Thoughts for Life: #36 You Must Prevail Before God

Dr. Wesley L. Duewel: To prevail involves being spiritually strong, committed to the prayer goal, and persevering until God's answer of victory is received.

Not only may prevailing prayer involve prevailing over ourselves, situations, other people, and Satan, but there may be an element of prevailing before God.

Prevailing may involve God's most perfect time. Only God knows at which point of time there would be the greatest spiritual returns and the most strategic advantage to His kingdom from your receiving the answer to your prayer.

God's clocks keep perfect time. God's time is the best of all times. To obtain the highest kingdom results God may need to delay your answer.

Included in this timing may be special blessing for you. God may see that it is best for your spiritual growth and eternal reward for you to prevail at some length before the answer reaches you.

1) God may be testing your depth of desire. We are assured that we find Him when we seek Him with all our heart (Jer. 29:13).

If we are willing to do without God's answer, our desire is not yet deep enough. The longer we pray with real soul travail, the deeper our desire becomes.

2) God may be testing your humility. If there is desire for personal prestige or self-glory, your prayer will probably not be granted. It is very easy to want something sincerely for God's glory but yet to be glad if it becomes known that you helped pray it to pass!

God may test, deepen, and purify your humility by delaying the answer. (see Matt. 15:21-28 The Phoenician woman)

3) God may use your time of prevailing to search and purify your motive. Wrong Motives can block any prayer, even if the desire sought is in the will of God. "When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives" (James 4:3).

Motives can be very complex. You may seek an answer from God for several reasons, one of which may be unacceptable to God. It is for your good that God purifies your motives even if He must delay His answer in order to do so.

Have you grieved God with any sin of omission or any sin of thought, word, or deed? The psalmist said, "If I had cherished sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened" (Ps. 66:18)

(Jesus intensely prevailed in the garden on our behalf for 3 hours. He was prevailing over Himself, His natural humanity and over Satan, who was then totally defeated. Other hidden aspects of His prevailing we are not aware of).

Over what did Elijah prevail on Mount Carmel? Elijah knew he was in the will of God. He had announced three years before that there would be no rain or dew except at his word (1 Kings 17:1).

(God then gave him step by step guidance over those 3 years, 'til the prevailing prayer on Mount Carmel, when he began to pray for the rain to start, after announcing to King Ahab that now, God would send rain...)

Elijah persevered in prevailing prayer, bowing down to the ground with his face between his knees in intense intercession.

Then the servant spotted a small cloud the size of a man's hand. Elijah had prevailed before God, and soon the rain was pouring down in torrents.
(Google image and my emphasis added)

Used by permission of the author and Duewel Literature Trust, Inc., Greenwood, Indiana

Mighty Prevailing Prayer

#36 You Must Prevail Before God

by Dr. Wesley L. Duewel

(pp. 60-62) Zondervan

Let's pray-

Father, there will be some hard times when

we'll have to come to Your Book for

guidance or help.

As You are the Supplier of our every need,

and You're aware of each one, it's up to us to

spend time with You, and to ask for Your plan.

We will be tested for our depth of desire for

our prevailing prayer requests.

May we stand under Your scrutiny and learn

from what You reveal to us to be our lack of

obedience, or our misunderstanding of the

situation we're praying for.

Hold us steady, as we process all of it.

I ask this in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Today’s Bible verse-

Is. 55:6 "Seek ye the Lord while he may be found,
call ye upon him while he is near."

Today’s quote-

"There is a promise over our lives that God wants to bring to pass, but he often has to take us through a re positioning phase first. It's confusing and heart wrenching because you know you're following him and his will for your life, but your expectations have been dashed on the rocks of hard times."

(Sherry Brady, p. 30 in Gary Heyes's book, SAY YES).

Our thought today-

If it is our desire to draw closer to God, and to have intimacy with Him through Jesus, His Son, there will be times of correction. These are to enable us to change. Our thoughts, actions or what we've said will be scrutinized by the Holy Spirit.

(I've found this to be true, even today, as I said something on my

FB page that was un-Christlike. (It's been deleted). If you were

offended by it, I'm sorry, and ask your forgiveness. I'm learning

from my mistakes like everyone else . . . )

Our question today-

Will you be willing to allow God to show you your faults (sins)? Do you want to be pleasing to Him at all costs, even though it may be painful?

Upcoming posts-

The Power of the Word of God: Part 3

23rd- Saturday's post by R. S. Torrey

Thank You, Thank You, Thank You my God

24th- Sunday evening's post by Lee Forbes

#37 Jacob's Night of Prayer

26th- Tuesday's post by Dr. Wesley L. Duewel

#38 The Dynamics of Prevailing Prayer

28th- Thursday's post by Dr. Wesley L. Duewel

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