Your prayers are powerful! Your prayers are needed! This year, the Lord has spoken to me about prayer. I felt like I heard from the Lord, “I am systematically dismantling the evil framework used to oppress and suppress the “common people,” but I don’t call them that. I call them my people. Evil will have no place to stand, no scaffolding to prop itself up. I am building up the stones of my church; the gates of evil will not prevail against the onslaught of the church and their prayers. See, I am raising up my godly ones, Sons and Daughters who I have set aside for this time and this purpose.”
Also, I heard, “You will pray for many things; your prayers are needed, required, and critical… Truth will prevail. Righteousness will be revealed. Justice will be done. As you have prayed. Your prayers are important (and powerful) and your journey is important. Be still before the Lord and heed the voice of the Spirit. He’ll lead you to show you what you *must* pray.”
And I also heard from an angel in a vision, “Thank you for your prayers for us; we love to be strengthened with His power.”
What Does the Bible Say About Prayer
In James 5:13-16 (ESV), it says, “Is anyone among you suffering? Let him pray. Is anyone cheerful? Let him sing praise. Is anyone among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.”
The NIV translates the end of verse 16 this way: “The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.” Do you believe it? Do you believe your prayers are powerful and effective? Do you believe your prayers have great power as they are working? Maybe you’ve been convinced by someone or something that you are not righteous. Let me tell you, you are righteous if you are in Christ.
1 Corinthians 1:30 (ESV) “And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption”
2 Corinthians 5:21 (ESV) “For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”
If Jesus did that for us, we should consider ourselves righteous rather than unrighteous. And if we are righteous because of the precious blood of Jesus, that means our prayers are powerful and effective. If our prayers are powerful and effective, then we should probably start considering our prayers as powerful and effective!
Demons Can Hinder Prayers
Now, prayers can actually be hindered. Sometimes it’s beyond our control, as Daniel experienced when he was praying for three weeks straight.
Daniel 10:11-14 (ESV) says, “And he [the angel] said to me, ‘O Daniel, man greatly loved, understand the words that I speak to you, and stand upright, for now I have been sent to you.’ And when he had spoken this word to me, I stood up trembling. Then he said to me, ‘Fear not, Daniel, for from the first day that you set your heart to understand and humbled yourself before your God, your words have been heard, and I have come because of your words. The prince of the kingdom of Persia withstood me twenty-one days, but Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help me, for I was left there with the kings of Persia, and came to make you understand what is to happen to your people in the latter days. For the vision is for days yet to come.’” (words in brackets mine)
A great spiritual battle was going on in the heavenly realms, but the answer from Heaven went forth as soon as Daniel started praying, “from the first day.” It just took 3 weeks for the angel to get to Daniel to give him the answer.
We Can Hinder Prayers
Sometimes our prayers are hindered because of us. In 1 Peter 3:7 (ESV), it says, “Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered.”
If we as husbands live with our wives in a misunderstanding way and show them dishonor, then our prayers will be hindered because of our actions. It’s a great call to love our wives as Christ loves the church and to lay down our lives for our wives. We get to wash them with the water of the Word, understand who they are, and show them honor. We are their spiritual umbrella, taking all the pot shots of the enemy so they don’t have to. I’ve noticed the women are usually pretty discerning, and they have “gut feelings” that should be heeded.
Things I’ve Seen In Prayer
Your prayers have great effect in the spiritual realm. I’ve seen it. The Lord started giving me visions during prayer in 2018 (background story here). One time, I had an encounter with an angel in a vision during prayer. As the angel was flying away, I prayed in the moment that the Lord would strengthen him with His power. Immediately, I saw a lightning bolt strike the angel, and it was like the angel warped into light speed. The angel tossed back a “thanks!” and I knew that the lightning bolt represented God’s power given to the angel. It was one of the coolest things I’ve seen in a vision.
Now, you may be curious how much experience I have in this realm, if I’m qualified to talk about prayer. Let’s just say I have 8 hours of dedicated prayer time every week, mostly praying with other people (so they can vouch for me), and that doesn’t even include all the spontaneous prayers I have with people. My prayer time has far outweighed my tv time, and year-to-date, I’ve likely spent over 350 hours in prayer.
I don’t tell you this to try to puff myself up or to put you down – not at all! – but I’d like you to see where I’m coming from and what my heart is. Amazing things happen in prayer. Great guidance and peace is given during prayer. The Lord oftentimes speaks to me during prayer, and now I have a vision almost every time I close my eyes to pray. It’s a fantastic journey; it is likely the most important ingredient to an abundant life. I can definitely say that my whole life has been changed through prayer, through the Lord’s power and Spirit coming upon me through prayer.
Healing Time
Let me give you a couple of recent testimonies to build up your faith. (How do we overcome? By the blood of the Lamb and the word of our testimony. Revelation 12:11) My good friend had covid along with his wife and 3 of his 4 children. Cherise and I decided to drive down and pray for them. When we arrived, he looked sick, with cloudy eyes and a temperature of 103°F. I read excerpts from Psalm 91, Psalm 103, Mark 16, and James 5 about healing, anointed my hands and my friends with oil, and started praying. I had placed my hand on the back of my friend’s neck, and his body was a lot hotter than my hand. As we prayed for him and his family, my hand started getting hotter than his neck. (Just FYI, hot hands during prayer typically means an anointing for healing.)
After we prayed, he went and took his temperature. It was 99°F! It had dropped 4 degrees during prayer! His eyes had cleared up, and he was able to blow bubbles with his daughter, an activity that almost made him pass out a couple days before. On our way out, he told me that the Lord had told him at midnight the night before, “Someone will come pray for you that’s not afraid of covid.” Turns out that “someone” was me and Cherise, and we weren’t afraid of covid!
The Hurt Knee Healed
Today (11/14/21), at 11:10am, my ministry partner sent me a message. Before I tell you what he wrote, I have to tell you what happened last Tuesday. You see, my ministry partner and I were on the phone, praying for his men’s conference coming up over the weekend. During prayer, in a vision I saw a guy sitting on a couch with a hurt left knee. My friend was praying for his knee, and in the process lifted it up to straighten it out, and he pulled it out toward himself. The knee popped and was instantly healed.
I reminded him of the vision last night, and his text message to me today read (including a pic of the guy): “He’s checking his left knee that was just healed!! Hallelujah! I pulled on it like you said/saw.” A man’s knee was healed today through prayer and the power of the Holy Spirit! You see, our prayers are powerful and effective.
How To Get Started
“How do I get started in prayer?” you may ask. It’s very simple. Say hello to God. Tell the Father how much you love Him. Thank Jesus for saving you and giving you His righteousness. Be grateful to the Holy Spirit for being your Comforter and Helper.
You can also try praying Scripture over yourself, one of the best things you can do. Pick any Psalm and just pray through it. Or you can pray one of Paul’s prayers. Read Ephesians 1:15-23 and Titus 3:3-8. Now let’s anoint ourselves with these passages in prayer as one would anoint another with oil (James 5:14).
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