The Power Of Prayer 3

down and pick up your Bibles and let's get into the Word.

This morning, on Mother's Day, I don't have a Mother's Day message.

Let me just say that right off the bat Praise the Lord, my message is happy Mother's Day, amen.

But I'm sharing a series of messages on the power of prayer and I believe that that's what the Holy Ghost wants us to focus on right now.

Let's lift our Bibles up and I know Mamas are praying Mamas.

That's good that you're going to hear some things maybe you haven't heard before and help you be more effective in your prayers.

Let's just wave those Bibles around.

Make Jesus glad, the devil mad.

Say this together.

Say, heavenly Father, I'm so glad that you gave me a mama and I'm so glad for the influence and I'm so glad for the influence of the Word and the Holy Spirit in my life.

It's because of those, then, I have the victory.

Today I overcome, I'm able to shout hallelujah in the face of the enemy.

In Jesus name, amen, praise God.

Let's be seated, please, and turn your Bibles to our text, james, chapter five, and to remind you that James is an end time book.

You know, 2nd Peter, revelation.

Sometimes we get stuck on the book of Revelation.

Of course that's an end time book, but there's other books in the Bible that have an emphasis on the end days and we're living in those, aren't we?

And I say we're living in the last of the last days, james, chapter five, verse 16, the second part of the verse of the effectual, fervent prayer of a righteous man, of aleth much, and I like the amplified, the earnest, heartfelt, continued prayer of a righteous man or woman makes tremendous power available.

Dynamic, multifaceted, I mean.

The power of God is adaptable to any situation.

There's nothing too hard for the Lord when we begin to pray those effectual, the earnest, the heartfelt, the continued prayer of the righteous, it brings much power to bear.

Dynamic in its working, tremendous power, and we've established a quick recap in the last couple of weeks.

We've established that that power is no less than the God's resurrection power, the power with which he raised Jesus from the dead, raised us from the dead.

We were all dead in sin when we, when we accepted Jesus as Lord and personal Savior, we were born again and raised, just like Jesus was raised.

That's why we baptized in water, in immersion, not the sprinkling.

The immersion in water of a born again believer show forth the death barrel and resurrection, not only of Jesus but of us, raised in newness of life.

And so that power and that power seated Christ in heavenly places and seated us in him.

Praise God.

That's the power with which we pray.

We pray available, with that power available and, and so when we don't pray, there's a power vacuum.

You can look at the country and that's the reason.

Anybody want to know why.

Why is it like this?

Why?

Well, part of it is because Jesus said was going to happen, and and you know Mark and Matthew 24, luke 21 he told us how it was going to be in the end days.

What are we supposed to do?

We're supposed to whine and complain and cry and moan.

It's difficult, I admit.

It's difficult in the flesh and in our mind to live through the days that we're living through.

It's hard to watch, it's hard to hear it.

What did Jesus say?

He said when these things begin to happen, look up and rejoice, because your redemption draw at night, I mean the final redemption, everything it's lacking.

You know, our bodies are not gonna be our bodies anymore.

We're gonna have brand new and story to God.

I'm ready for that to happen right now, pretty soon, quick amen.

So in James, chapter 4, we talked about you know.

James 4 · chapter mention

James said you have not because you asked not and you ask and receive not because you ask a miss.

So that tells me that we can do our praying in the wrong way, we can pray it for the wrong things.

We can pray, we can.

We can ask a miss.

And we talked all about the word ask.

You know, ask and you shall receive.

Seeking you shall find, knocking you should.

It should be open.

And everywhere you see the word ask almost almost every one of them also not only means that you know.

To ask does not mean bag, but it also means to make a demand or to require, not in the sense of banging our fist on the desk and saying God, I demand no, but demand what is due.

Us demand your do.

In other words, it's knowing what belongs to you.

And so then it's not a matter even of asking God for something he's already given you, but prayer becomes a discovery of what belongs to you and then, on the heels of you, having discovered what's yours, you know, appropriated by faith, and claim it.

And of course we know it's impossible to claim by faith something that we don't know God is giving us so that again, we have to have prayer, we need to pray to discover what belongs to us.

Many times, you know, the Bible tells us generally what belongs to us.

I like to use this illustration, and I mean, I knew I was, I was to start a church, I knew I was called a pastor, but it didn't tell me where my building was.

It did nowhere in my Bible did it say begin your, your, your church.

You know, be fine.

The building at 68, 27 FM, 1960, west Houston, texas, 770, whatever the zip code is 6, 6, I think.

No, it wasn't in there.

I was looking and looking.

How did I find it?

You know, I got into prayer and I then I had the witness of the spirit when I showed up at that place and that place that that address was for lease.

And boy I tell you what God worked it out.

And that was where, glorious way, church started, right there, in that building, it's same building that used to be big Ben's barbecue, and it had an iron post holding up the roof in the middle of the bill several of them, you know it was.

It was a crusty old place.

I mean, it was grimy.

I mean the carpet was like sandpaper, don't you dare.

I mean, you know, if you slid on that carpet you're gonna leave blood.

I mean, it's Jays dog job description was to change out all the ceiling tiles every time it rained because it leaked everywhere.

I had the river of life flowing through my office.

I learned to go home when it was raining.

Just don't don't try to be in the office, because I have a river to Ford.

Oh, I tell you those were.

I tell you God came through.

I'm telling you, god came through.

Amen.

All right, so you know, we talked a lot about praying.

Once it says pray and keep on praying.

Well, see, sometimes we think it says ask and keep on asking.

So the word asked there, make a demand.

Well, you don't.

You don't prayer ask for something over and over again.

You ask once and then you thank him over and over, and you thank him before you see it, before it arrives, and then after arrives.

It's almost anticlimactic.

You've done so much thinking.

Are y'all with me?

Now?

That's what the meaning of these verses, as it's a meaning of prayer.

So, because we have been taught so poorly on prayer and and then you know God wants to give good things to them.

That asked.

We talked a lot about that.

I mean I gave you a couple of testimonies about God giving us good things.

You know, god, we're living in this world and not everything belongs to the devil and his crowd.

God is going to let you have something nice.

It's not going to bankrupt heaven for you.

Drive nice, live in nice, wear nice.

It's not going to bankrupt heaven one bit.

Are you with me now?

Well, that's just so carnal.

You know, some people are so spiritual that their kids are going to hell, that their husbands are leaving them because they're too spiritual to be touched.

Are y'all with me now?

I mean there's a balance to everything.

I mean, you know God gives us richly all things to enjoy he wants us to enjoy.

This time it doesn't have to be just, you know, sweating bullets all the time, until some day I'll get over the glory.

Like you know, glory land can start right where you live, right around where you're walking.

I don't know who needs to hear this, but I mean, tell you, let's, let's get out of this religious idea that God is against us enjoying things here.

And so we got out, got into the fact that asking is not begging at making a demand, requiring, and then we talked a lot about Romans 826, that the Holy Ghost helps us pray.

We don't always know what to pray for, as we are, but the Holy Spirit help us, takes hold together with us against our infirmities, feebleness of mind or body.

This feebleness not knowing, see, compared to God we do have feeble minds.

How many of you know that God is wiser and smarter than you are?

So why do we attack and start praying for things that we don't even know what God's plan is?

Yet we just run rough shot into praying, ask for God to do this, do that, give me this, give me that, and before we've processed the plan of God.

I like Romans 826, because when you pray in tongues, he prays through you the perfect will of God.

Until you'll have a knowing.

At some point in down the line, you'll have a knowing about what God, what belongs to you, and then it's not a matter of begging God for that.

Then you just so, thank you, I didn't know that belonged to me.

I claim that right now.

Thank you, lord, are y'all with me now?

So, so, just a little.

You know I can't repreach everything for the last two weeks.

Be sure and get the the media on that and and and go over, listen to it over and over again, because we're living in the last days and the church has got to learn how to pray effectively.

The church has got to grow up in its praying and quit being immature.

That's, that's the reason God anointed the 5-0 ministry.

Apostle, prophet, evangelist, pastor and teacher was for the perfecting of the saints, so that the saints could mature, that we be not children anymore but grow up into him.

And part of the growing up concerns prayer to get out of the babyhood stage.

You know, a baby asked for things.

It isn't amazing the language when a mother and a baby.

The baby cannot express in words, but a mama knows exactly what baby talk means.

I mean you know that was a guy.

Yeah, oh, he wants this, oh, she wants that.

It's just, you know you scratch your head, okay, whatever you think.

I mean there's just, it's, it's amazing.

Well, yeah, but you know, when they're 15 you expect you know a little bit better.

I mean I use this.

I mean a baby's got to be supplied with every need.

I mean they've got to have their diaper change, they've got to be fed regularly.

They, if they, if they're, and all those things are not met, I mean they're gonna let you know about it real soon and but you know, when you grow a little, a little bit.

I remember coming home from from dates in high school and of course I dated my future wife Gladys.

We were sweethearts in high school and actually when she was what?

12, and I was 13 is when I first laid my eyes on sister sparkle.

She was sister sparkle back then, she's sister sparkle now, but anyway, I mean I didn't have to wake my mother up.

I was there on time.

I had a curfew and I met high school.

You make expect your kids to be home certain time.

Little town, you know, it's not a whole lot.

We can get into the bowling alley, the movies, lasers, drive in, whatever.

Not too much to get into in refurio Texas, but if it was to get into, I could probably find a way to get into it.

Anyway had to be home in a certain time.

I never woke my parents hey, I need something to eat.

No, I just went to the fridge, I opened it up.

Whatever was in there, I would eat it for.

I went to bed, I'd fix myself a sandwich or I, you know, if I was desperate and didn't couldn't find anything, I get two slices of bread, tearing up and pour milk over it.

Eat that to go to bed.

I mean, I almost always ate before I went to bed.

I know that's not very healthy, but you don't care.

When you're 16, 17 years old, I didn't need any help.

See, that's the thing we need to mature in and appropriating what God has already.

She supplied my mother and supplied the good.

She had it in there for me to get I.

She didn't have to get it for me, I got it.

That's the kind of praying we've got to learn to do.

Now, john 15 let's look at today what Jesus said about prayer and what he said about claiming.

John 15, verse one I'm the true vine, your and my father is the husbandman or the vine dresser, and every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away, and every branch that bears fruit, he purges it or prunith it.

And now what you do to a rose bush?

It blooms, and then you cut it.

And now it's going to bloom more.

If you don't, I didn't know that.

One time I had a rose bush in the backyard and it had a 18 foot long branch with a rose on that.

I had to get a ladder to pick the road.

I'd never, I'd never, prune the thing.

How dumb can you get and still breathe?

So I started pruning that thing and man, I mean it put on roses.

I had a nice little rose bush out in the backyard because I finally learned how to cut.

And what do you do when you prune it?

You have to.

You have to prune a live branch when you're bearing fruit.

Sometimes you'll be doing so.

Well, everything's rolling along and suddenly something ends and it's painful.

Right at the last, at Lakewood, I had told brother Osteen I'd asked for his blessing to start a church and he said well, wait a while.

So I was in the waiting mode.

I killed the church, by the way, I killed a, stuck a knife in it, just like Abraham was going to do to Isaac.

And I did it.

I let.

I released everybody.

It was waiting for the church to start.

I released them.

I said I'm killing the vision because I knew God's gonna raise it from the dead.

It'd be more powerful, but it was at that place of.

It was painful.

Are you with me now?

I mean I'm.

I mean I had to prune it.

I had to cut it myself and then I went on a trip with brother Osteen into India and we had a glorious time.

We got back, john, I need you to give you job up.

Now it's you know, it's time for so-and-so to grow and things and I'm gonna have him start opening, closing services and prayer.

I said, sure, I understand that boy, but it hurt very vulnerable.

I mean it was so you know, when you cut a live brain, people would come up to me they thinking they're doing me a favor.

Oh, john, we miss you.

Why aren't you open?

Oh, it's not the same up there without you open the it's not the same.

Don't, don't do that.

God is God did this.

So what?

So I could bear what more fruit?

Changes in church, if they're done by the spirit, are painful at times, but it grows at.

Church grows, I said the church grows.

I remember years ago we had a.

They had a greeters, a bunch of greeters that would greet you when you came in the door.

Lakewood, there's a pretty big ministry because there's all those, and so that we moved into a bigger phase and and brother Osteen, suddenly, I mean without any warning, he just suspended that entire ministry.

In there, all the head of that ministry all of a sudden didn't have a job and all the people that had signed up to work as a greeter no longer had a job.

And who did he give the job?

To the prayer partners.

So the prayer partners had double duty.

Prayer partners had to, had to be at the church, you know, at the end of the every altar call, and he would work the altar and they would take people out to pray with them and make sure they were saved, make sure they got filled with the Holy Ghost and all of that.

But they had double duty now they had to come early and be there to greet people at the door, and that was what the Holy Ghost told our pastor to do.

Well, you know, there's a lot of people were crying and whining.

And well, why don't you pray a little while and find out what your next assignment is?

But I did see people go through some real tough times and one of them just quit and left the church.

God all offended.

Well, god prunes you.

Sweetie, that's not the end, that's the beginning.

You're gonna bear more fruit if you just hang in there.

I don't know who needs this, but anyway, I thought we were talking about prayer.

Well, we are.

We're talking about the divine dresser.

All of this is connected.

He said so you know, when you're no bear fruit, god, god, replaces you.

He'll take what he had in mind for you to do and you're not doing it and you're not preparing yourself to serve him, he will say all right, I'm gonna give it over here to this guy or this lady, they're ready.

Right after 9-11 I went to pray.

God said you know the, the responsibility, the authority and the financial provision that I have given to another.

I have taken it away from them and I have assigned it to you.

I just knew there was a shift in the spirit realm, that someone I don't know who it is, and I don't care who it is, it's not my business who, but this, this word.

And then he said you take care of your.

You know, brother of Austin preached a message take heed, let no man take that crown.

I still got the notes on that, on that one take heed, let no man take that crown.

So this is what that's talking about the vine dresser when you don't, when you don't do what God told you to do, he'll love you, he'll help you, but at some point in time, if nothing happens, he's just gonna take it off of you and you're, you're thrown aside and it's given to another person, usually to somebody that's already busy.

Busy people get busier.

That's what been my excited by now.

That's what happened to me.

I got busier and busier, busier.

I got pruned and then I got busier.

What was the next assignment?

Being a pastor.

Right after that, we're right after that sit down.

Just within weeks, we started the church.

Are y'all with me now?

Now you were cleaned through the word which I have spoken under.

You abided me and I knew, as the branch cannot bear fruit of itself except it by didn't find no more.

Can you accept, you abide in me.

See, you know, jesus can't do it without us, we can't do it without him.

It's a partnership, it's a fellowship.

That's what Jesus said.

I'm the vine, you're the branches, he that abided to me, and I and him, and the same bringeth forth much fruit, for without me you can do nothing.

If a man about not in me, he's cast forth as a branch and is withered, and men gather them and cast them into the fire and they're burned.

That's what's going on right now.

I said that's what's going on right now.

Unprofitable, unfruitful people who call themselves Christians are being cast aside.

I'm not saying they're going to hell, I'm saying their lives are burning up because they haven't done what they're supposed to do.

You know there's a consequence for disobedience you can never pray, pray, pray and make up, by the sacrifice of prayer, what you lose through disobedience.

Verse seven now here's a real this is an amazing verse right here.

Listen to both ears, all three ears.

If you've got three ears, listen to three ears.

If you abided me and my words, abiding you.

Everybody shout if See, look at the condition that has to be met.

If everybody shout if, let's go five times, if, if, if, if, if, one more time, if there's ifs in the Bible conditions, meet the conditions, you can have what he said.

If you abide in me, well, that means being saved, because when you're saved, you're baptized into Christ.

If you go to a foundation class, you'll learn about the three baptisms.

The Holy Ghost baptizes you when you get born again, he baptizes you into Jesus.

But then, having done that legally, are we abiding in him on a daily basis?

Really, is he Lord of our lives?

So that's the second thing.

If you abide in me.

So you need to be saved and you need to act like it.

And then and then if my and you, if my words and my words abide in you.

So, in other words, you have to be saved and act like it.

His word abiding in you is the degree to which the word that you're obeying, the word like walking in love.

Love is not optional.

You have to walk in love.

You have to forgive.

Forgiveness is not optional.

You don't get to wonder whether you're going to forgive your enemy when they do you wrong.

It's not about whether they did right or wrong, it's that they did wrong and you forgive them.

You don't take personal action against them to punish them.

It doesn't mean that you don't sue them.

If they run into you at a red light, you're not suing them, you're suing the insurance company to be made whole.

You got people that are so religious, have been taught bad and they think, oh, I can't sue anybody.

No, that's talking about believers and it's talking about personal.

Everybody's got insurance or should have, and it's just a way that you can recoup your losses.

There's nothing wrong with that.

It's not personal, sunny, it's not personal, it's business All right.

So if you abide in me and my words abide in you, you shall ask what.

You will Notice what he said you shall make a demand.

The word I ask means make a demand, demand your duty.

It can mean prayer, but notice the context.

It's talking about fruit bearing.

It's talking about how the Father has pruned you.

It's talking about how the Father has dressed you so that you can produce maximum fruit.

Prayer, fruit, authority, fruit, covenant fruit.

What good does Jesus redeeming you from the curse?

What good is that if you just willingly go down the road and walk in the curses all the time and you do nothing about it?

But the Bible says what shall I render under the Lord for all His benefits toward me?

I'll call upon the name of the Lord, I'll call upon the covenant, I'll ask, I'll demand on my covenant and I will reap the benefits of the blood of Jesus.

I'm not going to let one drop of Jesus blood be shed in vain.

I'm going to receive everything he bought and paid for for me.

Amen.

That's how you glorify God.

That's what Jesus said If you abide in me, my words, abide in you, two conditions you shall ask, you shall make a demand, you shall demand your duty.

Your duty will notice it.

Not even what he wills is what you will.

There are desires that God will plan in your heart when you're just praying, worshiping Him, some of the most amazing things.

I've just been worshiping God.

Worshiping God, I wasn't thinking about anything I needed.

I wasn't thinking anything about anything I desired, and you know He'll just drop something in.

Yes, I was reading one day and I was man.

I was struggling financially.

I'd gotten back in the home building business.

I was building houses, but it was all I could do to believe God for $1,000 a month to pay my rent.

I was in a rent house.

I didn't have enough money to build myself a house.

I had to be honest with you.

I had been through the fire so much that I didn't want to have to believe Him or anything like that.

I was content with a rent house that I didn't build.

It was in the neighborhood that I built a bunch of houses in that neighborhood and here I am in a rent house and it's all I could do to get that $1,000 a month in.

Gladys came to me one day, said you know it's prom time.

Claire needs a prom dress.

I said that's on you.

I'm doing all I can do.

I'm like Brother Hagin, I got the house.

If you're going to believe the curtains, you're going to have to believe God.

If I've got to believe God for the curtains, that might just be the straw that broke the camel's back.

That's what Brother Hagin said to Aretha all those years ago.

He said you're going to have to believe for the curtains and that's what I told her.

I said Claire needs a prom dress.

You're going to have to believe for that.

I'm loaded up, I don't have any more.

I'll tell you what.

She wound up with a really nice dress.

I don't know how God did it.

Why are you talking about prom dress?

You mean she went to the prom.

Yeah, we wonder why our kids get back slid.

We don't let them have a normal life.

You know, we don't have to just keep them at home, locked behind a door.

They're going to be leaving the house one of these days.

You're going to teach a treat a 16 year old like a 12 year old.

You're going to pay the price when they get to be 18, 19, 20 years old.

I don't know who that's for, but anyway, it's no.

No, no charge, no, that's free and it's a happy hour.

Praise the Lord, it's happy hour.

Two, two for one, three for one.

Amen.

Jay needs braces, braces.

Are you braces.

Forget it, don't you worry, I'll get it done.

And I said yes, ma'am, and she did, and he did.

Praise God, it worked.

I mean, you know I'm the head but she's the neck.

I learned that she's the queen of my house.

She runs the house.

If things concern the kids and things concern the house, I let her she's God's faith.

Amen.

I don't know who needs all this.

I want this not in my notes again.

I keep y'all getting me off of my notes.

I have these wonderful notes.

They're so perfect.

They're just one, two, three, abc, 2a, 2b, 2c, and y'all get me off.

I'm on way out here in the weeds somewhere.

It must be the Holy Ghost.

If you abide, see the if, the if fact.

Everybody say the if factor.

Ask whatever you will, and it'll be done unto you.

Every good and perfect gift comes down from the father of lights and whom there is no variable and there's no shadow of turning.

God never changes.

He's the same yesterday, today and forever.

He let Solomon live like a.

Well, he was a king.

But I mean, you talk about rich, all about patriarchs were rich.

It didn't bankrupt heaven.

An ivory made out of ivory throne that even the queen of Sheba.

She said there's no breath left in me.

The half has not been told of thy kingdom and all of thy wisdom and the way your court is arranged, in all of your cup bearers and every why.

Talk about the wow factor God wants to show off.

Right now this world is so fouled up.

It's got his eyes completely mesmerized.

It's filled with fear, the lies that are coming forth in every direction.

And the church is here to shine.

The church is here to make people jealous of oh my God, how did you get all of that in this economy?

Oh, it's my heavenly father.

He takes good care of me.

Hallelujah, I'm offended.

Somebody I don't know.

I keep getting this hit back in my face.

Oh, robert's told me, the gospel to the poor is the guts of the gospel.

What is poverty?

God gave me a different definition of poverty about 25 years ago.

He said poverty is inability to meet the needs of the harvest.

The needs of the harvest are maximum in an agricultural enterprise.

There is no time during an agricultural enterprise.

That is, you've got a farm, you've got tractors, you've got planting machines, you've got all this stuff, you've got fields out there and you've got to buy the seed, and that's pretty major too.

But when it's harvest time, now you've got to have labor to go out there and harvest all those crops.

Usually what the farmer does is he gives those people with the combine harvester and the trucks.

He gives them a percentage of the crop as a fee because he would have to go take another loan out of the bank to pay them out of his pocket.

So they just trust him and say, yeah, we'll be at the gin when they weigh it out and you get your check, we'll get ours, and that's just how it's done.

But you add that money up and it is the maximum amount at the end.

Well, it's not going to be any different right now.

There's a mighty harvest out there.

It's going to take a massive amount of money to reap it.

And where's the money going to come from?

Joe Biden, him and Obama together I don't think they ever gave more than 50 cents to anybody.

Glory to God.

I knew he'd get politics in there somewhere, all right.

So he said here in verse eight here in what, whatever you desire, it'll be done unto you.

When that happens to you, when you make a demand and it comes forth in that, here in is my father glorified, how many of you want to glorify God.

Well, start getting your prayers answered, start getting your declarations to mean something.

Start making demands on your covenant and having them come in.

You're sitting in one of those right now.

You're sitting in a result of what I'm preaching right here.

Praise God, praise God, herein is my father glorified, that you barely bear fruit.

No, you bear much fruit.

So shall you be my disciples.

Jesus said in Matthew 28,.

All power, all authority in heaven and earth is given unto me.

Go ye, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded.

So, really, we're not doing the job when we just get people saved and we not put a check mark yes, saved.

What we are supposed to be doing is making disciples.

A disciple is a taught one.

A disciple is a disciplined one.

A disciple is one who knows how to get their prayers answered or, even more specifically, how to get their demands met, that when they write a faith check with their lips, the bank caches it.

The bank of heaven caches that faith check.

Are y'all with me now?

Go over there, come on, let's lift our hands right now.

Praise God, so shall you be my taught ones.

You're my disciples, hallelujah.

So we have to walk in love and forgiveness.

We have to be obedient to doing things God's way.

You know, when you go back and look at what Jesus talked about prayer, you know making a demand.

Let me just look at Acts, chapter three real quick.

I give you an example of a demand, because you know the church.

Again, we sometimes pray for the sick.

We're going to have prayer for the sick, we're going to pray for the sick.

We say that all the time but really and truly we don't.

We really don't pray for the sick.

We lay hands on the sick but we don't have to pray for the sick.

Why?

Because we don't have to pray for what God already did.

God Jesus already healed everybody.

He paid the price already.

So all we have to do is get people in a position to receive what's already been done.

So it's not a matter of praying, it's a matter of saying a declaring and laying hands on people in some cases.

But Acts, chapter three you know the story.

Peter and John went up together in the temple, the hour of prayer being the ninth hour, and there was a lame man and he'd been that way 38 years.

We find out that out later he's a certified beggar because he has a certain clothes on and when people give to him, it qualifies them to give alms.

That's what their Jesus are commanded to give.

Alms, that's helping the poor.

He's poor because he's lame, can't work.

He makes his living by people given to him.

And we know the story Silver and gold have a none.

In other words, I'm not here to satisfy the almsgiving, I'm not here to give you alms.

Peter wasn't saying he's broke, he's saying I don't have anything to give you today, but this, I've got this to give you.

In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, I'm going to get down here.

I fasted and prayed all morning and let's just, lord, make me cripple and give him my legs.

I'm going to trade places.

We're going to trade him the movie trading place.

We're going to trade places with this beggar.

Let me trade places with him.

Lord, just go ahead and afflict me with lame legs and I'll take it.

He's been here long enough.

I'm ready to just no.

He said in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk.

And when he didn't move fast enough, they jerked him up.

They jerked him up by the hand.

There was no prayer, there was no begging.

There was a declaration oh, come on now.

This is where we're living right now.

There's got to be more declaration.

We've got to quit being so poor-mouthed and ham-handed and so afraid.

And so you know, we can pray for boldness, nothing wrong with that.

Sometimes we need to pray a little bit more for boldness, don't we?

Because when he did that and that guy, he was instantly healed and they went walking, leaping, praising God, into the temple right in front of everybody.

And there was a whole bunch of men, 5,000 men.

That meant there had to be 20,000 people.

If most of them were married and had kids, there had to be 20,000 Jews.

And they were gathered.

They were just amazed.

And so Peter took the occasion to preach and, you know, 5,000 men got saved.

Probably a lot of them had already said Crucifying, crucifying.

Raymond T Richie said Healing is God's dinner bell.

Why don't we see more healing?

Lack of prayer, we're going to get more into.

You mean, I told I didn't think we had to pray for healing.

Well, you don't, but you need to pray for the atmosphere.

We'll get more into that type of thing later.

So in Acts, chapter 4, now they're persecuted, they're beaten and told not to preach and teach in that name.

Acts 4 · chapter mention

And so they went, had a corporate prayer meeting, went back to their own company, they had a prayer meeting and they magnified God and then said God, behold their threatenings and grant that, with all boldness, we may speak thy word by stretching forth your hand to heal, that signs and wonders may be done in the name of your holy child Jesus.

So it's scriptural to pray for boldness.

It's scriptural to pray for God to back us up with signs and wonders and miracles.

So if you want to pray for something and ask for something, you can ask for that.

Yes, man, every Sunday, every time I come to church, I'm claiming anksion and utterance.

I'm claiming that God will back me up with signs and wonders and miracles and diverse gifts of the Holy Ghost.

It's scriptural.

I don't even ask Him.

I'll claim it Because I know it's given.

Are y'all with me now?

Yes, so Jesus talked a lot about prayer.

When you go back into Psalm 22, remember that one.

Jesus quoted Psalm 22.

In fact it's a picture of the crucifixion and at the end he says my God, my God, why forsake us?

Thou me.

And Jesus said that on the cross and that's in Psalms.

So Psalm 22 is pre-crucifixion and crucifixion.

Psalm 23 is where we're living right now.

He's now our good shepherd.

He leads us beside the still waters.

Yes, we're living in that realm right now.

You know, though we walk through the valley of the shadow of death, he has prepared a table before us.

We didn't have to cook, we didn't have to do anything.

He cooked it all up, he prepared it.

It's got everything in the world, and it's right in the presence of our enemies, right with the valley of the shadow of death, all around us, and he's saying you know, come on and sit down at my table.

This is my table.

Well, thank you Lord, just pass me a bowl of victory and don't forget the gravy.

I want the glory gravy poured all over.

Hallelujah, I'm eating some victory today.

I'm praying God, eat your heart out.

Eat your heart out.

Devil, ha ha ha.

That's where we're living right now.

We're living right.

Do you imagine that on His table is peanut butter and jelly sandwiches?

What's he got?

He's got some shrimp diablo, you know, those big old giant with bacon wrapped around them and jalapenos stuffed in there.

That's why they call it diablo.

That's as close as the devil as I choose to be is eating jalapenos, anyway.

So, praise God, are y'all getting anything out of this?

See, I want to emphasize how willing God is not only to meet our needs.

Yes, do we have needs?

Yes, some of you have needs.

A need is a need, but you know, sometimes desire, and God will plant that desire down in your heart.

Glory to God.

And, of course, psalm 24 is the future.

I need to look at that.

That hadn't happened yet.

You know, king of glory shall come in.

Yeah, all of those things happening, it's going to happen.

So, surrounded as we are with what's going on in this earth, we're tempted to just be down, we're tempted to be frustrated, we're tempted to be even fearful.

And what I want to do through this message on prayer is get you in your prayer closet, where you know you're not a victim, that you are disseminating and you are projecting the greatest power that's ever known in this universe Resurrection power is right here, it's available.

When we pray, I said when we pray Glory to God.

Surely, goodness, not surely?

Surely goodness and mercy follow me all the day.

Surely, goodness and mercy follow me all the days of my life.

I just got this notice from my work.

They're going to lay me off, but goodness and mercy is running after me.

I mean, surely goodness and mercy is running after me.

I don't even have to look over my shoulder to know who's following me.

Praise God, it's goodness and mercy everywhere I go.

Hebrews 13, 18 says, you know, to offer to God continually the sacrifice of praise that is the fruit of our lips, giving thanks under his name Continually.

So if you want to talk about continual prayer, then the continual prayer would be continual thanksgiving, continually worshiping him, continuing to praise him.

That's what we ask and keep on asking or making the demand Every time we praise.

That is a basically acts as a demand and a rubber stamp that says yeah, he got it.

He got it, it's on the way.

It's on the way.

They're not feeling sorry for themselves, they're still shouting hallelujah in the midst of all the natural circumstances.

Glory to God.

Now let's look here at Ephesians, chapter six.

I'm actually gotten back on my notes a little bit here.

Ephesians is one of the mightiest, greatest epistles in the Bible.

I love to pray Ephesians one and two and Ephesians three prayers or Holy Ghost authored prayers.

If you want to pray, you can ask God to give you the spirit of wisdom and revelation and the knowledge of God.

The eyes of my understanding be flooded with light, lord, that I might know what is the hope of your calling, what are the riches of the glory, of your inheritance in the same, what is the greatness of your power to us?

What do you believe, according to the working of your mighty power, which you wrought in Christ, when you're raising from the dead and said he met your own right hand in the heavenly places?

Far above all principality, power might, and many never name his name, both in this aid and that would just to come.

Have I prayed that a few times?

Yes, that's good to pray, that's asking.

That's not the gimme, gimme, gimme kind of prayer.

That's the immature prayer and that's baby prayer.

When you're a baby Christian, you can pray those kind of gimme gimme and God start to give you.

He gave me I mean, he answered so many prayers, little shotgun prayers.

I didn't really even have the faith that he just gave it to me.

How many of you have give good things to your kids?

I mean, it's not that they deserve it, you just give it to them because you love them and you just you give them that sucker here.

Here's the passy, here Suck the back end of it out.

I sucked my thumb until I was.

You can get that on camera.

It's about a 3 1⁄8 of an inch shorter, 3 1⁄8 of an inch wider.

It's because I sucked that thumb until I was 8 and my brother's 8 years older, and we both quit sucking our thumb at the same time, and so Don't tell him.

I said it.

It's a constant source of irritation.

All right, let's get back to notes here.

Ephesians, chapter 6.

Ephesians 6 · chapter mention

But you know, when you pray.

So he winds it up in the final chapter talks about the whole armor of God, which turns out to be prayer armor.

That's what we need to pray.

We ought to always be conscious of our place.

We're seated at the right hand of God.

That's what we learn in the book of Ephesians.

When you pray that prayer, you might know it, you might have heard it, but when you pray the prayer, there's going to come a time when you experience that seating.

And now you're praying from a place of authority.

You're praying far above the principalities and powers, the runers of darkness and the little demons.

They're nothing.

You're talking about way down the list of power as a demon, and you pray from that position of strength and you pray from your seating and you pray with the whole armor, the entire armor of God and of course, the only offensive weapon, all of its defensive, until you get to the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.

That's how important the word of God is to pray the word and have the word abiding in you and you abide in it.

And then you get there on Ephesians 18, praying always with all prayer, all manner of prayer.

Everybody say all manner of prayer.

See, we think of prayer as asking God's supplication, begging God, asking God that's the immature idea of prayer.

But prayer is more than just asking God to do things.

So we're to pray always with all manner of prayer and supplication, in the spirit or according to the spirit.

That gets back to what I was talking about Romans, chapter eight, verse 26.

Let's make sure we know what to pray and let's pray about what to pray about and this process the plan of God for a while, before we just go in with our mind and our flesh and start praying our will and praying what we want and praying what we need or what we think we need.

Let's spend some time waiting on God in prayer until we know that's what it's called praying in the spirit.

It also means praying in tongues, but it means praying in our own understanding, according to the spirit, praying in the spirit and watching there unto with all perseverance and supplication for all saints.

So now we're starting to get a more mature outlook of more of our praying ought to be.

We ought to be praying more for other folks.

We ought to not just spend our entire prayer time about me, my four and no more.

That's babyhood.

That's immature.

Yes, we pray about our stuff.

Yes, we pray about our kids and our grandkids.

Yes, but let's not forget about other folk.

We have people in this church that need our prayers.

Well, I don't know who.

Give me a list.

You don't even need a list.

If you'll just be available, god can assign you the saint that you need to pray for.

You might not ever know what it is that you prayed.

You might not ever know the results of your intercession.

Intercession means you get between the devil and that person and you stand there and say devil, if you're going to come to my brother or my sister, you're coming through me and you can't come through me.

That's what intercession is.

That's when we've got to have the whole armor of God on when we, when we start taking our place oh, are y'all getting this now?

Oh, it's such a big size, so important.

Everybody say standing in the gap.

See, your personal needs can just be a matter of claiming what belongs to you and your confession.

It's not about a bunch of long winded praying.

You know, you just said that you can do that all day long.

You don't even have to be in your prayer closet to be going down the highway.

Thank God, I'm healed.

Hallelujah.

Every symptom in my body.

I demand my body line up with the word of God, jesus name.

I'm not putting up with that pain in my back.

I'm not going to have it.

Jesus took this.

Hallelujah.

Thank you, lord.

I mean it doesn't have to take hours for you to take care of your own needs, but you know when you're available.

How many of you are available Now?

If you wore your, okay, wait a minute now before you lay your hand, because God's watching.

Now how many of you are available for God to use you praying for others and interceding for others?

Whoo Glory to God.

Intercession Standing in the gap.

Glad it's not.

It was 1988.

I had just been ordained into the ministry.

I was doing weddings and funerals at Lakewood and various and sundry other things, and Billy Brim was in town at Brother Hillies over in Dayton, dayton Church, and we wanted to go here, sister Billy, and so we went over there on a Tuesday night I think, and it's a long drive from our house way out, you know in Dayton and how we live in spring but we were sitting kind of in the back third of the building and Billy was up there and it was a Holy Ghost meeting.

She was calling people up and prophesying and laying hands on people and was no message necessarily.

And so we're sitting there just and Gladys' hands were in her lap with her palms up, and she leaned over and she said my hands are burning.

And I looked down at her hands and they had turned color and on her right hand it was dark purple.

The entire palm all the way to the base of her thumb and the base of her fingers was dark purple like a pork wine birthmark.

And her left hand was smaller but the same color, about two inches, it was short of her fingers and her hand was just on fire.

And I said I don't know what to make of this.

And we're kind of going back and forth and we're not paying attention to what's going on up there and we're kind of looking, and so this young lady comes over across the aisle and she's sitting over on our left across the aisle and she comes and kneels down in the pew in front of us or the chairs in front of us, I think it were pews, I don't remember anyway.

And facing us and she said what's going on over here?

And her daddy we had met the year before on a missions trip to Mexico, jerry Caver, and he would work in these plants.

He was, I think he was a I don't know, not a plumber, I think anyway, worked one of these big plants and he would get extended vacation every summer.

They the union would give you like two, three weeks off all at once.

I think he'd have like a month vacation.

He'd take the whole month vacation, go to Mexico and preach, and so he was all along.

Brother Dearman, we had all went on a missions trip the year before, got to know him and this was his daughter and her husband, past her, a church there in Winning, texas, and and and I had met her once, I guess I didn't know her well, but she said what's going on over here and I said well, look at my wife's hands.

I said they're, and I said they're burning up.

And she said so you?

And she looked at glad.

She said so you're the one I prayed for all afternoon.

And I said what she said.

I was washing dishes this afternoon, like one 30 in my kitchen and I thought maybe I'd poured bleach in the dishwater because my hands started burning like fire and I quickly got them out and rinsed them off and and it didn't help and my hands kept burning and burning and then I realized intercession had come on me and I dropped to the floor and I laid on the floor of my kitchen all afternoon for about three hours, groaning in the spirit, and my hands were burning the whole time and I just had this sense that that something was being birthed in someone, a ministry or something.

I said isn't that, isn't that something?

See, she was available, pastor's wife, little mom, she's at home.

Stay at home, mom.

But she wasn't too busy to yield herself to the spirit of God, according to Ephesians, chapter six, and make intercession for somebody she didn't know.

She didn't have any idea why, when, where.

And then, boom, now you don't always know.

She got to know.

That night she went to that meeting and met the lady that she prayed for all afternoon.

Glory to God.

Come on, lift your hands right now, hallelujah.

What a thrill.

I hadn't seen her since, but I know God's rewarded her for her faith.

The church is built really on the backs of those kind of prayer warriors that have made themselves available, that know how to move heaven and earth by that power that they release when they pray.

So we went up, marched up there to the front, which you know, if you've ever been in a billing meeting, I mean you just don't do that.

But anyway, nobody stopped us.

So we walked right up to the front and she looked at us and you know, billy, she had she has this way of looking like an eagle, you know she.

You see her eyes.

You know she's got her eyes fixed like this.

And she looked right at me like what are you doing up here?

It was a little bit out of, or I didn't know how to do it.

I mean, I just something happened and you need to see this.

And so I said so I got Gladys to show her her hands.

I said her hands are on fire.

And so Billy looked at me and you know, an eagle, an eagle, an eagle doesn't just casually glance at you, you know, the eagle doesn't turn his head like this.

The eagle goes like that Went from me to Gladys, to the hands me, gladys in the hands me, about three times and I'm thinking, okay, are we going to get the devil cast out of us?

Are we going to get kicked out of the meeting?

What's going to happen next?

I'm, I wasn't sure, I had no clue.

And then finally, she said that's God, that's God.

I said, oh, thank God.

And from that time, you know, god gave Gladys a ministry that has just been astounding over the years Can't count the times that people, her hands are start burning and the gifts of healing begin to manifest.

That doesn't mean that everybody's instantly healed, but because of the abundance of, of the gift, you know, the devil comes against somebody and he come against her viciously in the last five, six years and the gift is wane somewhat, it's not manifesting like it used to, and we're believing for it to come back, because that gift is needed.

So then, now you know how you can pray, you can intercede.

You don't have to touch it with your brain, you know, you can just intercede for me and you can intercede for Gladys.

You can intercede for the gifts of the spirit to be manifest the way they've, you know, an even greater.

Are you all?

Are you with me now?

How many of you, then, are available?

See, god can use you.

You know, it's not about the abundance of how smart you are, it's just that it's just yielding yourself to him, amen.

So let's make ourselves available to release tremendous power through our prayers, power of prayer.

Come on, lift your hands and receive Hallelujah.

Thank you Lord, thank you Father, for instructing us more perfect way, giving us scriptural evidences of how we are able to walk in that realm of power.

We thank you for it in Jesus' name.