What Prayer Is and What Is Not

CHAPTER 1

WHAT PRAYER IS AND WHAT IS NOT

Gen. 4:26, Matt. 6:9, Lk. 18:1-8, Eph. 6:18

Every believer must learn how to pray and continue to learn how to do so Mt. 6:9. Sometime you need to be taught how to pray since a lot of people don’t know how to pray Lk. 11:1. Once you know how to pray, you can get better things from God, you can receive greater miracles from God.

Prayer is the ultimate reality of a relationship with God. Our journey to heaven and the desire to meet earthly needs has to do with how much you understand how to pray. Knowing how to pray means that you can speed up the time you get things from God.

In order to know how to pray, you’ve got to know how not to pray. This brings us to the subject of what prayer is not.

What prayer is not?

Over the years,prayers have been changing. Prayer is something that is always in born, it is like breathing. Somehow we all pray in different ways. Different religions have different ways of praying. This is just a way they communicate with an unseen God.

1.Prayer is not concerned with the devil– Jn. 10:10, Jms. 4:7, Dan. 10:12-17

By concern with the devil, I mean too much concern. It is wrong and time wasting to focus most of your prayers on the devil. It is not scriptural, it is not even sensible. This is because satan is regarded as a thief Jn. 10:10. Or hinderer of prayers Dan. 10:12-13. But what you need to do is to rebuke the devil. Uunderstand that the one who answers prayers is God James 4:7.

All payers must be directed to the Father in the name of Jesus. Do not focus your time, strength and energy on dealing with the devil. Satan doesn’t give, but steals.Once you take care of him, then you leave the answer to come from God.

Part of the reason you don’t focus too much on the devil is because once you had been born again. The blood of Jesus Christ has cleansed you from all your sins 1 Jn. 1:7. Unlike in the time of Daniel, when Jesus was going into heaven, he lined up the earth with the remaining part of the blood until when he gets into the third heaven where he is seated on the right hand of the Father right now Eph. 1:20, Heb. 1:1-4.The road is now very clear for your prayers to get to the presence of God.

2.Prayer is not too much crying to God –Ps. 22:2, Ps. 56:8, Ps. 69:3

Understand here that there are different types of prayer.One is the prayer of tears 2 Kgs. 20:5 or the prayers of crying Ps. 69:3. God calls prayers tears in the bottle Ps. 56:8. This does not however mean that you have to be crying all the time. Not all prayers should be crying. You can cry in prayer if your emotion has to be involved. But you shouldn’t focus on the tears as the ultimate reality in your prayers.

God is concerned about your tears. Every time you pray.It is referred to as tears. It goes inside the bottle. The answers to your prayer come in when the bottle is filled up. As you will discover under this principle that when you start to pray and pray and pray may be nothing happens.Suddenly that prayer becomes answered. You may not know why, the reason is that your tears has filled the bottle. The answer therefore has come. There are many people who cry in their prayer, it is not sinful.I am only saying that you have to know that there are other ways to pray rather than crying.

3.Prayer is not cursing somebody–Rom. 12:14, Mt. 5:44, Jms. 5:13, I Cor. 4:12

It is wrong to go into a time of prayer with hatred, swearing and anathema spirit. Sometimes you may pray wrongly by calling death and evil on an enemy. Such prayers are not scriptural. If you think they had been answered, I don’t know who is answering them. It is not the God of heaven who says curse not.

Prayer should be positive because it goes to a positive God. God says, bless and curse notRom. 12:14. Several times he says you should not curse Ps. 109:28. He connects blessing and cursing together. When you bless in prayer, you are bringing the blessing to yourself. If you curse in prayer, you will be the first recipient of the curse.

Does it mean that you don’t have many, many enemies? You have a lot, but the principles of God in the bible are the final authority on anything you want to do. It make sense to you when you think that if you curse, you are ok, as a matter of fact, after cursing you feel good or happy that you have revenged somehow over an enemy. What you see thereafter is that this enemy that you have cursed is still prospering. Many have experienced that. This is not because God does not answer a prayer that is evil.

Understand that you need to bless, Jesus says it Mt. 5:44, Paul says it Rom. 12:14. Even the scriptural Solomon says it Prov. 30:11. The experiences have shown that this is what you need to do.

You may ask the question, how about the prayer prayed by David? Asking and bringing curses upon his enemy in Psalm 35 and so on. The fact of this matter is that we are in the New Testament time and also David did not know beyond that.Today we know more.We understand more and we have the grace 2 Cor. 12:9. Moreover we have the whole bible Rom. 10:8, we have the Holy Spirit Acts 1:8.We also have the name of Jesus Phil. 2:9. David did not have all these.

You can’t be wiser than God who is going to answer your prayers. He commands you to bring good wishes, support and fortune to your enemy. God is not stupid.If you do it God’s way, you get answers to your prayers in God’s way.

4.Prayer is not a ceremony –I Kg. 18:27, Ps. 5:1, Gen. 24:63

There should be no ritual in prayer. It doesn’t have to be culture or formal. Prayer doesn’t have to have decorum or to be precise and done in a particular way.

To pray, you can lie on the floor.You can stand.You can open your eyes.You can seat down.

Part of the non-ceremonial aspect of prayer is that you don’t have to say a particular word or pray in a particular way or even start in a particular format. For true praying, you should just say it as the Holy Spirit gives you utterance. You don’t have to read it from a book necessarily.

Moreover, in true praying, you are just led by the Holy Spirit.

You don’t have to use an impressive language, such as “be thou”

Prayers can be spontaneous and you can pray it anywhere 1 Tim. 2:8. Jonah prayed inside the fishes belly Jonah 2:1. Jesus prayed under trial Matt. 26:39, Nehemiah prayed before the king Neh. 2:1-10.

Those different types of prayer are available and in some cases you don’t even have to open your mouth and pray. You can pray in your heart, so don’t attach any form of ceremony to prayer Matt. 6:6-8.

5.Prayer is not cheap –Lk. 14:28, Heb. 4:16, Mt. 6:17, Heb. 11:6

Nothing good actually in this world comes cheap. If you want to get things from God as your father, it doesn’t have to be so cheap. This is not to say that your Father is hard on you. God is love, but praying is not a bed of roses, it is expensive. To pray, it cost Jesus Christ to buy you back through his blood. The heavy price was paid. You mustn’t let the will of God run away from your life Jer. 29:11.

Prayer is worthy of all the effort you make to speak to God. If you fast and pray, know that there is going to be a reward from God to you Matt. 6:7, 17, Heb. 11:6.

Prayer is an excellent, noble, priceless power that God gives us in order to communicate and receive things from him Matt. 7:7.

When you are poor, prayer changes that for you. When you have a need, prayer meets those need.

But part of the fact is that prayer is not cheap, in the sense that when you want to pray, there are some conditions that must be fulfilled. You can’t be dirty or dishonest and just cheeping prayer like many people do. Even though Christ has paid the price for all the prayers you will pray, you yourself must pay some price of preparing yourself to meet a Holy God who wants to answer your prayers Amos 4:12.

CHAPTER 2

UNDERSTANDING WHAT TRUE PRAYER IS

Eccl. 5:1-6, Gen. 4:26, Jer. 33:3, Zech. 13:9

As believers, we have needs and request to make from God. Not only this, we need to speak to God when we have problems because He is our father Jn. 15:16, 16:23. We need to report some cases to Him on somebody that is not doing the right things or trying to harm us Acts 4:29. We need to tell him he should send his angels to help us in the world which he has created Heb. 1:14. We need to tell Him we are sorry, when we have done wrong Neh. 1:6-7 and in such a set up, it is as if two people are talking to each other. So we are on the earth, we can’t go to heaven yet and we have needs on the earth. These needs must be spoken to God, He now make a decision to give us our heart’s desire.

This generally means that, in such a setup, there must be a link by which God talks to us after we have talked to Him. The way He talks to us is the Word.The way we talk to Him is in prayer. This means that every prayer must be associated with the word of God. Without the word of God, prayer has no meaning. Most of the time you pray and there is no answer, simply because you are talking to God, but He has not been able to talk to you.It is not going to work that way.

1.Prayer is communication between God and man: Eccl. 5:1-6, 1 Sam. 1:10, 2 Chr. 33:18, 19, Jer. 32:16-25

In your prayers you exchange between you and God. Prayer is a means by which we get acquainted to God and disclose our intentions while we know His own intentions Jer. 33:3. In prayer, we discover the love of God for us,because answered prayers enlighten our heart and help us appreciate God the more I Sam. 12:15-18.

Prayer is a means of interacting with God on a consistent basis. God speaks to us in the word, we now speak back to Him in prayer.

Do not pray without bringing in the bible, it is not the proper thing to do. Reading the bible is just a way of reading the mind of God. God’s mind must be transferred to heaven.

When we pray, we first see God’s will in the bible Eph. 5:17. Then we transfer that will to a request whereby we need to read the mind of God who promises us that blessing.

Good communication in prayer begins with knowing the mind of God and asking God to make His will and mind real in our personal life 1 Jn. 5:14.

Communication is simply telling God what we want. In real praying, Satan’s part is minimal. He’s a hinderer, he’s a discourager but once you take care of him, leave that there.

If you communicate your needs to God, you must recognize that He is ready to answer your prayer 1 Kg. 18:24.

If the devil hinders, take care of him James 4:7but focus all your attentions on the source of answer Ps. 121:1.

Satan is not the answer.He will never be an answer. So in a prayer where the emphasis is so much on the devil or the flesh, little answers to prayer often come. Suppose you need something from God and Satan is hindering you. You will still not get that thing from God if you don’t make the request from the father, if you are unnecessarily focusing on the thief Jn. 10:10. Once the thief leaves your property, you have to pick it up.If you don’t pick it up your property,it is still going to be on the floor and you will still be as worse as if he hasn’t stolen your property in the first place.

2.Prayer is consulting God on an issue: Is. 1:18, I Sam. 23:1-5, Gen. 25:20-22, 1 Sam. 9:9

Many people don’t understand prayer as a form of consultation with heaven. All prayers is not about asking or making demand for God to do something. It is often not to tell you about communicating with God on a need. How about, asking God questions in your prayer there are definitely some prayers like that. How about knowing God’s will and making God in heaven make the decision about what you are supposed to do Ezra 8:21. Part of the work of the Holy Spirit in prayer is to give you an advice about something. It is true that most of the advice, we can get in the bible as we deliberate and meditate on the word of God. But that is not all. In some cases, we need to hear directly from God.We need to seek His face, we need to take counsel together Is. 1:18, 43:26. There are many issues that are troubling you, you need to talk it over with God.

God must be seen as a consultant through the power of the Holy Spirit. Your Father is an expert on any issue.He’s your greatest counsellor, and your guide.Your mentor and your master Ps.48:14. So every problem that bothers you must have its source revealed, instead of just praying and praying.

Though you must take prayer to the next level. You must see prayer as a form of consultation, whereby you speak with God, you argue things out, you work things out with Him.

When you go into a prayer closet, you should come out refreshed. And you will know that God has actually spoken to you.

3.Prayer is challenging God for a promise made:Zech. 8:12, Mal. 3:10-12, Is. 46:3, Joel 2:21-26, Jer. 30:19, Is. 48:17, Prov. 16:17, Is. 1:19, Is. 62:19, Jn. 6:31, 2 Cor. 9:8-10

Many people make the mistake of not understanding that sometimes they have the grace to question God and to make an objective demand from him Is. 43:26. You will not only ask in prayer, you go with confidence of a child to the father Is. 38:1-6. There are thousands of promises to claim. When those promises are not being fulfilled, you should confront God for it.

Someone had said, who dare challenge God? Is he not just a sovereign God? Do we not just accept what He gives us? Just leave it like that, that is not necessarily true.

According to scriptures, you will find many cases of people who had to contend for everything that God had given them.

When a man sees that things are not working well, he challenges God Is. 43:26. Rebecca knowing that she was facing a deaththreatfrom her pregnancy, so she had to move to challenge God Gen. 25:22.

Time and time again, we must insist upon any promise that God has made, we must compete for and contend for it Jude 3. You must require it from God after you have searched it out in the scriptures. You must stand for it and never give up until God does what He says he would.

The word of God says of Abraham and Isaac that they were literarily living in the land of promise Heb. 11:9. They did not come out until those promises became fulfilled.

The word of God is a chamber.It is a closet where you go.It is also a container where in everything you will ever need is made available to you. It is your responsibility to seek them out and to claim them into your life.

The good news about God is that He wants to be challenged, he wants to be threatened Is. 45:11. Don’t be afraid to speak like that to God. Many people have done so and God has quickly responded Num. 14:11-20. At times people like David will ask God to awake. Not that he’s sleeping, but by so doing is a way of challenging God to do exactly what he has promised to do.

4.Prayer is cooperating with God: Mt. 9:37, 38, 2 Chr. 36:22-23, Ps. 17:13, Prov. 21:1, 2 Cor. 5:20, 1 Cor. 3:9, Jer. 51:20, Ps. 127:1

God made us on this earth to do His work. We are His ambassadors or assistants2 Cor. 5:20. The cause of God on the earth is the salvation of soul. Our agreement to pray for souls’ salvation is part of the cooperation.

It is through prayer that we join forces with God. We lend a hand in the fulfillment of his earthily goal 1 Cor. 3:9. The church is God’s resources on the earth. The unity of the church creates a powerful spiritual force that will pull down all the works of the enemy especially in the salvations of soul Matt. 18:18. God ensures that He makes every believer through prayers become partners in the progress of the world. Without our collaboration with God nothing can be done.

Consider the world today, the number of people that are saved and going to heaven. God could not do anything unless he found the right person.The right person is somebody who prays the prayer of intercession always for the salvation of souls. You may not be able to go out on evangelism for some reasons, you may not have the time, but since you have a mouth and you can pray anywhere that is a good cooperation with God. The work of God on the earth is your responsibility.It calls for your cooperation.You and God can get a lot of things done. You are so important to God that without you, His goal on the earth will not be fulfilled.

CHAPTER 3

FULFILLING PRAYER CONDITIONS

1 Pet. 3:7, Gen. 33:4-11, Lk. 23:34, Dan. 10:1-15, Rev. 12:10, James 4:3, 1 Jn. 5:14, Mk. 11:25