Sermon Central
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Have You Received Your Prayer Language? – Revised
Contributed by J. Yeargin on Nov 21, 2005 (message contributor)
Summary: How many believe that prayer is important? But - Have you ever struggled to pray? (Guilt; Busyness; Weariness) Have you ever struggled to stay focused while praying? Have you ever been confused about what to pray for … or how to pray
Let me begin with a few questions -
· How many believe that prayer is important?
· But - Have you ever struggled to pray (but have struggled with guilt, busyness or weariness)?
· Have you ever struggled to stay focused while praying?
· Have you ever been confused about what to pray for … or how to pray about it?
Last question:
Is God really waiting on us to word the prayer right before He’ll consider it?
Listen carefully -
· There is an answer for our prayer problems!
· There is a way for us to defeat the struggles we so often have in prayer … and experience a break through that will revolutionize our prayer life and prayer effectiveness.
Here’s the answer to all of your prayer problems.
· It is the person of the Holy Spirit … the Holy Spirit wants to become our personal prayer partner! He, the Holy Spirit, wants to give you your PRAYER LANGUAGE.
· The Holy Spirit not only has the solutions to our prayer struggles … He is literally the spirit of prayer … a prayer partner who makes connecting with God possible and powerful!
The prayer partnering relationship we are meant to have with the Holy Spirit is made clear in three powerful passages of scripture:
Jude 20 - "But you, dear friends, build yourselves up in your most holy faith and pray in the Holy Spirit."
Ephesians 6:18 -"And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the saints."
Romans 8:26,27 - "In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express. 27 And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints in accordance with God’s will."
In these three passages of scripture we can see that there are specific ways in which the Holy Spirit wants to partner with us in prayer!
I want us to focus on 3 very practical ways the Holy Spirit partners with us in prayer-
1. The Holy Spirit stirs us to pray!
This might surprise some of you, but prayer doesn’t start with us knocking on God’s door … prayer starts with God knocking on our door!
Revelation 3:20 — "Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me."
Key — Revelation 3:20 isn’t about evangelism … it’s about fellowship with God … it was Christ’s call to a group of Christians (in Laodecia) who had grown luke warm and had lost their relationship with Jesus Christ!
A. The Holy Spirit stirs us to a prayer of fellowship.
Where does Christ desire to live?
Where is Christ’s home?
The answer — my heart
A “Fellowshipping Prayer” has to do with spending time in the presence of Christ.
B. The Holy Spirit stirs us to a fighting prayer!
How many know that our greatest battles aren’t the more obvious needs such as physical, financial or friends and family relationships?
Our greatest battles area all spiritual!
Ephesians 6:12 — "For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms."
Prayer is an offensive weapon in the armory of God … that’s why Paul wrote in
2 Corinthians 10:4 — "The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds." (NIV)
There are times when the Holy Spirit wants to stirs us to stand in the gap for someone or something … to battle in prayer … to fight or wrestle for God’s will to be done!
Not only does the Holy Spirit stir us to pray, but —
2. The Holy Spirit strengthens us to pray!
The Holy Spirit doesn’t just stir us to fellowship with God and to fight for the will of God … and then leave us on our own to make things happen … because we can’t!
That’s why Romans 8:26 says —"In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express."
There are 3 vital ways in which the Holy Spirit strengthens us to pray:
A. The Holy Spirit Strengthens us by — energizing Us!
Romans 8:11 — "And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit, who lives in you."
