The 'Me' that Is Within the ‘Power of Prayer'

July 15th, 2018

ICA Sunday Pulpit Message

<Intro>

As Deacon Kevin proclaimed today, the title for today’s message is the ‘me’ that is within the ‘power of prayer’. As we give our worship today there might be some people who never received an answer to our prayers yet. There might be some of us where in a few instances I have received an answer from God. Some can confidentially say that they received answers on several occasions. Some of us could say that we received answers from God before but recently you haven’t been hearing from him. For all of you. including myself, I pray that all of you will receive his answers today because that is the purpose or the joy of living our walk of faith. That is the amusement because you can receive answers from God which will strengthen you as well as your faith. It is those things that will make you randomly smile and a strength will be given to you where whatever comes your way you will be strengthen by everything. When God grants your prayers and you receive answers your faith in God being with you grows more. These are the part that we will discuss today. In the bible where it is the word of God there are many people of faith that appear. What is the content of that? If you look in the bible, it is centered on these figures as well as the prayers that they have given as well as the answers to those prayers. Through their answers in their prayer, you can see the guidance from God in their life. In the bible it promises that a saved child of God will receive answers from God. The people around us, the temporary Christians, we can see that, unfortunately, not a lot of people receive answers to their prayers. What is the reason? When you look at the believers today you will see that not a lot of them come to the determination in their life that they will pray to God and receive answers from God and with that answers live their life that way. We don’t live multiple lives, but we only live once. We keep forgetting that God who created our life that only occurs once has mastered it from start to finish it with his plan. You will see that even the parts of your life that is unknown to you as well as parts you don’t want to share with others, even if you try to keep it, God is the one who is aware of it all. When you realize that this is the truth, that is when is when you can make the determination and the conclusion that you will live your life by praying and by receiving answers. However, we all have the tendency to take most of the things of our lives and try to live it base on our prior experiences simply based on our knowledge. I want to tell you this very clearly, that God, he is alive and active and not only that, he is on stand-by 24 hours a day just waiting to hand you an answer to your prayer. The issues on receiving answers to prayers is not on God’s side. Then are there issues with the angels when we pray? Do you think the angels are on strike right now? Do you think there is any possibility that the angels formed a union because they wanted to be compensated higher and thus not doing their part? There was no such news like that broadcasted on CNN. The point is that there are no issues on the side of the angels. Prayers are meant to be answers and if that is so that means the issues lays on us. We need the realization of living our life according to our prayers because this is a life that will never repeat itself again.

The most important things in our life is not seen by our eyes.

 

1. Prayer is seeing invisible things.

 (Peace, thanksgiving, happiness, worth, proud)

This is something that we cannot grasp our hands nor overcome ourselves. It is only possible by God’s answers. The reason why believers fall into misunderstanding is because they think they can do everything by their own strength, knowledge, and wisdom because they let go of everything that is unseen to the eyes and only chase after the things that are visible. People misunderstand that if they have good health, wealth, or their kids are well off then they will have happiness. Being wealthy, healthy, having prosperity are all good things to have and you can be thankful for all these things however, true peace, thanksgiving, happiness does not come from these things. There is no true achievement in these things. There is no true self-confidence in these things either. The things that are true are unseen to us. True peace, achievement, and self-confidence are given by God. Because it is in God’s hands, we pray to him and he hands us these things as answers. Listen carefully to this, when we kneel before on our knees are pray, he is listening to us. Change and reformation starts to take place inside of you. God is with me, I am a saved child of God, and the holy spirit dwells within me, these are all things that we heard before. These things transfer to your heart and melts. That is when you realize God is invisible and he is really with me right now. it is the almighty God that resides with me. God who cannot ever make mistakes, he is the one that is with me right now. when you realize that, that is when peace will enter inside of you. That is the peace that God gives you. That is what you need to possess. In John 14:17, I give to you my peace. This is the peace that cannot be found in this world. May you truly meet God, enjoy God, and pray to him. You are letting aside of everything and only looking up to God. It doesn’t matter what your situation is, God power of recreation will be with you. when we take what we know and put it in to prayer, that is when our body will react to this. Once you have gotten a taste of this experience, you will be inside the mystery of prayer. There is a reason why we are meant to receive this peace from God. It is not the state of being comfortable but, when you have this true peace within you, you will have the ability to make the correct discernment. When you can correctly discern things that is when you can make the correct decisions. That is when you can make decisions for what is good. You are not waiting for God to drop answers on your lap but, you can envision God’s answers and live towards that answer. That is doable when the peace enters inside of you then you can enter inside God’s vision and answers.

 

2. Prayer is touching intangible things.

 (Peaceful life, thankful events, happy days, worthy life, proud legacy)

 

This is possible when you are given this peace because when you are in peace you can seek after and listen to God’s answers instead of people who do not have this peace. Other people just listen and cannot hold on to it but for us, because we have this peace, we can listen and follow. When you listen to something that is important to your heart then you will follow it. That is where the answers and blessings are. When you repeat these answers what happens? That is when you are truly thankful. What happens when this piles up? That is when you confess of happiness. I pray that you will be able to have these blessings. All these things are invisible to us. If our hearts are following only after the things that are visible to us, then all the things that are unseen to us they are deprioritized. On the other hand, when you experience God’s answers, then you will be at peace, thankful, and happy. These people who have been blessed by God devote themselves to be used by God. That is when you live a meaningful life. A meaningful life will be left behind for your next generation. I pray that you will have these important blessings in your life. You can find these things through prayer. You experience the intangible things all through prayer. You must remember this. The things that are true, most significant to our lives are all unseen to our eyes. You can only discover them through prayer. It can be only granted by God. You cannot receive these things in the world, people. Only God can give this to us. That is why God has given us the special privilege of prayer. As I relay this word to you, this is my desire as well as God who as placed me at this place, He hopes that you live a life that is peaceful and meaningful. Then a peaceful heart will naturally take place. Thanksgiving naturally occurs. That is how day by day you can live a happy life. When this all sums up together, you are living a meaningful life and your children can witness this. You need to believe in this and hold on to this. You will find everything by prayer. Because God and the holy spirit is inside of us, once you can hold on to this you will be able to see the rest of it inside of your life. Unknowing to you, you will be seated on blessings and following these answers. This happens when you pray to God and through that prayer God gives you peace. That is when you realize that the gospel means good news and it give you peace. When you pray there are other important things that happens.

 

3. Prayer is achieving the things people can't do.

 (Personal spiritual problem, family inherit, life crisis)

 

These are not accomplished by people. What are the things that people cannot do? Personal spiritual problems in individuals. There are personal frustrations that we carry. This can be the source of conflict between spouses and family. It can also become a hinderance of our process of success. It is not all personal spiritual problems like this. Not only our personal spiritual problems but, we must face the spiritual problems that comes down our family line. It is coming down from our ancestors. When these things are revealed in our life it can become our life crisis. We already know what this entails. We already know that we are saved but these things are placed there to interrupt us. It is a trap by the forces of darkness. It was placed there as Satan’s playground before we received salvation. Why is he trying to distract us? He is trying to not make us enjoy God’s blessings. Why does he try to deceive us? He wants us to revert to our old ways. Satan works through darkness. That is the course that Satan uses. With these misconceptions, he tries to block us in our lives. When you experience these failures and they repeat, that is when people fall in their life and fail. When you fall in to this, because we are the saved child of God we will not go to hell however, we will live a life worse than non-believers. We need to realize that we will face these interruptions from Satan in our lives. This cannot be undone by the strength of man, palm readers, or idol worshiping. Only through prayers because we are a saved child of God. This is what Jesus said in Mark 9:2, there is nothing else that can chase away evil spirits and darkness other than prayer. Make this challenge today, I am going to give you the topic of challenge that you need to make today. You need to start the battle of prayer. It doesn’t matter what Satan throws at you in your life, you will overcome this by prayer. If you don’t fight this battle with prayer what could happen? If we do not fight it with prayer, it will be handed down to our next generation. The reason why God has given us the privilege of prayer is to block and to stop the forces of darkness that is handed down to us. That is why God allowed to us the power of prayer. I pray that you will be able to experience this deep prayer. The reason why God has called you is because he wants you to become the main figure of these kinds of blessings. He has already shown us what could happen through figures in the bible such as Samuel. Today’s scripture is about Samuel. He made the confession that he will not commit the sin of resting in my prayer. Samuel was aware of the power of prayer. Samuel already realized in his life that he can overcome anything if he doesn’t cease in prayer. Is that true? Samuel already knew ahead of time through his mother and father the background of prayer. He received the inheritance of prayer. This is the reason why from a very young age Samuel enjoyed prayer. It says that he was always at the side of the ark of the covenant. He didn’t stay near the ark of the covenant because it was a comfortable place nor because it provided shade. It was the ark of the covenant that contained the word of God. Samuel wanted to be near the word of God. What does that signify? It is the existence of God, the power of God, the works of God, the plans of God, all these things that belong to God was embedded in his bones. This grace of God that is intangible Samuel was desperate for. It is because he has seen and experienced this grace of God. For you as well you need to hold on to the things that are intangible and realize that it has been given to you by God’s grace. Do you believe in this? There is something else. You will see that Samuel during his prayers experienced a lot of change. It means that the things that were intangible to him were tangible to him. Through Samuels prayers a whole age changed. Because of his prayers, his environment and history changed. Samuel lived in the age of judges. You will see from the beginning of the bible it starts with the book of Genesis, Exodus, and then it gets to the book of Judges. It is the book that share the content about how God established a judge to rule that age. You will see that where a judge that God has established, the people of Israel will prosper and be happy. But during the time when a judge will die that’s why Israel fell in to confusion and failures. You will see that 14 judges appear. The last judge of that age was Samuel. If you look at the book of judges in the very last chapter this is what it says, everyone lived according to their own wills. It means that people lived however they wanted. They were repeating this stage of confusion. You will see that the very last judge was Samuel. He is the one that concluded the age of judges. That is when they were able to embark upon the age of Kings. They were able to wrap up the period of confusion and face a new period of peace. It also says that during the age of judges, there were consistently in warfare but during the time of Samuel, all wars ceased. That is when all fears of wars disappeared. That is when the peace of God was upon the people. This all took place because of Samuel’s prayers. Because he prayed, he was able to enjoy the spiritual things that are unseen to our eyes. That was when he was able to change the things that were intangible and changed his entire age and history. This is called the prayer summit. The reason why God allowed Samuel to experienced this, the reason why God recorded the life of Samuel in the bible is to show us what he wants to give to us. He is using the pastor to relay this to his people. We need to see the things that are unseen to our eyes. That is when you can obtain the things that were once unobtainable. As we live our lives, we need to be able to be able to enjoy the things that are intangible to our life through prayer. There are things that seem achievable and things that are so close to our grasp. You will be able to grasps those things. My family decided to do 40-day prayer. The thing that were intangible to use was tangible prior to those 40 days. That is because God is the God who answers. Halleluiah. There are additional things that are more important. They were living a time of peace but suddenly, the philistines decided to attack. That is when the entire nation was about to be killed. That was an event that was very tangible and visible. Usually they would chase after the things that are visible. People were saying that we need to build up a wall to try to block the enemies to come in and to build weapons. Samuel appeared and was asking for the things that were invisible. He suggested that we need to gather and pray instead. They were at the brink of war and Samuel suggested to pray not individually but together at a place called Mizpah and pray all together. He is telling all the Israelites to gather in one place called Mizpah to pray together. He is saying let’s enter inside the power of prayer that is invisible to us. The enemies are at the door, but he is saying let’s gather at one location. Let’s say that they are already huddled together. What are they doing? It is almost a suicidal situation. The visible appearance now is very suicidal. But there is no believer that can do something similar. Through the one person of God, Samuel, they were all able to enter inside the power of prayer. Currently the power of God that is invisible to us, it strikes the enemies. The works that cannot be done by the power of people it was done by God’s almighty power. That is when they had this complete victory. Through war, darkness seeped in and they were able to overcome this. It happened through the prayers of Samuel. Do you believe in this? This is how Samuel was able to be seated in the place of spiritual summit. That is how he was able to say these words, I will not rest in my prayers. He said that, for me to stop in my prayers is committing a sin. It is because all of these are possible through prayer.  The things that are invisible, intangible, to us are possible through the powers of God’s prayers. You need to realize this today that the power of God that is invisible to us can be only enjoyed by prayer. Are you dissatisfied with this life lesson that comes from Samuel? Do you find these words of Pastor Ted Kim unbelievable? If that is so all you need to do today is listen to the word of our Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ was able to enjoy the blessing of Immanuel that was invisible. If you look at his life during his ministry, he was able to change his age through prayer. He cured the sick, he fed those who were poor, he gave the covenant to those who were wise in knowledge. That is how Jesus changed his field. The things that cannot be done by people he was able to fulfill it by the death on the cross. It is impossible for mankind to be saved but he is the one that opened the way of salvation. Mankind cannot change their fate. He is the one that opened the door of changing our fate. God has given us his important covenant through Jesus Christ. What does it speak about? He said that I dwell in you, and you dwell in me. When my words dwell within you ask for anything in my name and that’s when it will be given to you and your joy will be made complete. That is John 15:7. It says to hold on to his word and pray. It says that if you hold on to his word and pray, anything you seek will be given to you. Jesus is telling us, hold on to the word that has the power of creation and enter inside of prayer. Then the works of answers in your prayers will take place. I pray in the name of Jesus Christ that you all will be able to enter inside the power of prayer. May you experience answers to your prayers. Then God will work in your life.

 

Let us pray,

 

Living Father God, we pray before you. May we be able to discover your answers. May we seek out the grace of God that is invisible to us. Help us to see the works of God in our lives. Help us to see the blessings of the throne of God. The things that are impossible to mankind, help us to experience in our lives. I pray in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

Austin Immanuel