Prayer by faith!
Verse for Today: Thursday, March 21, 2013
Matthew 21:22 – If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer.
Faith and prayer are intertwined in essence and practice. Without faith, prayer becomes ritual. Without prayer, faith is baseless. Only a heart of faith will pray and a praying heart will develop faith. There are people who try to convert their faith into action without prayer. Faith and prayer go hand in hand because we can meaningfully pray only when we have faith. But our faith is not based on powerful and loud prayer, but in God whose power we depend on for answers. So it is imperative that we fortify our faith with the mind of God in all that we pray for. As we speak to Him about our needs, situations, problems, conflicts and anxieties, God will focus our minds on His will in it. So when we go to Him in prayer, we must go without preconceived answers unlike Prophet Balaam. Thus when we dwell in prayer, God will speak to our hearts about His will in our concerns. God’s transforming power will then fix His answers in our hearts and will encourage us to pray accordingly. It is at such times that we can pray specifically by faith about a matter for which the answer becomes absolutely sure. This was the truth about prayer that Jesus demonstrated to His disciples throughout the 42 months of His public ministry and thus captivated their hearts to ask Him to teach them to pray. Today we are challenged by God to go to Him with our needs and burdens and speak to Him about it. We pour our hearts out and exercise our faith to ask God to remove our burdens and meet our needs. He will honor our faith, no matter how feeble it might be, and will answer us for the praise of His name.
Dear friend, do you ever wonder why your prayers are not answered the way you wanted? Does it confuse you about the link between your prayer and your faith? We must understand that faith is a gift that we receive from God as we synchronize our minds with that of God through regular and continuous meditation on His person, promises and power. It is then that we will know His perfect will about all that we pray for. Our meditating heart must find rest in His presence as we pray about all our needs, burdens and situations. When we are in His green pastures, His Spirit will enlighten us about what He intends in our situations. He speaks to us on the basis of His written Word and enlightens us through His Spirit to make us understand His mind about His plans for us. As we believe it, faith is generated and strengthened in our hearts to enable us to pray while He fulfills it in our lives. Often the hindrance in receiving answers to prayer is the unconfessed sins of omissions and commissions in our lives. If we have grieved or quenched the Spirit of God, we won’t be exercised to know the mind of God in our prayer life. As we live a life of continuous confession and repentance and live in regular unhindered fellowship with God, He will reveal His mind on the matters that we speak to Him about. He will then give us the transforming power of His Spirit to understand and acknowledge His will. It is at that time that we will be able to pray by faith and believe that it shall be done in Christ. Today God challenges us to get to know His mind and will through a repentant life of meditation on and fellowship with Him. He waits for us to get right with Him without prejudices and angularities and be strengthened in our faith to pray and receive answers from Him.
Philippians 4:6 – Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.
Thought for Today
Prayer without faith is worthless and faith without prayer is illusion, but when they work together, there will be showers of blessings.
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