The #1 Key Ingredient to Powerful Prayers

In the ten years of praying every morning—it’s been about exactly ten years—there have been a handful of super-powerful breakthrough days. Today was one of those. About 30 minutes in, I can’t even remember exactly what I was praying about, but God said, “Speak to it!” So I did. Then it’s like He took me by the hand and brought up other situations, other challenges, other strongholds, other physical ailments, other people and their issues. He’d point at each and say, “Speak to it.” So I would. I was caught up in His heart of overwhelming love. His truth and His desire for each situation came out my mouth.

It seems so strange to me that with all that power, God chooses to align our hearts with His then puts His words in our mouths. Us puny jars of clay as vessels for the Holy, eternal, perfect will of God? Crazy idea. He woos us. He cleanses us. He slowly burns away our selfishness (an ongoing process like weeds that sprout to full height overnight). Then, as His desires become our desires, He says, “Say it.”

The power of blessing and cursing really is in the tongue. It’s not only the rudder for our individual lives, it’s the rudder that guides the course of the whole world. It’s effects even reach into the spiritual world, into the eternal world. “Speak it!”

That’s why faith is a gift. That’s why our confidence in God’s love has to be unshakeable. When His words in our mouths are filled with absolute belief, they carry transformative power from His throne.

To those who would say, “If God’s so powerful and loving, why is the world the way it is?” I would reply, “Because people are using the power of creation—the creative power God has instilled in all of us—to speak cursing, selfish ambition, self-absorption, retribution for harm, hatred for enemies, etc.” We’ve spoken it. We’ve established it. We’ve created our own hell on earth. Then we shake our fist at God and/or deny His presence. We have not because we ask not. We ask not because our focus and words are centered on self, on indulgence, on fear, on placing blame on others, on cursing others so we can feel superior.

James 4:1-3 addresses this head-on: What causes wars, and what causes fightings among you? Is it not your passions that are at war in your members? You desire and do not have; so you kill. And you covet and cannot obtain; so you fight and wage war. You do not have, because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions. (RSV)

The power of blessing and cursing is in the tongue. We in general, as inhabitants of God’s good earth and free receptors of His gift of life, have used that gift to side with evil, to slash and jab our way through life leaving a trail of maimed lives in our wake.

Correction of this wrong has to start with “My people who are called by My name,” say the Lord in II Chronicles 7:14. When we humble ourselves and pray and seek His face and turn from our wicked ways, He promises to hear from Heaven, forgive our sin and heal our land.

The beautiful healing of our land happens after our sin is healed. Our sin—our unforgivenesses, our pride, our fears, our selfish ambitions—prevent us from having God’s heart and mind towards others. When freed from those chains, we will be open channels of God’s unconditional, overwhelming love. That kind of flood? Nothing can withstand it.

Giants fall.

Evil strongholds crumble.

Captives are set free.

On all flesh God pours out His Spirit.

The Kingdom of Heaven is truly at hand. Let’s take our hands off the throats of our enemies. Let’s open our hands that grasp so desperately to things, money, shallow distractions, and empty ambition. Let’s empty ourselves so He can fill us with what truly satisfies. Then we can use our tongues to proclaim from the mountaintops, “Thy Kingdom come! Thy will be done!”

Child of the One True King, wife to the best man alive, mom to four VERY unique human beings & author of two bestsellers:

The Fall

One Night With a Rock Star


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2 Responses

  1. Wow. Holy Spirit indeed "spoke it" through you with this post. I've never thought to put James 4 together with II Chronicles, but God is the same, with the same message in both places. The key is molding our hearts – desires, loves, dreams – to His. But once there, we only need the courage to speak to it. Thanks for such a powerful post!

  2. Thanks for reading and encouraging, Marji! It's amazing how such a basic concept becomes brand new and an "aha!" moment when God speaks it fresh to our hearts.

    Transformational prayer. "The prayers of a righteous man availeth much" indeed! We're only righteous through Christ's blood. But when we get a grasp on who we are in Christ? Look out.

    I love your heart.

    Blessings,

    Chana

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