Intercessory Prayer: Key to God's Power and the Miraculous

Where are the miracles? Where are the converts? Where is the power of God in our churches? Why is our ministry so weak or ineffectual? Have you wondered these things? I have. Learn what I believe is key to seeing God's power in our churches and the miraculous happen in our daily lives and ministry.

Work in the Absence of Prayer

When we come to the place of realizing our absolute need and dependence upon God's presence and power, then we influence our world for Christ. If we through our own effort try to change a lost world through work--in the absence of prayer and without the power of God's Holy Spirit--the world loses and our efforts are ineffectual at best and detrimental at worst.

It is this negligence of prayer that leaves the church lacking and powerless. When we abide in Christ, when we connect with God in prayer and intercede on behalf of others, there is great power available--both to pray and to see answers to our prayers.

Prayer precedes work. Andrew Murray in The Ministry of Intercessory Prayer, sums it up well when he writes: "Prayer alone gives work its worth and its success. Prayer opens the way for God himself to work in us and through us."

Is Casual Prayer Enough?

As a Christian of some 30 years now, I think of all the ministry tasks I've taken upon myself to do or to help with in the name of Christ over the last decades. Every work has seemed valuable and my service appropriate for the task--at least in my own eyes. But so often, a casual prayer is all that preceded my efforts--if that. After all, wasn't I being obedient by doing the will of my Lord?

Looking back over the years of struggle in ministry situations, I've now come to realize that my life of Christian work--much of it done without the kind of intercession that unites me with the Vine--only hindered God's ability to move in me and through me. I was like a severed branch needing to be strengthened by the living power of the Vine, but was through prayerlessness, detached from the source of strength and power.

"If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you." (John 15:7)

Prayer may not seem the most exciting thing to do. In fact, we usually can think of several well-meaning activities or ministry tasks to do in place of prayer. But if we want to be effectual in reaching our world, if we want to see and experience the power of God in our lives and our churches, we must remain attached to the Vine, tapping into God's power and blessing through intercession. Then and only then will our work of Christian service allow God's power to move in and through us unhindered.

Sources:
Andrew Murray, The Ministry of Intercessory Prayer, Bethany House, 2003
Holy Bible, New International Version, Zondervan Publishing House