Morning Chapel Prayer Playlist
Morning Chapel Prayer Today
Pastor Ken…
Good morning. Welcome! It’s good to have you with us in the chapel as well as online. What an honor and a privilege to pray with you all today. This is not coincidental. This is God’s assignment, amen? At the outset of our week, at the beginning of our day, God wants us to connect with Him and stay connected with Him.
James 5:7, Amplified Classic…
Let me read a passage of scripture to you to start with, to get us going in a scriptural direction here. In James 5:7. This is from the Amplified Classic. It says…
“So be patient, brethren, [as you wait] till the coming of the Lord. See how the farmer waits expectantly for the precious harvest from the land. [See how] he keeps up his patient [vigil] over it until it receives the early and late rains.” So keep up your patient vigil…
In prayer
In your stand of faith
In your confession of the promise of God
In your belief that things are shifting and turning in the direction of the Father’s intention for your life, for our nation.
The Good Fight of faith is rigged in your favor…
Let me remind you, we have entered into a good fight. The Bible calls the fight of faith a “good fight.” That’s because it’s rigged in your favor. Whether it’s overcoming symptoms in your body or seeing a dream come into reality or your whole family swept into the kingdom and knowing salvation in Jesus, your fight is a good fight because God pronounces victory before you even start. That’s what the resurrection of Jesus is all about. He pronounces victory. He pronounces…
Rigged in their favor
Rigged in the church’s favor
Rigged in yours and my individual favor
We have an audience with the Faithful One…
Even before we know we have a problem, we have the answer. We have a solution. We have an audience with a faithful one, with the God of Heaven. Aren’t you glad that when we turn our attention to Him today, He hears? The Bible, in fact, says He inclines, He turns His ear to the prayers of the righteous. So He hears us. He sees. He understands. And He connects with us as we turn our attention to Him.
Let your hearts be settled…
In James 8 it says, “So be patient. Establish your hearts.” In other words, let your hearts be settled. Sometimes that’s the first order of business where prayer is concerned. We just need to settle ourselves down. We need to let our hearts be laid bare before the Lord. And sometimes you just have to speak to your soul, your mind, your will, and your emotions and say, “Peace be still. All is well.”
The blood of Jesus is still available to us today. The faithfulness of God has been extended and was never retracted from us. His goodness and His faithfulness are extended toward you.
Verse 8…
“So you also must be patient. Establish your hearts [strengthen and confirm them in the final certainty], for the coming of the Lord is very near.”
You could say the Coming of the Lord in regard to the rapture, but also the coming of the Lord in regards to you seeing the fulfillment of the answer.
In James 5:13 it says…
“Is anyone among you afflicted (ill-treated, suffering evil)? [one translation says “going through a tough time] He should pray. Is anyone glad at heart? He should sing praise [to God].
Verse 16 says…
“Confess to one another therefore your faults (your slips, your false steps, your offenses, your sins) and pray [also] for one another, that you may be healed and restored [to a spiritual tone of mind and heart]. The earnest [in other words impassioned, the deliberate, the purposeful, the fiery or earnest] (heartfelt, continued) prayer of a righteous man makes tremendous power available [dynamic in its working].”
In other words, it has the ability to morph and accomplish what is needed in the present moment or the situation you’re praying about.
Quote from E.M. Bounds…
Let me read one other thing to you that I came across. This is from E.M. Bounds’ writings. And he made this statement. He said, “Prayer is the mightiest agent to advance God’s work.” In other words, prayer propels or moves the plan of God forward in your life. Do you feel stuck? Are things seemingly at an impasse or a status quo or in stasis? Well, guess what? Prayer moves. It jumpstarts things. It causes you to become filled with what’s in heaven, and it causes the plan of God to get in motion.
So he said…
“Prayer is the mightiest agent to advance God’s work. Prayer is not a weak, passive exercise. It is one of the mightiest forces God has placed in the hands of His people. Through prayer, hearts are changed, strongholds are broken, laborers are sent, doors are opened, and the work of God, advances.”
“E.M. Bounds understood that the church does not move forward merely through better programs or plans or human ability, but through men and women who know how to seek God. When the people of God give themselves to prayer, they make room…”
Now listen to this.
“When the people of God give themselves to prayer, they make room for the power of God to accomplish what human strength never could.”
So keep that in mind today as we pray. As we worship and as we pray, you are making room for the power of God to come into reality, to become manifest in and through your life today, in and through your decision-making, in and through what you do today to do what you can’t do in your human intellect or your human physical abilities. But only God can. Amen?
What is the Holy Spirit standing by for?
Once again, God wants to partner with us today to do the impossible. He wants to come alongside us. The Bible says we have a “standby.” Somebody said, “What is He standing there for?” He’s standing by, waiting to be given attention, waiting to be wanted and invited. The Holy Spirit, after all, is the consummate gentleman, and…
He waits to be invited.
He waits to be acknowledged.
He waits to give our voices to Him.
He waits to surrender to Him.
What activates the Holy Spirit’s ministry?
But oh, watch out when you do that because He then is activated to reveal, to transmit, to disclose. When we pray, when we seek His face, when we acknowledge Him, when we say simply, “Holy Spirit, I recognize Your presence. I sense Your movements, Your inclination on the inside of me today.” When you do that, you cause His ministry to be activated.
Remember, it was very purposeful on Jesus’ part when He said that it was profitable, when He said to His disciples on a notable day, “Disciples, it’s profitable. It’s advantageous. It’s to your benefit, in fact,” and that’s yours and mine as well, “that I go to the right hand of my Father once again. Because if I don’t go, then I can’t send the promised Holy Spirit. But if I’ll go, I’ll pray and I’ll send one who will be advantageous for you. He will profit you. He will make a way where you are unable to make a way.”
The Day of Pentecost poured out…
And so we see in the book of Acts that a group of 120 mighty hungry people went to the upper room where they prayed and they patiently pursued God until the Holy Spirit was poured out. And then, notable miracles, signs, wonders, many, many came to belief in Jesus after the day of Pentecost. There’s something about that, that we can’t lose sight of. We can’t become familiar with. We can’t reference in a past season of our lives.
In other words, the baptism of the Holy Spirit with the evidence of speaking in other tongues, with the evidence of holy fire on the altar of our souls and lives is not something that once upon a time happened. We need a fresh baptism of the Spirit. We need to freshly acknowledge His all-important presence in our lives, not just for prayer, but for every aspect of who we are and what God has called us to do.
We have a leg yet in the race of God to finish…
If you’re breathing this morning, there must be some aspects to the plan of God that yet must unfold. There must be some prayer assignments you yet must pray out and pray for. There must be some significant blessings He wants you to take hold of and enjoy in your life. But it’s going to take the Holy Spirit to finish that final leg of your race, that next step in your purpose and calling. God never intended that we would go it alone or be able to do what He has for us or enjoy what He wants us to receive in and of ourselves.
He’s waiting to be activated…
It requires our acknowledgment of the “standby,” the great revealer, the divine psychologist, the strategist who is there waiting to be activated with our prayer in other languages, with our acknowledgment and our understanding, with our worship, with just being aware of Him as we go through our day and as we go through this time this morning. He’s standing by through every season and every situation you’re facing. And He is to be the ultimate cheat code, as they say. He’s the revealer. He’s the one that will make you look like a genius in any situation.
Oh, hallelujah. Glory to God!
He’s in the earth right now…
I love talking about the Holy Spirit. Remember, the Holy Spirit is co-equal with God the Father and co-equal with the God the Son. He’s an equal representation of the Godhead, and He’s in the earth right now. He’s in your heart and in my heart right now, and it’s time for us as the body of Christ, as individuals, as forerunners, as seers, which pray-ers ought to be, to see the reality and the all-importance of the Holy Spirit being stirred up in your heart and in my heart for a fresh season, to being stirred up at the center of our services, being stirred up at the center of our households and families and this midterm election and the White House.
It’s time to press down on the accelerator…
I’ve been preaching it for a number of years now. It’s time to press down on the accelerator of what God wants to do. And that is done only by and through and with the help of the Holy Spirit. We must be a people who are God-inside minded, recognizing we are not our little, old, broken self from before, but we’re new creatures in Christ Jesus made anew by the facilitation and the refabrication and the recreation of the Holy Spirit’s hands in our hearts and in our lives. And He is able…
To cause us to rise today
To overcome today
To obtain victory today
To shift atmospheres in situations in your office, in your home, in your church, in your city, in your nation today.
We were sent to be “change makers…”
We are sent to the earth by the Godhead, by the Father’s divine providence, you and I individually, to shift the course of human events, to shape history and remake lives, not by our intellect, not by our limited abilities, but by the collaboration and participation in our everyday lives of the Holy Spirit—the standby! He is…
Our strength
Our all in all
Our helper
Our assistance
Our divine assistance
