 Welcome back everyone. We had some questions here so it was just good to answer those questions about schedule prayer time. How about the Google Classroom students? Is there anything that you are thinking about as far as scheduling your time for prayer is concerned? Any issues, difficulties? I think for most people it's tiredness, business, distraction. So if we can sit down and plan a solution for ourselves then I think it will be a lot easier for us to make that time of prayer and then reap the benefits as we've been discussing. Yeah okay Shana. Oh okay so the question is what is more important? Is it prayer or is it reading the Bible? Okay is it prayer or is it reading the Bible? Okay so see I would say that we have to ask a bigger question. This question will come later. The bigger question is how can I strengthen my relationship with God? So if you answer that question you will get the answer to your question. So when I'm you know developing my relationship with God for I have to know him so then I would make time for Bible reading and you know so that I can get revelation of okay what is it, who is God and what is he saying and to relate to him which is my time in prayer. So then I would know in every season of my life how much time I should spend for the word or how much time I should spend in prayer. So you know it's not one or the other both are important but you just have to you know sort of it's like they say two wheels of a vehicle you can't say which one is important you need both for the vehicle to run. Yeah so did I answer your question? Okay so it's more about strengthening my relationship with God both will come in prayer and word true yeah anything else? I saw your hand was slowly going up so I thought okay maybe another one okay no worries we can move to the next topic here okay Paul has a question yes Brother Paul I don't think I'll be able to hear you could you kindly message can you type it in the chat please okay so Brother Paul I can't hear you at all I'm sorry you if you could please type your question in the chat that would be helpful okay so feel free to you know type it as we okay here is the question what is the best duration of prayers okay what is the best duration of prayers this also has a similar answer to what I told Sean so we can't really put a time to it see I could be praying for two hours but maybe that prayer is not effective because I don't know the foundations of prayer whatever we went through earlier in our course so it's not so much the duration it's the effectiveness of the prayer which is important now having said that it would be good for us to at least try an hour of personal prayer time on a daily basis I'm simply saying an hour okay there's no recommendation in the in the Bible some people quote Jesus when Jesus told his disciples you know you could have at least prayed for an hour he says that so they say okay then Jesus also was suggesting that people can pray for one hour nothing wrong in it it's a good suggestion so why not do at least one hour so that's what I would say Brother Paul one hour would be a good beginning from there you could go anywhere there may be times in our you know days where we may put in less than one hour that's okay I mean don't beat yourself about the one hour it's just like a reference that's all okay so yeah yes Sean ma'am for me personally I think the best amount of time the duration for prayer would be the time that you can focus and concentrate because when you can like focus on the content for 10 minutes I mean that's when you have a good prayer I mean if you if you can't if you're doing a 15 20 minutes and you can't concentrate during that prayer that it won't be a proper prayer but if you at least like focus on the content for the 10 minutes at least I feel that will be a good duration for prayer whatever how much ever you can meditate on the meditate and focus on the prayer is the best prayer for me okay okay sure I mean I accept that or whatever time you can concentrate but then my only thing is even that shouldn't become a limit so if I can only concentrate for 10 minutes I shouldn't say that is my capacity I can't pray for more than 10 minutes hopefully because I'm building my relationship with God it has to go from 10 minutes to 20 minutes I focus has to increase only then I'm growing otherwise I've become limited okay so just to bear that in mind okay and also please don't take this as some strict rule but it's good to have a discipline as we've seen you know from the life of Jesus from the life of Daniel okay so if we don't have any more questions we can move on anything you wanted to ask pray and give our time with God like it's it's better right because if we do it in the morning because we show that God you're important now I'm thinking of you yes yeah definitely so Rinna is asking wouldn't it be better to give time in the morning to God yes you know if you can work towards it that would be the best because you've finished your prayer before you deal with anything else so I heard Pastor Ashish's testimony about how he wakes up at 4 a.m every day he's been doing it since his you know his early days when he became a believer till now okay so he prays an hour or more every day and the amount of work we see him do you know in office because we all work every day right it's an incredible amount of work that that obviously you know is done at office and elsewhere but I can't imagine somebody as busy as pastor making time every day for personal prayer time okay and he still talks about it to you know teach people I think if pastor can do it anybody can do it okay so but it's something that has to be important if it's important to me I will do it no matter what okay so we have to recognize the importance and develop it so over time what happens you know let's say we start now one year down the line two years down it will just become a habit for all of us okay and and you'll see the power of God in and through your life because of this discipline which you develop so yeah yes Sean so it's better if okay okay yeah so Sean was just talking about the timing of waking up and praying if at all you're doing it in the morning I think every individual can decide I know people who wake up at 3 a.m you know one of my colleagues she does that every day she wakes up at 3 a.m she prays for a you know couple of hours goes back to bed then wakes up does her morning chores and then comes to work so I think it's very personal each one of us can pick whatever might work for us okay all right so let's move on then we will come to chapter nine now which talks about prophetic prayer so prophetic prayer we will look at it more in the context today of praying for others but we will touch upon praying the things that God shows for us as well but more about you know praying for others now God's word tells us that he is a God who reveals new things to us he can reveal things which are unknown to our natural mind and show us the way ahead so there are a couple of scriptures in our notes I'll quickly you know go through them Isaiah 42 verse 9 I'm reading the second verse there behold the former things have come to pass and new things I declare before they spring forth I tell you of them so we as believers we are not limited just to the five senses we don't say things like only if I can touch only if I can like Thomas only if I can put my finger through you know the pierced hands of Jesus I will believe what did Jesus say even though those who have not seen they are more blessed so we're not limited to our five senses and this scripture says that God can reveal new things which before they happen before they spring forth I tell you of them so even the things which have not happened is it possible for God to reveal that to us what do you think yes very much because what about the prophecies of Isaiah you know we call them the messianic prophecies Jesus is not come you know he will be born in Bethlehem born of a virgin these are all prophecies foretold you know many hundreds of years before Jesus was born so God is a God who is able to reveal beforehand the things which are to come another passage Isaiah 46 and verse 10 declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things that are not yet done saying my counsel shall stand and I will do all my pleasure so the initial part that says declaring the end from the beginning okay so this was something about my personal you know journey that was a certain decision that I needed to make okay so I wasn't sure whether it was like a it was like a transaction something so I wasn't sure if it will work out in the long run and I had to make a decision hey am I going forward with this or not I prayed this prayer I said Lord you declare the end from the beginning meaning you know the end of things before they even start because what do we know about God's nature he's omniscient he knows he knows where each one is going to go he knows what decision each one is going to make not that he's controlling those decisions but he's just aware you know what might happen so no I just prayed that prayer I said Lord you know how this deal is going to turn out you give me the wisdom if it is not going to work out reveal and it didn't work out right but the good part is God revealed before I experience a loss so I'm saying with regard to everything God knows he knows us he knows what's going to happen in our lives he knows what's going to happen in the lives of people that we are ministering to okay so that's the beauty of God he knows even the details of the past and that's where we talk about the prophetic prophetic okay so right now I'm not going to get into it but there is an apc publication known as understanding the prophetic how do these prophetic words come how do we receive these words how do we release these words you know how can we guide people in the prophetic so there's all that in that apc publication you also have a second year course on the prophetic but today all I want to touch on is that the prophetic can be helpful in praying in prayer so being prophetic or hearing from God can help us pray prayers that God wants us to pray so how does knowing God's will beforehand help we can we'll see some examples in our notes we can delay or avert God's judgment so when we know you know for example I'll get into it later but when we know that something is going to happen you know it's a matter of judgment so let's take for example okay that Jonah but Jonah didn't really he was not willing you know for God to forgive the people but maybe he had a sense that God is going to forgive the people and that's why he got so upset with God so you can kind of know beforehand you know what God wants to do and you can pray in line with it so you can avert judgment or you can delay the judgment which may be coming upon a city or the life of an individual when we are prophetic we can foil Satan's attacks that simply means you know some what do we read about Satan Satan is against God's people he's like a roaring lion you know seeking whom he may devour so does he have plans against every believer very much he wants to do something which will bring the believer down but when we are prophetic we can come to know his plans beforehand and pray you know for God's protection and his wisdom and being prophetic would also help us pray the plans which God has for a person so I'll just tell you one example just to you know encourage you since we're talking about prophecy and all so this was long ago I just graduated and I was I think I was in a job also at that point in my life but I went for a prayer meeting a prayer meeting from church we had 40 days of just worship prayer intercession all that so I went for that after I think it was the last day so we had an extended time and at the end of that extended time the person who was ministering they were led prophetically you know like what I'm talking about right now to reveal certain things which God had in their mind so they call different people and they happen to call me also so it was a very strange experience so I went and then that person told me that you know you will be teaching God's word but I like Sarah I laughed the reason is at that point or little before that I was leading a life group and before my life group you know I used to literally cry because I don't know how to you know plan put together what I have understood so that I can communicate so it's pretty hard so I would do my study and then I would really struggle to communicate what I have learned to my set of you know life group girls so I was I was really shocked I thought why is he saying this I don't think I want to do this in fact I just want to quit anything that has to do with teaching okay but God revealed much beforehand what he is going to do in my life and then things started happening you know it was not something that I wanted for my life but God led me in this way and today when I you know look at opportunities to share God's word I always recall that God knew before I could understand that this is what he wants me to do right but what did I do when I came to know what is the my direction I started praying you know Mary what she says be it unto me according to your word God whatever you say yes amen we receive it I receive it in my life so what I'm trying to say is when we hear from God we can pray according to God's will okay so it's very important to be prophetic when we pray so here another point is you can pray for one's destiny because God knows what he wants them to do through their lives and when he leads you to pray that prayer you can pray that for the person and then of course you know prayer and proclamation so where we declare the power of God so now let's come back to the first point here about averting God's judgment or delaying so we find here that there are instances in God's word where we see that God revealed much beforehand the judgment which was going to come upon people or going to come upon a community or a region so in the book of Amos Amos chapter 7 could somebody please read verses 1 to 6 Amos 7 verses 1 to 6 Thus the Lord God showed me behold he formed locus swarms at the beginning of the late crop indeed it was a late crop after the king's moans and so it was when they had finished eating the grass of the land that I said oh Lord God forgive I pray oh that Jacob may stand for he is small so the Lord relented concerning this it shall not be said the Lord thus the Lord God showed me behold the Lord God called for conflict by fire and he consumed the great deep and devoured the territory and I said oh Lord God sees I pray oh that Jacob may stand for he is small so the Lord relented concerning this this also shall not be said the Lord God okay so very interesting okay Amos you will read in verses 14 and 15 he is a prophet he is a man called by God to prophesy so he in the Old Testament prophets were the ones who heard from God what God is going to do what God is planning so he heard from God that judgment is coming upon God's people so in the first situation God shows locusts okay locusts are what insects which destroy so he gets the picture so Amos is seeing the picture of locusts coming and eating up the crop so he has to interpret it he interprets it as God's judgment is coming upon the people so when we come to know that you know there is going to be judgment or something like that what are we supposed to do what should we do let's say God reveals to us like Amos he saw something something and in that you know he came to know he understood oh God is going to do this judgment is coming so what should I do if you get a picture what should you do go and tell others okay go and tell others how about the others okay repent and pray for them okay what else can we do yes okay so read the word more and understand it and then go tell others okay okay fine so varied responses that you you are recommending it really depends okay whether or not we must tell it to the people we have to go by what the Holy Spirit is impressing on our hearts but here is the common thing that you and I can do we need to intercede and you know what is intercession intercession is talking to God on behalf of the people what did Amos do he said God it should not it shall not be please don't do this so he is interceding for the people when God is showing the coming judgment so what did God say God said okay I won't do it right so this is how you know God ministers through the prophetic word he will reveal this is coming or something is going to happen or you know people need to repent so he will show it to us when he shows it to us our first responsibility whether you tell somebody else or not that's the second question but the first responsibility is pray intercede you know go before God and ask God mercy you know give us your mercy you know pour out your mercy so intercession is the first response that you and I must have so in that passage we saw first time he saw locus second time what did you see yeah so fire again when he sees the fire he understands judgment twice God is showing him judgment is coming upon the people okay so what does he do after that again sorry yeah he pleads with him so he intercedes for the people once again okay so that should be our first response so God is a God who can reveal his purposes you know the what is there in the father's heart what are the intentions in God's heart he can reveal it to us and then we can start praying and interceding whether for an individual our own selves our families or you know anyone else so that is how the judgment we saw that what did God do he said okay Amos no judgment you prayed so no judgment we'll see later we have an entire section on intercession so in the book of Ezekiel it says even if there's one man standing in the gap God says you know I won't put my wrath on the people so we can take that position to pray for people but we need to hear from God right so when we hear from God we have this advantage that we are praying in line with what God is thinking and what God is doing so what if I don't hear from God and I just keep praying I'll take my pattern the Lord's prayer and I'll keep praying one hour I'll pray enough it's not effective so while the pattern is important while the structure is important the schedule is important sensitivity to the Holy Spirit you know is very very crucial so that's when you can pick up what is God saying okay what is God going to do so you can pick up these matters and you can begin to pray for those things maybe you just sense that I don't know why but I feel like you know when when I go today to work it probably is going to be a hard day you can't explain it but you sense that way then what do you do you just spend extra time in prayer and say Lord I need your grace no I need your mercy so things like that so God can reveal or impress it on our hearts and we must pray for it and similarly you find that especially those who are in leadership in the Bible God has revealed many things to them okay for example Moses, Moses becomes an intercessor for the people so he goes before God he comes to know that God is very upset with the Israelites why because they are a complaining people they are people with unbelief okay they are disobedient they are stiff necked they are stubborn so what does God say he gets very upset he says I'm going to destroy these people. Moses God tells Moses which means a man has received a word from God that this is what God is going to do judgment is coming upon the Israelites you will see in the different passages which are mentioned here Moses goes back to God and he starts pleading with God as a leader he says God you brought these people out of Egypt what will the Egyptians think if you destroy them they are your people you need to forgive them what you know please have mercy on us so prophetic intercession is a very important part of leadership we need to hear from God what is God doing even as pastors leaders right if I'm not hearing from God what does God want to do for my people I may not be able to pray effectively okay so we have to develop this ability to hear from God prophetic intercession we're just calling it prophetic intercession it's very simple it is to be sensitive to what God wants to do in these cases there was judgment which God already announced and Amos Moses you know other leaders in in God's word we see that they start to pray and they say God let this not happen Abraham do you remember Abraham yeah even in that situation isn't it when God said that Sodom and Gomorrah I'm going to destroy what did Abraham do he prayed he said God no please how did God respond yeah so it was like a bargain with God right so unfortunately in that case it didn't work out because they were so wicked Sodom and Gomorrah but the point is God is willing to listen to us he reveals so that somebody can pray for the people and then he also by nature he's a God of mercy so he listens when we pray such prayers okay next prophetic intercession foils Satan's attacks as I already stated there can be times where we sense that Satan is trying to you know have a weapon against us so in the case of Peter do you remember Peter what did Jesus tell Peter this is in Luke 22 verses 31 and 32 where he says Simon Simon indeed Satan has asked for you that he may sift you as wheat but I have prayed for you that your faith should not fail and when you have returned to me strengthen your brethren so when Jesus came to know that Satan is going to attack Peter what did Jesus do for him pray okay pray when they pray it becomes a protection for the person that we are praying for that is the reason when Jesus came to know that Satan is going to tempt confuse distract Peter he started praying for Peter okay so God's protection can come upon our lives if we pray if we don't pray what'll happen there's no protection Satan can just come in and do what he wants to do and that is why God is revealing God is revealing hey this person needs protection so can you pray for them so when we pray it is as if you know you're building a hedge or like a compound you're just building a protection around them and they are protected from the attacks of the devil in Hosea 12 13 it says by a prophet the Lord brought Israel out of Egypt and by a prophet he was preserved okay so preserved here the Hebrew word is Shamar S H A M A R Shamar and it means a hedge okay a protection around so by Moses Israel was protected how was Israel protected I already shared the incident where Moses interceded with God he prayed for the people so again coming back to leadership when you know God leads us to you know take care of people minister to people one of our primary responsibility is prayer you know we can instruct all we want but when we pray what is happening Shamar preserve Moses preserve the people through his intercession so as a leader one of my primary responsibilities is to pray for the people because when I pray for the people there will be preservation or protection around the people so that is how one can protect you know people that God puts in our hearts against the attacks of the devil you know I'm sure many of us we we are aware that generally parents your parents what do they do they pray for their children why do they pray for their children that God should protect them from you know sin deception all the all the wrong things which are happening in the world right so what happens what happens when parents pray like this the children are protected by God and sometimes you know even in a prophetic sense meaning God can reveal hey this is happening you know maybe your your child or your sibling or somebody God can reveal Satan is working like this can you pray so when you pray God protects that person so we can destroy the attacks of the devil through our prayers and prophetic prayers okay you've understood when we hear from God and we pray for them so has it ever happened in your situation that God revealed to you about somebody and then you prayed for them yeah okay prince you have a story yeah sure now God reveals someone and we like we didn't pray about it is like from next time God will not trust us with those things okay okay got your question so you're saying if God reveals something we should go and pray with them no if God so see for my question I have got it like maybe like last year so I was it's in early morning like I got a dream about one of our Cheshmambu so he's doing his business in Delhi and I showed in my dream it's very clear like there were some disputes with his partners and he got betrayed and he got loss of certain amount I was so sure about it and I was led I was like want to go and tell him but he's so bigger than me because I was like okay I don't want to tell and the later or two three weeks later he came back from Delhi and he's talking with my pastor and my pastor came and he's sharing what why he's like so much long for one and a half and he told like he got some troubles in his business so I understood and I asked him is about he got betrayed in business and no no and is this the amount that he was lost and he told like that is the exact amount he was betrayed with and lost okay the thing is like I didn't shared with him I didn't prayed with him prayed for him also like I didn't even intercede I just got it and I didn't do anything about it okay okay so what would have been the right thing to do so from the next time when I have any dream and I go share with my pastor he's like did you pray about it he asked me so my question is like if God tells reveals us some things about people and if we just see them and we just leave them God will not give next time another chance yeah so okay so there seems to be two things that I should address okay so one is when we get a message from God what would be the right thing to do as I shared you pray that is the first thing so God may or may not want you to go and tell somebody okay because their heart may not be ready to receive it so that's the mistake most of us make the moment I see a picture or a dream I'm all excited I just want to tell I saw this you were in the dream and you know this was happening to you and God is going to protect you that wasn't get scared they're like oh are you serious you know is that going to happen so you're making it worse you're not building faith you're building fear so actually when we get a dream or God reveals something you don't have to go and tell okay make that a note whenever I get a message from God I don't tell unless and I start praying about it unless God impresses on my heart okay you should tell this okay so that is one point second what if I don't pray you know God said something and I don't take it up seriously so we we study your prince that you know as far as God's grace God's gift is concerned it grows when we use it when you don't use it it will become dormant okay so that's why Paul also told Timothy stir up the gift of God which is in you through the laying on of the hands so we must practice what God gives us so if you don't do it once don't worry about it next time you pray okay for the person but if you keep neglecting if you keep neglecting Paul also tells Timothy do not neglect the gift of God which was given to you by the laying out on of hands it's possible that you may not hear you know sensitively not that God is not speaking the person is losing their capacity so that's how it is okay sure great good questions there so I think we've got the point when God reveals we said that we can pray so that judgment is averted we can pray so that there is protection from God and this is what intercession and the intercessory ministry especially prophetic ministry can you know bring to the body of Christ we can hear from God and we can pray in line with it then you know God lives of people are blessed but very important just because something is revealed don't go and make it a big thing because it'll cause more confusion and fear than faith so only what God tells us to reveal and when we study about the prophetic we'll also understand there is a way to reveal it you know you don't have to say everything from the pulpit you don't there might be a better way of sharing that message to the concerned person maybe if God reveals somebody is sinned okay now depending on the situation I may want to call it out from the pulpit but that's not the normal practice I might just finish the service and say brother can I meet you I meet that person have a nice chat with the person and say when I was praying for you I felt like this what do you think now hopefully if that person shares and says yes you're right I repent well and good okay so you get what I'm saying right when God reveals it doesn't mean we have to go and tell immediately okay that you we have to use wisdom use your wisdom and best thing to do is pray about it when you pray God will do great things we also have the section on how when we pray what God reveals like we look at Nathaniel in the Bible and Jesus looks at him and he says a man without guile how did Jesus know Jesus knew the character of the person without interacting with the person he looked at Peter and said you shall be you know a rock but Peter is a very unstable guy but what is that prophetic word is revealing the destiny of the individual so when God reveals the destiny what do we do we hold on to it to start praying Lord y'all you said that Pete you know I am a rock I claim it I'm going to walk in this so you begin to pray about it prayer and proclamation and God puts a word in our mouth these have to do with spiritual warfare and we'll talk about that you know a little later on so I can see that Shawn wants to ask a question yes my question is that do we need the prophetic prayer because we already have like revelation so shouldn't we just focus on figuring out what that means what God is saying the other things to come through revelation okay yeah I look at revelation I mean yeah sure sure so what Shawn is asking is asking is there a need for prophetic prayer when we already have the logos you know the revealed will of God through the word of God so here's the thing Shawn when we read about the gifts of the Holy Spirit in 1st Corinthians chapter 12 you know there we understand that these gifts so there is a list of all the gifts um yeah not getting that particular verse but you see these gifts are given for okay so verse 7 verse 7 I'm reading from NIV it says now to each one the manifestation of the spirit is given for the common good okay common good so just with that one small point what I want to say is when we talk about prophecy or the prophetic word Paul said that there is something good which will come out of it that's why God has given it also so though the revealed will of God is with us there is something good you know that God reveals through the prophetic word as well so everything is not in the revealed will for example you know which vehicle should I buy which job should I take I don't have those specifics but God can reveal it through a prophetic word so there is a job that the prophetic word does and therefore it's over and above so primary is word of God no compromise it is the authority but in addition God uses the prophetic word also and as we've seen you know the other texts you know we have terms like edify it builds God's people and so and Paul also says do not um you know do not neglect prophecies so we will treat it with respect and honor because God is the one who's giving it also okay yeah sorry we talk about the gifts of holy spirit right so we talk about gifts of interpretation gift of tongues but why don't we focus on the other gifts of holy spirit till now we only like talked about these two we're not only only about tongues interpretation like why don't we focus on the other gifts of holy spirit yeah so we must focus on all the gifts of the spirit but somehow in practice from the book of acts when you see tongues and prophecy are the most basic gifts so it's like saying you begin with these and then you talk about all the others so I would recommend an apc publication called as gifts of the Holy gifts of the spirit it has all the nine gifts and you know sufficient explanation from God's word about each of them so yes all should be talked about but tongues and prophecy are the basic ones maybe that is why people talk seem to talk more about it okay so with that I might have to close the class but we can always talk after okay right so okay thank you everyone for your attention let's pray and close off can one maybe Sean can you pray please yeah we'll close the class pray pray pray pray into the mic have any father thank you very much for gathering us all here today and thank you very much for guiding us and leaving us in your word and please help us to understand more about your word any father thank you very much to talk talk about your words and Nancy ma'am thank you father and Jesus let me pray amen amen okay thank you thank you bye everyone