The Power Of Prayer

Let's lift our Bibles up, wave them around, make Jesus glad, the devil mad.

Let's say this together say have any, father, I do want more, more of you, more of your presence, more of your spirit, more of your glory.

Set a fire down on the inside that I can't contain, that it will spread all over this world.

People just look at me and see something different, because it's real what you've done in my life and what you wanna do for everybody in Jesus' name, amen.

Let's turn in our Bibles, please, to James, chapter five, and I wanna begin a series today, james chapter five, and I'll start reading in verse 16 and the second part of that verse, the effectual, fervent prayer of a righteous man, a valeth much, but I wanna read it in the amplified because it's a little louder the earnest, heartfelt, continued prayer of a righteous man.

Of course, a righteous woman makes tremendous power available, dynamic in its working, tremendous power.

And so I wanna begin a series on the power of prayer.

The power of prayer.

You know I mentioned in our opening remarks about this year that God spoke to me back in last month in Galveston about being the year of momentum.

And you know we need in order to have that momentum and know, see, because prayer is not just.

We're gonna talk about it in detail.

We, you know we're all in different areas of knowledge about prayer.

Some of us pray like baby prayers and some of us are more advanced and so forth.

But we can all grow.

But there's a momentum, see.

There's a momentum that can cause people that are maybe way behind to catch up real fast.

We're living in the compression of the ages.

James is an end time book.

Everything you read in James is the context of the time we're living right now.

It was true of all time, but it's even more true now because we're just down the last bit of the age.

Jesus is coming.

There's a whole lot to get done all at one time, and we've got to be people of prayer in order to not only know what's going on but what is our part in it.

See, it's.

You know.

We're created for fellowship with God.

God is a father.

He's a father.

What the fathers want?

They want kids.

If you want kids, a dog won't do.

A dog is good.

You can have a dog, you can have a cat, you can have an armadillo, whatever you like.

You can have a cow.

I know people that talk to their cows, but you can't really have fellowship with a cow, can you?

If you can have fellowship with a cow, then you need this message.

I'm letting you learn how to be a dog, deep down in the bottom of my heart.

I'm letting you know how to be a cat.

Step down, got a dog and then you know how to be a cow is what?

And the dog had a dog.

So people who have two sides will be sitting in that one side, where they've been raised in a universe at day four kids.

That's what prayer is.

Prayer is not a laundry list.

We're going to get into the do's and don'ts and all of that, but I just want to start off by saying that we all have room to grow and this is the year of momentum.

Everything old is new.

Again, in prayer, you get him to light your fire.

It's in your prayer life.

No prayer life, no fire life.

There's no fire.

Without prayer, there's no knowledge of what's ahead.

You just wander around aimlessly.

You know you're walking your way and walk.

Most Christians walk according to their flesh, they walk according to whatever it feels good, whatever seems good and all of that.

Well, a prayer life will change what you're doing Because you, you know, in prayer you receive from God, you fellowship with God and then you receive from him.

And so this end time book, that prayer, makes tremendous power available.

Everybody say tremendous power.

Brother Mark got into this last week, if you were here Sunday morning.

He talked about the Ephesians prayers, ephesians one and two, the Ephesians prayers and how Dad Hagan used to say like you pray these prayers in Ephesians one and two and three.

I pray Ephesians, chapter three, prayer two.

I pray a lot of the prayers that are listed in the epistles because their Holy Ghost written and inspired.

So we ought to be praying those, and most of them are praying for things like wisdom and revelation.

Most of them are praying for knowledge of God, know how God operates, how God works, why?

Because we're in the God class of being.

We're called to imitate God, be imitators, be followers of God as dear children and walk in love.

I mean, if God is love and he's a love of God, then we ought to pray and then we ought to be more like him.

You see people that don't have any love and they just treat people with, you know, disrespect and sarcasm.

That's the person that doesn't have a prayer life.

That's the person's empty, oh, we need to be filled and filled again, amen.

And so he talked about that last week and it just segues into what he didn't know.

I was going to preach on this.

I knew I was going to preach on this because we mentioned it about this year and the momentum and how important, if you know, if you, if something's got momentum and you're called and join it, you've got to.

Okay, let's talk about surfing.

I've never I'm not been a big surfer, but I body surfed.

I bought a boogie board Anybody know what a boogie board is.

My kids wanted one and I got.

I used it more than they did, but I never did learn to surf like surf on a surf board, I mean, I just didn't have the balance to do it.

I think I could have learned if somebody who had given me lessons.

But the whole key to that is that you go out there where the waves are breaking and you got to read the waves and not every wave is a good surf wave and then you finally pick out a good one and then you you've got to time it.

Because what, what are you doing?

You're going to ride the momentum of that wave, hopefully all the way out from where it was, all the way to the shore.

And of course, when you start out you don't go very far and then you go and then you wipe out.

You know, I was in a why?

A Wahoo in the North Shore of a Wahoo, where those got some.

I mean, those are big boy waves there, and I was there in a in a February which the biggest waves are December through February there in that part of the world, and it just, you know, after growing up in Galveston, you see waves, you go to a Wahoo, you see a wave.

I mean that's a different.

There's no way that, there's no way I would even attempt to even set my toe in the water.

We were, we were sitting on the beach, gladys and I, we had everything all spread out, you know, and we were, and the waves were down below us, they were hitting on the shore and they were huge waves.

Just right there, big old wave curling up and it it looked like it's going to sweep us away, but the, the beach was real steep.

I thought we were fine, you know, no problem.

I had my cell phone there and all my stuff there.

We had our lunch there and on about 10 minutes.

Here comes a wave and I mean it swept us.

I mean we were both out there in it.

I mean it just grabbed us and pulled us right out.

I was too close.

My cell phone wasn't ever the same again, so so there's tremendous power and we have to pray in order to line ourselves up with a momentum that we're about to join.

We're joining something that's already underway.

I want you to see, we need to be people of prayer.

We need to be individually people of prayer and we need to invent.

When we get together for corporate prayer, we're gonna have some more power or prayer to do.

This year we suspended it for a while.

I felt like we needed to do something different.

Some of you don't know what I'm talking about, but back during the election of 2020, we had power hour prayer.

After COVID and all of that, we had power hour prayer on Sunday nights where we'd get together and sing a couple of songs and we'd pray.

We'd have corporate prayer on Sunday night.

So we kind of doubled up on praying.

A lot of what we're entering into that you're gonna hear a little bit more about later is built because of all the praying that was done.

Then Amen, prayer will prepare you for what's ahead.

Prayer will soften the ground.

It's kind of like sending in the bombers to bomb the island.

Before you land on it you gotta soften it up.

Then you send the Navy in and it softens it up some more.

That's what they did in all the islands and off of Japan and World War II.

They couldn't just land on the island because they had too many of the enemy dug into those islands.

It was bloody enough as it was, but they would just pound those islands with bombs from airplanes and then they would pound those islands from shells from the offshore battleships and then they would land.

There's no substitute for boots on the ground.

There have to be.

Look, we're the boots on the ground.

There's no substitute for boots on the ground.

There's no substitute for us being personally involved.

You can pray all day.

There's people that just they just think that praying is all about.

No, it's not all that needs to be done.

There has to be an action item.

With your prayer, God will always give you something to do.

This church has been busy doing, and we're just now coming into things that have been prayed about for 25 years or more.

Are y'all with me now Talking about the power of prayer.

So if there's tremendous power available through prayer, then by implication there's a tremendous power vacuum when there is no prayer.

You know, when there's no prayer it's worse than what you would think.

It becomes a reverse.

It becomes a reverse and now the absence of prayer means the devil is gonna start taking some things.

He's gonna come to steal, kill and destroy.

Because, why?

Because he sees, there's no prayer, there's nothing set up against what he's doing.

See, there's no resistance.

When the Nazis decided to attack man, I mean, they had the Blitzkrieg In Norway, one of the Scandinavian countries they took Oslo in two days.

For that, y'know, y'all leave.

Yeah, they didn't believe in having armies.

See, they believed in gun control, they believed in peace.

And the Nazis took Oslo in two days.

Sweden made peace with Russia.

Oh boy, that didn't work out too good.

Yeah, they just started.

I mean, they took Poland in just a few days, called it the Blitzkrieg.

These countries were not prepared for the onslaught.

Listen, we're the ones that's gonna bring an onslaught.

We're the ones We've got tremendous power available on our side of the equation.

John Wesley said God does nothing but an answer to prayer.

Why, why is that?

Why can't God just heal our land?

Well, we can pray.

We can pray 2 Chronicles 714.

If my people what you call by my name home of themselves and pray, I will hear from heaven.

I will heal their land.

Well, that's for Israel and that's for a whole different thing.

I mean, israel didn't have all authority in heaven and earth given unto them.

God didn't appear to Moses there.

All authority in heaven and earth is given unto me.

The gold, moses go and subdue the entire.

No, he didn't give that to Moses, he gave it to the church.

He gave it to Jesus and Jesus turned around and gave all authority to the church.

So the church is here and has authority.

We're asking God to do things that he's already given us the authority to handle.

So when I see millions of Christians praying these Old Testament prayers about what we're seeing today in the Biden White House anti-Semitic I mean completely nuts actually.

It is so wrongheaded.

I mean just think.

I mean do you really want to trash this entire country?

Is that what your goal is?

I think they're so proud of themselves.

They think they can tear everything up and rebuild it real quick.

It'll never be rebuilt.

We need a revival in this country.

It's bigger than Donald Trump.

It's bigger than any candidate.

Are we involved?

Yeah, we're involved in politics, but that's just part of it.

I mean, really the big part of this is the gospel has to be preached and the country's got a turn from its wickedness and that's the church's job.

The church Gotta do more than just pray.

So God does nothing but an answer to prayer.

I mean John Wesley, one of the great.

He prayed two hours a day.

He said you know, I pray two hours a day and if I've got a thoroughly busy day or really busy day and I know I've got a lot of challenges I pray three hours a day.

He just turned up the prayer fire.

He got more on fire because he recognized the value of prayer.

Kenneth Copeland said this 40-something years ago.

I heard him say it all failure in Christian enterprise is a prayer failure.

Ow, that hurts, that left a mark.

You know how Brother Copeland is.

He just shoots it out there and hits you right between the eyes.

All failure in Christian endeavor or enterprise is a prayer failure.

And Luke 18, one.

Jesus said men ought always to pray and not to faint.

That is, to turn coward, lose heart and give up.

Sometimes, you know, you start praying about something and things start turning worse.

Have you ever been praying about something and it got worse?

That's kind of typical.

No, you can.

They continued.

It says the earnest, heartfelt, continued prayer.

You continue, you don't quit, you don't turn coward, you don't give up.

Amen.

James again in chapter four.

This is worth looking.

You're in James five.

Just look over James, chapter four, in verse two, the last part of chapter two.

Yet you have not, because you ask not.

Sometimes people pray they don't get answers to prayer because they don't pray.

You have not because you ask not.

So there you go right now.

If you don't pray, you don't have.

I said, if you don't pray, you don't have.

You don't have what he already bought and paid for.

If you don't pray, cause you don't know what it is, you don't know what's been bought and paid for, you don't know what's included.

You're like the guy that took the Atlantic passage on that big old Queen Mary like ship that they used to have back in the 20s and 30s.

And you know, back then you know you didn't have transatlantic flights with airplanes, you had the big old, huge ships.

And he's out there by the life boats eating peanut butter and crackers.

And one of the passengers came out hey, buddy, what are you doing out here?

I'm eating my lunch, he's.

Why are they serving in there?

They got a big old meal.

Oh, I'm just in third class.

He said well, it comes with a ticket.

You bought the ticket.

It comes with a meal.

He's out there eating peanut butter crackers when he could have been eating.

Whatever third class steerage is, I mean, I'm not gonna be real fancy.

It probably was pot roast or something.

It was something better than peanut butter.

I can guarantee that there's a lot of Christians eating peanut butter.

When God has bought something, he's paid for something better.

You have not cause, you ask not.

Or the second thing he said you ask verse three.

You ask and receive not because you ask amiss that you may consume it upon your lusts.

You ask amiss.

I mean some people.

Just they don't pray the way that God wants them to pray.

They pray for things that fit in with their carnal desires.

Lust means fleshly desires.

It doesn't mean sinful desires.

It just means things that are not important for you in that moment.

You're asking for things that are just, that don't belong to you.

How do you know what belongs to you?

Where you gonna read your Bible and pray, communicate with God, cause he'll show you what belongs to you.

And guess what?

What he shows you is gonna be a whole lot bigger and better and greater than what you ever thought.

Thank you, thank you.

You ask, amiss, that you may consume it.

The word consume means waste it.

You just waste.

You know a lot of people.

They have a lot of things that's just a waste.

They're gonna wake up sometime and they're gonna realize that everything that they've pursued is a waste.

But if they had had a prayer life, they would have moved and made adjustments in their lives and moved their self over to being in agreement with what God's plan is for their life Just something that you dream of.

Say, we asked little kids who are 16, 17 years old to make a decision on what they're gonna do with the rest of their life and send them off and go into a quarter of a million $300,000, $500,000 in debt, send them to some fancy college and they come out and they still don't know what they wanna do with the rest of their lives.

Isn't that stupid?

Let's pray, let's teach our kids to pray.

Those kids are learning how to pray out there in Kilburn Church, junior high.

They're learning how to pray, they're learning how to reach God.

Are you with me now?

So, as we begin this series, there's some foundational points we need to make, and you've heard these well, that's great.

If you haven't, well that's then.

You need to know what prayer is, because, again, we see people that pray on a baby level and yet they should be praying at a more advanced level.

They just haven't been taught, they haven't heard a message like this.

But prayer is not trying to get God's attention.

Hey God, did you forget about me?

Children of Israel, they said you know, can God furnish a table and a wilderness?

I mean, he brought water out of the rocks.

They admitted they were there the day that Moses struck the rock and water gushed out to water.

Three million people.

Do you know how much water that is?

That's a lot of water.

And they're animals.

I mean, that's water like you can't believe how much water that is.

They saw it and yet they had the audat.

They got thirsty again later and they go around and say can God furnish a table in the wilderness?

Can God give us some meat to go along?

I'm tired of this old man.

I want some meat.

I want some meat.

I want some garlic and onions and cucumbers, cucumbers.

Okay, garlic and onions, I can underc Cucumbers, it's the top of your list that you want.

Can God see?

They questioned his ability.

That's what happens to people when they quit praying, they quit interfacing with the God of creation, the one who created everything, they quit being impressed with him.

They don't put like this morning.

I mean, how many of you felt his presence?

Now he started, we started expressing to him how hungry we were, how thirsty we were, send a fire that we can't contain.

And you know, he comes down in here and you can cut the atmosphere with a knife.

Well, guess what?

You can have that atmosphere in your home, in your prayer closet.

So no, it's not trying to get God's attention.

Hebrews chapter four says all things are naked and opened under him, with whom we have to do.

I mean, he sees everything, he knows.

If he ever quit noticing you, you'd die, you'd cease to exist, you'd vaporize.

He knows you, he loves you, he knows right what's going on.

It's a vain prayer to ask God.

I heard a preacher one time.

You know, god, if I were you, I'd be a little bit care, a little bit more about what's happening to me.

How arrogant is that for say that to God, I mean you know I wouldn't say that to him.

I mean that's just disrespectful.

Yeah, why?

Why you blame God for your trouble?

He didn't send it, he gave you the answer.

Why are you?

Why?

Why?

And see that that is so ignorant on so many levels.

Why would you ever say that from a pulpit?

All right, so prayer is not trying to get God's attention.

Prayer is not trying to get God to do something.

God now and have a laundry list.

God, I need this, I need that.

I want you to bless me.

My four, no more.

Bless, bless my kids, bless my, bless them, lord.

All my, my kids, all my kids are struggling.

Lord, bless them.

Dr Roy Hicks, I don't anybody ever heard Dr Roy Hicks.

Dr Roy Hicks came to Lakewood years ago.

I hadn't been saved very long when he came on a Sunday morning and preached and he was preaching on prayer and he said you know, some of you need to quit praying.

All the blessings on your back slidden and unsaved children.

And man, it got silent in there.

5,000 people went.

You could just feel the collective of mothers all out there.

I was thinking about a particular person that I knew, not glad it's been a particular person I knew.

I won't say who it was because they might hear it, but they're their favorite thing.

I mean they had, they had kids that just didn't serve God at all.

They weren't saved and they're always praying for the best job and they get a raise and, oh, get the best.

You know, oh, he's looking for a car now and oh, he needs a house, he needs this, and he's just just blubbering all this.

See, you're asking a miss.

What good does it do if all that happens and you go to hell at the end of it?

What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his own?

So you're not praying the right prayer, hun.

He was right and I hadn't been saved a few months and I thought, man, he is right on the button, that is perfect.

But all these others and bruh bruh, bruh, bruh, brother, those didn't got notes and everything had to follow up the next Sunday and defend Dr Roy Hicks.

Well, I mean, come along, grow up.

When are you gonna read your Bible and understand?

You're not using your authority in the proper way.

You ought to be binding the devil that's blinded the minds of your kids.

They know better, they've been raised better in some cases.

Now see, sometimes, when we've lived for the devil all our lives and then we raised our kids that way and then we get saved well, yeah, it's gonna take a while.

Well then, be a good example.

You can still break the power of the devil over there.

You don't have to put up with that, all right.

So so prayer is communication with God and I would say prayer is fellowship with God.

More than you know, when we say prayer, most people think, ask, they think, oh, I'm gonna ask God for this, I'm gonna ask God for that.

Well, there's a certain amount of asking.

We'll get into some of that next week, but really, more of it is just fellowshipping with Him.

Did you know praise is prayer, worship is prayer, worship is prayer.

Sometimes we just need to sing in tongues a while and then shut up and just bask in His presence and let Him love back on us.

Well, but I didn't hear.

He didn't speak to me.

Well, see, quit listening for voices.

I'm not talking about a voice.

I'm not talking about hearing words coming out of God's mouth to talk to you and shake you.

I'm talking about you having a picking up something in the spirit realm and your spirit receives it.

And we're gonna talk about later on in another session about how you pray in other tongues and what your spirit has received in your prayer time starts bubbling up and coming up into where, finally, your mind becomes aware of what your spirit already knew.

See, god doesn't talk to your mind, he doesn't talk to your flesh.

He talks to your spirit.

And I say talks, it's not a voice, it's just a knowing.

Your spirit picks up things from the Holy Spirit that lives right inside of you.

I preached a message on a Wednesday night.

We could go Wednesday on looking to your spirit.

I covered a lot of this on a Wednesday night.

Any of you ever watch Wednesday night?

Well, we're still here on Wednesday night.

Amen, it's just for live stream, that's all.

So prayer is communicating with God, believing and receiving what he's already given to us.

When you combine that with reading your Bible, see, that's how I pray.

I read my Bible with my.

I've read my Bible and I have my Bible open and I pray along with reading my Bible.

That's just how I do it.

Now, you can do it any way you want to, but that's just how I do it and I'll read something in the Bible.

And if I've prayed in tongues and I've magnified God and I've rejoiced that I'm saved and I've had a good time of confession, now I'm reading my Bible and I say, oh, that belongs to me, lord.

Thank you for that.

Oh, glory to God, thank you, thank you, thank you.

That's just how I pray.

Communication.

So I was praying like that one day.

That's just how I pray.

I mean, I'd start off singing.

I had a little Omnicord.

I'd played.

It's an electronic art of harp.

I taught myself how to play it.

Simple courses.

Back when I got saved, the church was singing courses.

Anybody remember courses?

What am I to God we serve?

What am I see?

Not hymns.

You know hymns and hers and all that.

We sang hymns in the Catholic Church, something about the ocean, the sea or something, some dumb song.

I never could understand.

Why is that?

Anyway, I didn't get much out of the hymns in the Catholic Church but I liked the courses.

They were all the word You're singing, the word.

So I'd play those things on my Omnicord, you know, and sing and I'd pray in tongues and I'd read my Bible and I'd thank Him and I'd you know, lord, you show me what I need to know today.

And one day I was reading the story of and it was after that we had suffered the loss of everything.

I mean I made a business decision and I mean, in other words, in here I am in my 40s and I lost everything.

My net worth was right at the floor.

I think I had a bigger net worth when I was 18 because I owned a car.

Now I didn't own a car, I was leasing a car.

The bank had taken three of my cars.

Now I'm leasing a house.

I don't own a house.

So I mean, you know, I think I was a head of the game At 18 I had money in the bank.

I had a car.

I paid for cash for it.

Here I am in my 40s and I just I lost it all.

What did I give up?

No, I didn't give up.

I kept praying and reading my Bible and trusting God for what was next.

And it started building houses again.

I'd gotten out of the building business because that's went through the depression of the 80s here in Houston.

That was a depression, not a recession.

Every builder I knew was broke, including me, and here we were just making it work.

I was working in a remodeling company, making a wage barely enough to pay the basic bills but not to get ahead.

And I was building this house in the West University place fancy houses and I had just.

I didn't have any desire whatsoever for a house.

I had a rent house.

It was fine.

I didn't have any idea that I would live in a house as nice as what I was building for other people.

My sole thing was to make a profit, pay my partner back and be able to, you know, make a living.

And I was just barely making a living at the time.

And one morning I'm reading about brother David, king David.

He went to the profit and said I want to build God a house.

That's not right for him not to have a house.

I want to build him a house.

And the profit said oh yeah, go ahead, do all that's in the heart.

And that night the profit had a dream and said that's not my plan.

David's a man of blood.

He shed too much blood on the earth.

I don't want him building me a house, but it's good that he wants to tell him.

It's good that he wants to.

I'm gonna have his son build me a house.

His son will build me a house.

Tell him it's good.

And I'm reading that story.

And Nathan the profit.

Nathan goes back and that's kind of a big deal.

When a prophet says King's ex, I mean they speak for God.

So for him to have told him to go ahead, that was a really.

I think Nathan probably wondered if he was gonna lose his head over it.

A lot of Kings would have just went in oh, I thought you were a prophet.

They said no and explained to him.

And so then David received it and David prayed the prayer.

You know I'm not worthy, I can't believe.

You're gonna allow my son.

That's so wonderful, thank you so much.

And he said tell David, I'm gonna build him a house.

I'm gonna build him a house.

And when I was reading that, I heard in my spirit I'm gonna build you a house.

What he said I'm gonna build you a house.

I said, well, lord, and I thought I thought he knew.

I thought it.

I don't even want a house.

I didn't want to have to believe for a house.

I mean, after believing for a house to sell and it didn't sell, I mean I built it 695,000, my last house that I'd built before this, I had $1.4 million worth of houses that I'd prayed for to sell and none of them sold until I got out of town and got a job.

Then they all sold and I didn't get the profit from it.

So you just and they took besides that, then they took the rest of my living away from me, took all my house, took my cars, all of that.

So you know, my faith is not where I need to.

I just didn't want to have to believe God for a house for myself.

I didn't want one, but I knew God had spoken to my heart and so I said you know, lord, you want to build me a house, and I prayed David's exact prayer.

I prayed David's prayer.

Nevertheless, do as you have said.

You go ahead and do it as you have said.

And I tried my best to believe what I was speaking.

Speaking, but I mean I didn't really.

I mean I just prayed the word.

Are y'all with me now?

I'm talking about prayer is communicating.

I'm talking about God showed me something that I didn't even want.

I didn't have the faith for it, I didn't have the desire for it, but God showed it to me and said I'm gonna build you a house.

And eight years later he did just that and I'm still living in that house.

I like that house.

Some people left the church because I moved into that house.

I guess they don't believe in prosperity, I can say for themselves.

They don't believe that the preacher ought to have anything.

I guess the preacher ought to just live in a rented, maybe a whatever about a tent.

Is that humble enough?

Amen, God will show you things that you just didn't even want.

And you know, after a while, it took a while, but after a while, you know, I began to desire, began to ask and I began to have faith.

And I never lost that word, I never gave up on it.

And eight years later, gladys and I moved into our house.

Praise God, he built it for us.

I didn't build it, I did not build it, I had.

I got to pick everything out, I got to be the customer.

Praise God, you know, mr Builder, you didn't do this.

Here's a list of the things that are deficient here.

Let me have this, let me have that.

And they did a pretty good job on it, not as good as I could have done, but anyway, that's it, the early church.

Let's look at Acts, chapter two.

Let's look at Acts, chapter two.

Are you getting anything out of this?

Well, we're just starting.

In Acts, chapter two, you had that great day of Pentecost.

All those people got saved, and verse 41, then they that gladly received his word were baptized the same day.

They were added under them about 3,000 souls.

So that's, you got 120 coming out of the upper room and now all of a sudden you got 3,000 more.

I believe we're gonna see today when all these chairs are occupied, we're gonna have to pull some more off the wall and get some more chairs in here.

Just so you know, we have a space for 1,000 in here.

We took a lot of the chairs and put them out because we don't have 1,000 Cummins, it just looks to.

You know, for the longest time we had 1,000 chairs out and it just looked like nobody was here.

But they're coming.

And so it says and they continued.

Verse 42, they continued, see continued prayer.

They continued in the apostles doctrine or teaching.

They continued in the apostles teaching and fellowship and breaking of bread and of prayers.

They continued in prayer and they reaped great results.

I mean, they had thousands of people come to the Lord.

They had notable miracles.

They had you start thinking about the people that went to church there.

I mean you had Stephen and Philip.

I mean Stephen went and did great wonders and signs among the people and they gave heed to what he was saying and he started preaching the Word and it got mad at him and stoned him to death.

And you had Philip went off to Samaria and preached Christ unto them.

They weren't preachers, they were just ushers.

They were doing the believers ministry.

The believers ministry is gonna be coming to the forefront.

As you get into prayer, you're gonna find out that God's got plenty for you to do besides stand behind a pulpit.

You've got two hands that can.

You can lay hands on sick people.

You've got a mouth.

You can sit in the witness chair and testify to people that don't know God like you know Him.

So during this season we're gonna begin to move into what God has prepared for us.

You know, I think, about the doors that are opening for us right now.

Paul said you know there are great.

There's a great door and a factual open under me and there are many adversaries.

One of the reasons why you have to pray and advance is you've got to take care of those demonic powers that camp out beside the open doors that God has for you.

I found people, you know, people just don't pray and they get to those doors, they get taken out right at the door.

They get to that door and they don't get to get through it because why?

There's demonic powers there that they never did handle, they never did prepare for, they never did do any praying.

Listen, a lot of praying that you do.

You don't even know what you're praying about.

We're gonna cover that.

We're gonna cover that Later on.

And you know, I like 1 Corinthians, chapter 12, it talks about that.

1 Corinthians 12 · chapter mention

Every member of us, every person here, is a member of the body of Christ in particular.

God doesn't have big eyes and little views.

Every one of you is a member, in particular, of the body of Christ.

When one suffers, we all suffer.

When one is honored, we all rejoice.

We're not in competition with each other.

That's why we have to walk in love.

Give people a chance.

Maybe they're a personality and your personality are not real compatible.

Well, that's all right.

You don't have to be everybody's best friend, but you do have to love people.

And you know, in this series I'm gonna four weeks here.

The next four weeks I'm loading your weapons with fresh ammunition.

You're gonna have fresh ammo.

Name of Jesus, the blood of Jesus, the word of God, the Holy Ghost, that's all you need.

Everybody say fresh ammunition and our collective firepower.

I'm headed into a place where, sometime during this year, when we do get together in corporate prayer, both Thursday nights and some of these Sunday night prayer meetings that we're gonna have again we're not gonna do every Sunday night, but we're gonna pick some out by the spirit and have prayer meeting on Sunday night and when we get together, that collective firepower is going to make it possible for us to get up to speed with the momentum that we're joining.

See, we didn't create all the momentum.

We're joining up with a momentum that God has built in the body.

We're coming alongside different ministries, different charities, different political action committees, political action committees, pacs.

We're coming alongside a bunch of people that we don't know that well, but they're all headed in the same direction and I'm telling you, it's just imperative that we pray.

It's imperative that we pray so we can just join up with that momentum that's going.

And so then, also those of us here that are under particular attack and I know that some of you are you go through things.

There's things that bad health reports, things going through with your family, things going through with marriage things going.

You're going through with finances.

Those that are in particular attack are going to join and they're going to receive from every joint that supplies.

When you come to church, there's an extra measure of grace, there's an extra measure of strength and anointing is coming into you to where you're not fighting anything by yourself, you're not fighting from a victimhood, you're fighting from victory.

This is the victory that overcome, with the world, even our faith, and that's where your faith is stirred up, your faith is energized.

And then also the rest of us, all of us really needing to adjust our receivers.

I had to adjust my receiver when God said I'm going to build you a house.

I couldn't receive it, but I didn't need it right then.

And the fullness of time when I did need it.

And there came a day when I needed it.

The rent house I was living in eight years later, after we had started the church, the church was only going a year and a half and all of a sudden the rent house I was just so satisfied never went up in rent in eight years.

That's favor.

It's almost like stealing candy from a baby really, because I knew that house.

I mean, we had signed the deal for $1,000 a month in just automatic to renew it each year and they never went up.

I kept thinking, well, they're gonna go up.

They never heard from me.

The water heater broke I fixed the water heater.

Air conditioner broke I fixed the air conditioner.

I mean, the faucets leak I fixed the faucets.

I don't mess with them, I don't call them and say, ah ah, ah, ah, ah, ah, ah.

But then one day I had a constable knock on my door looking for the owner and they hadn't paid the subdivision maintenance fee and the subdivision was gonna start foreclosure proceedings and foreclose on the house that I'm living in, even though I never was.

I mean, I paid them, I made sure that rent was paid on time every month.

But then on their side they were struggling financially.

They weren't charging enough for the house and I knew it and they couldn't pay the maintenance fee.

They just let it go and didn't know that they could lose the house.

So it became imperative for us to find another place to live.

So that's with the need then that I drew on that word that I had eight years.

Come on now y'all Listen when he speaks.

It doesn't have an expiration date on it.

Oh, glory to God.

So yeah, everybody say I'm adjusting my receiver.

See, adjust your receiver to receive everything that God has for you.

Brother Mark tells the story of being at a fellowship with a bunch of preachers and sitting at the table with Brother Copeland.

Brother Copeland's talking about one of his jets and something.

You know, he's got an airport that he owns.

He's got a fleet of jets.

I mean he's a businessman along with being a minister.

I mean he's just, you know, he's just involved in a lot of things besides just preaching.

He's given jets, sewn jets.

I mean you know you give a jet away, you're gonna get multiple jets back.

He fixes them.

He's got a whole facility there, eagle Mountain.

Just in case you didn't know, we're partners.

So anyway, he's sitting at the table and Brother Mark said something.

I mean Brother Copeland said something about his jet and Brother Mark just kind of joked about his piston.

He had a piston plane.

You know, little plane, smaller plane, it'd get there but slower, not as far, you know, it's got less range and less speed, but at least he had a plane.

I mean he used to have an old station wagon and then he had a you know I mean, he's grown up, you know just preaching around and doing everything he could and he said yeah, you know you're joking about a jet, but the Lord showed me that he's been trying to get a jet to you for two years and you just won't receive it.

Ow, in front of everybody you wanna say that In front of everybody's sitting at the table.

That's what happens when you get around.

People that will tell you the truth.

He wasn't being disrespectful, he just didn't have time to couch it in diplomatic language.

That's not Brother Copeland's style.

And so if you're rubbing the cat's fur the wrong way, let the cat turn around.

So Brother Mark had to turn around See, he was rubbing his fur the wrong way, see.

And he turned around and adjusted his receiver and he got a jet.

See, Now he's since sold it back in September and he told us that he sold it because he just wasn't working for him anymore.

It's better for him to just when he flies sometimes he charters and sometimes he flies commercially, just right now in the season he's in it just made sense for him to sell it.

So he sold it and he's doing just fine.

In other words thank God.

I mean thank God.

He's using wisdom about his ministry.

See, are you with me now?

Everybody say I'm adjusting my receiver to receive what God has already paid for me.

He already paid for it.

It's done, it comes with the ticket.

Jesus bought the ticket Now.

So the result is tremendous power being released to overcome all hindrances.

Everybody say every hindrance is overcome by this tremendous power.

So three things I'll leave you with you today.

Number one, and it goes back to Ephesians, chapter one and chapter two Dad Hagen says you ought to read these prayers and pray those prayers at least once a day better, twice a day for at least six months and the Bible will become a new book.

Well, I've been praying them for a lot longer than that.

I keep them, I keep them in front of my eyes and you can do that after a while.

You don't even need your Bible open to pray the prayer.

It just comes out of you because it's in you.

You didn't memorize the scripture, it's just in you and you approach everything with that knowledge that he has given you.

So Ephesians one and two prayer our position of prayer is that we are seated in Christ, in God's right hand.

You're seated far above all principality.

Power might dominion every circumstance, every trouble.

You're far above it.

Just that knowledge.

Now you can hear me say it and you can mentally agree with it, but until you pray it and until you meditate on it for a period of at least six months or so, it's just not gonna really be reality for you.

It takes longer than that.

Mental agreement doesn't do anything.

Most Christians will mentally agree with that statement, but they don't really, really really believe it in their heart.

It takes a while for that to get engrafted down into your spirit, to where you know that you're no longer going.

God, can you see me down here?

Can you see me down here?

I'm just a little weak worm in the dust.

No, you look to your left because you're seated at his right hand.

See, there's God right there.

He's right there off your left shoulder.

You're at his right hand in Christ.

You don't have to try to get his attention.

You don't try to get him to do anything.

You're just talking to him like you talk to somebody sitting around the table.

I like to picture myself sitting at the company table, the company business of God and sons unlimited.

He is the CEO and I'm one of his sons, and I've got my part to play in the family business.

So your position of prayer is seated in Christ, far above, and then again in Ephesians one and two.

The power that is released when you pray is the same power that raised Christ from the dead.

It's the same power that raised you from the dead, see.

The same power brought you out of darkness and delight, out of all of that, out of the world, and to his kingdom.

The same power, and then it elevated you and placed you at his right hand.

There is no power like that on the earth.

There's no nuclear power, there's no power of nations, there's no power of the government.

There's no power like it.

It is the supreme power that God has entrusted the church with.

Again, you can agree with that or not.

I'll be.

You know, just looking, I don't think very much of the church understands it.

And so they just always just well, I did everything I needed to do.

I just couldn't do anything else but just pray.

You couldn't do anything but just pray.

See, that tells you right there that they don't know anything, because prayer is what you ought to do first.

If you prayed, all this other stuff would be.

You might be going through it, but you wouldn't care about it because it'd be under your feet.

You'd be stepping on it, you'd be stomping on it.

Glory to God, it hadn't affected your joy.

Well, not one bit.

Your joy is the same.

Nobody could look at you and know that you're going through anything.

Why?

Because you're full of joy.

And then, finally, the last one your place of safety.

Again, you're seated where it heavily places, at the right hand of God, but you're arrayed with the entire armor of God, ephesians 6-11.

And when you keep reading Ephesians 6, you realize that it's prayer armor.

Take upon you the whole armor of God.

And then it goes down to verse 18, praying.

So everybody say prayer armor, the entire armor of God.

So when you have the armor of God on, you look indistinguishable from Jesus.

You're in him.

But now you look like you're in him.

I just keep thinking about the young man who had all the demons that the sons of Sceva tried to cast the demons out of this kid, and they were Jewish exorcists.

Acts, chapter 19.

Acts 19 · chapter mention

They came up to this kid and said, in the name of the Jesus that Paul preaches, come out.

They'd seen him function, so they thought that they could cast a devil out of this young man.

And the young man says, well, jesus, I know and Paul, I know, but who are you?

And the young man jumped on those seven and stripped them naked and wounded.

They fled naked and wounded from the presence of that young man.

I mean, you know, we ask our police officers to go out there and confront people that are filled with demons and have supernatural strength.

And even if they use their weapons, it's not good enough really.

I guess we expect them just to go out there and die.

I guess If you use your weapon, we're going to fire you, we're going to sue you, we're going to accuse you of murder, we're going to oh, this is all got to, it's got to change.

God's not in that, god's not.

God is not for that kind of society.

So everybody say I'm a raid in the whole armor of God.

So we're going to get more into this.

Next week we're going to talk about more specifics, about prayer, the power of prayer.

Come on, lift your hands right now.

Father, we thank you that you've entrusted to the church the name of Jesus, the word of God, the Holy Ghost, the blood of Jesus.

You've given us instructions on how to approach you and how I have fellowship with you.

Lord, we thank you that we're growing in our prayer lives, that they're becoming more and more satisfied.

You know, when I first started praying, it just seemed like it was exhausting.

I felt so tired.

When I got, you know, finished praying because I always felt like I didn't ask for enough and it took me a while to mature.

I started praying these prayers and my prayer life changed totally.

I got off this big long list of things that I wanted God to do for me and I just concentrated on getting to know Him.

I concentrated on fellowshiping with Him, and it puts more into you than it takes out of you.

I said it puts more into you than it takes out of you, hallelujah.