Morning Chapel Prayer Playlist
Morning Chapel Prayer Today
Pastor Ken…
Well, hello and happy Wednesday, everyone. Good to see you guys. We are live, streaming in person from the chapel here at Living Word in Brooklyn Park, Minnesota. Welcome, everyone, in the chapel. My name is Ken, if you didn’t already know, and I’m on staff here at Living Word and it is my honor to be a part of and help lead Morning Prayer here from the chapel.
Announcements…
I have two announcements. Just a quick heads up that Pastor Treena Haase is leading our Wednesday night service tonight. So if you’re able, I know she’s got something super timely and anointed and practical. So tune in online or join us in person at 7 p.m. Central Standard Time for our Wednesday night service.
And then Pastor Mac will be back once again this weekend. So you don’t want to miss that.
Franklin Graham commented about prayer…
I wanted to read something that Franklin Graham posted yesterday in regard to prayer. He really put out an invitation for prayer. I believe it’s today, Wednesday, January 14 at noon. I think maybe he’s leading some prayer. We’re doing ours right now, as we do every morning. We’ll do prayer all throughout this week.
Speaking about America, he said this…
“We have increasingly turned our backs on God and His commands, embracing godless secularism. We need to ask for His forgiveness and seek His face, pray for our leaders, and pray that God will bring calm to our streets. There are many who like to stir things up, or even those who would like to destroy this great country, pray that these efforts would be thwarted and their plans would be brought to confusion. So let us stand together as the body of Christ and kneel before God.” So we’re going to focus on that this morning in regard to prayer.
Acts 4:24…
So let me remind you of a couple things really quickly here. In the book of Acts 4:24, you’ll find the early church prayed. And it says this of them. “So when they had heard that…” when they had heard of the threatenings, the challenges, the adversity toward the church towards the Gospel “they raised their voice to God with one accord and said, ‘Lord, you are God who made heaven and earth and the sea and all that is in them.’”
I’m going to skip over some of that and go to the end of Acts 4:31, where it says, “And when they had prayed, the place where they were assembled together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit. And they spoke the Word of God with boldness.”
So just a friendly reminder this morning…
Prayer is not a religious activity that has no tangible outcome. No. Prayer is our high calling and our greatest opportunity to engage in ministry in the earth realm. Prayer produces real results. Prayer assigns and puts God’s plan and power in motion to do what He intends to do in lives, in nations, in hearts, in every situation that we lift up in the name of Jesus.
James 5:16…
And so I was reminded of these truths regarding prayer from the scripture drawn directly from the Word of God. There are promises for prayer, right? James 5:16. You probably are familiar with this passage. It says, “The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.” One translation, I think it’s the Amplified Classic, says it produces much power. It creates, or generates, much power and its dynamic in its working. The power of God in situations, in nations, in your heart, in your life.
First John 5:14–15 says…
“If we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us, we know that we have what we asked of Him.” Aren’t you glad that His ear is open toward you today as we raise our voices to Him?
We have an audience with Him, as the saying goes. His ear is inclined, or turned, toward the church. He is actually looking for and expecting us to say some things today, to pray some things today, to boldly declare some things in accordance with His Word and His will today.
Why? Because He’s the God of “Yes.” He wants to fulfill His promises. He wants to do what He stated in His Word to do.
Mark 11:24…
Again, another familiar verse: Mark 11:24 says, “Whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it and it will be yours.” I like that. That’s a good promise, right? That’s a blank check of sorts, as someone once said. We have not because we ask not. So ask today! Keep the lines of communication with your Father open.
I call Him Father…
And I call him Father because ultimately He’s our Heavenly Father. Some Christians don’t take that step. God is still some far-off ethereal deity who’s on a power trip in their minds. So it’s cold and impersonal and He’s the God out there somewhere. No! He’s your Father. He delights in communicating with you. He delights in you seeking Him and Him being able to have a conversation with you and impart to you through His Word to your spirit directly by and through His Holy Spirit.
So keep the lines of communication open…
Prayer isn’t just an assigned time at 9:30 CST in the chapel or online to articulate our request before God. Prayer is an ongoing conversation with Him. He was often known by those close to him, brother Kenneth Hagin, that is, that he was in a conversation with the Lord. You’d hear him sometimes in his office and it sounded like he had a conversation with someone and then somebody would walk in and there was nobody there. But he was just talking to the Lord.
I often myself will say, “Lord, what about this situation? How should I pray about this? Which direction would you have me go in?” As I’m going about my day, just random things. Just the day to day. Just lift things up to Him. Open your heart to Him. Thank Him. Worship Him. Give Him glory as you go throughout your day. Let your heart be transparent and open wide to Him to express yourself to Him, but also to receive what He’s doing and what He has to say to you.
Matt. 7:7–8…
Prayer also produces some other tangible outcomes as seen in the scriptures. In Matthews 7:7–8, it says “Ask and it will be given to you. Seek and you will find,” Jesus stated. “Knock and the door will be open to you.
In John 14:13–14, Jesus said…
“Whatever you ask in My name, that I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.” Don’t lose sight of that! God desires that we produce prayer fruit, the fruit of answered prayer because it glorifies Him. It causes fame and recognition to come to His name, in addition to the fact that it gives Him an avenue through which He can establish His plan in people’s lives, in nations, and in situations.
Prayer is truly powerful. Don’t lose sight of that. Expect that when you pray in the spirit, expect when you pray that prayer of faith, that God hears. And there’s a response instantaneously whether you see the tangible results of it in the moment or not.
In John 15:7, Jesus said…
“If you remain in Me and My words remain in you, ask whatever you wish and it will be done for you.”
Acts 4:31…
And now let me just also highlight a couple of promises regarding divine power released through prayer. Acts 4:31 states “For they [the early church] prayed and when they did the place where they were meeting was shaken and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the Word of God boldly.” I just referenced that verse earlier.
Acts 12:5–7 says…
“So Peter was kept in prison, but the church was earnestly praying to God for him. Suddenly an angel of the Lord appeared” in response to the early church’s prayers. So that’s the kind of authority that has been invested in you and in me, not just in some well-known national minister. But in you and in me, He’s invested a great authority…
So much so that we can ask and receive
So much so that we can affect the outcome of worldwide events when we come together in prayer
So much so that we can cause power to flow to heal people of cancer, to see dead bodies resurrected to life, to see maybe your sons and daughters, your grandchildren, their lives shifted in a whole new trajectory you don’t even know was possible created for them to follow in the footsteps of Jesus and His plan for them.
This is the answer…
I’m telling you, this is the answer. When the church prays, profound and God-ordained change comes into our reality from heaven to earth. Pastor started a started a series this last weekend about the gates and how gates open the way, when the gate is open, power flows. And prayer is our ability to open the gate between heaven and earth.
Philippians 4:6–7 says…
“Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation by prayer…” And it shortens it up. “…the peace of God then will guard your hearts and minds.”
Ephesians 6:18 says…
“Pray in the spirit on all occasions.” Paul writes, “Pray also for me that words may be given to me.” In other words, prayer accesses the Word of God so that you can pray it, so that you can speak it. I mean, yeah, you might say, “Well, prayer accesses so that you can pray other words?” Yes. Prayer allows the Holy Spirit to be activated within you as well from a personal standpoint, so that you live increasingly under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit to pray what God would have you to pray.
While I’m in this flow here, let me finish up by reading a couple of reflections from Mark Brazee’s book, “Processing the Plan of God Through Prayer. A really good book. I highly recommend it. Not a big book, but just a lot of great nuggets of truth.
And he writes in this chapter entitled, “Doing Business With God…”
“Do you know what the 120 believers did?” In other words, right before Jesus ascended, He gave them an assignment. “What they did for those 10 days after Jesus ascended, the Bible says, “These all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication.” Now, don’t get tripped upon the word supplication. It simply means earnest entreaty, or an earnest seeking or a requesting. That’s what supplication means. Generally speaking.
“Jesus told the disciples what He wanted to happen, but it took 10 days of prayer and supplication to pray through the mighty move of God. They knew there was a move coming. But again, God’s plan had to be processed through prayer.”
For whatever reason, God has chosen to accomplish and perform His works and His plan through His body, the church. We’re the ones that are legitimately assigned to the earth realm. The enemy and all his rogue minions as they call them, they’re just that. They’re not to be here. They’re rogue. They’ve been defeated.
Paul writes they’ve been stripped of their power and their ability really to cause us harm, but unless we are deceived and allow them to do so. But the truth of the matter is, we’re the ones that have been delegated authority to rule, reign, and administrate in this earth realm in our day-to-day lives, to set the tone for how things ought to go.
How? Firstly through prayer.
