One Prayer Away

Texts: Daniel 10;Luke 11; 1 Kings 18; Gen. 18; Luke 18:1-8

Truth: Keep on praying because you might be just one prayer away from your breakthrough.

Target:To inform and inspire the audience to make a commitment to persevering in prayer and to the 21 Day Prayer Challenge.

Introduction:

George Mueller a 19th century evangelist in England is known for having recorded fifty thousand answered prayers in his journal. One of the aspects of Muller’s remarkable prayer life was his practice of persisting in petitioning God until he received an answer.

Mueller testified that at one point in his life, he had received thirty thousand definite answers to prayer on the first day of asking. But when it came to the especially big and/or difficult requests, he believed that the bigger the request, the greater the number of prayers required to secure it. He felt that he should show his trust in God by asking two, three, four times a day until the breakthrough came.

On one occasion, Mueller’s orphanages desperately needed more workers. His response was to lead his staff to triple their daily group prayer times until God supplied the needed staff.

On another occasion, Mueller and his staff needed a huge amount of money to double his ministry’s space to house more orphans. His plan was to increase the amount of prayer about the need. During this time, he wrote, “Many and great may be the difficulties. Thousands and thousands of prayers may have to ascend to God before the full answer is obtained.

1 “God responded. Money poured in from all over the world. When the last of the donations arrived, Muller gave thanks saying, “Thousands of times I have asked the Lord for the means to build these two homes and now I have to the full received the answer.”

2 “Mueller is known for having prayed for five young men to be saved. After daily prayer year after year, they all eventually came to Christ. In fact, the last two were converted only after fifty-two years of daily, disciplined, devoted prayer.

In George Mueller’s autobiography, we read his formula for prevailing prayer: “It is not enough to begin to pray, nor to pray alright; nor is it enough to continue for a time to pray; but we must patiently, believing, continue in prayer until we obtain an answer.”

What do you do when you sincerely pray for something. . .and nothing happens? Do you get discouraged. . .or even just stop praying about the matter?

I don’t fully understand why, but God has designed prayer so that it involves an aspect of persistence. Through the Bible we see amazing answers and big breakthroughs because of perseverance in prayer.

Today we are going to look at four examples of the power of persistence in prayer and remember that we might be just one prayer away from the answer.

Outline: Four Portraits of Persistence in Prayer:

I. The PERSEVERING Prophet: Daniel 10:2-14

Daniel fasted and prayed for 20 days with no response. But he did not quit. He was just one prayer away. On the 21st day, his answer got through.

I think one of the most difficult challenges we might experience in persevering in prayer is the fact that we might not see any progress in the physical realm as spiritual strongholds are being destroyed.

Paul writes

2 Corinthians 10:3–5 “For though we walk in the flesh, we do not wage battle according to the flesh, for the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses. We are destroying arguments and all arrogance raised against the knowledge of God, and we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ,”

then in… he writes

Ephesians 6:12 “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.”

In losing weight we want to see a lower number on the scales, in the weight room a bigger number on the bar. In the war against debt we want to see our credit cards go down, this progress inspires us to do it again. But in prayer we must realize that in Christ the battle is already won, but it is our job to bring it into reality through persevering prayer.

In Luke, Jesus tells the story of the persistent friend

II. The PERSISTENT Friend: Luke 11:5-10

The man needed food for his guest. He knocked on his friend’s door at midnight without a response. But he did not quit. He was just one knock away. He kept knocking and his sleepy friend got up & gave him what he needed because of his persistence.

Matthew 7:7 ““Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you.”

I’m noticing lately in my prayer life that God has reminded me to ASK. Do you find your request too small? Do you find it too big? Do you find it insignificant to others? or perhaps you are too prideful to think you need God’s help in the story of the persistent friend, the appropriate request was to ask for whatever the need regardless of the convenience or significance of the request.

Are you truly and clearly making your request known to God?

Rewind with me now to the Old Testament as we consider..

III. The Relentless Intercessor: Genesis 18

Abraham repeatedly interceded with the Lord on behalf of Sodom. He succeeded at getting the Lord to promise to not destroy the city if it had enough righteous people. He successfully got the Lord to spare the city if there was 50, then 45, then 40, then 30, then 20, and then ten. But Abraham stopped there. Unfortunately, the town was destroyed because there were only 3 who the Lord could spare. He proved the power of persisting in prayer but failed because he stopped too soon. If he prayed one more time for 3 righteous people in Sodom, the city would have been spared.

Some could argue that continued prayer (which is what Abraham was doing in his intercession with the Lord), would not have made a difference, but because the prayer was not answered, we may never know. I wonder what prayer you want to be left wondering if praying more would have made the difference.

Finally we will open our Bibles to look at our last case for one more prayer.

IV. The Insistent Widow: Luke 18:1–8

Jesus told of a desperate widow who finally got the justice she deserved because she would not quit badgering the judge until he relented. Jesus promised speedy answers to his elect who cry out to the Father day and night.

Luke 18:1–8 “Now He was telling them a parable to show that at all times they ought to pray and not become discouraged, saying, “In a certain city there was a judge who did not fear God and did not respect any person. Now there was a widow in that city, and she kept coming to him, saying, ‘Give me justice against my opponent.’ For a while he was unwilling; but later he said to himself, ‘Even though I do not fear God nor respect any person, yet because this widow is bothering me, I will give her justice; otherwise by continually coming she will wear me out.’ ” And the Lord said, “Listen to what the unrighteous judge said; now, will God not bring about justice for His elect who cry out to Him day and night, and will He delay long for them? I tell you that He will bring about justice for them quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth?””

Church, will Jesus find such faith in cap city when He comes?

RESPONSE: Invite the team, and Invite to baptism

Tell Jericho story, song do it again…

Take poll. By uplifted hand, who in here currently has an unanswered prayer?

The call to the altar then this morning is simply this. Come pray one more time. Ask in faith not wavering. Maybe today is the prayer that breaks through the barrier, but if not it’s one step closer to the prayer He wants to answer tomorrow.

BAPTISM

CONCLUSION:

COATS

Operation Christmas child 100 boxes (GLOBAL)

AUDRAN HERE (GLOBAL)

Explain QR code with 21 DOP

THE 21 DAY PRAYER CHALLENGE · Praying ___ days · Praying ___ minutes a day · Praying with their family ___ days · Praying with their mate ___ days · Praying with a partner ___ days. · Attending __ prayer meetings · Reading the book everyday · Watching the video each day · Fasting ___ days