Multi-Colored Prayer!

You're listening to the Cross Kingdom Sermon of the Week.

We helped you enjoy this message from Justin carbon here man,

Sunday is gonna be awesome when I when I anytime

I deal with demons in the night, I'm just and

it's a lot of times it's when it happens, I

should say, typically this is before Sunday morning. I just

get excited. You have to be afraid of those little minions.

Y'all know that, right, they're just lie detectors. Just tell

them to go pound sand gps. I'm so glad you

all are so alive now. So for those of you

that have been consistent over the first few weeks, we've

had this theme of standing in the gap. Last year,

one of the things was we do hard things. Right,

where's Kylie? Ky Don't see Kylie? Oh, Kylie's in the

front row. Kylie Kylie one of our elders. She sends

me attack. She goes, can we change the theme from

we do hard things? Do we do fun things? And

I said sure, and I send her a little a

little deal where it shows this guy whitewater rafting and

then he like wipes out and she goes, well that

looks hard, Anthun, I said, there's your theme. We do hard,

fun things. So but this issue of standing in the gap,

I want us to continue with this theme or this

lens as we look throughout this year. And last week

we talked about different areas of standing in the gap,

and I want to continue that theme. I'm actually gonna

speak on prayer. And what's interesting was Susan brought this

painting this morning and started painting and you all see

it's the windows open and there's a little deal alter

there to pray and there's feathers coming in. And that

was a nice little confirmation. But I want to talk

to talk to you about multi colored prayer. But we're

gonna land on beholding prayer, okay, And I know that

made a lot of sense. It will just say yes, okay,

y'all are with me, right, So if you're taking notes,

I want you to write this down. Write the word pray, okay,

P pause to be still, R Rejoice with a psalm

and reflect on the Bible. All right, I'm slowing down, sorry,

R is Rejoice with a psalm and reflect on the

scriptures our Bible. Same thing? Can I move forward? Okay?

A ask God to help us and others. Amen, because

that's what we sound like. And we call that intercessory whining,

not her. But you know, and then why yield to

His will in your life not your own? I know that.

P okay, pause to be still and listen, No, not listen,

pause to be still. So the Pew Research Center did

a survey on frequency of prayer among Christians. They found

that sixty eight percent said they prayed daily, seventeen percent

say they pray weekly, five percent say they pray monthly,

nine percent say seldom, and one percent don't know if

they pray. Got a spirit of confusion over the country.

Now look at this when it comes to age breakdowns,

it goes as follows. Ages eighteen to twenty nine, fifteen

percent of them pray daily, twenty two percent pray weekly,

twenty two percent monthly, twenty four percent seldom or never,

and twenty six percent don't know that meaning they don't

know how often they pray, not that they don't know

if they pray. We're joking about that. First service, Ages

thirty to forty nine say they pray daily, thirty three

percent of them thirty three percent weekly, thirty six percent monthly,

thirty two percent seldom, and twenty eight percent don't know

how often they pray. Now we're getting we're inching closer

to baby boomers. Fifty to sixty four, thirty percent say

they pray daily, twenty eight percent weekly, twenty six percent monthly,

twenty five percent seldom, and forty two percent are not sure.

And then retirement age sixty five, we got any retired

folks in here? We got a few yes, So okay, piper.

Two percent of sixty five and older say they pray daily,

seventeen percent say they pray weekly, fifteen percent say they

pray monthly, nineteen percent say they pray seldom, and forty

two percent of retirements not sure how often they pray.

The average believer spends about five to ten minutes in

prayer a day undisturbed. Right, the average pastor spends about

fifteen minutes in prayer, some thirty depending on denominations. What

the survey said, Now, I ask you, how often do

you pray? Supposed to be a house of prayer, But

yet when we do prayer specific meetings throughout the Christian

or throughout the church in the United States, statistically, it's

the least attended meeting. You look at every major revival,

every major move of God. It was on the cuffs

of massive intercession. I said this last week that Banni Schabda,

the Chabdas, they've held a Friday night watch for thirty

years straight, consistently. The Moravians prayed twenty four to seven,

seven days a week for one hundred and fifty years.

They'd sell themselves into slavery to reach unreached people groups,

and they'd cry out as they were going mad. The

Lamb receive the reward of his suffering. As we look

at standing in the gap this year, as we look

at going deep with him. Prayer is not optional. It's

not a spiritual discipline that we can afford to visit

weekly or monthly or seldom. It's something that we've got

to visit daily. It's a priority we need to make.

How many y'all like shorts hold on? Let me rephrase

that it, you know, like social media shorts reels. That

was going straight to the seat of the crash people rills.

All right. You know they've proven scientifically that your attention

span shrinks the more you watch them, the shorter the

attention span you get. We are bombarded with so much

advertisement to capture our attention mentally for just a few

seconds and then move on to the next, move on

to the next, move on to the next. And you're

being bombarded from all different avenues in a day of

people wanting your attention, trying to get your attention, trying

to sell you something, trying to convince you that you've

lived all these years on planet Earth and you can't

do this anymore without this, So they create the fear

of loss. So then you're motivated by fear, and then

you think that advertisement is your answer. If you're in

a place where your undisturbed prayer life is five to

ten minutes, I want to challenge you this morning. If

you're in a place that your prayer life is thirty minutes,

I want to challenge you. It's all about quality first

and foremost. I'd rather have ten minutes of manifest presence

of Jesus than to pound the ground for an hour

feeling like I'm hitting a wall. Right, y'all with me,

so I'm not telling you that we need to set

our stop watch. And if you pray more than fifteen minutes,

you are just so much more righteous than those around

you have you pray more than fifteen minutes, you're way

better than the leaders in the United Well anyways, all right,

you get the point. Pardon you not going there. We're

live streaming. I'd love my channel to stay. Mark eleven seventeen,

and he was teaching them and saying to them, is

it not written my house should be called a house

of prayer for all the nations? But you've made it

a dinner robbers. Again, there's this over and over and over.

Jesus tells us to watch and pray, watch and pray,

says what I say to you, I say to everyone,

watch and pray. And yet somehow we have gotten into

this place where we have this microwaveable daily bread devotion

and hear my heart, you're a new believer. Everyone starts someplace.

I remember when I got saved at seventeen, and I

remember thinking I climbed Mount Everest because I prayed for

ten minutes because my mind was just so scattered and

so thoughts running. It was like Chase Spetzer had so

many thoughts running through my mind. Uh ah. I was

just making sure you're listening. Left side of the room

is just play and chain. But many times we approach

our prayer life as a consumer. It's transitional or transitional,

it's transactionally based. So in other words, we have a

list of prayers that we're going to bring before the Lord,

and as soon as that list is over and the

awkward silence shows up, all of a sudden were left

with our thoughts that we didn't calm, the anxiety, the accusation,

the clatter, the chaos, and the soul. And we try

to hang in there just for a few minutes, and

then we give up. We think, well, our prayer time

must be over. Rather than recognizing the Lord is way

more interested in you coming to him relationally, not transactionally.

We show up to churches, we look at different churches,

we figure out where we want to go worship, and

it's all about the transactions. It's all about what we

can get versus what we can give, and everything is

a consumer mindset, and when consumption's over, we're left with silence.

Then the Lord appeared to Solomon and the Knight and

said to him, I've heard your prayer and have chosen

this place for myself as a house of sacrifice. When

I shut up the heavens so that there's no rain

global warming, I mean, what or command the locusts to

devour the land. By the way, let me say something

about global warming. I'm not saying there isn't fluctuations, but

the reality is the earth is groaning and reacting to

the sin of humanity. And Scripture says that when a

nation gets so corrupt, the earth itself will spew it

out of the land. It says the earth is groaning

for the manifestations of the sons of God. So if

you care about the earth, which you should, and you

should be a good steward, don't misunderstand me. Stop sinning.

I'm saying that facetiously, but I'm also saying it seriously

because it bloodshed, innocent bloodshed, defiles the land. The land

reacts to that innocent bloodshed. You've had millions of babies

aborted in the name of convenience in a better life,

to the same idle mullock from thousands of years ago.

And that is where we step in with intercession. Like

Abraham over Sodom and said, Lord, for the sake of fifty,

will you have mercy, Lord, for the sake of forty five,

will you have mercy? We don't stand back and just

throw out judgment and condemnation All day long. I'm reading

social media posts from believers about California and just hammering

and saying all sorts of stuff, stop it, stop it.

That doesn't appeal people to Jesus. When people are losing

their homes and everything they have. It's not just the

Hollywood elite that are there. There's thousands of people. In fact,

Ken Fish's home, who's a speaker that comes here, his

entire neighborhood is at risk of being burned up. We

should be standing in the gap and saying, God, have

mercy over California, Have mercy over these people, have mercy

over their homes. Instead of it's disgusting the crap I've read.

I'm crapola Greek, all right. I'm calling back down, command

the locusts to devour the land or send pestilence among

the people. If my people, who are called by my

name humble themselves and pray and seek my face, and

turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from

heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land.

Now my eyes will open and my ears attentive to

the prayer that is made in this place. For now.

I've chosen and consecrated this house, that my name may

be there forever, my eyes and my heart will be

there for all time and one more one Timothy two

to one and two says this first of all, Then

I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made

for all people, all not some for kings, and all

who are in high positions, that we may lead a

peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way.

I said this first service, I'll say it again. We

are all guilty of talking trash about leaders politicians. Are

we not take your halos off and get real. We're

all guilty of it. We've all said stuff about leaders, right,

whatever stance you have towards a leader, we're all guilty

of it. I've been guilty of it, especially in the

last four years. I've had to really watch it. But

we're commanded to pray for all leaders. The bigger question

we should be asking when an unrighteous leader takes the office,

what is God saying in the midst of that, and

what is that saying about the collectiveness or the culture

of a nation that says righteousness exalts a nation, but

sin is a reproach to any leader. God says, he

takes the heart of the king, turns at whatever direction

he desires, and we're commanded to pray for peace. Now.

It doesn't mean we put our head in the sand

and we don't talk. We don't we don't stand up

for righteousness. We don't vote right, I mean, you know

you vote righteously. You should vote, but we need to

be praying and interceding for our leaders. Y'all. You have

to understand something right now. This nation is being fought for.

So don't get don't get comfortable because we saw a

little bit of a breakthrough. It's just starting. If you

think that the fallen divine Council that rules over nations,

they're these council members, these principalities are just going to

sit back and be like, oh, that's not happening. We

need to continue to wake up as the Church and

be the backbone of this nation and intercede for this

nation and pray for all the leaders. Are y'all with me? Okay?

Number two Prayer of supplication. We see Jesus doing this

and Hebrew seven says we see Jesus offered up prayers

and supplications with loud cries and tears. So is it

okay to pray out loud? Is it okay to have emotion?

Is it okay to not be completely silent when you pray?

Can you imagine Jesus in the garden, sweating blood, in agony,

knowing what he's gonna have to, what he's gonna have

to do, the price he's gonna have to pay for us. Now,

there's been many times in my life. I don't know

about y'all, but I'm like, why did you? Why'd you

do it? Like we're a hot mess? You know, it

would have been so much easier for him to just

start over and then probably not give us a choice.

Otherwise we'll be right back here. The Hebrew word for

supplication is touch nun, which if you speak Hebrew you

can fix it later. It means supplication or supplication for favor,

the action of asking or begging for something earnestly or humbly.

Remember again, in First Timothy two to one we see

supplications in prayers. We need to be asking for mercy

over our nation. We need to be asking for mercy

over ministries. Over leaders over the church. One of the

Hebrew words for prayer is teflaw, and it means to

judge oneself. Remember Jesus that I you judge yourself, you

won't be judged. Part of the issue with communion and

us examining our lives before we take communion. When it

says some of you have gotten sick, some of you

have fallen asleep because you've not properly observed the body,

do you understand that means his literal body, going into

communion and bringing judgment on yourself. But it's also it's vertical,

but it's also horizontal. So because you don't treat each

we don't treat each other correctly, which we are the

body of Christ. Some of you have been sick, some

of you have fallen asleep. What if we actually took

a step back and remember that we, every one of us,

are created in His image. That when we bring accusations

towards each other, we forgot that we were made first

and foremost in the image of God, and that that

person that we're railing on was considered worthy for Jesus

to die for. Kim Clement had a word about Donald Trump.

He says they will say he has hot blood and sorry,

that was my Kim clement impersonation. Did it work? Is

it close? Did I sound like Kim? He's from South

Africa where he was? Anyways, God doesn't use perfect leaders.

I don't care who you are. Everybody's in process. If

I knew today what I didn't know eight and a

half years ago, almost Holy cow, Sean wouldn't have to

rebuke me half as much. Philippians four to six do

not be anxious about anything. So do you have a

right to be anxious about anything in your life? Okay,

then why do you do it? What? Oh you have

to use that process word? Huh? Only I get to

use that be anxious about nothing, but in everything by

prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, Let your request be made

known to God. Last week, my wife, she drove me

nuts for a second. I know you're watching livestream, baby,

love you. I was feeling a smidge stressed last week

because so much. You know, we had people in the hospital,

we were down staff members, and I was feeling pulled

in a bunch of different directions. And we're in the

kitchen and Lisa comes up to me. She goes, give

me your hands. She's got this big smile. I'm like,

what the heck is going on? And so give me

your hands. She goes, let's jump, like off a cliff. Like,

what are we doing? Let's jump? She says, So we're

jumping and she starts laughing and she goes, remember what

Graham Cook says. I'm like, I don't want to. For

those of you, Graham Cook's a prophet, and Graham shares

this story about that the Holy he sees the Holy

Spirit like Tigger, like, when we got a problem, the

Holy Spirit's just like, come on, let's go. This is awesome.

And I'm like, and he gives us illustration. He's like

calls his buddy, Hey, how are you. Yeah, yeah, yeah,

I'm I actually got a really big problem right now.

Oh you don't have a problem. Well it's okay. I

can share mine with you until you get your own problem.

And he's all excited and going through this and he

says like, let's jump. We got problems. It's awesome, And

so we're jumping in the kitchen and then I kind

of lighting back up. But the reality is, if we

will go from the viewpoint of knowing that there is

provision attached. There's an answer attached to every perceived problem

we have. Because he's already there. He doesn't gain a knowledge, right,

he's all knowing. It may be a suddenly to us

in the moment, but it's not a suddenly to him.

And literally before the foundations of the earth, he knew

you would be there in that moment dealing with that situation.

It did not take him by surprise. Jump Ephesian six,

P't eighteen. Praying at all times in the spirit, with

all prayer and supplication to that end, keep alert, with

all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints. Think about

this tower of Babbel. Everyone is one in their soul, right,

God says, let us come down, because now nothing's impossible

for them, because they've become one in their soul. This

is solical, this is soulish power. And he says, now

nothing's impossible for them. And then he brings all these

languages onto the earth to bring confusion between the people,

to break the unity. Fast forward to to Pentecost and

the outpouring of the Holy Spirit and the gift of

tongues and the prayer language, and all of a sudden

we all have the ability to speak the same language

once again, but this time it's in the spirit, and

then nothing is impossible in him. He says, you pray

anything according to His will, it's done. So what if

you actually looked at the seeds of your prayer the

first time you prayed it, and you know you prayed

according to his will. What if you said, Okay, I'm

going to stewart this little seed because this seed is

a yes, I'm not going to give up. There's a

bowl in heaven right now that I'm going to fill

up overflowing so that that incense gets lit on fire

and poured back down as a result. Because that's exactly

what Revelation says, that these bowls of your prayers fill

up and then zap with the fire of God. He

pours it back down on the earth as an answer.

So the next time you think your prayers are nothing,

go read Revelation and see what's taking place around the

Throne room, and it may motivate you to stay a

little bit longer, to persevere, to terry, to not give up,

to not believe the enemy, to not allow the circumstances

in the natural to tell you what to believe about God.

So number three, the Prayer of Faith James five point fifteen.

He says, in the Prayer of Faith will save the

one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up,

and if he's committed sins, all y'all right here, just

take a deep breath this whole section. Take a deep

breath and blow out. Let's say, come Lord, how many

of y'all were just getting heavy a second ago, like

wanting to sleep? Yeah, I felt it drop like a blanket.

See if we catch this, if we catch the heart

of the Father for the type of prayer we're supposed

to be doing, transformation happens. All of a sudden, you

actually become a threat to the enemy because the things

that he had in common with you, he no longer

has in common with you. Because you were beholding the

one who brings transformation, and you stopped making it about

works and transactional prayer, and you made it relational prayer,

and all of a sudden you became totally content with

just being in his presence, being saturated by his light

on a cellular level, spirit to spirit, face to face,

divine breath to breath, beholding the one who bore our sin.

Mark eleven twenty to twenty five that passed by in

the morning, and they saw the fig tree withered away

at its roots. And Peter remembered and said to him, Rabi,

look the fig tree that you cursed is withered. And

Jesus answered him, have faith in God. Truly, I say

to you, whoever says to this mountain be taken up

and thrown into the sea, and does not in his heart,

but believes that what he says will come to pass,

it will be done for him. Therefore, I tell you,

whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you've received it,

and it'll be yours. And whatever you whatever you stand praying,

forgive if you have anything against anyone, so that your

father also, who's in heaven, may forgive you your trespasses.

The one of the number one blocks to healing is unforgiveness.

Scripture is clear that if you don't forgive, you're not forgiven.

So when you're petitioning for prayer or for healing, but

you're over here standing in a place of unforgiveness that's

in front of you, and guess what, especially if it's

energized by a spirit of infirmity, that demon's not going

anywhere he has legal right. Proverb says, a curse cannot

take flight without a cause. And I can't tell you

how many times when I've prayed for healing for people

we hit a block. We hit a block, and even

in times where literally the pain moved as we prayed.

When you're praying for healing for someone and that prayer

moves in their body while you're praying, you know it's

a demon, y'all know that it's no longer just a

natural pain. That pain starts moving. You're dealing with a spirit.

So now you stop petitioning for healing and you go

into deliverance. You know what's awesome. A third of Jesus's

ministry was deliverance? Is it yours? That was good? I

don't know if my angel's over there or over there,

maybe he left ten minutes ago, I'm not sure. So

he says, whatever you have, but he says, if you

have anything against anyone, so that your father, also, who's

in heaven, may forgive you your trespasses. There's multiple words

in the Hebrew that translate faith, some of the meanings

of them, or trust in or trust rely upon. Remember

the old illustration of what real trust is you know,

you have the two buildings, you have the tightrope, you

have the guy up on a deal and he asked

the crowd, Hey, how many people believe I can walk

across this whole crowd? Yeah, he goes across. Now he says, hey,

how many people believe I can go across this tightrope

blindfold that. Everybody's like yeah. He goes across blindfolded. And

then he goes, hey, how many people believe I can

go across this tight rope blindfolded with a wheelchair. Everybody's like, yeah.

He goes get in. That's trust. In order for us

to fully understand the prayer of faith, we must first

understand what faith truly encompasses and it's full meaning. And

Matthew nine eighteen to twenty six see the woman with

the issue of blood for twelve years, healed by her

prayer of faith. She literally just says, if I can

touch the hymn of his garment, y'all know the story.

She touches him, he feels virtue leave from him, and

he's being pressed by everybody around him. It was like

when I was in Paris for our anniversary. We were

in rush hour in the subway. I hated this. I

told Lisa, I said, I don't care if we got

to spend two hundred dollars more were taking taxis, But

I was like this, and I'm making sure I got

my wallet, my front pocket, and making sure I don't

get picked. And literally, you got people all around you

like miserable, like sardines. And so imagine Jesus being pressed

on all sides and somebody comes up and just touches

his clothes, the hem of his garment, and all of

a sudden faith activates and pulls virtue from him. And

he turns around and says, who touch me? You have

to understand that when we're truly walking in the spirit,

you're not limited by your natural flesh. Y'all with me,

It says, exercise your spiritual senses so you can discern

between good and evil. In Luke seven one to ten,

we see the centurion servant healed because of the prayer

of faith of the Centurian soldier. He literally says, I've

not seen such faith in all of Israel. But you

know what the key was for the Centurian soldier. It

was all about authority. He understood the authority structure, and

therefore he recognized that Jesus was under a different authority,

and he understood he was under the authority of the Father.

And whatever he said, he knew the Father was doing,

and it was he knew that it was a commandment

from the Father. And he goes, you say the word,

and you don't even need to come under my house.

You say the word, he'll be healed. What if we

had that outrageous faith. What if we had three hundred

people running around Kerr County that number one didn't have

a bunch of things in common with the enemy number two.

The enemy could see the light radiating off of you.

Oh crud, here he comes, here she comes, all of

a sudden, we know who you are. We know who

you are. How's in a deliberance session one time the

demon goes, I don't know you, And I said, if

you didn't know me, I'd be stripped naked right now,

now come out. What's that scripture? The sons at Skiva,

they were exercising demons in the name of the Jesus

that Paul preached, that had no relationship. They didn't know him. Well,

that went over like a fart in a space suit. Okay.

I was making sure you're listening. Hang in there, yep,

a few more minutes, you'll be okay. Prayer of agreement

Genesis eleven one to nine. The power of agreement was

clearly seen in the Tower of Babbel. We talked about

that earlier. If nothing they purpose would be impossible, then

think of the prayers of agreement of the saints when

praying with one accord in the will of God. Has

anybody ever been in in a service where like during

worship where everybody start literally everyone starts singing in tongues.

There's there's been a couple of encounters I've had corporately

in worship. One was that impact years ago and we

all of a sudden, we were all singing in tongues

and I literally begin to vibrate like a tuning fork

because it was the it was everybody coming into alignment

through prayer language, singing in tongues, and it lit the

atmosphere up of that I'd never at that point, I'd

never experienced in anything like that. I don't think we

have a clue. But so when we hit realms of

worship like that, do you understand those are the moment

that's where all of a sudden we come over the

hill and our enemies are wiped out. Yeah, it's that

level of anointing. Hey, you just hang out with me

and worship. I'll handle them. Y'all understand. One angel wiped

out one hundred and eighty five thousand Syrians one, and

I see people going. I command this angel to go here.

I command you. Ain't commanding anything. Nowhere in scripture does

any human being command an angel. Nowhere. You can petition

the Lord to move angels, but they answer his will

or his word, and they move according to his word.

Y'all with me? All right? Hanging there. The prayer of agreement,

I know it's rough, buddy, I'm almost done. The prayer

of agreement is when two or more people come together

and agree with one another and with the word of

God that something's pacific will be done. Matthew eighteen nineteen

and twenty. Again, I say to you, if two of

you agree on earth about anything they ask, it will

be done for them by my Father in heaven. For

where two or three are gathered in my name, I

may show up sometimes. No there I am among them.

Ectodus seventeen. We see God, we see Moses, his arms

are up, Israel's winning, and all of a sudden his

arms start dropping. He's got his arms up in the

staff and as his arms drop, all of a sudden

they start losing. Question is, how long do you think

it took them to recognize that? How long do you

think it took when the arms started lowering before they recognize, Oh,

wait a minute, you think Aaron went over there and

just like, I mean, how do you think about that?

I love thinking about that stuff. And then all of

a sudden they recognized they had to keep his arms up.

What was God teaching them in that moment? Not just

us hindsight's always twenty twenty. What was going on with them?

Maybe the Lord was actually healing the final residue of

division with Mariam and Aaron when they came against Moses.

We don't know everything that was going on in that moment.

All the while, while Israel's kicking a mud hole in

their enemy, acts for Peter and John were released. They

went back to their friends and then all lifted their

voices together to God. And when they had finished praying,

the place that they had gathered had shaken, and they

were filled with the Holy spirit. When's the last time

you were in a prayer meeting and the building shook?

Number five, just got a couple more prayer of declaration

or declarative prayers. Oh, twenty two twenty eight. You will

also declare a thing, and it will be established for you,

so light will shine on your ways. Let me say

something about decorative prayers. If you're trying to declare something

against God's will, it's not gonna happen. You understand that

right when it says whatever is bound on the earth

will be Whatever you bind on the earth will be

bound in heaven. Whatever's loosed in heaven will be loosed

in the earth. If you read that in context, it's

whatever was already declared in heaven, what was what already

was loosed in heaven will be loosed in the earth.

Y'all with me again? The key is prayer according to

His will? But how many of us leave our prayer life?

Are our prayer time with him? The moment? Especially you

profet well where to me go? He stepped outside with

his kids, especially you prophetic people. Revelation revelation right, evangelists

cry out, gim me souls. Shepherds cry out, give me

people to lead to shepherd. Prophets cry out, gimme revelation.

But do you stay after you get a revelation already

you go, oh, thank you Lord, ching all right, prophecy,

I'm out see you tomorrow. And then now you go

tell everybody about this great, amazing prophetic words you got

in five minutes. And that was the only time he

spent with them the whole day. He corrected me some

years ago, It's like, Lord, why won't you talk to me?

Why won't you speak to me right now? Why won't

don't you give me revelation? And I clearly heard he goes,

because you'll leave. And he was way more interested in

spending time with me than just giving me a word

for somebody. Now I'm messed up. When we pray prayers

of declaration, we're making known the truths of God's word,

proclaiming his promises and power in our lives and our circumstances.

We're confessing His names over our families and relationships, proclaiming

the advancement of His kingdom in us and through us.

We're making known the counsel of God to any given situation.

We're being messengers of His sovereign will to our towns, cities, states,

and nation. Number six, Prayer of intercession. We see Abraham interceding,

dwindling down, over and over. Lord, if there's fifty, if

there's forty five, if there's forty, if there's thirty five,

over and over and over. The Hebrew word for intercession

is pega. It means to encounter, to meet, reach, and treat,

make intercession. Elijah goes into intercession and he says, it

will not rain, and except for at my word, and

for three and a half years it did not rain.

And then at his word it rained. And if you

all recall he prayed seven times, he prayed, he prayed,

he prayed, he prayed. He kept sending his servant because

I see a cloud like a fist, goes go, tell

aheb get off the mountain. It's gonna rain. That's faith

cloud the size of a fist, Go it's gonna pour.

Why because he already had the word from the Lord,

and he didn't doubt. He knew that unless he said rain,

it wouldn't rain. Imagine being given that type of responsibility

in the kingdom. Some of us don't have that much

authority because we probably would misuse it. Oh yeah, it's

not raining over your house for three and a half years.

You'd jerk. Acts twelve. It took a minute to hit huh.

The Acts twelve one to eighteen. Intercession is made for

Peter to be released from prison, and the prayers are

answered by an angel of the Lord. He releases him.

Remember he shows up right. She gets all excited, goes,

Peter's here. I don't know, he's not. No, he's here.

He's here now. It's probably just his angel. Peter thought

he was in a vision until the angel left him.

He's walking with the angel, and all of a sudden,

the gate opens up by it says specifically, the gate

opened up on its own. The angel didn't open the gate,

But yet the gate opened up supernaturally on its own.

Who opened the gate? Number seven Prayer of Thanksgiving and praise?

Oh on, let me back up one statement. To truly intercede,

we plead or meditate on behalf of another person. We

earnestly pray for the needs of others and God's will

for their life. Jesus is our model of prophetic intercession.

But the prayer of thanksgiving and praise the Hebrew word

for thanksgiving and praise is yah dah and it means

to throw, to give thanks loud or praise, to confess

something about God's that confess one's own sins. Another Hebrew

word is tadah and it means confession, praise, thanksgiv giving

of praise to God, thanksgiving and songs of worship, thanks

of choir or procession, thank offering sacrifices of thanksgiving. Do

you know you're never going to have to give a

sacrifice of thanksgiving in heaven? Only on this side? And

Psalm twenty two three says yet you are holy enthroned

on the praises of Israel. One Thessalonians five sixteen to

eighteen rejoice, always pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances,

for this is the will of God in Christ, Jesus

our Lord. And I'm going to land with the last one.

The eighth style of prayer, it's the prayer of beholding

or contemplation. Over the century is one of the key

ways that believers have sought to know God or intimate

way was through this kind of contemplative prayer. In recent years,

this practice has come to be known as soaking prayer.

According to the Merriam Webster Dictionary, the word contemplate means

to view or consider with continued attention. To meditate on.

The word meditate means a definite focusing of one's thoughts

on something so as to understand it deeply. Beholding prayer

is an inward journey in the spirit. In simple terms,

its relational prayer rather than transactional letting Him do whatever

he wants to do in our lives. In previous revivals,

believers refer to this intimate communion with God as waiting

on the Lord or tarrying as they lingered in prayer

expecting God's revival blessings. To behold God's presence is to

rest in his love rather than to strive in prayer.

Beholding our contemplative prayer takes time in the inner chamber

to bow down and worship, wait on him until He

unveils himself, takes possession of you, and goes out with

you to show you how a man or a woman

can live and walk in the abiding fellowship with the

unseen Lord and prayer. We dwell on the edge of

eternity and mystery, yet we so often ignore it, wasting

our souls and devaluing our relationship with God, and we

do not yet know that our mind has ceased to

be sensitive to wonder. The Hebrew word kavanaugh, the Hebrew

mindset for prayer, is referred to as kavanaugh, which is

generally translated as concentration or intent. This introductory measure of

kavanaugh is an awareness that we're speaking to God and

therefore take on the obligation to cast aside distractions that

keep us from focused attention to Him as we pray.

The Hebrew understanding in this prayer without kavanaugh is like

a body without a soul. This attitude is meant to

take one into deeper prayer by yielding the focus of

our mind to God. It is the disregard of our

personal desires. It is the absence of self centered thoughts.

The truth is only God can grant pure kavanaugh. It

is impossible for a human to initiate this level of focus.

At the same time, it cannot happen without human desire.

Desire then prods the will of man to pray. The

prodded will then opens the door for prayer. But what

enters that door is not so much prayer. It is

the future that will come through prayer Psalms twenty five fourteen.

The secret of the Lord is with those who fear him,

and he will show them his covenant. In prayer we

come close to hearing the eternal theme of the Kingdom

of God, which allows us a greater perception of our

place in the Kingdom. Through prayer, life in God becomes

more like a seamless garment and ext in extrins brah

andextringeably interwoven with the infinite. It is here our property

becomes his, and his property becomes ours, and we gladly

exchange our will for His wisdom. But beholding prayers nothing new.

In a seventeenth century monastery cook named Brother Lawrence gave

his life to the art of practicing the presence of

God and one single act that does not end. He

learned to cultivate the deep presence of God so thoroughly

in his heart that he was able to joyfully proclaim,

I am doing now what I will do for all eternity.

I am blessing God, praising him, adoring him, and loving

Him with all my heart. Now think about this Psalm

forty six ' ten Be still and know that I'm God.

I will be exalted among the nations. I will be

exalted in the earth to still our hearts long enough

to hear him speak to us and actually have a

two way relationship. This is a part of beholding prayer.

We should have regular times of being still and just

beholding the Lord. So we're taking notes. Let me give

you a few steps and then we're done. Number one,

establish a daily time. Establish a daily time. Two focus

on him. Three be still and quiet your mind, y'all,

even if it takes ten minutes for you to calm

the clatter in your mind, do it. You will have

You will get so much more out of your prayer

than your time with him if you actually take time

to allow his peace. But what you have to do

in that moment is give up your right to understand,

because all this clatter and the background is you trying

to understand everything that's going on. And the problem is,

many times all of that racing of the mind is

us trying to figure it out without Jesus. Maybe we're

imagining a future that he's not in and it causes anxiety.

Watch and listen. Jesus said, over and over and over,

what I say to you, I say to everyone, Watch

and pray watching means silence. We have to get comfortable

again with solitude. I just finished up the book on

beholding prayer yesterday and strong. This guy does these silence,

these retreats, these one day retreats where it's just silence,

and all these people are signing up like crazy for

these one day retreats to be silent. You have no

idea the healing power of getting silent before the Lord

and just being with him. If you make that a discipline,

it'll it won't. It won't just change things outside, it

will change you inside because you're going from a transactional

spirituality to a relationship of true love where it doesn't

matter what you get from him, you just get to

be with him. So this is not transactional prayer, but

abiding in his presence. Last thing, be aware of your

spiritual senses. What you see, what you hear, what you feel,

what you smell, what you taste. Your five senses and

the natural are also your spiritual senses as well. Don't

be afraid God's not going to give you a snake

or a rock when you ask him for bread and fish.

Allow the Lord to lead the time. Be okay with

just being with him in silence and beholding his presence.

Trust that he will lead this dance of prayer as

you yield yourself to total abandonment to his presence, love

and desire for you. Remember a few weeks ago we

talked about some people ares givers, some are exchangers, some

are takers. This is not about taking. It's not even

about exchanging. It's about being with him. If you're married,

even if your marriage isn't super hot right now, remember

when it was. Remember when all you wanted to do

was just be with your spouse, didn't matter if you talked,

you were together, you were holding hands, you were walking.

You got to know each other so much that their

body language would speak to you. It's in the Psalms.

It says he will guide you with his eye us

getting into a place of intimacy with him where we

can behold his face, look into his eye and go, ah,

I need to go this way, or I should stop that,

or I should stay y'all. This type of intimacy is

what he desires with us, and it's this type of

intimacy that will radically change us from the inside out. Wayne,

if you could come, if I get the prayer team

to come, so Father, thank you for listening. For more

messages and other resources, please subscribe to this podcast or

go to our website at www dot Cross Kingdom dot

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