PRAYER IS POWER - aching, hurting prayers - POWER WITH THE ALMIGHTY!

 Today's topic is one that often fills my time, thoughts and heart:

The prayers of the saints.. 🙏🙏🙏

Believers in the Lord Jesus Christ are saints according to the Bible. They trust in Him as their Saviour alone. 

Yet too often as believers we underestimate the POWER of PRAYER. 

For to quote a dear saint now above, Bro Mac:

“Prayer is Power, it brings about the Mighty Action of the Almighty”.

As a result of our limited understanding, we also under-utilise the power of prayer.

We breathe. 

We never or rarely think of how to breathe. 

So prayer ought to be exactly the same as breathing. 

As we grow as believers, it becomes as natural as breathing. 

I'm closer in my chat with my Lord than to anyone else I know.

I've been saved 50+yrs. Right from salvation at 12 years, two key things were practiced daily. My Father God drew me, met my deep hunger, I was so very lonely, and sad too in pre-teens and teens. He met the deep need. 

1. Reading of God's word daily. A habit never lost, unless very ill. 

2. Prayer of heart - fellowship of the Spirit, communing, praising my Father.. a growing, deeper relationship. Very simple at first .. as child-like, but hunger drew me on.

 When saved I was not in a strong Bible teaching church, my family were unsaved or not walking with LORD. However in spite of this, I trusted in the LORD Jesus as my Saviour for sin.

The key truth I recall was the sudden realisation that MY SIN put our LORD Jesus on the cross!

It was locally at a Scripture Union Beach Mission. I was largely untaught, except by the Spirit, and my own gleanings with God from 1966 to 1974. However these two habits of prayer and word ie daily quiet time habits kept me anchored, alert aware of God’s truth in His word when the attacks of the evil one surely came.

The LORD in His wisdom brought very hard and extremely rough, sad, lonely paths in my life as a teen. These extremities almost to death, great tests of faith,  also kept me anchored. Jesus gave me HOPE.. And this was reflected in His word.

So it’s rough now, dear ones?!!

Oh, YESS! its for our good.

Most of all it is for our Loving Father's glory, as He works in and through us.

May He be glorified in us today!

Do you long for our Father God to be glorified in you? 

Then expect hard things.

I love how very much God values prayer. 

Prayer to an Eternal Father God - that prayer is eternal.. your heartfelt cries, weepings, pleadings, rejoicings to the Eternal One all live on.

Rev. 5:8 And when he had taken the book, the four beasts and four and twenty elders fell down before the Lamb, having every one of them harps, and golden vials full of odours, which are the prayers of saints.

Rev. 8:3 And another angel came and stood at the altar, having a golden censer; and there was given unto him much incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of all saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne.

Revelation 8:4-5 And the smoke of the incense, which came with the prayers of the saints, ascended up before God out of the angel's hand. 

And the angel took the censer, and filled it with fire of the altar, and cast it into the earth: and there were voices, and thunderings, and lightnings, and an earthquake.

Every single one of our yearning, hurting, intercessory, or praising prayers are there in heaven before the throne of God.

.. or even as Romans 8:26 puts it of prayer “the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us, with groanings which cannot be uttered..” none of them are lost, or left unanswered. 

Unanswered prayer is a lie of the evil one. God answers - like our earthly parent may have said - “yes”,”no”or “wait” .. but all are answers.

The hardest answer to a prayer maybe no, but it IS an answer. As is WAIT, or yess! The wait maybe more than a decade, or with my dad's salvation, more than 5 decades. 

And therefore will the Lord wait, that He may be gracious unto you,

 and therefore will He be exalted, that He may have mercy upon you: 

for the Lord is a God of judgment: 

blessed are all they that wait for him. Isaiah 30:18

*****

Revelation 6:9-10 And when he had opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of them that were slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held: 

And they cried with a loud voice, saying, How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?

Recently I was just thinking or it was as I was praying actually - a beautiful thought came ..

It was of Revelation 6 above and the praying tribulation saints in heaven, who were praying for the avenging of their death, having been slain for their faith, yet they saw others still suffering the same - I wondered if there are praying saints who’ve gone before who are praying for those suffering below, now! and for those before us also?

We are a finite being, limited.. and God is infinite and eternal, as is heaven. We really don’t know what it’s like in the life to come, unless we are caught up as for example Paul was (2 Cor.12) and shown unspeakable things.

How do we know that saints before are watching as witnesses even now?

Hebrews 11 is the Faith chapter describing many saints of Old Testament. 

THEN Hebrews 12 the very next chapter begins thus:

Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, 

let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, 

and let us run with patience the race that is set before us..

“Wherefore seeing (= BECAUSE) we are also compassed (SURROUNDED) about with so great a cloud of witnesses”..

Yes, the Heavenly witnesses, spoken of in Hebrews 12 are those of Hebrews 11 - remember this letter to the Hebrews had no chapter verse divisions, so as Chap 11 ends it follows immediately with “wherefore seeing we are so compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses” in my minds eye the passage turns to those who've gone before, they’re watching on, above.

As Hebrews 11 says it’s truly those of the FAITH who’ve gone before! 

Their prayers on earth prayed even now live on, even though they are no longer here to pray them. eg Daniel for Israel in Daniel 9, Jesus for ALL those who follow Him in John 17, etc., so will ours when we are gone - and even now those who've gone before!

Indeed they are the "so great a cloud of witnesses”, 

SO “let us lay aside every weight, and the sin that does so easily beset us..

….  let us run with patience the race that is set before us... looking unto Jesus, the Author and Finisher of our faith."!

Why? run with FAITH as they did "seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses"..

How LONG indeed,  before You come, Lord?

.. even so come Lord Jesus ... perhaps today.

While we wait - let press on doing the best we can as those who’ve gone before, be not discouraged or cast down look up and fight and be not weary! (If not showing - Hymn link)

Praying for you all who read this. I wrote the bulk of this over many months - starting more than two years ago when a very dear sister in the LORD went to be with Him. It greatly grieved her that she wasn’t staying here to keep praying for her dear ones!

The lovely LORD gave me this word back then - saying her prayers last longer than her sick physical body - our prayers of faith are eternal in heaven in ..“those golden vials full of odours..” UNTIL they’re ANSWERED - and I believe perhaps even then preserved as a testimony to God’s faithfulness in “those golden vials full of odours”. 

It is God Who is glorified in ALL this, dear ones!

Remember GOD is not finite as we are!

He is infinite, not limited and communication with Him is limited only by our FAITH. 

It’s truly something we cannot fully grasp until heaven how great a tool and how VERY important our prayer is!

So use it every moment of every day.

(I’m sorry for my silence.. as my craft blog said I’m in an unwell patch, but I’m hopeful I maybe on the improve. Thank you for popping by, I truly pray this blesses you as it has me - as I write, rewrite, meditate and pray ...

I’m sorry it’s a bit long, I didn’t want to do two posts as was concerned I may not get back to it as it has happened before.)

AND thanks you so much if you are able to comment.

Love in Him, 🙏🤗

Shaz in Oz.x 

 If you are not sure if you are a Christian, a Christ follower, please read this post here 

- Who or What is a Christian?

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