Tag Archives: faith

Prayer – Abraham Strengthened In Faith

These verses on Abraham are packed with faith and encouragement.

Romans 4:17 …  God, who gives life to the dead and calls those things which do not exist as though they did;   18who, contrary to hope, in hope believed, so that he became the father of many nations, according to what was spoken, “So shall your descendants be.”   19 And not being weak in faith, he did not consider his own body, already dead (since he was about a hundred years old), and the deadness of Sarah’s womb.   20 He did not waver at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strengthened in faith, giving glory to God,   21 and being fully convinced that what He had promised He was also able to perform.

Consider the seven sections of these verses that add encouragement and faith to our daily experience of prayer.

1. gives life to the dead – what is not working, God can make it work.

2. calls those things which do not exist as though they did – what we cannot find or do or does not seem to be there, God can create out of nothing.

3.  in hope believed – this is compounded faith, in the middle of hope there is also more  faith.

4. not being weak in faith – Abraham’s faith was very strong just because God spoke to Him. God’s speaking was enough to trigger faith and belief in Abraham.

5.  did not waver at the promise of God – because his faith was strong there was not a shadow of doubt or consideration that God could not fulfill the very thing God promised to Abraham and Sarah – a baby boy, a son – Isaac.

6. strengthened in faith – Abraham’s faith got even more strengthened every day while he did not see the fulfillment, but just believed God according to what God had spoken.

7. being fully convinced that what He had promised He was also able to perform – Where did Abraham get all this faith and belief in God that what God had spoken, He, that is God, could and would do.

Stand Still, and See

In Exodus 14:13 it says:  And Moses said to the people, “Do not be afraid. Stand still, and see the salvation of the LORD, which He will accomplish for you today. For the Egyptians whom you see today, you shall see again no more forever. There is something about just standing with God, sometime doing nothing but just believing God in the midst of a rough situation.  Just a quiet prayer to have faith in God and in what He will eventually do.

Faith Welcomes God into our Life

Faith is that meekness of soul which waits in stillness to hear, to understand, to accept what God says; to receive, to retain, to possess what God gives or works. By faith we allow, we welcome God Himself, the Living Person, to enter in to make His abode with us, to become our very life. However well we think we know it, we always have to learn the truth afresh, for a deeper and fuller application of it, that in the Christian life faith is the first thing, the one thing that pleases God, and brings blessing to us. And because Holiness is God’s highest glory, and the highest blessing He has for us, it is especially in the life of holiness that we need to live by faith alone.

from Holy in Christ by Andrew Murray

 

Intercession is a Work of Faith

Intercession is preeminently a work of faith. Not the faith that tries only to believe the prayer will be heard, but the faith that is at home amid heavenly realities—a  faith that does not trouble about one’s own nothingness and feebleness, because it is living in Christ.  A faith that does not make its hope depend upon its feelings, but upon the faithfulness of the Three–One God, in what each person has undertaken to do in prayer.  A faith that has overcome the world, and sacrifices the visible to be wholly free for the spiritual, heavenly and eternal to take possession of it.  A faith that knows that it is heard and receives what it asks, and therefore quietly and deliberately perseveres in its application till the answer comes.  The true intercessor must be a man of faith.

The intercessor must be a MESSENGER—one who holds himself ready, who earnestly offers himself personally to receive the answer and to dispense it.  Praying and working go together.  Think of Moses—his boldness in pleading with God for the people was no greater than his pleading with the people for God.  We see the same in Elijah—the urgency of his prayer in secret is equaled by his jealousy for God in public, as he witnessed against the sin of the nation.  Let intercession always be accomplished, not so much by more diligent work, as by the meek and humble waiting on God to receive His grace and spirit, and to know more definitely what and how He would have us work.  It is one thing,  a great thing, to begin to take up the work of intercession—the drawing down to earth of the blessings which heaven has for every need.  It is a greater thing as an intercessor personally to receive that blessing, and go out from God’s face, knowing that we have secured something that we can impart.  May God make us all whole-hearted, believing, blessing-bearing intercessors.

But there is so much conscious sinfulness and defect in our prayer? True, but have you not learned what it is to pray IN THE NAME OF CHRIST?  Does the name not mean the living power?  Do you know that you are in Christ and He in you—-that your whole life is hid and bound up in His, and His whole life is hid and working in you? The man who is to intercede in power must be very clear that, not in thought and reckoning only, but in the most actual, living, divine reality, Christ and he are one in the work of intercession.  He appears before God clothed with the name and the nature, the righteousness and worthiness, the image and the spirit of life of Christ.   Do not spend your chief time in prayer in reiterating your petition, but in humbly, quietly, confidently claiming your place in Christ, your perfect union with Him, your access to God in Him. It is the man who comes to God in Christ, bringing to the Father that Christ in whom He delights, as his life and his law and only trust who will have power to intercede.

These are quotes from The Inner Chamber by Andrew Murray on Moses the man of prayer.

Faith in Association with Prayer

The Prayer of Faith

Faith in association with prayer is simply the exercise of confidence in God to do His will in a particular matter.  As we pray in the name of Jesus Christ, we are indicating that we have complete confidence that God is going to do what is good for us and that He will never do what is bad for us.  Recognizing the sovereignty of God, we are to completely leave all to His jurisdiction as we pray concerning everything, particularly the matter of healing.

— from James the Epistle of Applied Christianity by Theodore Epp.

James 5: 15 and the prayer offered in faith will restore the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up, and if he has committed sins, they will be forgiven him.   16 Therefore, confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another so that you may be healed. The effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much.   17 Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the earth for three years and six months.

Encouragement when we do not see God

Isaiah 41:10 Fear not, for I am with you; Be not dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, Yes, I will help you, I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.’    This means we should be encouraged even when we do not see God in our daily environment.  God is there, He will strengthen and hold us up.

We sometimes rely upon our feelings to indicate God’s presence, but our feeling are many times not accurate.  The one sure way is to trust by faith in what God says in His Word.   All that counts is what God says, not what our feeling feel.  We may feel up or feel down, but regardless God is there and we know by faith that He answers prayer.