1-14).

Second, this brief life is our training ground for eternity, and He uses our prayers as part of the training. We may not think of it often or seriously contemplate ruling and reigning with Christ throughout eternity on the new Earth, but He is dead serious about this. Everything He does in regard to our prayers is within the context of Him conforming us to the image of His dear Son, Jesus Christ, and us ruling with Him.

The significance of this is He never passes up an opportunity to further us along in our spiritual growth. Every prayer is answered, delayed, or denied within the context of growing us up and getting us ready for eternity.

We see through a glass, darkly, and we have partial knowledge. So no matter how wonderful our motives or dire our situation, we nearly always pray from a position of deficiency. So how is this deficiency overcome? How can God grant mountain moving, world changing power to people in this compromised, often sinful, condition?

My understanding is that since we often operate at such an acute deficit of knowledge (or character or faith or love or a hundred other things!) when we pray, we come before Him boldly as sons and daughters, but are nonetheless in utter dependence upon His goodness and wisdom to bring whatever we pray for to pass. And a tool He uses to overcome our deficit is the time interval between the prayer request and its answer. Time is a tool in the hands of God when we are praying.

How God Uses Urgency and Time to Answer Our Prayers

 No matter how dire the situation or noble our interest, when we pray God’s primary concern is answering the prayer in such a way that you are transformed. This normally takes time. However, if there’s not enough desire, or urgency, in your heart for the object you’re praying for, chances are you won’t hang around long enough for God’s work to be done in your heart.

Unless God decides otherwise, this often results in what appears as God saying no to your request. Actually, He’s not saying, “No.” He’s saying, “Get yourself back in here so we can finish the transformation process in your heart. You need to be changed so I can answer the prayer.”

If you stay in prayer long enough, the Holy Spirit will search your heart and bring thoughts to your mind. These thoughts will give you a portion of God’s perspective on whatever you’re praying for. They’ll also reveal to you things about yourself. This is a coveted place to be! It’s the transformation process. If you respond honestly and patiently to these thoughts, you will be changed and barriers to your prayers will disappear.

And as I said when I opened this chapter, some situations are so complicated or so reinforced with demonic power that only sustained prayer power will secure the victory. Sustained prayer. Just another way of saying desire or urgency.

How to Get More Urgency

Since urgency is often needed for our prayer to qualify as true prayer from God’s perspective, how do we get more urgency? Good news, it’s not a matter of will power. If it were, most of us would be in permanent trouble because creating willpower is like grasping fog in your hand.

Time to smile. There is a backdoor way to get urgency without short-lived, exhausting efforts of trying to will yourself into it. The secret is to use the right tool. Who changes a tire by using brute force to lift the car off the ground? We use a car jack that allows us to lift thousands of pounds with relatively little effort. Similarly, there is a prayer tool that lifts our urgency level higher than we ever could by will power alone. That tool is exposure to something that automatically produces urgency.

The Bible is filled with examples of people getting spectacular answers to prayers that required great intensity, focus…urgency. None of these people tried to manufacture urgency. Let’s look at one of them to get an idea of what I’m talking about.

Hannah (1 Samuel 1:1-20). Hannah’s prayers overcame her infertility. Hannah didn’t try to have urgency. Nor did she try to pray longer or more regularly. Her urgency, length, and regularity in prayer came automatically by what she was exposed to. She was constantly exposed to the daily taunting of a human tormentor, which aggravated her sense of loss and drove her to her knees.

Do you really want more urgency in prayer? You want to pray longer and with more focus. Be like Hannah. Allow your circumstance to drive you to your knees. But what if you don’t have a daily tormentor like Hannah, so to speak? Something like pain or immediate danger to make you get off the internet or turn off the TV? What if you just want more urgency, duration, and focus when you pray about regular stuff?

Is the regular stuff important? How important? What happens to the object of your prayer if you don’t pray? If the perceived repercussions of not praying aren’t serious to you, you’re not going to have a sense of urgency. Conversely, if you feel there’s a chance of something bad happening by you not praying, you will find a sense of uneasiness inside of you. What you want is to inflame that sense of unease to a strength level that displaces your other time eating priorities—at least for a while.

You can increase the sense of unease by deliberately putting before your face things that make you think about the object you desire to pray about. You want to pray about someone more regularly? Put their name on your prayer list. Look at their name as you pray. Better yet, use a picture of them if you can. You want to pray for them more urgently? As positive as you might be, make yourself think of worse case scenarios concerning them. Now pray.

I know how that last statement sounds. So let me give you an example that hopefully will put my statement in context. You’re praying for someone’s salvation, but not with any real sense of regularity, duration, or urgency. Make yourself think of what happens if this person isn’t saved. There’s only heaven or hell. The prospect of someone spending eternity in that horrible place will automatically help you pray for them—if you think on it honestly. You can do this for anything you’re praying about.

Finally, perhaps Jesus’s own words will help clarify. Jesus said, “Blessed are the poor in spirit…blessed are those who mourn…” (Matthew 5:3, 4). The blessing is not in simply being poor in spirit or of mourning. The blessing is that the person knows he’s poor in spirit. When you know you’re poor in spirit, it produces a spiritual mourning. The end result is you’re driven to Jesus by a revelation of your need.

Now apply the concept of what Jesus said to whatever it is you’re praying about. Just as a sinner is driven to Jesus by an awareness of his spiritual poverty, you can be driven to Jesus by an awareness of spiritual poverty. The poverty is, What is the present condition of my prayer object? What is the worst case scenario of my prayer object if the situation doesn’t change?

Now just as the sinner must think on his condition honestly enough and long enough for the Holy Spirit to change his heart, you, too, must do the same. You will find your heart getting softer and your emotions getting stirred.

If this still seems a little on the negative side for you, do the exact opposite (whatever works!). Think on the good that can happen if you keep praying. Either way…

Here comes urgency!

Lessons Learned

Lesson One. God wants to see real desire in my prayers. If I am only window shopping, I will take steps to intelligently increase my desire.

Lesson Two. I will remember that God uses the time interval between the prayer and the answer to grow me up into the image of Christ and to prepare me to rule and reign with Him on the new Earth throughout eternity.

Lesson Three. I will stop wearing myself out in the flesh trying to be a better prayer warrior, and will instead increase my sense of urgency in prayer by using the tool of honest exposure to the need. I will remember how it worked for Hannah in 1 Samuel 1:1-20).

Practical Exercise

Pray, “Lord, I know that every prayer doesn’t require me to pour out my soul. And I know that You love me, and that You’re so kind and longsuffering that You often answer prayers even when we should pray better. But I know that some things require more fervency and urgency in prayer.

“I’m going to do my best to expose myself to things that remind me of the importance of this prayer being answered. Will You please help me in this? I know You will; so I thank You now that my sense of urgency in prayer is growing.”

Commit to Change the Situation through Prayer

Commit to Change the Situation through Prayer

by | Sep 27, 2017 | Prayer, Spiritual Warfare

Commit to Change the Situation through Prayer

 

“Now about that time Herod the king stretched out his hand
to harass some from the church. Then he killed James the brother of John
with the sword. And because he saw that it pleased the Jews,
 he proceeded further to seize Peter also…
Peter was therefore kept in prison,
but constant prayer was offered
to God for him by the church.”

 Acts 12:1-3, 5

We know that prayer is our most powerful weapon. We preach it. We teach it. We speak it. We sing it. We write it. Nonetheless, often it’s either the last thing done, the thing done with little duration, or the thing done not at all. What’s going on? Are we lazy? Negligent? Unbelieving?

Certainly, I know there are moments like these and people like this. This book’s intent, however, isn’t to beat up on people; so I’ll let God handle any reprimands. Rather, I want to help those who know, or possibly only have an inkling, that prayer can help their situation, yet find themselves not praying. These people aren’t lazy, negligent, or unbelieving. There’s something else going on here.

Busyness, Tiredness, and Past Prayer Failures
Can Steal Prayer Time

There have been times when I planned to pray and later got so busy doing stuff that by the time I finished, I was exhausted. I’d either press through and get on my knees and promptly fall asleep, or I’d try to outsmart my tiredness by prayer walking in my room. Often that only transformed me from a lying mummy to a walking zombie! Not a lot accomplished.

I haven’t yet figured out how to be absolutely dead tired and pray with any real energy or duration. B…u…u…t I have discovered something useful. If I really want to pray, I have to deliberately take steps now to either not be dead tired later, or change my prayer time from later to now.

What Can You Stop, Start, or Modify to Save Time?

Write or type a list of your daily activities. Which are fixed and which are not? For instance, are you married? Do you have children? What about other obligations that aren’t going anywhere? Now do the same with activities where you have more discretion. How often do you do these things? For how long? Is there anything you can stop, start, or modify that will give you more time to pray? Can you cut sixty minutes a day? Thirty? Ten?

Do you know how much more powerful you would be in prayer if you offered ten more minutes a day of intelligent prayer to your heavenly Father who is just itching to show you His mighty power? Did you know that ten minutes a day comes out to sixty hours a year? The last thing Satan wants is for you to spend sixty hours in the presence of God your Father!

Maybe this short list will give you some practical ideas of how to find time to pray. Ask yourself can you stop, start, or modify any of these activities: cooking, cleaning, talking on the phone, surfing the web, reading, watching television, shopping, eating, sleeping, visiting, working, vacationing, lawn work, hobbies, etc. Believe God for ideas. If you want to pray, He’ll help you find time.

Most People Are Too Busy to Pray…Until a Crisis Makes Time for Them. Don’t Let This Be You!

Or perhaps your best course of action is to simply pray now rather than later. Can you pray as you drive to and from work? Driving to work is better than driving from work because now is always better than later. Can you go to the restroom and pray? I’ve had many, many, many awesome prayer sessions in the restroom. If you did this two or three times a day, you’d have significant breakthroughs in prayer. Can you get up earlier so you can pray? Next time you’re running an errand, can you pull over somewhere safe and cry out to God in prayer? You get the picture. Be aggressive and use your imagination. You won’t regret it!

Don’t Let Yesterday’s Prayer Failure
Stop You From Today’s Prayer Success

 If we define prayer failure as praying for something specific and spectacularly not getting it, then there’s nothing like a prayer failure to discourage you from praying like that again. It’s at this point that we cut back on praying. Or we may do the downward adjustment thing and only pray in safe, general terms. Nothing too specific. Nothing that will by its failure to come or refusal to go can embarrass us or damage our faith any more than it’s already damaged.

But in what field or industry do we find successful people who haven’t had to deal with setbacks, disappointments, and failures? As part of your quest toward regular answered prayers, and even spectacular prayer answers, you must learn to get off the mat and stand on your feet again. Okay, so you prayed for something and things didn’t turn out the way you hoped they would. Join the club. We’ve all been there. This changes nothing about the power, influence, and creativity of God to answer your next prayer.

The story in our opening Scriptures tell of a church crisis that was conquered through prayer. The apostle James was unjustly put in prison for his faith in Christ. I have to believe the church prayed for him. We’re talking eleven other apostles and thousands of converts in an on fire church. It would be a real stretch to assume they didn’t pray. And if they didn’t, James probably did. Wouldn’t you? Nonetheless, James was executed! This is big time prayer failure.

Next, King Herod put Peter in prison for the same purpose. “But constant prayer was offered to God for him by the church.” God sent His angel and delivered Peter. That’s way beyond awesome. But here’s what’s also awesome. The church had just experienced a spectacular prayer failure. They had every reason in the world to throw in the prayer towel and say, “We prayed for James and his head is rolling down the street like a bowling ball. This stuff doesn’t work. I’m going back to praying for empty parking spaces at the mall.”

Instead, they refused to focus on their shock, grief, and unanswered questions. They focused instead on the unchanging character of God, and on His power, influence, and creativity to answer prayers. Son or daughter of God, you may have suffered devastating prayer failures, but God is still on the throne and Satan is still defeated. You don’t need to have every question answered before you get back in the win column.

What you do need is what the early church had. They trusted in God’s faithfulness and radically rearranged their schedules to offer prayer sufficient to meet the newest crisis. Let yesterday’s failure drive you to even greater levels of prayer!

Lessons Learned

Lesson One. I can ask God to help me examine my daily activities for areas I can start, stop, or modify things that will give me more time to pray. Even ten more minutes a day is sixty hours a year in the presence of God!

Lesson Two. Yesterday’s spectacular prayer failure doesn’t mean there aren’t many spectacular prayer answers in my future!

Practical Exercise

Pray, “Lord, what can I start, stop, or modify that will give me more time to pray.” Now with your eyes closed, wait before the Lord for a little while. Write down the thoughts that come.

If you found this post helpful, please use the buttons below to share it with others. Also, try one of my other articles on prayer by clicking here

If you want to grow in spiritual warfare and supernatural ministry, read about Eric’s School of Spiritual Warfare and Supernatural Ministry at ericmhillauthor.com. The school’s main forum is Facebook.com/groups/ericmhillauthor.

Copyright 2017 by Eric M Hill. You may contact me at ericmhillauthor@yahoo.com, Facebook.com/ericmhillauthor, or Twitter.com/ericmhillatl.

Click on image below to get more information about my books!

Prayer: Knowing God’s Will When You Pray About a Mountain

Prayer: Knowing God’s Will When You Pray About a Mountain

by | Sep 18, 2017 | Prayer, Spiritual Warfare

Prayer: Knowing God’s Will When You Pray About a Mountain

“Now this is the confidence that we have in Him,
that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us.
And if we know that He hears us, whatever we ask,
we know that we have the petitions
that we have asked of Him.”

 1 John 5:14, 15

I heard the sigh of frustration. That’s one of the problems, isn’t it? Often we don’t know the will of God; so how can we pray in confidence, especially if the answer is delayed? Good news! God didn’t give you the promises above to tease or frustrate you. He wants your prayers answered.

How to Pray According to the Will of God

 Let’s begin with what’s not mysterious. There are innumerable Scriptures which tell us what to do and not do. For instance, 1 Thessalonians 5:18 says, “In everything [in, not for] give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”

You don’t have to search for Scriptures like these; they’re everywhere. So are the others which don’t have “this is the will of God” in them, but nonetheless are as clear and directive as those that do. So it is entirely possible that the answer you’re searching for in prayer has already been revealed in the Bible. You may be able to cut down your prayer time considerably (at least for the object you’re presently praying) by aggressively searching the Scriptures. I suggest starting by carefully reading through Proverbs.

However, you won’t find a Scripture that says, “Marry Blake. He’ll make a great husband and father, and you’ll never regret your decision.” Sure, you will find a ton of Scriptures about relationships and marriage and commitment and so forth, but none of them will mention Blake. This is where things start feeling like a dangerous coin toss. Thank God, there’s a better way!

Is Your Prayer Paralyzed

Because You Don’t Know What God Wants?

 Christians are often paralyzed in place, afraid to go left or right, for fear of missing God. Now waiting on God before big decisions is good, but when taken to an extreme, it works against our prayers. I’ve talked to Christians who purported to be so spiritual that literally everything about them was “Spirit led.” Sounds awesome; actually awful.

This one real example represents what I’m speaking of. A woman told me she was so led of the Spirit that she didn’t even dress herself until she was sure of the exact clothing God wanted her to wear. To me this is cringe worthy because my understanding of the Scriptures leads me to believe God gets glory from our growth in Him, and from the decisions that arise from that growth.

Super Spiritual Lady Waiting Hours for God to Tell Her What Clothes to Wear

God gets no glory from a daughter of God sitting in the closet waiting for Him to tell her what clothes to wear. This example may appear silly and a waste of space in a book this size; it’s not. It’s directly related to praying in the will of God.

Imagine the prayer life of a person who thinks like this. If she can complicate something as simple as what clothes to wear, prayer must be an exceeding complicated task for her. I know she’s an extreme case. And in all honesty, I’ve only dealt with a few people who go this far. Yet many Christians who would never ride the bus as far as this lady does, are in fact on her bus. And in my over thirty-five years of serving Christ, I’ve talked to bunches of Christians like this.

To illustrate, I read an article about mental illness. It discussed the different levels of mental illness. For the sake of simplicity, let’s say on a scale of one to ten, ten qualifies as the level where a person’s life is functionally disrupted and perhaps noticeable to others. The article went on to say that tens of millions of people are at levels that don’t reach the severity of ten, but are at high enough levels that they possess extremes in their emotions, judgment, and perspective. Functionally normal, but compromised.

Similarly, many otherwise outstanding Christians who don’t wait for God to tell them what clothes to wear each day do possess a milder version of this paralysis. They go about their lives routinely making hundreds of decisions, some of them quite important, based upon common sense, academic or specialized knowledge, Scriptural encouragement or prohibitions, growth in Christ and experience with God, among other things.

Nonetheless, often when it comes to seeking God for specific things in prayer that aren’t clearly spelled out in Scripture, they wipe the board clean and promptly forget everything they’ve been doing to this point.

They default to “I don’t know how to pray in this situation because I don’t know what God wants here.” And since they don’t know exactly what God wants, they can’t pray with the confidence spoken of our Scriptures, 1 John 5:14, 15.

I understand. Trust me. There are some situations that are so complicated and time critical and potentially far reaching in their effects that we don’t want to flip a spiritual coin and hope for the best. So I’m not blasting you for hesitating to thump the coin into the air. What I want you to see is you don’t have to call heads or tails. God has a better way. And it’s one hundred percent His will—always!

What Did Paul Do

When He Didn’t Know Exactly What God Wanted?

I don’t believe we need to know exactly what God wants for us to do exactly what He wants. The apostle Paul wrote two-thirds of the New Testament and was, according to the Holy Spirit, the greatest of the apostles. He certainly knew what we call the great commission: “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature” (Mark 16:15).

Yet we see him going about his missionary journeys in Acts 16:6-10 making what we might call mistakes or presumptuous decisions in his attempt to obey God. He tried to go into Asia (not our geographical Asia) and “they were forbidden by the Holy Spirit to preach the gospel in Asia.” So they went to a place called Mysia and “tried to go into Bithynia, but the Holy Spirit did not permit them.”

Lord, I don’t know exactly what to do. But I know You don’t want me to just sit and do nothing. Please cover me with Your grace as I go forward.

What were the others thinking? “Wow, I’m trusting this guy with my life, and he has no idea what he’s doing. Why, he’s just flipping a coin!” Just when the board was about to call a secret meeting to discuss Paul’s inability to hear from God, Paul had a vision directing them to go to Macedonia.

How does this relate to you praying in confidence when you don’t know the exact will of God? Look at Paul. If we conclude that him knowing the exact will of God meant knowing which direction and destination to go, then he clearly didn’t know. Yet in the end, he arrived exactly where God wanted him. What happened for him can and will happen for you.

Paul didn’t know the exact details of what God wanted. So he started with the clear will of God: Go, preach the gospel in all the world. He took this general command and chose a way he could practically implement it. Yes, I’m sure he prayed first, but we know from the record that Paul’s prayers didn’t exempt him from having to forge ahead without customized directions.

He spent time, money, emotions, and work doing by principle what had not yet been revealed to him by revelation. Or in other words, sometimes you don’t get the big unmistakable, “Whoa, that was awesome!” confirmation that you were in God’s will until after you have tried to go into Asia and Bithynia.

Your Asia and Bithynia may be taking a timid step toward what you think may be God’s will. What if you’re wrong? So, what if you are wrong? Was Paul wrong for taking a step toward Bithynia and later Asia?

Did God reprimand him for using his initiative in the absence of customized instructions? No. He blessed him as long as he followed His general will. And when Paul’s initiative, which was in submission to God, brought him to a place God didn’t want him, God spoke clearly.

God is a fantastic communicator. If you get to a place where you are about to make a so-called wrong decision, whether it stems from your humanity or sinfulness, He’ll talk to you, too.

God Doesn’t Expect You

to Know Everything When You Pray

 Here is something that has helped me and others hugely in our prayers. Paul was wrong only in the sense that he was human, and humans don’t know everything. Please hear and never forget this: God doesn’t expect you to know everything—even as you pray.

I like to tell people that failure is built into the system, and it doesn’t bother God one bit. I get this concept from the entire Bible, but specifically from 1 Corinthians 13:9, 12. Here it says we see through a glass, darkly, and we have only partial knowledge and partial effectiveness in spiritual gifts. Call it what you will, but this sounds like the perfect recipe for a bunch of mistakes and a bunch of unanswered questions.

Don’t worry about this context of imperfection we’re in. It’s just the way it is. It’ll be this way until the Lord returns. Drop to your knees. Submit yourself to God in humility. Tell Him you don’t have all the facts you’d like to have, but you’re going to use what you do have to make your petition.

You know that God is holy, righteous, just, loving, kind, and forgiving. You know that for some reason He has this crazy, irrational love for you. You know that the Scripture says, “The eyes of the Lord are upon the righteous, and His ears are open to their cry,” (Psalm 34:15). You know that He has told you to “come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Hebrews 4:16).

God has set this thing up so that His glory and power is manifested through imperfect and often bumbling misfits who dare to trust Him to do the impossible. Soon you’ll be able to say with the psalmist, “I sought the Lord, and He heard me, and delivered me from all my fears” (Psalm 34:4).

Come on, son or daughter of God. You can do it!

Lessons Learned

 Lesson One. The answer to my prayer may already be revealed in the Bible.

Lesson Two. Prayer paralysis is often caused by forgetting to use some of the principles we successfully use every day as we make decisions.

Lesson Three. If I don’t know the exact will of God, I can confidently follow the general will of God and what I know about Him until He chooses to reveal more details. My confidence in prayer is not in knowing exact details, but in knowing God.

Lesson Four. God doesn’t hold my humanity against me as I pray. I can boldly go to the throne of grace to get help even when I don’t know as much as I’d like to know about the situation or the exact details in God’s heart.

Practical Exercise

Pray out loud: “Lord, I don’t know as much as I’d like to know about this situation, but I now know You don’t expect me to know everything. Though I offer You my prayers with imperfect knowledge, I have faith that You hear me. As I pray, I’m watching and listening for any further light from You. Until I receive more, I will pray in faith with what I have.”

 

If you found this post helpful, please use the buttons below to share it with others. Also, try one of my other articles on prayer by clicking here

If you want to grow in spiritual warfare and supernatural ministry, read about Eric’s School of Spiritual Warfare and Supernatural Ministry at ericmhillauthor.com. The school’s main forum is Facebook.com/groups/ericmhillauthor.

Copyright 2017 by Eric M Hill. You may contact me at ericmhillauthor@yahoo.com, Facebook.com/ericmhillauthor, or Twitter.com/ericmhillatl.

Click on image below to get more information about my books!

5 Things That May Be Killing Your Prayers

5 Things That May Be Killing Your Prayers

by | Sep 8, 2017 | Prayer

5 Things That May Be Killing Your Prayers

“Why can’t I get my prayers answered?”

You may be asking yourself that painful and puzzling question. Well, let’s take a look at five known prayer assassins and see if any of them are killing your prayers.

Prayer Killer Number One: Sin

There are thousands of promises in the Bible. It’s easy to grab one and believe God to fulfill it for us without considering that every promise of God is given within the context of our assumed obedience. Or in other words, the promises of God are for those who obey God.

This may come as a shock to many people. Especially since today’s popular presentation of God is depicted in such a way that it leaves us believing that we can do nothing to offend God. And then even if there is such a thing as offending God, we’re told His great love for us compels Him to overlook our behavior and give us what we desire.

This may attract large crowds and increase our popularity (with people, not with God), but it’s one hundred percent wrong! The biblical record of God from beginning to end, from Genesis to Revelation, is that God is inherently, uncompromisingly holy, righteous, and pure, and that He demands obedience.

Yes, our holiness, righteousness, and purity comes from the accomplishments of Christ in His sinless life, sacrificial death, and victorious resurrection. However, we must be careful that we don’t convince ourselves, or allow false teachers to convince us, that Jesus lived right so we don’t have to. Or that because of Jesus obedience is now an option.

Let’s conclude this section with just a few Scriptures that prove my point.

Behold, the Lord’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save; nor His ear heavy, that it cannot hear. But your iniquities have separated you from your God; and your sins have hidden His face from you, so that He will not hear.

Isaiah 59:1-2

“But that’s the Old Testament,” you say. “I’m under grace.”

Ooo…kaaay, so the first thirty-nine books of the Bible don’t apply to you? I disagree, but I’ll use a Scripture that we both hopefully agree applies to you.

And whatever we ask we receive from Him, because we keep His commandments and do those things that are pleasing in His sight.

1 John 3:22

This is a crystal clear New Testament declaration that obedience to God is required of anyone who approaches God with a request.

Living in sin can kill your prayers.

God Had Mercy On You, But You’re Not Going to Have Mercy on Others? Really? Good Luck with Those Prayers!

Prayer Killer Number Two: Unmerciful

Jesus said, “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy” (Matthew 5:7).

The obvious opposite of this statement is that those who are not merciful shall not receive mercy. Of course, many of our prayers require mercy to be answered. But if our behavior has cut off our mercy, then we have killed our prayer.

This is a difficult concept for some Christians to accept. Especially those who are victims of the false grace message. Nonetheless, it is true.

Jesus told a parable about a slave who owed his master a huge debt. This slave asked his master for mercy, and the master graciously forgave him the debt. Yet this same slave was owed a much smaller amount of money by another slave. Instead of having mercy and forgiving the debt, as his master had done for him, he had the slave thrown into prison.

Look at the sobering progression of this story in Matthew 18:31-34:

So when his fellow servants saw what had been done, they were very grieved, and came and told their master all that had been done. Then his master, after he had called him, said to him,

‘You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you begged me. Should you not also have had compassion on your fellow servant, just as I had pity on you?’

And his master was angry, and delivered him to the torturers until he should pay all that was due to him.

 “Wow,” you say, “glad I’m under grace, and my heavenly Father would never do that to me!

Oh, really? Let’s look at the last verse:

So My heavenly Father also will do to you if each of you, from his heart, does not forgive his brother his trespasses.

 Being unmerciful can kill your prayers.

Prayer Killer Number Three: Unforgiveness

Unforgiveness and lack of mercy are similar, but not the same. For one can be unmerciful to someone without being unforgiving toward them. There simply may not have been an offense to not forgive.

For instance, Jesus told a story about a man who had been beaten, robbed, and left for dead on the side of the road. A couple of groups of religious people passed by, saw the man, and did nothing to help (Luke 10:25-37).

They were unmerciful, but not necessarily unforgiving. They didn’t know the guy. (And didn’t want to know him!)

Unforgiveness, however, has the element of offense, either real or imagined. The offended person refuses to forgive. What does Jesus specifically say about such a person’s chances of getting their prayers answered?

And whenever you stand praying, if you have anything against anyone, forgive him, that your Father in heaven may also forgive you your trespasses. But if you do not forgive, neither will your Father in heaven forgive your trespasses.

Mark 10:25-26

Living in unforgiveness will kill your prayers.

 Prayer Killer Number Four: Strife

The strife that kills prayer is the kind that either originates or ends in sin. It is more than disagreement. It is more than heated disagreement. It’s disagreement without the character of Christ. It’s disagreement without humility and love and self-control.

Strife Kills Prayers. Don’t Let It Kill Yours!

James talks about the futility of offering prayers in an atmosphere of strife:

Where do wars and fights come from among you? Do they not come from your desires for pleasure that war in your members [body]? You lust and do not have. You murder [God calls hatred murder] and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures.

James 4:1-3

 A few verses later, He tells these striving Christians that “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble” (v. 6). Now if God is the one resisting you, who is left to answer your prayers?

Strife kills prayers.

Prayer Killer Number Five: Impatience

Impatience is a great killer of prayers. Perhaps that’s’ why there is so much teaching in the Bible about being patient in prayer, and so many graphic examples of people in the Bible receiving spectacular answers to prayer—once they paid the price of waiting.

The writer of Hebrews captured this critical thought with only two verses:

Therefore do not cast away your confidence, which has great reward. For you have need of endurance [patience], so that after you have done the will of God, you may receive the promise.

Hebrews 10:35-36

Abraham was called the friend of God because he believed God (James 2:23). Read the narrative of Abraham’s life (Genesis 12-22) and you’ll see that this refers to more than him being declared righteous because he believed God one day.

It includes that. But it refers primarily to him patiently waiting on God for at least twenty-five years to keep His promise to give him a son when his body couldn’t produce a child.

It also included his willingness to give that son back to God twelve years later, and if necessary, to believe God to physically raise that child from the dead if that’s what it took for Him to keep His promise to give him a son. That’s thirty-seven years of believing God for a promise. No wonder he’s called the father of our faith!

Unfortunately, most Christians pray and don’t have the stamina to wait on God for the prayer to be answered.

Impatience kills prayers.

Now the Good News!

Let’s not end this thinking of the many ways we can mess up in prayer. Instead let’s end it thinking not of our many weaknesses, but of God’s great desire to give us more than we can imagine, and of His infinite ability to perfect us and get us to the place where our prayers are unhindered:

You Are Not Alone in Your Journey Toward Answered Prayer. God Will Help You!

Do not fear little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.

Luke 12:32

Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to present you faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy, to God our Savior, Who alone is wise, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and forever. Amen.

Jude 24-25

Lord, I ask You to help everyone who has read this article to humbly consider any area of their lives that need correcting. I include myself in this prayer, Lord. Help us to repent of any known sin. If there are areas of darkness in our lives that we don’t know of yet, open our eyes to the truth. And once our eyes are open, help us to immediately turn from darkness to light.

Lord, if we are unmerciful or unforgiving, we repent this very moment. For You have so graciously shown us Your great mercy in offering us forgiveness. And if we are in strife with anyone, we offer that situation up to You. We will not press for our rights in an ungodly way.

Finally, help us to have patience as we wait for our prayers to be answered. In faith we believe that “the eyes of the Lord are upon the righteous, and His ears are open unto their cry” (Psalm 3414-15).

Be encouraged! The Holy Spirit is your Helper! It’s going to be alright!

***

If you found this post helpful, please use the buttons below to share it with others. Also, try one of my other articles on prayer by clicking here

If you want to grow in spiritual warfare and supernatural ministry, read about Eric’s School of Spiritual Warfare and Supernatural Ministry at ericmhillauthor.com. The school’s main forum is Facebook.com/groups/ericmhillauthor.

Copyright 2017 by Eric M Hill. You may contact me at ericmhillauthor@yahoo.com, Facebook.com/ericmhillauthor, or Twitter.com/ericmhillatl.

Click on image below to get more information about my books!

Prayer: Honestly Recognize the Mountain, but Compare It to God’s Ability to Move It

Prayer: Honestly Recognize the Mountain, but Compare It to God’s Ability to Move It

by | Aug 30, 2017 | Prayer

Glory to God, I’m not in trouble! Glory to God, I’m not in trouble! Glory to God…uhh, Lord, help! I’m in trouble!

Honestly Recognize the Mountain,
But Compare It to God’s Ability to Move It

“But He [Jesus] said, ‘The things which are impossible with men are possible with God.”

 Luke 18:27

The Scripture above shows that Jesus recognizes the impossibilities of men. If you are going to get regular and spectacular answers to prayer, you must be based in reality. Ignoring a problem or pretending it isn’t as big or as serious as it is, isn’t faith. It’s foolishness.

A few decades ago the Word of Faith movement gained popularity in the church, mainly the portion that considers itself charismatic. After a few years of retrospect, it can be safely said that like other genuine moves of God (e.g., the Reformation; see Persecutions of the Reformation on the internet), much good and much bad resulted.

The good was that the power of faith in God and His word were taught in detail with great consistency. Millions of people found that the God of the Bible hadn’t changed one bit. He still answered prayer, and He still worked miracles. Subsequently, the Holy Spirit responded to this new atmosphere of faith in marvelous power—He is still responding!

2 Chronicles 16:9 was realized: “For the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth to show Himself strong on behalf of those whose heart is loyal to Him…” Think of it. God actively searches for people to bless. The Word of Faith folks crammed this truth into our faces. I for one am grateful.

Nonetheless, the bad that came from this movement was very bad. Ambitious and enterprising preachers polluted the movement with their greed, covetousness, dishonesty, and astounding biblical ignorance. The point that fits in with our march toward spectacular answers to prayer is ignorance.

One of the extreme doctrines that came from this movement encourages people directly or indirectly not to speak anything negative. Well, I’m all for not being a negative person, but this doctrine goes light-years beyond addressing a negative disposition. It actually condemns an honest assessment of the mountain. It’s considered doubt, fear, or unbelief to acknowledge that the situation is horrible and getting more horrible by the moment.

Listen to me…please! No amount of ignoring a cancer will stop it from growing or spreading. No amount of ignoring bills will keep your utilities from being cut off or you from being put out on the street.

I’m not confessing I need a ride. All my needs are met. Whew! I’m not confessing how how it is either!

I have a friend, an absolutely incredible woman of God who is so far ahead of me in some Christian graces that I can’t even see her in the horizon. Nonetheless, it’s hard to talk to her when she’s facing a mountain. She’s so afraid of undoing her faith by an errant word that it’s hard to get a straight answer from her about what’s going on in her life.

It’s like, “Mary, I see you standing there in the hot sun. Do you need a ride?”

“Glory to God, all my needs are met,” she answers.

The disconnect here is I’m asking her about her practical need, and she’s responding by telling me what spiritual truth she believes. So I smile and drive off. Guess what? She just missed the ride God sent her. Do not think this is a hypothetical extreme. Unfortunately, it’s all too familiar. But not in the next story.

Recognizing the Problem as a Mountain
Won’t Damage Your Faith If You Compare the Mountain
 to God’s Power 

Part One

“Then some came and told Jehoshaphat, saying,
‘A great multitude is coming against you…And Jehoshaphat feared,
and set himself to seek the Lord, and proclaimed a fast…
So Judah gathered together to ask help from the Lord…
they [the nation] came to seek the Lord.

Part Two

Then Jehoshaphat stood in the assembly…and said,
‘O Lord God of our fathers, are You not God in heaven,
and do You not rule over all the kingdoms of the nations,
and in Your hand is there not power and might,
so that none is able to withstand You?
O our God, will You not judge them?
For we have no power against this great multitude
that is coming against us; nor do we know what to do,
but our eyes are upon You.”

2 Chronicles 20:12

This story shows how to properly look at a mountain. This is crucial because your perspective of the mountain will determine your prayer and your behavior after prayer. Often post-prayer behavior slows down, complicates, or totally stops the answer. So it’s absolutely critical that we understand this lesson.

Part one of the story shows the mountain in all its power: Judah was vastly outnumbered by the huge armies that were coming against it. The king could’ve said, “Bless God, don’t worry about the bad report. We don’t want to glorify the devil by talking about what he’s doing. Doesn’t the 91st Psalm say, ‘A thousand shall fall at our side, and ten thousand at our right hand; but it shall not come near us’?

Notice in part one that the king does something that ordinarily is considered negative in the Christian context.

And Jehoshaphat feared.

Now how many times have we been blasted by faith preachers for having fear? Uh, a lot! I’ll go a reverent step farther. How many times did Jesus rebuke the disciples for their fear? A lot. So, isn’t fear bad? Isn’t it the automatic kiss of death for getting prayers answered?

I think not. I think faith preachers have missed it terribly here. In baseball parlance, they’ve hit the ball and run directly to third base. And as far as Jesus’s admonitions against fear are concerned, we’ve simply struck out. We didn’t understand the context of His words.

Fear certainly can derail prayer answers if we let it, but this isn’t inevitable. Jehoshaphat feared and received a spectacular answer to prayer. How can you imitate Jehoshaphat and get your prayers answered even though you feel fear? Start by understanding two things.

The presence of fear is not necessarily proof of lack of faith. It may be proof that you’re not presumptuous or delusional!

First, the absence or presence of fear doesn’t mean you are either in or out of faith. It is simply an involuntary emotion that the brain produces when it perceives a dangerous threat. You don’t turn off fear by declaring it’s gone, pretending it’s gone, or quoting a Scripture. And since you don’t need to get rid of fear to get your prayers answered, I suggest you spend very little time trying in the flesh to get rid of fear.

Second, Jesus’s commands to “fear not” doesn’t mean don’t feel fear; it means don’t obey fear. Isn’t He the one who said, “But I will show you whom you should fear: Fear Him who, after He has killed, has power to cast into hell” (Luke 12:5). Was the object of the Lord’s words simply to get us to feel an emotion? Was it not to get us to obey?

Absolutely. God knows that behavior follows what we fear. For instance, when He says in Revelation 21:8 that the fearful will suffer eternal doom, was He saying those who feel fear are doomed? No. In this context, and indeed whenever the Lord rebukes fear (you can check this by examining such references in the Gospels), He is talking about allowing fear to keep us from obeying Him.

Back to Jehoshaphat. Can you imagine being told you’re being surrounded by ISIS, and then trying to not have fear? Are—you—kidding—me? Jehoshaphat did what I encourage you to do. He honestly and realistically looked at the threat…and subsequently felt fear. But! But! But! He didn’t stay focused on the fear. And I couldn’t hardly wait to say this: Instead of letting his fear stop his answer to prayer, he used the power of fear to increase a sense of urgency and to push him into the presence of God.

A sense of urgency in prayer is often needed to get certain prayers answered. And getting into the presence of God is always needed. This is why I am laboring on this point of Jehoshaphat’s fear. If you don’t admit how big and dangerous the threat is, you may not find the focus and intensity you need to hold on in prayer until its power is broken and the prayer is answered.

Follow Jehoshaphat’s example. Be honest about what you’re facing, and if this admission causes a so-called negative emotion, whether it’s fear, grief, worry, or whatever, let that thing drive you to your knees. Trust me. If you do this, you won’t have to try to spend more time in prayer. You won’t have to try to be more focused in prayer. You won’t have to try to be more fervent in prayer. The mountain will make sure you have all of these things in abundance!

I am surrounded by destruction, oh Lord, but my eyes are upon You!

Jehoshaphat Took His Mountain To God, And So Can You!

Part two of Jehoshaphat’s prayer is the good part. He did two things that are part of successful prayer results, especially spectacular results. First, he acknowledged and spoke out loud the general greatness of God. That’s always good, but he went a step farther. Second, he transitioned from speaking in general terms of God’s mighty power to specifically asking God to use His mighty power in the nation’s behalf.

Remember this: It’s not enough to acknowledge that God is great and powerful. At some point, you have to transition to asking God to use that mighty power and influence for your specific situation.

Let these words of Jehoshaphat roll around in your heart. Say them out loud a few times. “For we have no power against this great multitude that is coming against us; nor do we know what to do, but our eyes are upon You.”

Jehoshaphat didn’t minimize the threat, did he? He felt overwhelmed, didn’t he? He had fear, didn’t he? Yep, yep, and yep. Didn’t stop him one bit! Why? For the same reasons you won’t be stopped. He acknowledged this horrible threat. It produced fear. He let the fear drive him to prayer. In the presence of fear, while praying, he reminded himself of God’s power and spoke this out loud. He then admitted that he didn’t know what to do. Finally, he said out loud, “But my eyes are on You.”

You won’t be stopped because your eyes are on God!

Lessons Learned

Lesson One. It is not a lack of faith to honestly assess my need, the presence of a mountain, or the power and danger of the threat, if there is one.

Lesson Two. The presence of fear before or during prayer is not an automatic faith or prayer killer. I should use fear and other negative emotions generated by the mountain to drive me to my knees. I should continue this process until I know in my heart or I see with my eyes that the prayer is answered.

Lesson Three. I must remember that the things that are impossible for people are possible for God. He has unlimited power, influence, and creativity. I should believe God well beyond my ability to figure out how He will answer my prayers.

Lesson Four. As I take my issue to God, I should orally speak of His power. And at some point, I must transition to asking God to use that mighty power and influence for my specific situation.

Practical Exercise

  1. Do you have a mountain in your life? If so, write it down.
  2. Think of what happens if that prayer were to never be answered. Scary thought? Good.
  3. Be honest with God about the bigness of the mountain. Tell Him with your mouth how big the mountain is. Don’t be afraid. This isn’t unbelief; it’s actually faith!
  4. Now imitate Jehoshaphat. Say, “Lord, I don’t know what to do, but my eyes are upon You!” Say this out loud several times. Feel the spirit of faith come over you. Now with your eyes closed and hands raised, let the Holy Spirit feed faith thoughts to your mind about God’s ability to fix this situation. You don’t have to know how, just that He is able.

If you liked this excerpt of Eric’s book, You Can Get Answers to Your Prayers, please share it with someone on social media. And if you like spiritual warfare novels, click on the graphic below for a wild ride!

This was article three of a 14-part series on prayer. The next article in the series is Make Sure You Pray According to God’s Will When Dealing with a Mountain. You may read the previous article in this series here.

If you are interested in Eric’s School of Spiritual Warfare & Supernatural Ministry, read more about it here and visit the school’s Facebook group here.

 

Prayer: Move that Mountain through Prayer!

Prayer: Move that Mountain through Prayer!

by | Jul 31, 2017 | Prayer

Prayer: Move that Mountain through Prayer!

Now in the morning, as He returned to the city, He was hungry.
And seeing a fig tree by the road, He came to it
and found nothing on it but leaves,
And said to it, “Let no fruit grow on you ever again.”
Immediately the fig tree withered away.
And when the disciples saw it, they marveled,
saying,“How did the fig tree wither away so soon?”
So Jesus answered and said to them, “Assuredly, I say to you,

If you have faith and do not doubt,
you will not only do what was done to the fig tree,
but also if you say to this mountain, ‘Be removed and be cast into the sea,’
It will be done. And whatever things you ask in prayer,
believing, you shall receive.”

 (Matthew 21:18-22)

Promises like the one above seem so out of reach for us ordinary Christians that we either skip over them or explain them away. Better to put the promise in the basement than to have to live within range of its mocking voice.

Great news! We’re unlocking the basement door and letting this great promise out. Look what happened to personal friends of mine once they put the contents of this book [this article is an excerpt of my book, You Can Get Answers to Your Prayers] into action.

Your Dental School Application is Denied…
Unless You Know How to Pray

 John is a wonderful Christian. He’s smart, too. He graduated with a double major from Georgia Institute of Technology. But sometimes no matter how smart you are, it’s not enough. You see, his passion was to become a dentist and periodically provide free dental services as a medical missionary. Standing directly in the path of this God-given dream was a mountain. The name of this mountain was Dental School Rejection.

He applied to many schools and was denied. His Dental Admission Test scores were decent. They were within the range of others who had been accepted. He was at a complete loss as to why he was being rejected. Of course, many people are not accepted into dental school. It’s a normal part of life. The question, however, was as a son of God was he subject to this limitation?

John came up for prayer about this matter one evening at our church. I shared with him that he wasn’t subject to this limitation because God could overrule everyone who was denying him. I shared with him how I had gone directly to God many times when the mountain had said no and ultimately God had overruled the mountain. I told John to cry out to God and to thank Him for removing the mountain even before there was any natural evidence that it had been removed.

I then instructed him to go right back to those dental schools that had rejected him. I told him that because of his prayers, God could do one or more of several things to get him into dental school. He could change the hearts of those who had denied him. He could replace those people with others who would accept him. He could create a new program that would provide him a slot. Or He could do that God thing He does so often and baffle our minds with His creativity and power.

We went over Scriptures like Jeremiah 33:3, “Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know.” Which you do not know. Think God opening the Red Sea to save the Hebrews from the Egyptian army (Exodus 14). Think Jesus multiplying a few fishes and loaves of bread to save thousands (Matthew 15:32-38).

There is no way you or I would’ve imagined either of those moves by God. His influence, power, and creativity are infinitely beyond our ability to figure out. That’s why we shouldn’t spend too much time considering how difficult it would be for God to answer our prayers. Our part is to ask; His part is to answer.

Oh, and I guess you’ve figured out John’s story. The school coincidentally started a new program that allowed him to be accepted. He starts dental school next month!

Oh, how I love those coincidences!

You’re Stuck at This Financial Level…
Unless You Know How to Pray

 Kenny and Abbey are wonderful Christians. They’d been dating for quite a while. Marriage was definitely an item of interest for them both. However, Kenny’s financial history and status, and his career path had built-in challenges that Abbey felt should best be changed prior to them getting married.

The mountain was that there was absolutely nothing in Kenny’s past or anticipated future to give them a realistic reason to think the situation would change for their good. So Abbey listened to my teachings about pressing in to God in prayer. She discussed this with Kenny and they agreed to change the situation through prayer. You know what’s coming now, don’t you? Yep, another coincidence.

It took about two or three months of them crying out to God and using the twelve elements of prayer listed in chapter one. Wouldn’t you know it? A friend of Kenny learned through a friend that there was a great job coming open at one of the major airlines. Kenny’s friend lobbied heavily to get his friend to consider Kenny.

In a little while Kenny was hired. Today he walks around with a permanent smile on his face, happy with his beautiful bride, Abbey, and gushing about his high salary and great benefits. Think of it. Decades of financial ruin and dead-end jobs spectacularly turned around through a few months of intelligent, fervent prayer.

In the following chapters, we’ll dissect the anatomy of prayers that are spectacularly answered. You’re going to learn exactly how to imitate others who receive great answers to prayer.

You’re next in line to receive your own, precious child of God!

Lessons Learned That I Can Use Now

Lesson One. Other Christians are getting spectacular answers to prayer and so can I!

Lesson Two. No doesn’t have to remain no if I know how to pray!

Practical Exercise

  1. Look at your prayer list. After reading about God so dramatically answering other people’s prayers, do you need to add anything to your list?
  2. Use your imagination to think of “coincidences” that could bring your prayers closer to becoming reality. Write the coincidences down. God has unlimited creativity; so He doesn’t need the coincidences you write down. But keep your eyes and ears open. Don’t be surprised if He uses a couple of them just to let you see He’s with you.

If you liked this excerpt of Eric’s book, You Can Get Answers to Your Prayers, please share it with someone on social media. And if you like spiritual warfare novels, click on the graphic below for a wild ride!

This was article two of a 14-part series on prayer. The next article in the series is Honestly Recognize the Mountain, but Compare It to God’s Ability. You may read the previous article here.

If you are interested in Eric’s School of Spiritual Warfare & Supernatural Ministry, read more about it here and visit the school’s Facebook group here.