Morning Chapel Prayer Playlist
Pastor Ken…
Good morning, everyone. Happy Wednesday.
Get excited about what God wants us to do today…
As the Bible reminds us, God’s mercies are new every morning. And there is an extension of God’s mercy and graces and kindnesses toward us today. Hallelujah! And I’m excited to get into what God wants us to do this morning. He’s got a purpose in mind. He’s got something on His mind for you, for me, for us collectively that He intends to do… for us to experience. So, I just encourage you as we worship this morning to open up your heart and your soul and just invite Him in. Amen? Invite Him to inundate and saturate every recess and corner of your life, of your soul. We need Jesus. We need Him desperately. That’s a key right there, just the recognition or daily recognizing that we can’t go it alone anymore. That’s not how this thing was all set up by Him. It was set up that we would be utterly dependent on Him.
Prayer…
And so heavenly Father, we just thank you this morning that as we approach you, we can, as the Word says, come boldly to your throne of grace, your throne of obtaining the place where we can receive, the place where we can honor you and worship you and give you the acclaim and the credit and the worship that you so deserve.
And so, Father, we just humble our hearts before you this morning. We just pause and exhale and draw a
Some defeat themselves within themselves…
The best life is the product of a renewed mind and a surrendered will. I didn’t necessarily prepare something specific to share this morning, but there’s always something percolating in me and something God’s doing in me, just like He’s doing in you, right? And so I just have been sensing that there are some that defeat themselves within themselves because of perspective, because of thinking, because of an unyielded will. The Bible says He desires to will in us to do His good pleasure. His design and His destiny.
And I love the teaching of prayer because it’s one thing we definitely need to perpetually renew our minds to. And one thing I’m reminded is the truth that praying in the Spirit will help you “get over yourself.” It enables the Spirit of God to take hold of what you need and bring it to you. And so my prayer this morning is, in fact, the Bible even talks about how some basically defeat themselves within themselves, the war going on within. Your mind, your emotions, your attitude.
A fresh attitude of mind…
Scripture reads that we’re to daily adopt a new attitude of mind. And that’s one thing God wants to impart this morning, a fresh attitude of mind. We talk about increase. We talk about promotion in God’s calling and assignment, but well before the “look, there it is,” the dream in my heart, the answer to my prayer, the increase to my finances, the open door to ministry or calling or business or whatever it is for you, there must be preparation in the heart and on the altar of our soul. God is wanting to bend the hearts of His people in a good way, in a God-ordained way, for the coming day and season that’s before us.
It’s rigged in your favor…
And I just want to read this. I’ve shared this story loosely before, but I want to read it a little bit more specifically from a gentleman who had a life- after-death experience. He went to heaven on the operating table, back in the early 90s. And had an experience in heaven for a period of time and then came back as it wasn’t his time. The Lord sent him back. God said, “I’ve got more for you.” And he was the same guy that the Lord looked at him and said, “What if I tell you, if I send you back, you cannot fail. That things are rigged in your favor.” And it wasn’t just for him. Jesus was saying a kingdom truth that we must renew our minds to. And that is that God has rigged it all in our favor, honestly, if we will find our identity, our perspective, our attitude, and we will bend our will toward Him, and His Word, and what His Spirit is doing inside of us. And as pray-ers, it’s not just about “kunda malalelo ungutting (tongues) gutting it out in the midnight hour praying. I’m not making fun or light of that at all. But often times it’s just sitting in His presence. And just letting Him, do the work that He does surgically within us to prepare us for what He’s prepared for us, to prepare us for what He wants to bring through us.
Life isn’t just one long season…
Somebody once said, “God wants to do a great work in you before He does a great work through you.” And that’s seasonal. Life isn’t just one long season. Life is back to back to back to back seasons. And maybe you’re in the middle of a season, maybe you’re at the end of a season, maybe you’re about to embark on a brand-new season. One thing I can tell you is God wants to prepare in you some new things. He wants to do some things that only can be done when we sit in His presence. When we yield to Him. When we turn ourselves over to Him.
And prayer in the Spirit, of course, is one way that I’ve found since I was a young person, helps me to settle down. And even more so today with all the social media and the constant bombardment of distractions. Sometimes I find, I’ll just be honest with you that I can’t even really get to a place where I can just be present and listen until I prayed in the spirit an hour. I’m not trying to make that a mark for you or make it a law or anything. I’m just saying oftentimes, not all the time, but oftentimes I have to just sit and just really press in in prayer, maybe that’s why Jesus said, “Could you not tarry with me one hour?” And then after an hour, I noticed, okay, my soul’s quieted down. I start to hear my spirit, and I’m more peaceful and saturated by God the Holy Spirit. And He’s operating, He’s working. Really, that’s the place that God intends everything to flow from. It’s that place. That’s why I suppose, was it Martin Luther from the Middle Ages, the guy with the 91 Theses that he nailed to the door? He was, I think, the one that said, “I have so much to do that I cannot begin my day without praying three hours before I even start my day.”
Prayer “is” the important work…
Or as I quoted yesterday, Oswald Chambers says “It’s not that prayer prepares us for the essential or important work. Prayer is the important work.” It is where we settle down and where we get over ourselves and we recalibrate our consciousness to our identity. That’s really so important for pray-ers and believers. We can’t lose sight of that. That wasn’t a seasonal teaching where we heard about who we are in Christ. No, that’s the Gospel. And as much as the lost need the Gospel to be saved, you and I need to hear the Gospel daily, to be refreshed. That’s the concept of renewing your mind. Right? Romans 12:2. In fact, it’s linked to being able to do the good and acceptable perfect will of God. In other words, the will of God progressively advances and you are progressively prepared and advanced in God’s plan and calling and purpose, directly correlated to not being pressed into this world’s mold, as Romans 12:2 says in one translation, but are refreshed and refilled and renewed in your mind. Recalibrated to who you are in Him, what you possess in Him, your posture and your position with Him.
We have an equal position with Christ…
As one author said, you have an equal position and possession with Christ. That’s your place of prayer. And it just takes time sitting in His Word, sitting in His presence. Amen. Being cascaded over and over by His Word and His presence. The Bible, in fact, says you are cleaned or pruned through the Word. Just like a husbandman goes to work in the vineyard to clean the leaves and prune the leaves. So that the fruit that’s produced is more lovely and desirable and has the size and the shape and the look that he or she desires. It’s not a matter of just growing a bunch of Christian leaves that are showy. That’s not what God’s after. That’s not what a farmer is after. It’s about selectively… “Ask me how I know. I have a degree in horticulture.” Selectively pruning out the deadwood, the diseased wood, let’s say in a shrub or a bush or a rose plant in your yard. You start by pruning out diseased and deadwood. And then you start selectively pruning out things that… it looks really nice. They’re nice looking leaves. But it’s not what I’m after. I have a vision for where I want this plant to be in a month or at the end of the summer. I have a vision for what it should look like. How many blossoms, how big those blossoms are going to be, how fragrant they’re going to be. And that is all determined by pruning.
So don’t discount the strong dealings of the Lord that are happening in your heart today or what He’s saying to you, what you’re sensing, or that pit in your stomach isn’t always something that grieves you from the world’s standpoint. Sometimes it’s the Lord saying, “Hey, I’m trying to get your attention. Don’t do that. Don’t go there. Come spend some time with Me. Spend some extra time with Me. I desire to prune.”
God is tending hearts…
The Bible reveals that He is the ultimate and consummate and cosmic husbandman, farmer, rancher, if you will. And He is tending to the church and He’s tending to hearts now. He’s preparing, He is orchestrating, He is readying and sometimes there are things that hurt that He does, at least in our flesh. They’re not comfortable. It’s not convenient. But remember, God’s thinking ahead… days, weeks, years into the future and where He intends you to go and who He intends you to speak to and what He intends you to step into.
Much of the will of God is a runway…
I’ve found that much of the will of God, whether it be in prayer or any area, is a runway where you just grow in Him and get stronger so that you can ultimately obey.
“Oh, that’s a really good teaching, Pastor Ken. And you didn’t prepare that?”
No, I’m just sharing my own reflections and experiences. It’s productive to sit in the presence of the Lord. It is productive to pray in the Holy Ghost. It’s productive to turn yourself into God and say, “Lord, my only prayer today is not my will but yours be done. Lord, let me decrease that you might increase.” So that He can do what He wants to do in us. The result, the dream, the provision, the promotion, that’s easy. The fulfillment of His plan. That’s easy. He’s got that. It’s already planned out. There are already storehouses chock full of what you need. You can just exhale, take a deep breath and rest in the knowledge that all things that pertain to life and godliness and your calling have already been set to the credit of your account. What’s necessary is for Him to get it to and through you. And that relates to your will. Your attitude. Your perspective. And of course, what’s going on in here comes out of your mouth, and what comes out of your mouth makes a difference. It either releases life and the plan of God, or it releases death and the plan of the devil.
“Myrtle, did he just say that?”
Yes! You are either covertly or unknowingly being used by the enemy, or you’re more and more yielding yourself and being used by God and allowing His plan to flow to and through you, for you and for all those you’re called to influence.
Here’s what happens when you pray…
But this one gentleman that had this experience in heaven shares that when He was with Jesus, he said “Instantly as though the destinations the Lord took him somewhere in the spirit and maybe overlooking literally a natural geographical place like he describes, he and Jesus were together and we had come to the destination. We were standing on a mountaintop, overlooking what appeared to be the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico. As we stood there, Jesus said to me, “Here’s what happens when you begin to pray.” Then they began to pray in the Spirit. He told this guy, “Pray in the Spirit.” And he prayed. Then, a fireball resembling an atomic explosion erupted. As we watched… this is in the spirit in other words. He’s pulling back the curtain and allowing him to see what happens when you pray in the spirit realm, what happens, what occurs.
“Then a fireball resembling an atomic explosion erupted as we watched. The plume created by the fireball towered high above us. Jesus then pointed out a shockwave that was traveling along the ground in every direction 360 degrees. The shockwave came quickly and with great intensity and it was so powerful that it removed everything standing in its path. You better believe that your prayers not only remove things in the spirit dimension and other situations, but they also clean out.”
Pastor Lynne had a message many years ago entitled, “Clean Out the Clutter.” And how prayer, over time the enemy seeks to just like in ancient Israeli times, one of the tactics or strategies of the enemies was to fill in the wells. They’d throw dead animals down the wells. They’d fill it full of dirt, debris, whatever, to fill it up because that was the source of life.
And so the enemy does that to us spiritually in our souls. He just tries to fill up our well, if you will, block up and stop up and hinder. Pastor Lynne did a message one time called “Clear out, clean out the clutter,” and how prayer helps us to re-dig the wells of our soul and our spiritual lives and clears out the clutter. That’s what prayer does. It blasts away where there doesn’t seem to be a way. It opens up. It’s kind of like we prayed yesterday, Roto Rooter, right?
But oftentimes, it’s not that we need to strain or struggle to try to apprehend or get what we need. It’s that it’s already there, maybe even backed up. It’s that God wants to clear out some things and make a way for it to come through.
So he goes on to say, “The shockwave came quickly with great intensity as they pre-prayed in the spirit and it was so powerful that it removed everything standing in his path. After this illustration of how powerful our prayers are, Jesus encouraged me to never give up on my prayers and to always pray with intensity and faith.”
Oh, that’s good. Come on! That just feels good to me because, I can get intense sometimes. And I feel like sometimes, I’m always trying to sparkplug. And maybe that’s part of my calling, but God wants us to pray white hot prayers, right? James says the effectual fervent white hot prayers of the righteous ones will produce much power, dynamic in its working.
In other words, it will morph to do what it needs to do in your life and situation and in this world. But the prerequisite and the presumption is, there’s an intensity about yourself. There’s an intensity on the altar of your soul. You’re purposely bending your will and say, “Lord, ignite the fire within me. Bend my will your way, not my way.”
Sometimes that’s all that’s needed is just us surrendering to Him. In fact, the saints of old talked about how surrender was a key ingredient to fullness of power. You have to do that. Just like we talked about. You have to give yourself to prayer. You have to give your will to Him.
The Bible talks about worshiping Him. And that part of our acceptable worship is by giving our very bodies and lives and will to Him and surrender in worship. We are an altar. We are a temple. We are the body of Christ. We just need to be a body. He wants to inhabit us. He’s got the plan for us. He’s got the provision and as pray-ers, He’s even got prayers He wants to grant, but the one thing that limits and blocks oftentimes is our will and our choice to keep thinking that old stinking thinking about ourselves or about what somebody told us in our maybe childhood even. Rather than embracing the admonishment of scripture where it says, once again, in Romans 12:2, don’t be pressed into this world’s mold, the devil’s mold for you, but be ye transformed, changed from within. That’s just not one time, that’s in the continuous present sense, in the original language.
Daily, even moment by moment, being conscious of Him, conscious of His Word, so that you can be changed from within, and therefore prepared and pruned. And have your will bent where it needs to be bent. And surrender where it needs to be surrendered. So that you can go on to prove or exhibit for yourself, in your life, in your world, in your church. The church needs you. The greater body needs you. The nation we call America or whatever nation you’re a part of needs you. It is time for the church. God is looking all over the earth for a people who will stand up and say, “Here I am, Lord, send me. I’m willing to let my will be bent. I’m willing to be pruned. I’m willing to be inconvenienced. I’m willing to go the distance and not stop halfway.”
