Meditation of the Heart
A continuous, strong, and sincere prayer life is crucial to the believer. It’s very important that we continue to seek God so that we will know the more of him. As we learn of God, we will pray the more earnestly to know, live in and desire his will for us. It is in his will that we are open to receive his wisdom and his power, his authority.
Prayer increases the believer. It increases his faith. It gives encouragement to his spirit. It strengthens him when he may become weak. It gives him access to joy in times of sorrow. It gives him hope for a brighter tomorrow. It is his means to forever praise the Lord. It is his pathway to share the issues of his heart with God. It is in his prayer that his personal relationship, his faith and hope in Christ is revealed. It is in the name of Jesus that we pray. It is here that we acknowledge our relationship with Jesus as we seek the will of God.
As we pray, let us pray for more of our Lord God. Let us desire his love, his patience, his tolerance and long suffering. Let us desire those things of him that will allow us to live and be at peace with ourselves as well as with others. Know that a man who is not at peace with himself, is not capable of being or living in peace with another. And the peace that he seeks, it can only be found in God. God knows our hearts and he will supply all that we need...physically, emotional, and more importantly spiritually. As we seek God in prayer, seek to be closer to him, seek for the understanding of the Holy Spirit in our lives, seek to be willing and available, to be obedient and faithful. Seek Jesus for the courage to walk in the power and authority of the Cross.
We must seek him with a sincere heart. In this, know that the Lord our God hears us and he will answer our prayers according to his will and his purpose. We are to pray without ceasing. There is power in the believer who continues to petition the throne of God. Know that there’s nothing greater than praying in the word of God. It acknowledges our hope and faith in the fact that God will do what he says he will do. It strengthens the believer’s belief in the word of God as he is able to see it manifest first in his spirit and then in his physical.
It is the persistent prayer that honors God. It shows our dependence and trust in him, that he hears us for we have an expectancy for him to hear us. It shows that we believe that in his time he will answer our prayer. As we pray, without giving up, it shows that we know God and we reverence him as the Almighty in our lives. It is here that we are trusting God to be who he says he will be to us and we know him as able. It is here that we do not doubt but that we stand on our faith in his word.
Galatians 6:9 “And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up.”
Journey with me…I am called to remember the many times that I have called on the Lord for not only deliverance but the courage, the strength to walk in the deliverance away from one of the many dry places in my life. If I had quit praying and depending on the Lord to work things out for me, I wouldn’t be writing to you today. There were many times I must admit that I felt like giving up. I began to believe the lies of the enemy that I had gone too far this time…that I was doomed to forever reap the consequences of negative things that I had sown…that I was not worthy of redemption. But God, quickened in my spirit, when despair and disgrace had me down, that he was there with me. If I had given up, I would not be living the miracle of his promises. The miracles of his grace and mercy, of restoration and provision, of peace and joy. If I had given up, the victory would have gone to the enemy but it now belongs to the Lord My God for keeping me. Oh, how I love the Lord. I’m so grateful for his keeping his hands on me. It was Jesus, the one and only begotten, obedient and precious Son of God, who endured the cross at Calvary. I have been redeemed by his blood and in him I have new life. I thank God that I no longer exist but that I live. I live in and for him.
I thank God for I know that if I stand before him in prayer, with faith and hope, depending on him, trusting with a blessed assurance…He will hear and answer my request before him. I thank God that today I will not quit…I will not give up on God for he never gave up on me! I stand on his word, his promises. I thank God that now my prayers are not request focusing on me but that I have learned the value in praying for others. My prayers are now those of praise and worship for he deserves my all; for that which he has poured into me. What I have come to know above all things was that… I must pray. I began to pray with doubts…not in God but in my ability to keep this path, in my being sincere enough for God to hear me, in the fact that I still desired the pleasures of my flesh…in this I felt ashamed and guilty. But God, he heard those prayers and he blessed me. He blessed me. He blessed me…for now I pray with faith, hope and an expectancy.
James 5:13 – 18 Is anyone among you in trouble? Let them pray. Is anyone happy? Let them sing songs of praise. Is anyone among you sick? Let them call the elders of the church to pray over them and anoint them with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise them up. If they have sinned, they will be forgiven. Therefore, confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that they make be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective. Elijah was a human being, even as we are. He prayed earnestly that I would not rain, and it did not rain on the land for three and a half years. Again he prayed and the heavens gave rain, and the earth produced its crops.
I praise God for the rain that he has allowed to pour into my live. For today, I am better, stronger and wiser in him. Today, I strive to produce a bountiful crop for his namesake.
God is no respecter of people…let him do for you what he so lovingly did for me. It is by your prayers that you will hear from heaven.