Prayer Warriors: Unlocking God's Power through Psalm 39:12

Understanding the importance of prayer in our lives

Recognizing the struggles of prayer and the need to wake up as a church and nation

Exploring four types of prayers: repentance, adoration, thanksgiving, and sanctification

Emphasizing the need to prioritize prayer and sanctification in our lives

Music And today I want to talk to you about prayer a little bit. We're going to have one key verse and it is Psalm 39 and verse 12. Psalm 39 and verse 12, so if you want to look along there you can. But today I want to talk to you about prayer. And I'm going to talk to you about prayer in kind of an interesting way. Maybe we have troubles with prayer sometimes. I'm not going to ask you to raise your hand on that. But, you know, sometimes we do. We have difficulties with prayer. We find it difficult sometimes to just take that time to get down on our knees or sit down in a chair or whatever the case may be, however we pray, and just take that time and pray. And be doing our due diligence, right? But we're not alone. We're not alone. I think all Christians struggle with that. In some way, shape, or form. I mean, the interesting account was when Jesus went into the garden, He asked the disciples to stand and watch and pray for Him, right? Just for a little bit while He does and does His. And what did they do? They fell asleep. They didn't stay awake. They didn't pray. They didn't do their part. They fell asleep. Wow. God's speaking here. Okay. You know what? I didn't even have that written down. God just, as I said that, God just told me something. And that is this. The church is falling asleep. Amen. The church is falling asleep. We're falling asleep. We're not doing our part anymore. We're not praying. We're not doing our part anymore. We're not praying. We're not praying for our church. We're not praying for our nation. We're not praying for our people. We're not praying that God's blessings fall. We're not doing our part. We're falling asleep. We're like the disciples. We're falling asleep. It's time for us to wake up. It's time for us to wake up as a nation. It's time for us to wake up as a church world and realize we've got to do our part. If we want to see the blessing of God, we've got to do our part. I mean, it's not that difficult to pray. We make it harder than it actually is. Prayer is vital. Prayer is a necessity. Prayer really changes things. We've seen it so many times how prayer changes things. Someone comes to the church and they sit there, or they call people of our church and they say, well, I need you to pray for this person. And our people pray, and then God reaches down and does a miracle, and then we sit and we go, wow, I'm amazed. Amazed is fine. Surprised we shouldn't be. Why should we not be surprised when God answers prayer? Because He said He would. He said He would. So why should we be surprised when God reaches down and does something miraculous? We shouldn't be surprised. We should be maybe amazed and be awestruck and say, God, we just love you. We thank you. We're amazed at your goodness. But never be surprised when God reaches down and does something. See, there's four types of prayers. Four types of prayers. Number one, there's a prayer of repentance That's a prayer that says, you know what Lord, I'm a sinner and I need a savior And I'm thankful that you sent Jesus to die on the cross for me And not only me, but the entire world That's a prayer of repentance There's a second type of prayer, and this is the type of prayer that I love It's a prayer of adoration Now what is adoration? It means a prayer of love You just want to pray a prayer of love Lord I love you with all my heart I want to thank you for your love shared to me I want to thank you for all the love that you've put in my life To love my church, to love my people, to love my family, to love my friends I thank you for that love That's the second type of prayer then there's a third type of prayer and it's a prayer of thanksgiving Lord I just want to thank you for all the good things you've done thank you Lord for your blessings on me oh I tell you I love that beautiful song because it's so true well I know I'm not wealthy and these clothes are not new and I don't have much money but Lord I have you And to me, that's all that matters. Though this world may not see, thank you, Lord, for your blessings upon me. It's not about what I have in this world, because I'm not taking nothing with me. I can own all the things in this world that I can possibly have. But when the cold fingers of death put their hands on my shoulder, and I'm making my trip to my heavenly home, I ain't packing a bag. I ain't packing up the U-Haul and driving it up to heaven. I'm not taking my stuff with me. All my stuff is going to stay here for someone else to have. So it doesn't matter to me how much I own. It doesn't matter to me how much I have. have, the only thing that really matters to me is if I have Jesus in my heart. That's the only thing that is going to count. Because when Jesus calls me home, I better have him in my heart. Because if that trumpet sounds and I don't have Jesus in my heart, I ain't going. And that goes not only for me, that goes for you and everybody else. It goes for all of us. If we don't have Jesus in our heart, we ain't hitting it. We're not hitting heaven. We're not going to see the pearly gates. We're not going to enter into heaven and home. We're not going to see Jesus and kneel at his nail scarred feet. We're not going to see the Father. We're not going to see it. If we have not been redeemed, we're not going. But I am thankful that he redeems us. I am thankful that He saves us and sanctifies us, and that is a word we don't hear. You do not hear that word sanctify or sanctification in this generation. Why do we not use the word sanctification? Is it because it offends somebody we talked about that how that sometimes things especially in this generation we're canceling words and canceling phrases and canceling stuff because it offends people. Should sanctification really offend somebody? Not really. It just means to be separated unto God so much that this world does not mean anything to you. That's what it means. That's what it means so that should not be canceled. I want, whether this world wants it or not, I want to be sanctified. I want to be holy, acceptable unto God, which is what? My reasonable service. That's what the Bible says It's the least I can do Now why is that the least I can do? Well because Jesus did it all for me already Jesus laid down his life on an old rugged cross Had big spikes put in his hands and his feet Had a crown of thorns put on his head And he hung on a cross And he smothered to death and died for me and the least I can do is say Lord I love you and I am going to do my best to walk the way you walked but we don't do that in this generation we just want to make it oh well everybody loves the Lord Okay, Lord, I'm going to get in trouble today. Lord's talking to me and he's going to get me in trouble today with somebody. Well, I'll tell you, okay? But this is true. This is true, okay? We're seeing so many in this generation. There is a groundswell, if you will. of everybody follows the Lord. We're seeing that. The Muslims, they follow their God. It's the same God that the Jews serve. It's the same God that the Christians serve. It's just a different name. Is that true? No. No. We're seeing so many groundswell of things in this generation from our Christian churches. Of people saying, well, you know what? We all love the Lord. It doesn't matter what you believe, we all love the Lord. We're even seeing it in the church, and we're seeing it outside the church. we're seeing people saying, oh, well, we believe in Mother Nature. That's God, too. First off, I've never heard God called by the name Mother Nature. Okay? Because, let's face it, first off, God is a masculine, you know, thing. Okay? So he can't be a mother. He's not transgender. Sorry. Okay. See, I'm going to get in trouble with somebody today. I know. But the idea is true. Okay? and then we're seeing it coming and creeping into the church. We're seeing it happen, coming and creeping into the church. Oh, by that we all love the Lord. It doesn't matter what you do, what you believe, what you are, or what you think you are. Doesn't matter. God loves you anyway. Well, God loves you. But that doesn't mean you're going to make heaven your home. I mean, that's just the truth. That is the truth of the matter. That's where, as they used to say, where the rubber meets the road. That's what it comes down to. That's where it comes down to brass tacks, you know. That's what it comes down to. You can sit there, and I can't imagine that we're living in a world where people feel this way, but we're seeing it in the church where we're allowing it to creep in. I'm thankful that the Wesleyan denomination is not doing that, because I'm telling you, if the Wesleyan denomination started to say, oh, we've got to allow transgender, we've got to allow gays, we've got to allow all this to come into church, and you've got to say, it is okay, I am out that door. That's it. I will not be a part of it the moment that says, because that is not what it says in this book. Now that does not mean I don't care for these people and I don't pray for them. Because I was a sinner. There's no difference between my sin that I did and someone that is sinning by being gay or transgender or whatever. There's no difference. God doesn't look at that and what I did and says, okay, that's worse than this. No, God doesn't do that. God says it doesn't matter if you told a little white lie. There is no such a thing. You don't matter if you told a little white lie or if you went out and murdered a whole bunch of people. Sin is sin. And that's the point. That's the point. See, we're living in a world where we're trying to push this all around to one thing, which is, hey, we all love the Lord, but that's not true. That's not true. we want to make it that it's all one religion all one faith there is going to come a day someday down the line where this nation and this world as a whole is going to be one faith now see back in the day when I heard this from my dad when my dad would preach revelation and prophecy and all this and I would watch him and I would listen to him do this and he would talk about a one world faith. I sat there and I said, how could that possibly happen? I cannot see how that could possibly happen where you would have all these faiths together and they would all believe one thing. I just can't see it happening. Now I'm standing back as I look now and I go, wow, I'm seeing it come right before my very eyes. Christian churches are starting to seep into the world and the world seeping into the Christian churches. And they're beginning to say, oh, well, we've got to stand with our Muslim brothers and sisters. When did this happen? I always thought, according to the Bible, right was right and wrong was wrong. I don't know. But I will say this, and I went off on a tangent, but I know where I'm at. I am thankful that God's Word is true and that it's proven. And that's why I'm thankful, and that's why I pray a prayer of thanksgiving. Lord, I thank You for Your Word, that You have laid out the roadmap for me to get to heaven. And I am thankful that I know it. and now, Lord, help me to walk it. Help me to walk it every day in which I live. And then the final prayer is a prayer of intercession A prayer of intercession The prayer of intercession is going in on behalf of somebody that has a need These are the four prayers that we need to pray Now we don't have to pray a prayer of repentance every day. The only time you pray a prayer of repentance is when you messed up. So if you didn't mess up that day, then don't worry about praying a prayer of repentance. we should always pray a prayer of adoration love to God a prayer of thanksgiving and when we know someone has a need pray for them go and intercede on their behalf we have a lot we need to pray about now today I want to share with you this verse really quick and it is this Psalm 39 and verse 12 it says Hear my prayer, O Lord, and give ear unto my cry. I love that. Hear my prayer, O Lord, and give ear unto my cry. Well, what does the Bible say? It says before they call, I will answer, and while they're yet speaking, I will hear. That's Him. I just can imagine that when I begin to pray, I don't know, when I think about God and I think about heaven and I think the way God hears, You know, it's almost like I can almost picture God in my mind's eye of I go, dear father. And he goes, yeah. You know, I'm listening. You know. I'm here. What do you need? And I love the fact of what God is, because God can not only hear my prayer, but he can hear millions of others. at the same very time. And that's amazing. That's amazing. Because I have a difficulty sometimes focusing on one person. I get some people, they get two or three people and they start trying to talk to me all at the same time and I'm like, okay, hold on, wait a second. One at a time, please, because I can't distinguish everybody. You know? But God can. And I'm so thankful for that. It's so beautiful. He says, hold not thy peace at my tears. I love that. Hold not thy peace at my tears. The tears fall like rain sometimes when we pray. And I can just imagine God as our tears fall. He catches them. He holds them in His hands. And He says, I've seen your tears. And I'm answering your prayers. I can deceive God that way. I'm going to bring you peace in the midst of your storm. You ever been going through a storm and you go, I don't know if I can make it. but you're not alone. You're not alone. We've all gone through storms. We see people in the Bible that have gone through storms but never gave up on God. His brothers hated him because of it and they said, we've got to kill this boy. Can we kill him? He can't be loved by Dad no more. You imagine having that in your mind that your brother and your sister was loved by your parents so much that you sat there and said, I can't stand, I've got to kill that person. That's evil, that's Satan. Thankfully that didn't happen. But they sold him into slavery and they lied about it. But it was all for a purpose. so Joseph went from his beloved father's love to a slave in Egypt but God was there he began to come up the ranks and he began to become more than just a regular slave he began to be a very educated higher up slave that was doing all the blueprints and all this type of stuff. So he wasn't out there getting whipped to death. And he began to rise up. Potiphar saw that this guy was really, really good, so he brought him into his house. But then Potiphar's wife saw that he had some good-looking characteristics, and she wanted him to be with her. He's decided, I can't do this because I love my God first and foremost. And he refused. And what happened? Boom! Satan came in, knocked him down and put him in prison but God was there in all this time Joseph did not fail God did not charge God does that mean Joseph didn't say to God why is this happening no, I'm not saying that but he never charged God and said see what you've done to me God he didn't do that so often that's what happens when troubles happen and trials go on we sit there and we go why did you do this to be God God doesn't do it Satan tests God allows Joseph then rises up yet again and in this last rise up Joseph becomes second only unto Pharaoh himself and the whole land of Egypt. Now Joseph at this time saves millions upon millions of people. You know the story as well as I do. Famine in the land. Joseph's father sends his brothers to go to Egypt to buy food. They get in there. He knows that it's them. He brings them to him. And he sits there and he says, now I'm going to destroy you. Right? Is that what Joseph did? No. Joseph wanted to do a lesson so that they would realize because he said, I'm going to keep Benjamin here, my brother. I'm going to keep him here. You go to your father. And they said, we're not going to leave our brother behind. We will fight to the death if we have to for our brother. And he said, so now you're willing to die for a brother What about your other brother that you left, sold to slavery? Joseph then took off all the stuff and said, I'm Joseph who you sold to slavery. At that point, he could have had them put to death, but he didn't. Because he knew there was a peace much deeper inside. He had a peace in the midst of the storm through this whole thing that he knew God was going to get him where he needed to be. And he didn't have to worry about anyone else. You don't have to worry about anybody else in this world. Just make sure you and God are copious. Make sure that you've got your hand in his and he's walking beside you. And then this world can do what it wants to you. But you will be the head and not the tail, as the Bible says. Hallelujah. I love that. Hold not thy peace at my tears, for I am a stranger with thee and a sojourner. I love that word sojourner What is a sojourner Well a sojourner is a person who resides temporarily in a place Well, that's us, isn't it? Because this world is not our home. We're just what? A passing through. That's the point. We are sojourners. We are people on our journey to go into a better land. Hallelujah. And what does he say? as all my fathers were. This word of God is filled with examples of people that came before us, walking the way, doing their part, showing us how to make it to heaven and home. And what was the major thing that was all of those people? Prayer. That was the thing. Prayer was their key. Paul was all about prayer. When the disciples finally got it in their mind that they needed it more than they thought they did, they were all about prayer. Prayer is what connects us to God. A prayer life is a daily work. And I want you to understand that. It's a daily work. We don't just find ourselves being prayer warriors. It doesn't happen. You don't go from kneeling at an altar of prayer and saying, Lord, forgive me of my sins, to being a prayer warrior. It doesn't work that way. That's like saying For a military man Or woman You go into You sign your papers You walk in And they put you on the front lines They don't do that do they? No they don't You have to go through basic training You have to go through all this type of stuff Before they put you on a battlefield Because they know if they put you on a battlefield Without going through training You're going to die So we do not become prayer warriors The moment we say Lord forgive me of my sins We don't do that. It doesn't happen. It takes a lot of practice, it takes a lot of work, and it takes a lot of faith. And that's what we've got to do. So we need to make prayers of intercession, prayers of thanksgiving, prayers of adoration. These are all ways that we build ourselves to becoming prayer warriors. What does it come down to? We need to do our due diligence. That's the term. Do your due diligence. In other words, just don't expect you're going to just be a prayer warrior. It's not going to happen. You've got to do it little steps at a time. So today, the question is this. Do you find yourself, do you look at yourself and you say, I'm a prayer warrior. I've come to a point where I feel Like I'm a prayer warrior And if you do then I say amen to that I say hallelujah praise the Lord But do you feel maybe in your heart of hearts That maybe I have a little ways to go I want to be a prayer warrior But I love the Lord I pray but I want to have power in my prayer I want to have that power how do you feel this morning as you look in your heart bow our heads before the Lord as we examine our life for just a second and as we look deep down inside there's nothing wrong with admitting that we are not where we should be in our prayer lives. There's nothing wrong with that. We're not all going to be perfect when it comes to prayer yet. We're going to have the same issues like we all do, even as we walk. Prayer is a daily work. Is there someone that would be honest to God, not to me today, but to God and would say, God, I want to be a prayer warrior. Help me to use the prayer life that was laid before me, these four prayers today, that I would become a prayer warrior. Will you be honest to God and say, help me, Lord. Hands going up today. That's beautiful. Awesome. Awesome. All over the place. I got my hand up, too. I got my hand up, too. I want to be a prayer warrior. Maybe you're watching the video today and you're looking and you're saying, I want to be a prayer warrior. Wherever you are, raise up your hand there, too. Father God, you saw those hands all around. People, whether they're watching the video, people here in our church right now, these people saying, God, I want to be a prayer warrior. Father, God, help us right now that we will be prayer warriors, that we will use those four tiers of prayer. The prayer of repentance, if we mess up, we use that. The prayer of adoration or love. The prayer of thanksgiving and the prayer of intercession. And through these prayers that we use throughout the day, we will become stronger in our faith. and we will be greater prayer warriors for you. Because, Father God, that's what we need to be. We need to be prayer warriors. We need that in our lives. See, it's vital for a Christian to have that prayer life. Help us, Father God. Help us, Father God, today. I pray that you will reach down upon everyone that raised that hand this morning. Father God, that you will reach down upon them, Father, and that you will give them the strength of God that their prayer life will increase. It will increase and become stronger every single day. And before long, Father, we will all be prayer warriors. We will go through our basic training and we will become warriors for you. Father, we thank you today for that. We praise you. Now, Father God, I want to thank you for this day together. I want to thank you for this time together. I want to thank you for the fact that you are with us today. And Father God, as we dismiss and as we conclude our service today, Father God, I ask that you will not dismiss us. But Father God, I ask that you will go with us. You will keep us safe. And then, Father God, you will bring us back safe into your house. That we will be able to worship you one more time. And Father, for all that you are, for all that you do, we give you praise and honor and glory for it all. for it's in Jesus name we beg these blessings today and we see a hearty amen and amen Thank you. Thank you.

Playlist coming soon.