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The
Importance
of
PREVAILING
PRAYERS
By:
Pastor Max Solbrekken
Jesus
said: "When ye pray, use not vain
repetitions, as the
heathen do; for they think that they
shall be heard for their much
speaking." (Mathew .6:7)
"I
have been driven many times to my
knees by the overwhelming conviction
that I had nowhere else to
go"
- Abraham Lincoln
 THE
IMPORTANCE OF PREVAILING PRAYERS
"Watch
and pray, that ye enter not into
temptation: the spirit is indeed
willing, but the flesh is
weak." (Matthew 26:41);
"Ask
and it shall be given you; seek, and
ye shall find; knock, and it shall be
opened unto you: For everyone
that asketh receiveth; and he that
seeketh findeth; and to him that
knocketh it shall be opened."
(Matthew 7:7-8)
"Pray
without ceasing." (1
Thessalonians 5:17))
DOES
PRAYER REALLY WORK - OR IS IT
ONLY AN ESCAPE FROM STRESS OR FEAR ?
You
may ask, "Does
prayer really work, or is it only an
escape from stress, fear or inner
turmoil"? Or perhaps you may feel
that prayer is only a safety valve
from anxiety and danger?
Could
prayer just be the consoling of a
wounded spirit or a guilty
conscience?
WHAT
EXACTLY IS PRAYER ?
What
exactly is prayer? Is prayer actually
the communication between the
supplicant and Almighty God?
Or is prayer only an inner
quietening of the human spirit, a
tonic of the soul?
DO
YOU HAVE TO SPEND TIME IN PRAYER
TO BE A CHRISTIAN ?
Is
prayer a prerequisite to healthy
Christian living or is it just a ploy
of entrapment by Ministers of the
Gospel or Roman priests, in order to
gain and keep church members in line?
IS
PRAYER A WASTE OF TIME ?
You
may say that you have prayed and
prayed and God didn't answer your
prayers, so you gave up praying.
Is
prayer just
a waste of time, like some think or
say, or is prayer a valuable
tool in the Christian’s arsenal
against sin, fear, sickness and the
devil?
IS
PRAYER
ONLY A RITUAL THAT WE DO BY TRADITION
OR HABIT ?
Many
people pray as a ritual or habit, but
are they just saying the words they
are taught and memorized, or are they
actually praying and communing with
the LORD. When you pray, are you
meeting with God, our Heavenly Father
through Jesus Christ our Lord?
In
this treatise, I will endeavor to
shatter all the humanistic assumptions
of modernist theologians as well as
atheists and cultists! I will share a
number of concrete evidences from
personal experience, as well as from
the Holy Scriptures, to prove that
"God is a Spirit and those who
worship Him must do so in Spirit and
in truth." (John 4:23-4)
I
will also prove to you, through the
Holy Scriptures of the Bible
that God is a loving Heavenly Father,
Who desires to fellowship with us and
wants to have communion with His
children.
IF
YOU OPEN YOUR HEART TO THE WORD
OF GOD
- YOU'LL DISCOVER GOD HEARS AND
ANSWERS PRAYERS
My
friend, if you will open your heart to
accept the Word of God as the absolute
and final truth, you will experience
the reality of His presence and power
at work in your life! And you will
know of a truth that God hears and
answers prayer.
MARTIN
LUTHER WAS A MAN OF PRAYER
At
his trial at the Diet in
Worms
,
Germany
on
April
18, 1521
,
Martin Luther - the Great Reformer –
was asked: "Will you recant of your
writings?"
He
answered so eloquently: "Since
Your Majesty and your lordships desire
a simple reply, I will answer without
horns and without teeth. Unless
I am convinced by Scripture and plain
reason, I do not accept the authority
of popes and councils, for they have
contradicted each other - my
conscience is captive to the Word of
God. I cannot and I will not
recant anything, for to go against
conscience is neither right nor
safe. Here I stand, I cannot do
otherwise. God help me.
Amen."
As
Martin
Luther presented his case before
the Emperor and the highest
authorities of papist
Rome,
I
hereby present my case for the reality
of God, the need for prayer and the
overwhelming evidence that the
Almighty does hear and answer our
petitions and supplications, when we
call upon Him in sincerity and faith.
WHAT
IS PRAYER ?
The
Church of Scotland's Westminster Confession
states: "Prayer is an offering
up of our desires unto God for things
agreeable to His will, in the name of
Christ, with confession of our sins
and thankful acknowledgment of His
mercies."
GOD'S
WORD SAYS "...before they call, I
Will answer..."
God's
Word says, "And it shall come to
pass that, before they call, I will
answer; and while they are yet
speaking, I will hear." (Isaiah
65:24).
The
Psalmist prayed: "Let the words of
my mouth and the meditation of my
heart be acceptable in Thy sight, O
Lord, my Strength and my Redeemer.
Thou hast heard the desire of the
humble.”
(Psalms 19:14:10:17
)
JESUS
SAID, "WHEN YOU PRAY, USE
NOT
VAIN REPETITIONS, AS THE HEATHEN
DO"
Jesus
said: "When ye pray, use not vain
repetitions, as the heathen do; for
they think that they shall be heard
for their much speaking." (Matthew
6:7)
PRAYER
IS AN ACT OF WORSHIP
Martin
Luther's
Small Catechism states:
"Prayer
is an act of worship wherein we bring
our petitions
before God with our hearts
and lips and offer up praise and
thanksgiving to Him."
PRAYER
IS A LIFTING UP OF THE SOUL TO
ALMIGHTY GOD
King
David referred to true prayer as the
"lifting up" of the soul to
Almighty God: "Unto
Thee Lord, do I lift up my soul."
(Psalms 25:1) That speaks of an
intense desire to fellowship with our
Heavenly Father, similar to the flower
turning its face toward the sun to
receive warmth and sustenance.
PRAYER
IS MORE THAN JUST ASKING GOD
FOR BLESSINGS
Prayer
is much more than just asking the
Almighty LORD for His blessings or for
intervention during trying, dangerous
or impossible situations.
Prayer
is a holy conversation with God, a
divine meeting and a time of intimacy
with the One who is Lord over life and
death, time and eternity! It is a
loving relationship and communion with
our Heavenly Father, wherein we can
bathe in His presence and extol and
worship our precious Lord and Saviour.
PRAYER
INVOLVES TIME OF WORSHIP AND
PRAISE AS WELL AS THANKSGIVING TO GOD
Genuine
prayer involves a time of
thanksgiving, worship and praise to
the LORD, as well as definite
supplications or calling upon the Lord
for His mercy, grace and blessing!
Prayer is essentially, entering the
Holy of Holies in the very presence of
God and worshipping Him in Spirit and
in truth.
SATAN
TREMBLES WHEN WE PRAY
It
has been said: "Satan laughs at
our toiling, mocks at our wisdom, but
trembles when we pray!" The
book 'The Kneeling Christian' gives
this poignant and powerful assessment
of the importance of prayer.
THERE
IS NOTHING THE DEVIL DREADS AS
MUCH AS PRAYER
"Fellow
Christians, let us awake! The
devil is blinding our eyes. He
is endeavoring to prevent us from
facing this question of prayer.
Do we realize that there is nothing
the devil dreads so much as
prayer? His great concern is to
keep us from praying. He loves
to see us 'up to our eyes" in
work - provided we do not pray.
He does not fear because we are eager
and earnest Bible students - provided
we are little in prayer."
'THE
KNEELING CHRISTIAN'
When
my sister Astrid passed away in 1987, the above mentioned book fell into my
hands. She had purchased it from the
Hull Publishing Company in Winnipeg
many years earlier, and knowing what a
consistent and ardent Christian she
had been since 'Day One' in her
life, I greatly treasured it. It
wasn't until I read 'The
Kneeling Christian’'
in the
Norwegian language, however, that I
began to fully understood its great
spiritual worth.
Written
many years ago by a Minister of the
Gospel in Great Britain
,
the author refused to reveal his
identity, using the pseudonym 'An
unknown Christian', this book
has a powerful appeal to those who
love Jesus Christ and are sold-out to
His cause. Here is another excerpt
from his writing:
WE
CAN ACCOMPLISH FAR MORE BY OUR
PRAYERS THAN BY OUR WORK
"Let
us never forget that the greatest
thing we can do for God or for man is
to pray. For, we can accomplish
far more by our prayers than by our
work. Prayer is omnipotent; it
can do anything that God can do!
When we pray, God works. All fruitfulness
in service is the outcome of prayer -
of the worker's prayers, or of those
who are holding up holy hands on his
knees on his behalf. We all know
how to pray, but perhaps many of us
need to cry as the disciples did of
old: "LORD, teach us to
pray."
"LORD,
TEACH US TO PRAY"
MARTIN
LUTHER declared: 'If I don’t
spend at least three hours in prayer
daily, I would never get my work
done. If I should neglect prayer
but a single day, I should lose a
great deal of the fire of faith."
A.J.
GORDON stated: "You can do more
than pray, after you have prayed, but
you can never do more than pray until
you have prayed."
RICHARD
BAXTER WAS A 'MAN OF PRAYER'
RICHARD
BAXTER was a mighty 'man of
prayer'. He stated:
I"seek to preach as a dying man to
dying men." He delivered
every message "as though it were
the last message" he would ever
preach.
JOHN
WESLEY - founder of the Methodist
Church - stated: "Give me one
hundred preachers who fear nothing but
sin, and desire nothing but God, and I
care not a straw whether they be
clergymen or laymen; such alone will
shake the gates of hell and set up the
Kingdom of Heaven on earth. God
does not but in answer to
prayer."
Interestingly,
history credits John Wesley and the
Methodist Revival that swept Great
Britain, for saving
England
from
the similar fate of the French
Revolution.
GEORGE
WHITEFIELD, a contemporary of
Wesley's wrote: "Whole days and
weeks have I spent prostrate on the
ground in silent and vocal
prayer."
DR.
A.J GORDON wrote concerning David Brainerd: "In the depths of those forests alone, he was
unable to speak the language of the
Indians, but he spent whole days
literally in prayer…that the power
of the Holy Ghost would come upon him
so unmistakably that these people
should not be able to stand before
him…Once he preached through a
drunken interpreter, a man so
intoxicated that he could hardly stand
up…Yet scores were converted through
that sermon."
DAVID
BRAINARD wrote: "I
cared not where or how I lived or the
hardships I went through, so that I
could but gain souls for Christ.
When I was asleep I dreamed of these
things. When I was awake, the
first thing I thought of was this
great work. All my desire was
for the conversion of the heathen and
all my hope was in God."
Toward
the end of his life, John Wesley wrote
a letter to all his pastors and
workers urging them all to read the
'Life of David Brainerd.'
DR.
A.C. DIXON
wrote: "William Carey read
'Life of David Brainerd', and he was
so moved that he went to India.
Henry Martyn read 'Life of David
Brainerd', and by its impulse, he went
to India. Payson read it, as a
young man of 20 years, and he said he
had never been so impressed by
anything in his life as by that
story. Murray McCheney read it
and was powerfully impressed by it.
It
was Robert Murray McCheney who stated:
"A holy Minister is an awful
weapon in the hands of God."
WHY
IS PRAYER NECESSARY ? WE HAVE AN
INNATE DESIRE TO COMMUNE WITH GOD
1.
Because we are spiritual beings with
an innate desire to communicate with
our Heavenly Father and Creator.
We were
created in the image of God and there
is therefore a natural pull
heavenward! Although Adam’s fall
greatly marred this
process, through Jesus Christ’s
death on the cross for us all,
believers are reinstated and again
bear the image of our Father and God!
WE
HAVE A DEEP NEED OF DAILY
CLEANSING FROM SIN
2.
Because of the deep need of daily
cleansing from sin, having been
reconciled to our Heavenly Father
through the shed blood of Jesus Christ
our LORD.
And
the blessed assurance that this
relationship will continue throughout
our lives and into eternity! Prayer
keeps our relationship current, so
that doubts and fears do not enter our
hearts.
3.
Because of the many and varied
problems, crises, tragedies and human
needs that we cannot personally solve,
which involve ourselves, our families
and society in general
DURING
PRAYER WE CALL UPON THE ONLY
ONE WHO CAN HELP US AND GUIDE US
Prayer
calls upon the only ONE who can make
the necessary modifications to solve
those problems and give us proper
directions and guidance.
4.
Because of God's generous offer to us
- through the vicarious death and
resurrection of His Son, Jesus Christ
- of full salvation which includes
divine healing, the Baptism of the
Holy Spirit and eternity with Him
forevermore.
Through
prayer, we take advantage of His
bountiful provisions for us, thereby
allowing the Holy Spirit to pray
through us "with groanings that
cannot be uttered." (Romans 8:28)
PRAYER
FULFILLS OUR SPIRITUAL HUNGER THROUGH
PRAISE & WORSHIP
5.
Because of a spiritual hunger and
longing to be in His presence -
through worship, praise and
thanksgiving - we are drawn by the
Holy Spirit into the very Holy of
Holies, the very presence of our
Heavenly Father through the Blood of
Jesus Christ that was shed for us on
Calvary's cross.
'Dear
Heavenly Father, bless all who read
these lines. In Jesus'' precious
name, I pray, Amen.'
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