 I want to speak to you this morning on the topic prayer makes the difference. When it comes to prayer, I want this year to be a year of prayer and small groups. Where we go back into prayer and we go back into small groups. Small groups, there's a reason for that and I won't highlight that this morning. What I want to highlight this morning is the importance of coming back to prayer. The church is called the house of prayer. We as Christians, we know there is power in prayer. The example for me when it comes to prayer is Jesus Christ. He prayed on earth. He prayed in the garden. He prayed on the mountain. He prayed when he was facing a very large decision, which is who's going to be his 12 disciples. He prayed when his cousin got beheaded and he went to process his grief and sorrow like a human being that Jesus was. He went to prayer. Jesus prayed in the Gethsemane right before his betrayal. He prayed on the cross. He prayed in heaven when he went to heaven, that the Father will send the Holy Spirit. And guess what Jesus does as a full-time job in heaven right now? Hebrews 7, 25. Therefore, he is also able to save to the uttermost those who come to God through him, since he always, somebody say always. Come on, those of you in Second Sanctuary say always lives to make intercession for them, which tells me that Jesus deems prayer as a noble full-time job in heaven. If our Savior who died for us on earth thinks prayer is so important that he always lives to make intercession for us, that tells me Jesus wouldn't be involved in something that is worthless or pointless. Prayer has power. What is prayer? Prayer is three things. Prayer is a cry. It's a conversation and it's a confrontation. A cry means you're hurting. God help me. Conversation means you have a relationship with God. And the confrontation means in prayer you take authority. In prayer you speak to the mountains. In prayer you speak and you pray in the Holy Ghost and you begin to see a shift in your life in prayer. The Bible says in Matthew chapter 7 verse 7, ask and it shall be given to you. Seek and you will find. Knock and it will be open to you, which tells us three types of things we can do in prayer. We can ask, we can seek and we can knock. When you ask it's you petitioning God. Lord bless me with my business. Bless me with or bless disappointment I'm about to have. It's petitioning. Lord help me with this. Heal this person. Deliver this person. Seeking is when you are begin to press in into the presence of God and you're soaking in His presence. You are receiving God's presence in your life. You're devoting yourself to Him. And knocking now deals with an intercession where you're standing in the gap and you're interceding. You are stepping into the enemy's territory and you're saying I'm going to take back my family members for God. I'm interceding for them to be saved. I'm believing for them to come to the knowledge of the truth. I am knocking on heaven's door so that God will grant them repentance and salvation. Which tells me that these three types of prayers should be in our life. Now some of us we more likely to just cry. Petition. We have a list of things we pray for. We come to the Lord and say Lord bless ABCD. We're done. Some of us we more like Mary's at the feet of Jesus. We just come. We turn on worship and for the hours we just worship. We don't even ask anything. We're like Lord you know my problems. And plus I probably deserve them anyway so I'm just going to love on you Jesus. I don't care about my my problems and honestly I'm not even sure you want to help me with those but I just love you. That's not bad. And if some of us we're just we're just intercession intercessors. We literally from the first second we come into prayer we're like Father God in the name of Jesus Christ. I just pray right now for this person to be saved and we have a list of people we lay hands on these sheets at the morning prayer and it's good. But I want us to understand that God wants this prayer to be all three at once. There will be seasons you spend more time in worship. There will be seasons you spend more time asking. There will be seasons where you spend more time interceding but do not neglect neither of them at the expense of another when it comes to prayer. Amen. The first thing I want to highlight and that is this prayer brings a reward. Prayer brings a reward. Matthew chapter 6 verse 6 it says but you when you pray go into your room and when you have shut your door pray to your father who is in the secret place and your father who sees in secret will now I find that interesting what the bible says here. He will reward you openly. What should it say since you're praying it should say your father will answer your prayer openly but it doesn't say that. The father will reward you openly which tells me the ultimate goal of prayer is not always to get results which means sometimes you will not get the results you're praying for but God still will reward you for praying. Prayer brings a reward. In Genesis 15 one after these things the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision saying do not be afraid Abram I am your shield your exceedingly great reward. Prayer is as much about results as it is about a reward. God's presence is the reward of prayer. God's presence is the reward of prayer. Yes we receive results like brother Jose mentioned when we pray God answers and I'm going to mention that in just a moment but I want you to not think of prayer as only a means by which you get what you ask for. God says to us in Matthew 6 6 if you pray I will reward you openly and then to Abram the Lord says Abram I know you want a son you're asking for a son but before I give you a son I want to give you myself. Do not limit your prayer to only getting results because prayer is where God wants to give himself to you. He wants to be your exceedingly great reward. When it comes to prayer I want to highlight about answers. If your request is wrong God will say no. If your timing is wrong God will say slow. If you are wrong God will say grow and if everything is right God will say go. Our requests do not get answered all the time. What we pray for does not get granted to us right away and this should not discourage us the reason why is because the ultimate benefit of prayer is not just getting results it's getting a reward and that reward is God's presence and that reward is God himself. Charles Spurgeon said we shall not grow weary of waiting upon God if we remember how long and how graciously he once waited for us. Secondly prayer brings revival. Not only prayer brings a reward in the sense that we experience God's presence but in the second leg prayer brings a revival that it revives our spiritual life. Luke chapter 3 verses 21 and 22 when all the people were baptized it came to pass that Jesus also was baptized and while he prayed while he prayed the heaven was open and the Holy Spirit descended in bodily form like a dove upon him and a voice came from heaven saying which said you are my beloved son in you I am well pleased I want you to see this while he prayed say this with me say while he prayed while he was praying we see heaven gets opened while he prayed we see that something else happened the Holy Spirit descended while he prayed a voice came from heaven another instance look chapter 9 verse 29 as he prayed the appearance of his face was altered his robe became white and glistening which means as he is praying we see first time while he prayed God opens the heaven as Jesus is praying while he's praying his face begins to change so prayer is not only where God is giving me himself prayer is also when God is transforming me and changing me into his image and likeness he changes me before he changes my circumstances prayer is not only to get results prayer is also to get revival revival for you where your spiritual man gets ignited where your face changes where your mood is altered where your thoughts can get come down where your spirit man gets built while he prayed the heavens were open while he prayed the Holy Spirit descended while he prayed God spoke something happens when you pray you experience personal revival there was a guy named Dave Dave Robertson some of you maybe have read his book walking in the power and walking in the Holy Spirit his mom was an alcoholic his father was violent in and out of jails and would beat him grandfather decided to raise Dave but grandfather while he taught him work ethic he also verbally abused him he said you'll never amount to anything you're worthless and you're just gonna be like your dad at 16 years of age Dave got saved in the Pentecostal church because the church did not have a follow-up two weeks later Dave backslid from God he eventually joined navy for it for a term and after that came back to God in some legalistic holiness church where he found his wife one thing good happened that in this legalistic church is he got baptized in the Holy Spirit and after that he never backslid he was working in the lumber mill working with wood and all of the stuff one day at the age of 30 he wakes up one morning and he has a vision and in a vision and i'm going to read it how it happened his eyes were open but instead of seeing his bedroom he saw an auditorium with people in wheelchairs on the platform he was seated three rows behind back to the left somehow he knew this was the meeting that was supposed to be his meeting associate pastor began to announce the speaker and look right at Dave and Dave had his bible open to Jew 20 and 21 which teaches about speaking in tongues so this is happening in the vision Dave started to stand up but suddenly an associate pastor pointed on the stage curtain and there came a blonde woman who moved mightily in the power and the anointing of the Holy Spirit people got out of wheelchairs and then the auditorium became empty except for Dave and this woman who looked at him and said i don't know why God has chosen me but it's probably because you failed and he wakes up from the vision at the age of 30 this was a dream or a vision from God it messes with him so bad that for next two weeks he doesn't know what to do with himself he quits his job and instead of working eight hours a day typically when he would go to work he would find a closet in his church go and pray there in the closet until there will be a whistle at the local place where he worked you know for a break there was this whistle that will happen so he would end the prayer four hours into it go have a coffee break there was another whistle to go back to work and he would go back to prayer and he did that eight hours a day three months straight now of course first few days he ran out of prayer things to things to pray about because his english ran out in 15 minutes and then he started praying june 2021 start praying in the holy ghost as he would pray in the holy ghost for four hours and then four hours after lunch treated it like work he says if i worked at this mill station i could work at my prayer he would build his spirit man one day somebody invites him to a meeting as a church meeting and he was so glad to go so he can get out of prayer as well as he goes to this church meeting the preacher was boring the service was dead i mean things were just just as dead as Lazarus dead Lazarus is just dead and he sit there just bored out of his mind thinking i probably should have been praying instead of sitting at this dead meeting and instantly he looks at this woman he sees an x-ray of her knees and in this x-ray he's literally just seeing like a clear image of what is wrong with her knees so he approaches in the middle of the meeting to her scoots over to her say hey do you have a problem with your knees he's like i've never had this happen before to me but this is happening at the meeting and she's like in fact yes i do and she pointed to some kind of a disease that she has he says hey can i just pray for you so he prays for her god supernaturally touches this woman creates a commotion in the service prays for another person another person gets healed and it literally launches his ministry that eventually lasted for 40-something years into different nations of the world of healing ministry deliverance ministry then he pastored also a large church but one thing he attributes this to is this god told him that this happened to him because he chose to build himself up in the spirit by praying in tongues he added fasting to his prayer and eventually have seen a healing ministry for 49 years and he passed away in 2022 what this tells me is the prayer is a reward god gives us his presence we experience him prayer is also a revival if you want to have revival this year it cannot happen without you praying and i'm not just talking about a prayer before a test father god please help me because i didn't study may you add super to my natural i'm not just talking about when you are driving you are speeding and you really have a police officer in your tail that's pulling you over he's like god i promise i will give half of my income to the poor and just just please don't let this bought this police officer give me a ticket and i'm also not ask i'm not telling about a prayer when you came to church you're single you're ready to mingle you found somebody that you like your heart is beating faster you're like man can she just look at me once and that would be a sign lord a sign that you love me and you will never forsake me not that kind of prayer i'm talking about a prayer where you are dedicating time like Jesus did he went into the water and he prayed in while being baptized he went to the mountain and his face was changed god wants to revive your spiritual life mark my words if you dedicate yourself to continuous prayer this year you will live in continuous revival there are people who want revival and there are those who live in revival it's time to move away from just wanting revival hoping for revival asking god for revival to live in the spiritual revival and that secret is a secret place because somebody say amen number three prayer brings a release so not only prayer brings a revival but prayer brings also a release in fact let me just mention a few more things about the revival if prayer brings revival prayerlessness will bring you into a spiritual rut matthew 26 verses 40 and 41 jesus said it says then he came to his disciples and found them sleeping and said to peter what could you not watch with me for one hour pray watch and pray lest you enter into temptation the spirit indeed is willing but the flesh is weak john bonyan said prayer will make a man seized from sin or sin will entice a man to seize from prayer iam bounce who i think is like an apostle on prayer if you want to read anything on prayer iam bounces the guy he said no man can do a great and enduring work for god who is not a man of prayer and no man can be a man of prayer who does not give much time to praying iam bounce also said to give prayer the secondary place is to make god secondary in one's affairs pray when you feel like praying but it's a sin to neglect such an opportunity pray when you don't feel like praying for it is dangerous to remain in such a condition turn to your neighbor say it's time to pray number three prayer brings a release look chapter 22 verses 40 and 41 when he came to a place he said to them pray that you may not enter into temptation he was withdrawn from them about a stone's throw and he knelt down and prayed a few verses down verse 43 it says then the angel appeared to him from heaven strengthening him now i want to address that for some people you're sitting here today and what i'm sharing is falling on deaf ears right now because the argument you have in your mind maybe or a stronghold is this i did that that you're talking about and it didn't work i prayed but my mom still died i prayed where was god why didn't he answer my prayer because this situation only got worse this week we had the opportunity to meet with some young people and and as i was meeting with them i was just asking them about the state of their spiritual life and one of the young men mentioned he said what really hit my prayer life this year last year and he said literally knocked me out was the fact that on my wedding day my mom died and i hoped for a breakthrough i believed for a breakthrough and it didn't come what's the point of praying why press in where is god and all of this and i know how devastating it could be when you experience tragedy when i was nine years of age i saw my best friend had half of his skull gushed out in front of my eyes it's traumatizing why did god not prevent that i was born with something that damaged my optical nerve because of that i struggled with insecurity as a teenager you know how many prayers i prayed for god to heal this many that god answered well you're looking at it still and it was struggle for me too what do you do when you're asking god for this and it's not happening and i mentioned to this young man what i want to share with you today i don't think any believer could ever walk with the lord for more than few years without having an experience of disappointment where some prayers are not answered like we want them when we want them to be answered the strong christians are not those who didn't have these experiences it's those who walked through them and found god on the other side i would submit to you my savior your savior had an unanswered prayer in the garden of gethsemane god didn't answer his prayer father made his cup pass over from me that was never granted and i'm glad it was never granted because if jesus's prayer in the garden would have been granted i would have been doomed to lake of fire i am not in any way comparing my prayers to jesus's prayer absolutely what i'm saying is i have a high priest who can sympathize with me in my weakness and jesus did not give up on prayer just because of a garden of gethsemane his situation because he's still prayed to his father on the cross and when he rose from the dead he prayed to his father to send the holy spirit and guess what he does continuously still prays so what do you do with these experiences where some prayers were not answered even when there was a clear clear scriptural proof that it was god's will you can take it in charnel and say oh i didn't have enough faith i'm at fault and you start beating yourself you can blame somebody else what do you do this week the lord gave me a scripture that brought a lot of clarity personally for me and i want to share that with you it comes from revelation in the book of revelation chapter 6 verse 10 and 11 it says this and they cried with a loud voice saying how long oh lord holy and true until you judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth then a white robe was given to each of them and it was said to them that they should rest a little while longer into both the number of their fellow servants and their brethren who would be killed as they were was completed what an irony these people cry out to god god when will you avenge our deaths god doesn't grant them the request he still answers them but now with oh yeah let me go do it right now god says puts a robe on them first clothes them with a white robe and says rest a little while because more killings are gonna happen more death is gonna happen and then i will step in as the righteous judge and judge the iniquity judge sin and judge even death itself when it comes to prayer i want you to if you hear anything i'm going to share today i want you to for the next minute and a half two minutes open both of your ears wide you cannot approach the topic of prayer ignoring the foundation of the gospel the gospel tells us good god his son jesus dies on the cross to rescue us from the grip of sin god gives us the gift of salvation we are rebels to god and god gave us mercy we live in a broken world where sin satan still rules and dominates things don't work out like god wanted them because of sin because of our rebellion and because of satan and one day god will make everything right when he will judge sin satan curses will be thrown to the lake of fire death will be thrown to the lake of fire and we are in between that season where if sometimes some prayers do not get answered here on earth we have to remember it's not just about 70 years on earth don't box god into this thing if this doesn't happen to me right now if my physical body doesn't get healed if my finances don't break through right now god i quit on you because if you have that approach you forgot about the fact you are a rebel to god the world is under the demonic oppression miserable years on earth also forget that god is not boom he has his own timeline and time is coming where god promise and promises to judge sin to judge injustice and to execute his righteous judgment on this earth and god will make everything right so how do i deal with the fact that some of my prayers did not get answered especially i would say concerning my physical appearance how i deal with them i just turn them over to god and i know one day when i see his face i will have a perfect face until that day i'm not gonna stop praying i'm not gonna stop trusting and i'm not gonna start walking with god because prayer for me is not just getting everything i want from god sometimes it's releasing the pain i'm experiencing the struggles i experience i go to god with my doubts i go to god with my hurts i go to god with my disappointment like my savior did he went to god and say lord could you cause this club to run pass me by god didn't grant the prayer but god sent an angel to strengthen him when god doesn't remove the struggle he will renew your strength when in prayer god does not always fix every single thing he will come and strengthen your heart and say son i am with you i will walk with you through the valley of the shadow of death i will walk with you through the fire i will walk with you through the struggle i will be with you in the flood in the river and in the fire amen i want to encourage you with that today when the answer to prayer is delayed god will clothe you with the rope of his comfort there was this guy named Ivan he endured all the horrors of soviet prison camp one day he was praying with his eye closed his eyes closed when a fellow prisoner noticed him and said with the ridicule prayer won't help you to get out of here any faster opening his eyes Ivan answered i do not pray to get out of this prison i pray to do god's will don't turn prayer into a vending machine experience if i punch in the right numbers everything i want will come out god is not a universe that you pray to and god is not a law of attraction god is a being just judge your father and my father and he asks us to ask him and we pray to him he gives us results but there are things we don't get sometimes on this side and this should not discourage and destroy our faith this should strengthen our faith to bring our hurts frustrations to him in prayer if you stop praying because you've had a very disappointing experience with prayer before maybe god didn't answer the prayers and you stopped completely i want to ask you to step over that mystery of why it did not happen and to step into many more answered prayers that god wants to answer in your life if i would stop praying you know as i could stand here today and say well look god didn't answer this prayer the people even pointed to me when we couldn't have children look where is your god now you you guys can't have children so what our god is a good god and he answers prayer but even if he is not going to answer i'm going to still love him seek him press him in press into him why because i believe in the gospel my sins have been forgiven i've been washed by the blood of jesus christ and if god doesn't answer one prayer for the rest of my life i will love and praise him why because of what he did on the cross for me he saved me i'm a rebel to god and he converted this rebel into his son and adopted me into his family that's such a big deal this life on earth whatever i get a good bad or the ugly it's still gonna come to an end and when you reach poor it doesn't matter six feet underground all of our bones and skeletons will be the same and all of our lives to be reduced to one dash but what happens in that eternity that's what's going to matter and i want on that side to be with this god who gave his son to die for me and that's what we need to remember is the gospel eternity his love for us be clothed with the righteousness when we experience prayers that don't seem to get answers sometimes they'll get answered just a little bit later but but in that moment the enemy will come in and say you know look look what happened to you this person died yeah but this person is in heaven right now hoping you will stop whining and actually trust in god so you can have a family reunion in there i remember when sidroth you know when he got saved his family got saved and his brothers and sisters got saved his mom got saved and there was the last person who didn't want to give their life to jewish messiah jesus and that was his father and sidroth said on the deathbed he would come to his father and say dad you need to get saved you need to believe in the messiah you need to believe in Yeshua as a messiah and it's that of course was a stubborn orthodox jews like i'm not gonna do it and then him and his sister would come and say dad everybody's going to heaven we're all gonna be in heaven we're gonna miss you dad for crying out loud get saved so we can have a family reunion and something about that just broke his heart that he's gonna be in hell alone and the whole family is going to be without him in heaven and right there i think few hours before he breathed his last he shouted that he wanted to get saved and sidroth wasn't convinced so he's like he need to shout louder that you want to be saved he's like i just want to make sure with an exclamation mark that we will be with you in heaven because he's like i don't want to go to heaven without my whole family being in heaven and when that dad got saved such a big deal that's what the most important is our eternal salvation not our temporary blessings now with that said the fourth thing is prayer brings results bible records 650 prayers 450 answers to prayer jesus prayed 25 different times during his ministry paul mentions prayer 21 times in his writings jensen franklin said this one of the greatest tragedies of prayerlessness is unemployment of angels mausman rose said prayer is the earthly license for heavenly interference mark batter says that prayers are prophecies they are the best predictors of your spiritual future who you become is determined by how you pray ultimately the transcript of your prayers becomes the script of your life abraham prayed for abimelech and god answered it joe prayed for his friends god answered it solemn asked for wisdom god granted it to him hannah asked for a son god gave it to her jesus prayed for protection and blessing god granted his request ahab was a heathen king and he prayed for repentance god granted him repentance and postponed judgment hezekiah prayed god added 15 years to his life men of a prayed and god postponed destruction zekariah prayed and god answered that prayer by giving him a son yes prayer will not change god but it will change everything interesting some of us say well god promised it settles it i don't need to pray about it yet it's interesting when god came to rescue israel from egypt he didn't say hey i made a promise to abraham and i'm gonna rescue the bible says god says i heard your cry so yes god will fulfill his word but he loves to answer your prayer just because god gave you a promise to bless you protect you save your kids don't sit and fold your hand and say well god said it i'm just gonna simply chill about it no you need to pray through because the bible says that god loves to answer our prayers we see that god the father promised the outpouring of the holy spirit yet jesus asked the father to send the holy spirit why because it's not just about god making a promise it's you partnering with god so god begins to release that promise because of your prayer there was this about this preacher he was on the way from a service it was uh january 18 1989 his name was don piper he died his carga smashed to pieces virtually every bone in his body was broken and shattered and he died on the scene he remained dead for 90 minutes the steering wheel he said impaled me in the chest and then the car's roof collapsed on my head so there was just no way you could survive this accident he said that his heart stump pumping and the paramedics declared him dead he was without a pulse for 90 minutes now another guy was driving by there his name was dicker dick one wrecker and he decided to go and climb over there where don piper was at and hold his hand the guy was dead for 90 minutes and pray for him he prays for him he prays for him he prays for him he prays for him and got specifically instructed this another baptist preacher to pray specifically for him that he will not have internal internal injuries he will not have any brain or internal injuries after 90 minutes of being dead medically verified dead 10 minutes your vegetable 15 minutes you're gone 90 minutes a guy that's praying for a dead man don is already in heaven has visits in heaven seeing his family everything but somebody on earth is not giving up and praying and don comes back to his body god didn't just bring him back into his body god used somebody to intercede and to pray interestingly of course when he came back to his body every part of his body was damaged except what the preacher prayed for no brain damage supernaturally got protected his brain and he was not a vegetable so this baptist preacher is holding the hand of this dead guy who just came back to life runs to the paramedics and say guys i think he has a pulse of course the paramedics are like he's gone there is no way he can have a pulse it's been 90 minutes and they're about to leave and this baptist preacher lies on the floor on the on the road and tells the paramedics you're gonna have to run me over you're not leaving until you go check on him and so of course paramedics wouldn't run him over so they came to check on him and when they come to check on him they find out he actually has a pulse now and of course two years of like 30 something surgeries and god brought him back and not only that he lived and still testifies to the glory of god the power of prayer if prayer can bring somebody from the dead what can your prayer do what would happen if in the next 21 days you start to pray not only you'll experience revival not only you'll experience god's reward of his presence not only you'll experience some release in your life but there will be results that only god can do can somebody say a man a buddhist monk a buddhist man he was born in south korea steve kong at the age of six he started to attend buddhist temples and at the age of nine he moved to united states he started having identity crisis and middle school confusion anger rebellion depression sadness he coped with it by taking drugs in his freshman year of college ended up living in a dealer's house and they were transporting carrying and selling drugs 1998 during the summer he got high so he caused the buddhist temple for help and they didn't help him so he smoked what is called death bull which is a heroin cocaine and pcp combined he stayed awake for 10 straight days started to experience trips an old asian grandpa would show up to steve and tell him if he takes his life he will have 50 000 years less in hell and go to heaven then he's on such a heavy drugs for 10 days he's not sleeping so he's going crazy he's seeing this grandpa and then finally this grandpa who's just a demon tells steve to kill himself so points to a kitchen knife and says you need to go do it right now now steve's mom was in the house at that time and so steve goes for the kitchen knife and starts cutting himself and as he's cutting himself what begins to happen is mom comes in and starts to get the knife out the grandpa shows up to steve and says do it faster and do it right now because he's hindering your salvation the moment he dies steve leaves his body and grandpa disappears and instead he ends up in hell now his mom being a buddhist calls a christian lady who is the mother of the drug dealer's house that this is happening at they all come to the house the pastors come and they begin to intercede for hours for steve and god brings him back to life he gets rescued from that hell comes back to his consciousness and then these pastors and leaders tell steve say hey do you want to get saved he says yes yes he prays sinners prayer 10 times just in case and it saved his life the mother prayed him out though he was a buddhist but god rescued him and today sivin is a pastor and he's a leader and tells other people about jesus christ moms dads never give up praying for your children there is power in prayer there are results that god will do when you begin to pray let me tell you about liberian warlock named joshua they call him bot naked general there's documentaries about him stories about him actually i had the privilege of interviewing him already but i can't post the video because his reception was really bad and his father was in line to be a priest for this deity in africa but because his father was rich this deity it's a demon chose didn't choose his father instead he was chosen at 11 years of age he becomes a high priest for a demonic deity in liberia four years before he becomes a priest so 11 minus four seven years of age he starts the process of preparation for high priesthood this process involved being blindfolded and from morning till evening hunting animals as a seven years of age blindfolded killing an animal with bare hands ripping the heart out from an animal blindfolded and eating the heart of an animal four-year training disgusting nasty that's what demons cause people to do finally he qualified to be the high priest at 11 he becomes the high priest and the first thing he has to do as a high priest is now not kill animals but children and eat their hearts a human sacrifice and for the next 14 years this happens every year he has 3000 something priests under him as a 11 years old 12 years old because he's so demonically possessed eventually the president of liberia was under his control he went from being a witch doctor to becoming a warlock where he now organized an army and start killing people in fact about 20 000 people will kill directly under him now i didn't think it was a lot of it was true until i tried to fly him to romania a week ago so i can interview him and they flagged him at the airport because of 20 to 30 000 people that were killed by him now he received forgiveness now he's helping is totally restored but still in europe he can't go anywhere because of his background christian group knowing this guy is completely crazy started to intercede for him and they named him joshua their intercession wasn't for his salvation but for his immediate death by god's judgment so much death he caused they didn't even dare to pray for his salvation the reason why they changed his name to joshua so in case somebody finds out they'll never be able to link them to his judgment and so they will not have repercussions for their prayers god brings a prophet to this christian group of intercessors and says don't pray for his judgment pray for his salvation him this guy kills children he's a warlock 30 000 people were slaughtered not him he needs to burn in hell he's on the level of it but god had a different plan so they start praying for his salvation and if that was not enough they will brave enough every day to try to go to his house and evangelize to him this is the funny part interesting part none of his security could detect christians they would pass through his security none of them saw christians only he had an encounter with them every day he would always decline the gospel he would say no to them but because they kept praying for him and god supernaturally protect them where his army man didn't kill the christians until one day he said he'll come to church and when he came to church he had an open vision at the altar and god supernaturally touches them and he becomes saved interesting part he goes to nigeria to share his testimony and in nigeria while he's sharing his testimony god starts delivering him the very thing he swallowed as an 11 years of age priest there was particular demonic objects he had to swallow now as a saved christian in another country during deliverance during deliverance the same objects that were in his body came out and god totally set him free and today he rescues child soldiers and ministers to them and prays for them and we have people in our church who actually worked with him in Liberia this is not something i read off of internet and they can testify this heart this man's life is dramatic dramatically dramatically and crazily changed the power of prayer if your son your daughter maybe is involved in some sinful things and you say there is no way god can rescue them my friend keep praying because our god does miracles because nothing is impossible may this be the year where god does the supernatural miracles in your family may this be the year where god does supernatural miracles in your finances may this be the year where god will do supernatural miracles in your life in jesus mighty name can somebody say amen i want to encourage you to pray in the conclusion i don't want to just inspire you i want to give you practical steps how to pray properly our prayer is to the father through the son by the holy spirit say this with me say our prayer is to the father through the son by the holy spirit we don't pray to Mary we don't pray to saints and we don't pray to the universe we pray to the father in the name of jesus by the holy spirit second thing the place of prayer you can pray privately you can pray publicly men of god had altars where they prayed later on people prayed in the temple jesus prayed in the wilderness prayed in a mountain in the garden or any solitary place we are told to go into a room to pray we are also told to gather together as a church and pray the third thing practical prayer the posture of prayer the heart is more important than any postures but in the bible people prayed sitting people prayed standing people prayed kneeling they prayed face to the ground they prayed hands lifted up they prayed eyes lifted to heaven they prayed placing the head between your knees probably not a best idea for a lot of us but you can still practice that if you really want to go biblical and some people pray pounding their chest don't want to do that when if you come to a morning prayer but in case you privately in your home and this really helps you you can pound your chest somebody in the bible pounded their chest but they were sinners and they pounded their chest and god reacted or responded to that the biggest question that people have is what do i pray about i have a solution for you very simple pray tacos prayer tuesday tacos monday tacos wednesday tacos thursday tacos and friday tacos what is tacos prayer stand for tacos stand for t stands for thanksgiving thank god for what he did does in your life a stands for adoration you praise god for who he is his righteousness his holiness his promises his character c stands for confession confess your sins confess your wrong doings confess who you are in jesus confess his promises of your life confess prophetic words of your life do a confession pray for others intercede for your family members intercede for your co-workers for your immediate family members for your friends pray for others and lastly is pray for yourself pray for your needs your goals desires so next time you get into prayer like man i don't know what to pray for try tacos thanksgiving adoration confession others and yourself pray in the holy ghost pray in tongues lift your prayer and you will see god will begin to meet you at the point of your need next 21 days starting tomorrow we want to embark on the 21 days of prayer now it's also fasting but fasting without prayer could just be physical purpose of fasting is spiritual reasons not just physical instead of eating replace your eating with prayer maybe you've never prioritized getting up a little bit earlier do that if you are able you don't live very far from the church come to church to pray let's make this a house of prayer we're starting something with our team and i want to invite you to be a part of that i want you to pull out your phone and if you have a telegram chat i want you to go to this telegram chat if you want to be a part of this prayer with us you don't have to if you don't want to but if you want to i want you to join this telegram chat this is a hungry gent prayer chat we're the night before we will put some prayer requests that we are going to be praying for the day after so like tonight we're going to tell you who we're praying for tomorrow who got saved today we're going to also pray for specific things each day we have prayer requests that we're going to be praying and then when you join that in that morning when you go into prayer you can say started when you start it when you finish you can say finished this is not to show off we don't care about that this is to hold us accountable and as a church to build a church culture of prayer we invite you to come to pray at church but i like what a new friend i met this week and he said the lord touched my heart my life i come three times a week to church to pray and the rest of the four times i pray at home so i can cultivate prayer at home so i can build a church so i can build prayer in church and i can build prayer in my house and maybe that's something some of you can do come two three times or one time to church prayer and then pray at home our goal is in to get everybody to come here to pray our goal is to have everybody praying strategically specifically targeting those things god has given to you to target in prayer this year and if you add fasting to that god's going to do so many amazing incredible things this year may this year be different than any other year but may you approach this year differently than you approached it before if you're a pregnant nursing or you're a child you're not encouraged to fast in fact you're encouraged not to fast food because it's not healthy if you're on heavy medication before you make a decision to go fasting if you're not sure talk to your doctor don't just kind of go in and just say okay i'm just gonna go fast but if you are healthy and you're not on any meds and you feel the lord's leading to go into a fast you will be okay the lord will sustain you first three days will be hard but please understand your body has about over 30 pounds or something fat stored for days like that god wired you like that that you have extra stuff now most of us some of us have extra extra extra stuff on the average you can go on about 68 days for your body to have enough fuel so what happens tomorrow when you stop eating your body actually goes into eating is there's eating toxins is there eating all the extra stuff in there that's why you get the bad breath that's why you get a little bit of headache all of that detoxing begins to take place in your body your body starts a buffet it has enough to store so the craving is here nothing here so i want you to know that don't don't kind of fall a victim oh my gosh i'm gonna die no no no no no that's here for most of us it's right here the body has enough fuel for most of us to last many many many many many many many days and in fact there are studies that have been done where actually fasting is beneficial for your health but again we're not doing it for a diet we're not doing it to get healed physically we're doing it to draw near to god and again this doesn't mean every person needs to do a water fast it's just simply every person needs to talk to the lord and ask what does the lord have them do for the next 21 days will jesus love you less if you fast if you don't fast absolutely not our love for the lord is not determined by a prayer fasting is determined by the cross god doesn't love us more or less but we can draw nearer or further from him during the season that the lord is drawing us nearer to him and when you're praying check in on telegram let's stay connected if you have an urgent need a trouble visit your home or something that's really radical that telegram group is also that group where you can say hey could you pray for this but it's not necessarily a prayer needs wall it's for urgent needs it's for uniting prayer warriors together and every once in a while when there's an urgent need we will drop it in there so that everybody can press in and pray so that we can be united as a church in prayer amen