Tuesday, May 30, 2017

#115 Why Do we Wrestle?

Dr. Wesley L. Duewel: Why has God planned for us to wrestle? The overarching purposes of God include developing us spiritually and making us partners and warriors now so we can share in the triumph and rewards of victory in eternity.

   It is of God's grace and love that He has ordained that His most faithful intercessors wrestle in prayer. (Google image, Wrestling prayer).
   
   1. To keep us realize our dependence upon God. The more deeply we sense our own impotence and helplessness, the more fully we can cast ourselves upon God. Humility is always the first step to God's grace and power.

   2. To help us share Christ's heart. Christ is the great Wrestler. He wrestled in prayer with the powers of darkness while on earth. The day of wrestling is not over until Satan is bound and cast out.

   Now Christ must wrestle through us, but He on the throne must share His heartbeat with us so we can see the world, the lost, and the opposing demonic forces from His perspective. 

   Wrestling helps us share His vision, His hatred of sin, and His holy determination to oust Satan.

   3. To teach us spiritual alertness. Paul recognized that Satan constantly tries to deceive and outwit us. We must beware of his schemes (2 Cor. 2:11). He tries to sift us like wheat (Luke 22:31).

   He masquerades as an angel of light (2 Cor. 11:14). He prowls around like a roaring lion (1 Peter 5:8-9). Wrestling in prayer teaches us to "be alert and always keep on praying" (Eph. 6:18). Just as a wrestler must be alert to every move his opponent makes, wrestling teaches us to keep awake and alert for God.

   4. To teach us spiritual passion and vehemence. The more we wrestle in prayer, the more deeply the Holy Spirit is able to fire us with His passion and His holy but vehement opposition to Satan and all Satan's deceits, strategies, and forces.

   5. To teach us the secrets of triumphant overcoming. We learn to triumph by the Spirit's helping us triumph. This is no textbook mock battle. We learn the deceits of Satan by confronting them.

   We learn the use and power of our spiritual weapons by using them. We learn spiritual warfare by confronting the powers of darkness in prayer. Victory requires skill as well as might. The Spirit teaches us spiritual skill as we wrestle.

   6. To Strength our faith. Faith is made purer and stronger by our overcoming the resistance we face in prayer and the obstacles to the answers of prayer. Faith is strengthened by exercise. We must feed on the Word and live in the Spirit, but only as we put faith in practice do we move from theoretical faith to faith as God's means of victory.

   Faith seems mightiest in the simple trust of the new believer and in the mature, militant faith of the battle-tested warrior. Faith must become more than a confidence in Jesus.

   It must become a strong shield in battle and a mighty spiritual weapon of attack. Like a spiritual muscle, the more we use faith, the more it becomes tough and powerful.

   7. To enable us to amass prayer resources. Intensive prayer and, in particular, prayer wrestling and prayer warfare can be amassed as if it were a bank reserve or a spiritual treasure.

   Just as an army needs to amass weapons, munitions, and reserves before an all-out attack, so God prepares for spiritual breakthrough. We see this law of prayer at work even with angels. 

   Daniel prayed and Gabriel fought with the demons representing Satan for three weeks before God amassed the divine power of prayer and had Michael join Gabriel in the spiritual warfare (Dan. 10:2-3, 12-13). 

   This whole incident is a mystery, but it is clearly revealed in the Word. The disciples failed because they had not been praying enough. They had not been amassing sufficient prayer (Mark 9:29).

~ ~ ~ ~
Used by permission of the author and Duewel Literature Trust, Inc., Greenwood, Indiana, (with Jean's impressions added)


Mighty Prevailing Prayer
##115 Why Do We Wrestle?
by Dr. Wesley L. Duewel

(pp. 213 -215) Zondervan







Prayer-

Why won't God answer me?
(Good post!)

   Father, just as an army needs to amass weapons, munitions, and reserves before an all-out attack, so You prepare us for spiritual breakthrough in our praying experiences.
   New believers, as well as mature, militant faith of the battle-tested warriors, are challenged to feed on the Word and live in the Spirit, and to put their faith in practice and move from theoretical faith to God's means of victory.
   Like spiritual muscles, the more we use our faith to war for God's purposes, the more our prayers become tough and powerful.
   Father, as we see our need of dependency upon the Holy Spirit, we ask for help in this ministry, and we ask this in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Today's Bible verses-

(Jer. 7:23 KJV) "Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and ye shall be my people: and walk ye in all my ways that I have commanded you, that it may be well unto you."

(2 Chron. 14:11 KJV) "LORD, it is nothing with thee to help, whether with many or with them that have no power: help us, O LORD our God; for we rest on thee, and in thy name we go against this multitude. O LORD, thou are our God; let not man prevail against thee."

Today's quote-

Crawford W. Loritts Jr.- "As we walk in the light, the Holy Spirit shows us more areas to be surrendered to the Lord. But the heart commitment, the response to Christ and His Word, must be settled.
   We are passionate pursuers of Jesus. We have decided to live and move in one direction, toward Jesus. We stop making excuses for our disobedience and view repentance as a gift from God to keep us pursuing the heart of our Savior and His will for our lives. We want to be all in." (Taken from the Herald of His Coming, p. 4 of Dec. 2016)


Today's popular post-

#85 Mighty Answers Through Agreeing in Prayer


   Dr. Wesley L. Duewel:
"There are thrilling biblical examples of agreement in prayer. When Moses faced the problems of disobedient, unbelieving Israel, he and Aaron repeatedly agree in prayer.

   We first see it when the Amalekites attacked Israel at Rephidim. Moses, Aaron, and Hur climbed a hill, and Aaron and Hur upheld Moses' hands in prayer..."


Upcoming posts-

#116 Holy Wrestlers
6/1- Thursday's post by Dr. Wesley L. Duewel

Still Waiting
3rd- Saturday's post by Lisa Buffaloe

#117 Wrestling with God
6th- Tuesday's post by Dr. Wesley L. Duewel

#118 Prayer Groans in Prayer Agony
8th-Thursday's post by Dr. Wesley L. Duewel




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Granny's Guide to Marriage in Verse
31-day Devotiona
l
+ Jean's testimony


[Maybe just choose a title each 
day that interests you] 

A sample verse from p. 102- 

I Found God's Way
Was Not My Way

"I found God's way was not my way
For how to get things done.
But soon I would learn it did pay
to not let my mouth run.

If my husband was to lead me
And the Lord to lead him,
I had a part I was to see
Or for me it was sin." 

(Published by Lighthouse Publishing 
of the Carolinas. Used by permission).

A great gift for someone who may need help 
to prepare for marriage, and for those in a
marriage, wanting some helpful advice.

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