James 5:16 | NKJV Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.
James 5:16 | AMPC …The earnest (heartfelt, continued) prayer of a righteous man makes tremendous power available [dynamic in its working].
James 5:16 | ERV …Anyone who lives the way God wants can pray, and great things will happen.
James 5:16 | MSG …The prayer of a person living right with God is something powerful to be reckoned with.
James 5:16 | TPT …for tremendous power is released through the passionate, heartfelt prayer of a godly believer!
There is a key to living and functioning in the power of God that most of us have not yet tapped in to and that is heartfelt, fervent prayer.
Jesus taught on prayer quite a bit in His earthly ministry.
Luke 18:1 | NKJV Then He spoke a parable to them, that men always ought to pray and not lose heart (give up – NLT)
Why would Jesus tell us to always pray if prayer does not work? Why would He also tell us to not lose heart or become discouraged when we are praying for something?
I believe that He knew that it was a great possibility that we could get discouraged while we were praying for something.
Why did Jesus pray?
Was it simply to be an example to us? Not necessarily. Jesus is an example for us, but I believe the reason that Jesus spent much time in prayer was because He needed to pray.
Philippians 2:7-8 | TPT Instead he emptied himself of his outward glory by reducing himself to the form of a lowly servant. He became human! (8) He humbled himself and became vulnerable, choosing to be revealed as a man and was obedient. He was a perfect example, even in his death—a criminal’s death by crucifixion!
He laid aside all His Divinity and picked up His humanity and as a human He needed the power and direction of the Holy Spirit in His life.
- Jesus needed to commune and fellowship with His Father.
If Jesus, when He was on this earth needed to pray, do you think there is a possibility that we need to pray?
Why don’t we pray more?
- Complacency
Complacency – a false sense of security; accepting of a current situation that should be changed
There are things that we could avert, change, or avoid altogether if we would only pray about situations in our lives.
- Unbelief
We really don’t believe that something is going to happen.
- Discouragement
Perhaps, we have prayed for something that did not happen and we get discouraged.
Or it may seem that God is not moving in that situation that we are praying about and so we get discouraged.
There are two attributes of God that we should understand because if we understand them, they will motivate us to pray instead of not praying.
The enemy is so subtle that he has taken these two character attributes of God and he twisted them to get us not to pray.
- The Sovereignty of God
This is a characteristic of God. The word sovereign means supreme ruler. God is the Supreme Ruler of the Universe.
Satan has twisted this to get us to believe that because God is the Supreme Ruler of the Universe, He is going to do whatever He wants to do, and God’s will is going to happen no matter what we do.
Whatever is going to happen is going to happen. We say, “God knows my needs, and if they are going to be met, He will just meet them.”
Matthew 6:8 NKJV (8) “Therefore do not be like them. For your Father knows the things you have need of before you ask Him.
God’s will = God’s desire.
God’s desire is that none should perish but that all should come to repentance.
2 Peter 3:9 NKJV (9) The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.
This is the will or desire of God, but does that mean it is automatically going to come to pass because He is Sovereign? No.
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- In His Sovereignty, God created us in His image with the right to choose and to have a will.
In other words, if there are those that die and go to Hell, it is not because of the will of God; it is because of our human will.
We determine our future. God has a great plan for our lives, but we determine by our will whether we experience that plan or not.
He has given us the ability and privilege to pray, and if we pray, He is going to move on our behalf. He has put it in your hands. He gave the stewardship of your life to you.
God is looking for a person to cooperate and agree with Him.
The reason God’s Sovereignty is a reason to pray, is because you have the right and the privilege to agree and come together in prayer with the Supreme Ruler of the Universe.
Example: In Matthew 6, The disciples asked Jesus to teach us to pray. Jesus’ response was to instruct them to pray this way, “Your will be done on earth as it is in Heaven.”
- The Immutability of God.
Malachi 3:6 TLB “For I am the Lord—I do not change. That is why you are not already utterly destroyed, for my mercy endures forever.
The enemy wants us to believe that you are not going to change God so why bother praying.
Just because God’s character will never change does not mean He will not change His mind.
He cannot change Who He is as a person, but He can His mind. He cannot change His character because He is perfect.
In the Bible there are many cases in the Bible where God changed His mind because people prayed.
Moses prayed for the Children of Israel and God changed His mind about the punishment that they had incurred.
God said something and then did not do it. He did not lie; He changed His mind.
The story of Jonah is another example of God changing His mind.
It was not God’s desire to destroy Nineveh but His righteous character was requiring it to happen. If it was not His desire to save Nineveh, why did He send Jonah? They repented and God changed His mind. Their will determined their future and not God.
The reason to pray is that because God cannot change, this means that He will always be merciful, compassionate and want to be good to people.
He is the Sovereign Ruler of the Universe and He can and will answer prayer. He cannot change and therefore He will always be kind, compassionate, and merciful if someone will ask Him.
God’s will is to bless and prosper you but it will not happen if you don’t pray.
Your prayers are the pipeline from earth to Heaven.
We need to pray, and God will move when we pray.