Morning Chapel Prayer Playlist
Morning Chapel Prayer Today
Pastor Ken…
Good morning, everyone. Happy Monday. It is time once again to pray together. I hope you had a good weekend. If you don’t already know, my name is Ken Olson and I’m one of the pastors here at Living Word.
Make no mistake about it…
We, as part of the body of Christ in the earth as pray-ers in particular, are here on divine mission and assignment. And we’re going to continue that mission and assignment in the spirit in prayer by seeking Him, by yielding to Him this morning.
I don’t know about you, but my prayer is, “Lord, what is on your heart for prayer this morning? What do you want to accomplish?” It’s not about what I want or what you want, it’s what He wants. And that’s what we want. So be in agreement with me that we’ll have that today.
“For His Kingdom” Conference announcement…
I was reminded that the “For His Kingdom” conference is coming up the 12th through the 17th of August. So continue to be prayerful about that. We’re believing for big things, not only as we get a chance to interact and pray for and hear from our pastors in other parts of the world who have planted churches or helped us to plant churches. But we’re also believing just for revival to break out basically during that week of meetings. Be prayerful about that. Mark your calendar August 12–17.
Scientific research perspective on prayer…
But let me share something here. I always love things from… especially when you hear it from outside of the body of Christ, sometimes maybe from a scientific or a research perspective on the importance or the reality of what prayer accomplishes in our lives.
The connection of prayer with the brain…
It just adds to and reinforces what the Bible states about the connection between prayer and all the rest of our lives. To pray is to get better in every regard, in every arena of your life, including your physical life. Because your mouth is connected to your central nervous system, and your central nervous system controls or monitors or runs every other part of your life pretty much.
So this came from a researcher and a scientist and a neurologist, I believe, who was on a podcast of somebody who’s really well known, He has a huge podcast, like millions of followers. And I’ve read her books and followed her for some time now. I don’t know that she’s a believer, but she was interviewing this woman, this urologist, who shared some recent research on the power of your spiritual life and prayer.
She says, in this podcast that I transcribed…
“There is now much research and science explaining the connection between spirituality and depression. In MRI studies…” In other words, they quantified this. “In MRI studies of the brain, we see a thick cortex across the regions of the awakened brain in people who day in and day out sustain their spiritual life through meditation and/or prayer.
“People who engage in spiritual activities such as prayer have a thicker, stronger brain across the regions. People who make spiritual practices such as prayer part of their daily lives…”
And I don’t know that this woman is saved per se, but she’s just relaying the research that’s been done now in recent years.
“…such as prayer, have a much healthier brain. And in fact, the regions that become thick and strong through sustained spiritual life are the very same regions that are not thick and strong, but thin in people with recurrent major depression. So that means we all have a brain that is very sensitive to how we live. And if we live a spiritual life, it gets thick and strong, your brain, and we see deeper dimensions. But if we ignore this opportunity to pray, the brain itself is weaker and thinner and less likely to perceive opportunities.”
In other words, less likely to be discerning. And she implies both naturally, like natural opportunities in your work life, your relational life, your financial life, whatever. And also spiritually. Of course, we know this.
“…to pray is to flip a switch on the operation and the functioning of the Holy Spirit in your life.”
Brother Hagin used to say when you pray in the spirit, it’s like walking into a dark room and suddenly somebody flips a switch and the light is emitted, the light comes on.
There is a download. Make no mistake about it. Even when we pray collectively together for things outside of ourselves or greater than ourselves, there’s a benefit. There is a blessing that is transmitted to you when you yield to your spirit and you pray out of your spirit in your known language and in your heavenly language.
Testimony on being obedient to the leading of the Spirit…
Ask me how I know. I was a 19, 20-year-old college kid, attended the University of Minnesota back years ago, and one day I felt like I needed to get in a prayer group. I kept listening to Pastoral Lynne on Wednesday nights and I was like, “Yeah, I need to do that now.”
Now understand, I’m 19, 20 years old. Like the last thing you would think at that age, or stage of life would be to go pray on a Friday night. Because the group I found was on a Friday night and they were praying for Israel. I’d never prayed for Israel. I knew nothing about Israel. I just graduated high school like months before, but I made a decision that I’m going to be a part of this prayer group. In fact, I sensed in my heart leaving the room that night… I remember one of the first nights I was there, I sensed in my heart, the Lord saying, “I want you to be consistent and go to this group.”
Oh, don’t shout me down when I’m preaching good. The Lord is all about commitment. I didn’t hear it, but I sensed the impression in my heart. The Lord stressed to me, “I want you to be committed and go to this Friday night group and pray.”
There is a spiritual law that’s set in motion when you’re committed to something. When you make a decision, “I’m going to engage in this, I’m going to follow this assignment, I’m going to give myself to prayer, I’m going to choose to be a really good forgiver and not hold a grudge or be resentful…” That’s for somebody this morning. The Lord in His direction to our lives often is very practical and pragmatic. And to our natural minds sometimes we think, “Well, that’s not very spiritual.” The Lord’s saying, “You better make a commitment to go to this prayer group.” But in that commitment and in that leadership of the Holy Spirit in our lives, even in the simplest of directives, there’s a purpose that He wants to unlock. There are things that He wants to show you. There are profound changes He wants to bring to your own soul and your life and your outlook when you follow the leadership and the directive of the Lord to your life, no matter how simple it is.
Testimony of Terry Savelle Foy…
I always think of Terry Savelle Foy, Jerry Savelle’s daughter, who’s ministered here many times over the last number of years, and her life was in pretty rough shape many years ago. She recounts her health was faltering even though she was in her 30s. Her marriage was on the rocks. Her finances were not looking good. Her and her husband were in a lot of debt. And she just had no direction for her life.
Until one day as she was spending time in the presence of God, the word of the Lord came. Yes, the word of the Lord still comes to us. The word of the Lord is flowing to you and to me today. That’s not an old-time phrase. The word of the Lord will show up in your life if you’ll give it time and space. If you’ll take time to wait on Him. If you’ll take time to pray in the Spirit. It’s great if you pray a lot in your heavenly prayer language, but remember to pause and take time and after you’re done praying in the Spirit.
I’ve found through the years, for me, it often takes like an hour of just praying in the spirit, maybe some worship and prayer in the spirit before I come to the end of that time, I can just pause and maybe sometimes I’ll open my journal and begin to write because there’s something about a pen or a pencil in your hand and it connects to your heart. And it begins to flow from your heart to the page.
But also, I’ll just get quiet sometimes and I’ll just listen. I’ll just be still and I’ll sense in my heart what the Lord is saying. Because He’s speaking now. He’s speaking to you right now, today on this day of July in 2025, He’s speaking.
And He spoke to Terry many years ago and said, “Terry, I want you to get your house in order.” And if she would’ve taken that at face value, she would’ve thought, “Well, maybe I’m about ready to go to heaven.” But she understood in that moment, as the Word of God came. See, the Lord always leads with His Word before He does something, before change comes, before revival shows up, He’s speaking. He leads with His Word. For you and for me and for us collectively.
And He spoke a word over her that day and she heard it. She felt it impressed upon her heart that she was to get her house in order. And she knew what the Lord meant by that was that she was to clean her house, that she was to organize the drawers and clean out the clutter and get things in order. And she also knew that she needed to begin to use her time more wisely.
The Bible says, David said in the Psalms, “Lord teach me to number my days.” In the New Testament, it reveals that He is the God who desires to redeem the time because He in fact says that to us. Learn to redeem the time for the days are evil. That means repurpose it. That means buy it back. That means grab hold of little bits of time that ordinarily we would waste and fritter away on mindless, useless kind of things and grab hold of that time and use it. And invest it spiritually.
The power of gratitude…
So she made a decision that she was going to listen to one podcast a day. She also made a decision she was going to begin to practice gratitude. Which I do as well. I find it hugely helpful. And a means to actually rewire your thinking so that very seldom am I a complainer or a griper or focused on what’s missing or what’s broken. Instead, I’m like, I’m just so glad to be alive. I’m glad for today. I’m glad to sit in a chair and enjoy the breeze of a beautiful summer day. You’d be surprised how practicing gratitude, whether it’s journaling it, or praying it, or just acknowledging it to the Lord, even one or two things a day, how it will rewire your neural pathways and give you a brand new outlook, a positive hope-filled faith-filled outlook.
Anyway, Terry goes on to share in her story…
She began to do some of those things. She began to use her time more wisely. She got her house in order. And in a matter of weeks, months, she began to see change. And she said, “Even down to this day that it opened the door for the greatest breakthrough of my life. Things that I didn’t even think were possible, including to become an author of many books, a speaker, a host of her conference, which I think she hosts in other countries now, like in Paris, has millions of followers and likes on her social media channels, including YouTube. And it all started with a simple, pragmatic, very practical word of the Lord, or impression, maybe she didn’t even hear a voice. It was just an impression on the inside what the Lord was saying for her to do. That shifted the course of her life and opened up a whole other dimension of God’s purpose for her family, for her future, for what God had called her to do.
And I share that because maybe that’s what the Lord’s saying to us in some ways today. Maybe there’s a practical word. Don’t overlook it. Embrace it. Get after it. Step into it. Pray into it. See what happens in the coming days.
Finally, this bit of research goes on to say this…
“We have a brain that’s very sensitive to how we live. And if we live a spiritual life, the brain gets thick and strong and we see deeper dimensions. But if we ignore the opportunity to pray, the brain itself is weaker, thinner, and less likely to perceive huge opportunities, not just naturally, but opportunity to live in alignment with our spiritual path.
It’s a fact, hundreds of peer-reviewed studies show a strong spiritual life is more protective against or from the diseases of despair than anything else to have ever been examined in both the clinical and social sciences. A strong spiritual life that includes prayer is more protective against addictions, depressions, OCD, suicidality, et cetera, et cetera, than anything else we have examined to date.
Wow, what a strong endorsement, not only on a spiritual life but on prayer. So I just encourage you in that today.
