Good morning sweet ones!

I want to encourage you today about ANSWERED PRAYER.  The power of our prayer life will determine the power of our success and Christian witness.  It’s so important that we life with confidence and purpose, knowing how to receive ANSWERS TO OUR PRAYERS.  Our ANSWERED PRAYERS will draw others into the Kingdom of God.

Hebrews 10:35 (AMP) says,

• Do not, therefore, fling away your fearless confidence, for it carries a great and glorious compensation of reward.

My dear brothers and sisters, God will reward us for having confidence in Him.  When we maintain intimacy with Him in prayer, we will experience His results in our lives.  I exhort you to guard your confidence in God because Satan seeks to destroy it.  

1 John 5:14-15 is one of my favorite Scriptures.  It says,

• Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us.  And if we know that He hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of Him.

So, if we know with certainty that God hears us when we pray, we also know that we will receive what we’ve asked of Him.  Asking “according to His will” means asking according to His Word.  See, faith begins where the will of God is known.  So, we wouldn’t want to pray, “Father, if it be thy will, heal me”, because healing is always God’s will.  It’s part of the atonement.  There are hundreds of healing Scriptures in the Bible, and Jesus NEVER turned anyone away who came to Him for healing.  Also, because He’s the same yesterday, today, and forever and is no respector of persons, if He did it then, He’ll do it for you today!

The confidence Jesus had in the Father was evident when He raised Lazarus from the dead (see John 11:38-46).  Jesus thanked God, in front of everyone, for hearing Him.  By doing so, he confirmed the confidence He already had.  He said, “Father, I thank You that You have heard Me.  And I know that You always hear Me, but because of the people who are standing by I said this, that they may believe that You sent Me” (verses 41-42).  When Jesus called out to Lazarus in a loud voice, he rose from the dead.  The victory Jesus had in raising Jesus from the dead served as a witness that God ANSWERS PRAYERS!

Now, we’re able to come to God without fear or reservation.  This is what Hebrews 4:16 says. Because of Jesus, we have free access to the Father (see Ephesians 3:10-12 AMP).  We can boldly come to Him with our requests, just as Jesus did when He raised Lazarus from the dead.  We should be confident in who we are because of Jesus’ sacrifice.  Hebrews 10:19-23 tells us that we have a blood-bought right to have our PRAYERS ANSWERED.  Hallelujah!

Praising God for ANSWERED PRAYER,

Lisa Gordon

Assistant Pastor 

Jesus City Church