Prayers that Prevail
. . .
Christians Fight Best on Their Knees
"Praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end, keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints."
Ephesians 6:18
Message begins at approx the 33 min mark.
There’s no doubt that Paul’s having invoked the image of warfare leads him to talk about the necessity and urgency of prayer in the Christian life. War naturally leads people to prayer. As they say, “There are no atheists in foxholes.”
At my church in Indiana there was a retired minister. He was 90 years old, and he had served as a chaplain during the second World War. One time he recounted to me how he had the opportunity to lead a worship service for men who were being deployed. He said the place where they were meeting was jam packed. Men had crammed in and were basically shoulder to shoulder. And he said to me that after his message he felt led to give an invitation. (Mind you this was a Presbyterian minister. So that his giving an invitational and having feelings was something of a feat!) He said to the troops that, if they wanted to receive Christ and know for certain that they would have eternal life, they could come forward and pray with him. He said there wasn’t a single man who stayed in his seat that day.
These soldiers were coming to grips with the reality of warfare. The thought of stepping into battle and the dangers that they would face there made them very much sensitive to their need for the Lord.
We have mentioned the reality of spiritual warfare in this study. We have noted that we engage each day in a vigorous battle. We may not see bullets whizzing or swords clashing, but it is nevertheless an intense combat. The enemies and dark forces of evil are bombarding us with temptation and are striving with all their might to defeat us. They want to destroy our lives and obliterate our faith in Christ.
And so, understanding the nature of this conflict, Paul calls us to pray. Since the battle is so great, there is a great need for us to be in prayer. Paul basically says, if we want to be victorious in this war, we must pray. How can we survive this war? How can we be successful in this war? It is by arming ourselves with the proper attire and by making use of prayer.
Not just any prayer will do though. Knowing that this monstrous regiment is attacking us, we must engage in the right kind of prayer. Prayer that will prevail. We must be lifting up what sometimes has been called “prevailing prayer.”
Some of you might say, “That sounds a little charismatic, Matt. Aren’t the Pentecostals the one’s that believe in prevailing prayer.” Don’t we believe that all prayer is powerful. The prayer of a righteous man avails much, right?
But you’ll notice that Paul doesn’t just say “Hey, you gotta pray.” He gives us some specific instructions on how to pray. In sum, Paul shows us what kind of prayer is necessary. And you might say that these instructions constitute the kind of prevailing prayer that suits spiritual war. If we want to prevail in the Spiritual War we need to be lifting the kind of prayers Paul lays out here.
How are we to pray? What constitutes prevailing prayer. Well, you look into our passage and the first thing you see is that we must pray “at all times.”
I. Its frequency: Prevailing prayer is constant [At all times]
There never is a season of life when it is not a good time to pray. When is the best time to pray? The answer is, “Now.”
Scripture is rather emphatic about the need to be in constant prayer. In the OT we see Daniel who prayed three times a day. Nehemiah’s story is filled with small expressions of prayer. Jesus told the parable of the persistent widow in order to teach how they ought always to pray and not give up. Paul tells the Thessalonians to pray without ceasing. He told the Romans to be constant in prayer.
If there is one thing we learn from the Bible it is that we should be praying at all times. When you wake up, when you brush your teeth, when you are driving to work, when you sit down at the computer. When you have lunch. All through the day you should be seeking to make it a habit.
I know one girl in college who put a cross on her watch. So every time she looked at her watch, she was reminded that it was time to pray. And she would pray throughout the day because she was looking at the time.
Stonewall Jackson, the great Civil War general, once confessed that he had trained himself to offer a short prayer every time he lifted a glass to take a drink.
We have these handy dandy devices in our pockets. These can be useful for prayer. Setting alarms - every hour on the hour or a couple times throughout the day. Praying over meals is a good way to train yourself. Not just praying for the Lord to bless your food, but using this opportunity to pray.
These are just a few practical ways you can train yourself and make prayer a greater habit in your own life. The simple idea is to make it a point to engage more fully and more successfully in the battle that ensues around us each day.
Of course, doing this means recognizing your complete dependence upon God. Why is it that we do not pray all day long? As Pastor Brian Borgman says, we don’t pray because we don’t think we need to. We do not realize just how much we are dependent upon God.
We don’t feel we need to pray because we believe ourselves to be independent. We believe ourselves to be capable. But if we truly understood our weakness and absolute dependency upon God, we’d be praying all the time.
Our prayer-less-ness is really a sign of how we do not really understand the fullness of God’s sovereignty. If we really believed that God was sovereign and we were completely dependent upon him for everything, there would never be a moment where we are not in prayer. We would be like babies crying out all day long.
And that’s the point of prevailing prayer: We are so limited. But we have a God who is unlimited. And knowing that should motivate us to make prayer more frequent.
But prevailing prayer will not only be offered at all times, it will also be done “in the Spirit.” That is the Holy Spirit. So the second characteristic of prevailing prayer is that it must be spiritual.
II. Its quality: Prevailing prayer is Spiritual [In the Spirit]
It’s not just enough to have a lot of prayer. The frequency of prayer is important. But we should not think that comes at the expense of the quality of our prayers. If we are not praying in the Spirit, we will not be praying in the most effective way. Prevailing prayer needs to be of the highest grade. So it needs to be imbued with the Holy Spirit of God.
But what does it mean to pray in the Spirit? Now, our Pentecostal friends would likely say that this means speaking in tongues and using what they call their special prayer language.
Others will say that this means we pray with the help of the Spirit. But I think that is just as unhelpful. Because we cannot do anything to conjure up the Spirit’s aid. It’s not as if we have to somehow “get in the Spirit” before we can pray.
I think the best way to understand this is to read it in light of what Paul has just said. If you back up to verse 17, I believe you will get a good idea of what Paul means when he says pray in the Spirit. Paul has just talked about the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God. He has just encouraged you to take up this sword as a means of defense and attack.
As we talked about verse we noted that the Spirit works in and through his word. The Spirit is very much linked to the Word. The word is the vehicle by which the Spirit operates.
As you step into verse 18 you it shouldn’t be too far fetched to say that the two ideas continue to be linked together. Praying in the Spirit likely means that we should be filling our prayers with Scripture. We pray in the Spirit when we pray the words that the Spirit inspired. The most Spirit filled prayers are prayers that are filled with Scripture.
How exactly is that done? Let me give you a few examples. Years ago, when Elizabeth and I lived in Indiana, we had a pastor who was very much dedicated to prayer. He had a sheet of paper which he used as his guide when praying for the congregation. That piece of paper had the 10 commandments, the Lord’s Prayer, and the Apostle’s Creed. And each day he would take the names of the members of the congregation and he would pray through each.
So he would begin with Alexander and he would pray “hallowed be your name.” And he would ask that Royal, Ethan, and Titus would continue to develop reverence for God; that they would know his holiness more and more, and that they would use God’s name in the most holy way themselves.
Then he would go on to Arthur household and pray “have no other gods before me.” He would ask that Matt and Cathy be devoted to the one and only true God; that they would be kept from pride and other forms of idolatry.
Then he would take the Auerbach’s and pray, “I believe in God the Father.” He would ask that Jeff and Amanda would trust in the Lord with all their hearts. That Josiah and Naomi and Suzanna would know God as their father and call upon him as such. That Malachi and Adam and Micah would believe with all their hearts, with all their minds, and with all their souls.
Using this tool allowed him to have a great deal of variety in his prayers. But it was also a way of filling his prayers with the kinds of things that would keep in step with the Spirit. These were very much Spirit filled prayers.
There are other tools that you could use to make your prayers rooted in Scripture. You could attempt to pray through the 7 deadly sins each day: Pride, greed, lust, wrath, envy, gluttony, and sloth. There you have at least 7 times in a day that you have sought to pray and ask for a greater amount of sanctity in some of the most important areas of your life.
If you’d like to be more positive, pray through the fruit of the Spirit each day. As God to fill you with love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Each time you pray, focus on one of the fruits. Begin in the morning with love and ask the Lord to make you aware of those areas where you could be more loving. May he help you love your sister when she is cranky or annoying. May you be more loving and less annoying.
There are lots of ways to do this kind of thing. But the thing to remember is that the more Scripture fills your prayers, the less carnal your prayers will be. Your prayers will be less selfish and more likely to focus on the kinds of things that will make them into Spirit filled prayers.
The next thing Paul says is that we must pray with all prayer and supplication. This, I would say has to do with the manner of our prayers.
III. Its manner: Prevailing prayer is varied/diverse [With all prayer and supplication]
Now, I don’t know that there’s a great distinction between the words prayer and supplication. I think Paul is simply emphasizing that we should be eager to pray in every way possible. Some commentators say, praying with all kinds of prayer. We pray at all times, in the Spirit, and in every possible way.
Sometimes you pray out loud, sometimes you pray silently in your head. Sometimes you pray by yourself, other times you pray with your family or some friends. There are times when you have a set time of prayer and you have your list of prayer requests that you work through systematically. There are other times in the day that you pray short, sporadic prayers.
Now, I’d like you to think about this in terms of your emotional enthusiasm too. Elizabeth and I once had a fellow ask us if we had tried praying earnestly. We asked him what he meant by that. He said that when he and his wife had a big decision to make, they committed to praying earnestly. And they prayed earnestly everyday. The idea was that they tried to make their prayers more emotionally intensive. And somehow that was supposed to have made their prayers more effective.
I’m not sure that we can beef up our prayers with emotion. Our prayers will come to God no matter how we pray them. And that should give you some comfort. And maybe even some more encouragement to pray.
I get it. Sometimes we don’t feel like praying. Sometimes we don’t feel that our prayers are doing anything. It just feels dry and like you are just going through the motions.
But that’s the beauty: God doesn’t care too much how they come. He just loves to have you pray. And you can have those kinds of prayers. There’s nothing wrong with that. You can pray when your emotions are distraught. You can pray when your emotions are high. You can pray when you emotions feel like they are absent.
The fact of the matter is you are still praying. And you are praying with all prayer and supplication. You are prevailing in prayer because you are praying in every possible way.
Fourthly, we need to be watchful in prayer.
IV. Its posture/perspective: Prevailing prayer is attentive (Watchful)
Prevailing prayer is one that, as Paul says, will “keep alert” or “be watchful.” Prevailing prayer must be constant. It must be spiritual. It must be varied. And, as we see here, it needs to be attentive.
What does it mean to be watchful or attentive in prayer? It means to be on the lookout for evils that might arise or for opportunities to do good. And when you see it, you pray about it.
You know how you can be driving somewhere and some how tune out. You can be going along the highway and start thinking about some other things. Then at some point you realize that you haven’t been really concentrating on the road. You can’t even remember what happened on the road for the last 10 minutes. You didn’t fall asleep, but you somehow weren’t paying full attention either.
That can happen in life. We sometimes don’t tune in to all that is going on around us. Sometimes we miss opportunities to serve because we are a little overly consumed with ourselves. Or we are not really paying attention to the temptations we are facing.
I am thinking about doing our next evening study on pride. This past week I came across an article that was simply amazing. The author starts out by saying, “The other day a friend told me that I am a very prideful man. I said to myself, ‘the dude is just jealous.’
That response is a bit of pride in and of itself, isn’t it? It assumes that the friend is wrong and he is right. It didn’t take time to consider that he might be proud. One form of pride is an unteachable spirit. You are unable to take correction or you easily dismiss it.
He recognized he needed to be more alert and maybe needed to think more deeply about pride. And he came to find that pride isn’t always boasting and arrogance, but it can be expressed in many, many more subtle ways. Being an overachiever can be an issue of pride. Just making jokes and poking fun at other people can be a form of pride.
Pride, of course, is only one of the many different kinds of things we need to be on the watch for. There are many other ways we can slip up. And our alertness isn’t just for sins of commission. We need alertness so that we don’t miss good opportunities; opportunities to serve and help.
Its like Frank. Frank came home from work one day in January and his wife said that she was leaving him. She said she was waiting til now to do it so that she wouldn’t spoil his Christmas. But she was fed up and was leaving him.
Frank went to his pastor and said he was dismayed. He thought they had a wonderful marriage. He didn’t run around on her. He was home by 5 every night. He didn’t expect much of her, except that she cook his meals and clean his cloths.
Well, the fact of the matter was that Frank was not alert to what his wife wanted. She wanted interaction. It wasn’t enough for him to come home and kick up his feet each night. She wanted to have meaningful conversations. She wanted to have someone who was genuinely interested in her and would do things with her.
Frank wasn’t alert to all that he was failing to do.
I’m not telling that story for the husbands and wives. I’m telling that for you young people. You might think that story was about marriage, but it really wasn’t. It was about honor and the failure to observe opportunities to show honor to the people you are supposed to honor.
That story was about being so consumed with yourself and your own interests that you are not alert to how you might be able to outdo one another in love.
I encourage you young people to make that a point of prayer this week. Ask God, “how can I honor my parents? How can I serve best?” Keep asking that throughout these next two weeks. I bet if you do, you’ll find that there are lots of things you can do. Maybe you’ll recognize that the trash needs taken out or the lid needs closed on the toothpaste. I bet if you ask yourself that question, “How can I honor and show love?” God will show you lots of new opportunities.
The last part of prevailing prayer is that it lifts up others.
V. Its breadth: Prevailing prayer Lifts up Others [all the saints]
You can talk about its frequency, its quality, its diversity, and its posture. But you must also recognize its breadth. Prevailing prayer does not merely focus on yourself. It also, as Paul says, “makes supplication for all the saints.”
The thing about this spiritual war is that we are all in it together. And we need to be supporting one another by means of prayer. We should be lifting up one another.
This one thing is true: We won’t prevail if some of the congregation is floundering. If there is a breach in one household, then we all will suffer to some degree. Paul makes that clear when, in 1 Corinthians, he compares the church to a body. If one part of the body suffers, the whole entire body suffers.
And the same holds true in regards to the war image. If one squadron gets hit, that ends up being a real blow to the entire army. Our best chances of advancing is when all our forces are working at their optimal levels.
And, of course, one of the best ways to ensure that this happens, is by having a systematic way of praying for your brothers and sisters in Christ. And I just happen to have an updated list of Hopewell families for you to take home. This is super handy. If you fold it just the right way, it makes a perfect bookmark for your Bible. So if you are doing family devotions together, you can keep your place in your Bible reading and you can also see who you can be praying for as you gather around that table.
Conclusion
One refrain that I found in a number of commentaries this past week goes like this,
“Satan trembles when he sees the weakest saint upon his knees.”
That truly is the sum and substance of prevailing prayer. It reminds us that we do not have to be a great gladiator or a top notch navy seal when it comes to engaging in this spiritual war. You can be an average Christian. You can be a below average Christian for that matter. It does not matter.
You can be the weakest saint, but so long as you are lifting up prevailing prayers, you will do great things. You will thwart Satan’s plans and have an incredible impact upon the kingdom of God.
As long as you are praying at all times, and as long as you are praying in the Spirit, and as long as you are seeking to use these prayers as a way of targeting places in your life (or in the life of others) where you might grow or where you might be susceptible to temptation, then you may know that you have the tactical advantage. For it is God himself upon whom you call and he will come to your aid.
At my church in Indiana there was a retired minister. He was 90 years old, and he had served as a chaplain during the second World War. One time he recounted to me how he had the opportunity to lead a worship service for men who were being deployed. He said the place where they were meeting was jam packed. Men had crammed in and were basically shoulder to shoulder. And he said to me that after his message he felt led to give an invitation. (Mind you this was a Presbyterian minister. So that his giving an invitational and having feelings was something of a feat!) He said to the troops that, if they wanted to receive Christ and know for certain that they would have eternal life, they could come forward and pray with him. He said there wasn’t a single man who stayed in his seat that day.
These soldiers were coming to grips with the reality of warfare. The thought of stepping into battle and the dangers that they would face there made them very much sensitive to their need for the Lord.
We have mentioned the reality of spiritual warfare in this study. We have noted that we engage each day in a vigorous battle. We may not see bullets whizzing or swords clashing, but it is nevertheless an intense combat. The enemies and dark forces of evil are bombarding us with temptation and are striving with all their might to defeat us. They want to destroy our lives and obliterate our faith in Christ.
And so, understanding the nature of this conflict, Paul calls us to pray. Since the battle is so great, there is a great need for us to be in prayer. Paul basically says, if we want to be victorious in this war, we must pray. How can we survive this war? How can we be successful in this war? It is by arming ourselves with the proper attire and by making use of prayer.
Not just any prayer will do though. Knowing that this monstrous regiment is attacking us, we must engage in the right kind of prayer. Prayer that will prevail. We must be lifting up what sometimes has been called “prevailing prayer.”
Some of you might say, “That sounds a little charismatic, Matt. Aren’t the Pentecostals the one’s that believe in prevailing prayer.” Don’t we believe that all prayer is powerful. The prayer of a righteous man avails much, right?
But you’ll notice that Paul doesn’t just say “Hey, you gotta pray.” He gives us some specific instructions on how to pray. In sum, Paul shows us what kind of prayer is necessary. And you might say that these instructions constitute the kind of prevailing prayer that suits spiritual war. If we want to prevail in the Spiritual War we need to be lifting the kind of prayers Paul lays out here.
How are we to pray? What constitutes prevailing prayer. Well, you look into our passage and the first thing you see is that we must pray “at all times.”
I. Its frequency: Prevailing prayer is constant [At all times]
There never is a season of life when it is not a good time to pray. When is the best time to pray? The answer is, “Now.”
Scripture is rather emphatic about the need to be in constant prayer. In the OT we see Daniel who prayed three times a day. Nehemiah’s story is filled with small expressions of prayer. Jesus told the parable of the persistent widow in order to teach how they ought always to pray and not give up. Paul tells the Thessalonians to pray without ceasing. He told the Romans to be constant in prayer.
If there is one thing we learn from the Bible it is that we should be praying at all times. When you wake up, when you brush your teeth, when you are driving to work, when you sit down at the computer. When you have lunch. All through the day you should be seeking to make it a habit.
I know one girl in college who put a cross on her watch. So every time she looked at her watch, she was reminded that it was time to pray. And she would pray throughout the day because she was looking at the time.
Stonewall Jackson, the great Civil War general, once confessed that he had trained himself to offer a short prayer every time he lifted a glass to take a drink.
We have these handy dandy devices in our pockets. These can be useful for prayer. Setting alarms - every hour on the hour or a couple times throughout the day. Praying over meals is a good way to train yourself. Not just praying for the Lord to bless your food, but using this opportunity to pray.
These are just a few practical ways you can train yourself and make prayer a greater habit in your own life. The simple idea is to make it a point to engage more fully and more successfully in the battle that ensues around us each day.
Of course, doing this means recognizing your complete dependence upon God. Why is it that we do not pray all day long? As Pastor Brian Borgman says, we don’t pray because we don’t think we need to. We do not realize just how much we are dependent upon God.
We don’t feel we need to pray because we believe ourselves to be independent. We believe ourselves to be capable. But if we truly understood our weakness and absolute dependency upon God, we’d be praying all the time.
Our prayer-less-ness is really a sign of how we do not really understand the fullness of God’s sovereignty. If we really believed that God was sovereign and we were completely dependent upon him for everything, there would never be a moment where we are not in prayer. We would be like babies crying out all day long.
And that’s the point of prevailing prayer: We are so limited. But we have a God who is unlimited. And knowing that should motivate us to make prayer more frequent.
But prevailing prayer will not only be offered at all times, it will also be done “in the Spirit.” That is the Holy Spirit. So the second characteristic of prevailing prayer is that it must be spiritual.
II. Its quality: Prevailing prayer is Spiritual [In the Spirit]
It’s not just enough to have a lot of prayer. The frequency of prayer is important. But we should not think that comes at the expense of the quality of our prayers. If we are not praying in the Spirit, we will not be praying in the most effective way. Prevailing prayer needs to be of the highest grade. So it needs to be imbued with the Holy Spirit of God.
But what does it mean to pray in the Spirit? Now, our Pentecostal friends would likely say that this means speaking in tongues and using what they call their special prayer language.
Others will say that this means we pray with the help of the Spirit. But I think that is just as unhelpful. Because we cannot do anything to conjure up the Spirit’s aid. It’s not as if we have to somehow “get in the Spirit” before we can pray.
I think the best way to understand this is to read it in light of what Paul has just said. If you back up to verse 17, I believe you will get a good idea of what Paul means when he says pray in the Spirit. Paul has just talked about the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God. He has just encouraged you to take up this sword as a means of defense and attack.
As we talked about verse we noted that the Spirit works in and through his word. The Spirit is very much linked to the Word. The word is the vehicle by which the Spirit operates.
As you step into verse 18 you it shouldn’t be too far fetched to say that the two ideas continue to be linked together. Praying in the Spirit likely means that we should be filling our prayers with Scripture. We pray in the Spirit when we pray the words that the Spirit inspired. The most Spirit filled prayers are prayers that are filled with Scripture.
How exactly is that done? Let me give you a few examples. Years ago, when Elizabeth and I lived in Indiana, we had a pastor who was very much dedicated to prayer. He had a sheet of paper which he used as his guide when praying for the congregation. That piece of paper had the 10 commandments, the Lord’s Prayer, and the Apostle’s Creed. And each day he would take the names of the members of the congregation and he would pray through each.
So he would begin with Alexander and he would pray “hallowed be your name.” And he would ask that Royal, Ethan, and Titus would continue to develop reverence for God; that they would know his holiness more and more, and that they would use God’s name in the most holy way themselves.
Then he would go on to Arthur household and pray “have no other gods before me.” He would ask that Matt and Cathy be devoted to the one and only true God; that they would be kept from pride and other forms of idolatry.
Then he would take the Auerbach’s and pray, “I believe in God the Father.” He would ask that Jeff and Amanda would trust in the Lord with all their hearts. That Josiah and Naomi and Suzanna would know God as their father and call upon him as such. That Malachi and Adam and Micah would believe with all their hearts, with all their minds, and with all their souls.
Using this tool allowed him to have a great deal of variety in his prayers. But it was also a way of filling his prayers with the kinds of things that would keep in step with the Spirit. These were very much Spirit filled prayers.
There are other tools that you could use to make your prayers rooted in Scripture. You could attempt to pray through the 7 deadly sins each day: Pride, greed, lust, wrath, envy, gluttony, and sloth. There you have at least 7 times in a day that you have sought to pray and ask for a greater amount of sanctity in some of the most important areas of your life.
If you’d like to be more positive, pray through the fruit of the Spirit each day. As God to fill you with love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Each time you pray, focus on one of the fruits. Begin in the morning with love and ask the Lord to make you aware of those areas where you could be more loving. May he help you love your sister when she is cranky or annoying. May you be more loving and less annoying.
There are lots of ways to do this kind of thing. But the thing to remember is that the more Scripture fills your prayers, the less carnal your prayers will be. Your prayers will be less selfish and more likely to focus on the kinds of things that will make them into Spirit filled prayers.
The next thing Paul says is that we must pray with all prayer and supplication. This, I would say has to do with the manner of our prayers.
III. Its manner: Prevailing prayer is varied/diverse [With all prayer and supplication]
Now, I don’t know that there’s a great distinction between the words prayer and supplication. I think Paul is simply emphasizing that we should be eager to pray in every way possible. Some commentators say, praying with all kinds of prayer. We pray at all times, in the Spirit, and in every possible way.
Sometimes you pray out loud, sometimes you pray silently in your head. Sometimes you pray by yourself, other times you pray with your family or some friends. There are times when you have a set time of prayer and you have your list of prayer requests that you work through systematically. There are other times in the day that you pray short, sporadic prayers.
Now, I’d like you to think about this in terms of your emotional enthusiasm too. Elizabeth and I once had a fellow ask us if we had tried praying earnestly. We asked him what he meant by that. He said that when he and his wife had a big decision to make, they committed to praying earnestly. And they prayed earnestly everyday. The idea was that they tried to make their prayers more emotionally intensive. And somehow that was supposed to have made their prayers more effective.
I’m not sure that we can beef up our prayers with emotion. Our prayers will come to God no matter how we pray them. And that should give you some comfort. And maybe even some more encouragement to pray.
I get it. Sometimes we don’t feel like praying. Sometimes we don’t feel that our prayers are doing anything. It just feels dry and like you are just going through the motions.
But that’s the beauty: God doesn’t care too much how they come. He just loves to have you pray. And you can have those kinds of prayers. There’s nothing wrong with that. You can pray when your emotions are distraught. You can pray when your emotions are high. You can pray when you emotions feel like they are absent.
The fact of the matter is you are still praying. And you are praying with all prayer and supplication. You are prevailing in prayer because you are praying in every possible way.
Fourthly, we need to be watchful in prayer.
IV. Its posture/perspective: Prevailing prayer is attentive (Watchful)
Prevailing prayer is one that, as Paul says, will “keep alert” or “be watchful.” Prevailing prayer must be constant. It must be spiritual. It must be varied. And, as we see here, it needs to be attentive.
What does it mean to be watchful or attentive in prayer? It means to be on the lookout for evils that might arise or for opportunities to do good. And when you see it, you pray about it.
You know how you can be driving somewhere and some how tune out. You can be going along the highway and start thinking about some other things. Then at some point you realize that you haven’t been really concentrating on the road. You can’t even remember what happened on the road for the last 10 minutes. You didn’t fall asleep, but you somehow weren’t paying full attention either.
That can happen in life. We sometimes don’t tune in to all that is going on around us. Sometimes we miss opportunities to serve because we are a little overly consumed with ourselves. Or we are not really paying attention to the temptations we are facing.
I am thinking about doing our next evening study on pride. This past week I came across an article that was simply amazing. The author starts out by saying, “The other day a friend told me that I am a very prideful man. I said to myself, ‘the dude is just jealous.’
That response is a bit of pride in and of itself, isn’t it? It assumes that the friend is wrong and he is right. It didn’t take time to consider that he might be proud. One form of pride is an unteachable spirit. You are unable to take correction or you easily dismiss it.
He recognized he needed to be more alert and maybe needed to think more deeply about pride. And he came to find that pride isn’t always boasting and arrogance, but it can be expressed in many, many more subtle ways. Being an overachiever can be an issue of pride. Just making jokes and poking fun at other people can be a form of pride.
Pride, of course, is only one of the many different kinds of things we need to be on the watch for. There are many other ways we can slip up. And our alertness isn’t just for sins of commission. We need alertness so that we don’t miss good opportunities; opportunities to serve and help.
Its like Frank. Frank came home from work one day in January and his wife said that she was leaving him. She said she was waiting til now to do it so that she wouldn’t spoil his Christmas. But she was fed up and was leaving him.
Frank went to his pastor and said he was dismayed. He thought they had a wonderful marriage. He didn’t run around on her. He was home by 5 every night. He didn’t expect much of her, except that she cook his meals and clean his cloths.
Well, the fact of the matter was that Frank was not alert to what his wife wanted. She wanted interaction. It wasn’t enough for him to come home and kick up his feet each night. She wanted to have meaningful conversations. She wanted to have someone who was genuinely interested in her and would do things with her.
Frank wasn’t alert to all that he was failing to do.
I’m not telling that story for the husbands and wives. I’m telling that for you young people. You might think that story was about marriage, but it really wasn’t. It was about honor and the failure to observe opportunities to show honor to the people you are supposed to honor.
That story was about being so consumed with yourself and your own interests that you are not alert to how you might be able to outdo one another in love.
I encourage you young people to make that a point of prayer this week. Ask God, “how can I honor my parents? How can I serve best?” Keep asking that throughout these next two weeks. I bet if you do, you’ll find that there are lots of things you can do. Maybe you’ll recognize that the trash needs taken out or the lid needs closed on the toothpaste. I bet if you ask yourself that question, “How can I honor and show love?” God will show you lots of new opportunities.
The last part of prevailing prayer is that it lifts up others.
V. Its breadth: Prevailing prayer Lifts up Others [all the saints]
You can talk about its frequency, its quality, its diversity, and its posture. But you must also recognize its breadth. Prevailing prayer does not merely focus on yourself. It also, as Paul says, “makes supplication for all the saints.”
The thing about this spiritual war is that we are all in it together. And we need to be supporting one another by means of prayer. We should be lifting up one another.
This one thing is true: We won’t prevail if some of the congregation is floundering. If there is a breach in one household, then we all will suffer to some degree. Paul makes that clear when, in 1 Corinthians, he compares the church to a body. If one part of the body suffers, the whole entire body suffers.
And the same holds true in regards to the war image. If one squadron gets hit, that ends up being a real blow to the entire army. Our best chances of advancing is when all our forces are working at their optimal levels.
And, of course, one of the best ways to ensure that this happens, is by having a systematic way of praying for your brothers and sisters in Christ. And I just happen to have an updated list of Hopewell families for you to take home. This is super handy. If you fold it just the right way, it makes a perfect bookmark for your Bible. So if you are doing family devotions together, you can keep your place in your Bible reading and you can also see who you can be praying for as you gather around that table.
Conclusion
One refrain that I found in a number of commentaries this past week goes like this,
“Satan trembles when he sees the weakest saint upon his knees.”
That truly is the sum and substance of prevailing prayer. It reminds us that we do not have to be a great gladiator or a top notch navy seal when it comes to engaging in this spiritual war. You can be an average Christian. You can be a below average Christian for that matter. It does not matter.
You can be the weakest saint, but so long as you are lifting up prevailing prayers, you will do great things. You will thwart Satan’s plans and have an incredible impact upon the kingdom of God.
As long as you are praying at all times, and as long as you are praying in the Spirit, and as long as you are seeking to use these prayers as a way of targeting places in your life (or in the life of others) where you might grow or where you might be susceptible to temptation, then you may know that you have the tactical advantage. For it is God himself upon whom you call and he will come to your aid.