Who is Hearing My Prayers?

This morning I woke up early- for some unknown reason my body decided that I was done sleeping.  I am in the middle of a few days where I have purposed to set aside some things in order to focus on prayer for our nation.  (You can find out more about this national call to  prayer and fasting by clicking over to TheCall.)  So I said in my mind, "Ok God, if you want me to pray right now, I will pray."  I proceeded to pray silently, inside my mind as I lay there in bed. (I was tired, remember...)  It wasn't too long into my prayer time that I started to think about what I was doing- this silent praying.  I thought about Jesus, and how he prayed.  I know he prayed silently sometimes, but whenever he was confronting something, whether it be disease, demons, or death, he prayed out loud.  Paul, Peter, the rest of the apostles?  I can only think of examples where they prayed out loud.  I then thought about confrontation.  When we need to confront someone, how effective is it if we only confront them silently in our head?  It's not.  In order for effective confrontation to happen there has to be verbalization.

Much of our prayer life is spent in confrontation.  We may be confronting lack, fear, stress, hopelessness, sickness, relationship issues, despair, etc.  All of those requests on your prayer list, all of those things you are interceding for, it's confrontation.  We are confronting the devil and his plans and declaring God's truth and God's kingdom over the situation.  Yes, God hears your prayers when you pray silently, but its time for the devil to hear your prayers too!  Beyond this though, there is supernatural power attached to our words.  

God made mankind in his image, we are created in his likeness.  When God speaks, the world is created.  The spoken word has power.  As his image bearers we too carry power in the words we speak.  When Ezekiel was confronted with a valley of dry bones, this is what God said to him:

4 Then he told me to speak (prophesy) to the bones and say: “O dry bones, listen to the words of God, 5 for the Lord God says, ‘See! I am going to make you live and breathe again! 6 I will replace the flesh and muscles on you and cover you with skin. I will put breath into you, and you shall live and know I am the Lord.’”

7 So I spoke these words from God, just as he told me to; and suddenly there was a rattling noise from all across the valley, and the bones of each body came together and attached to each other as they used to be. 8 Then, as I watched, the muscles and flesh formed over the bones, and skin covered them, but the bodies had no breath. 9 Then he told me to call to the wind and say: “The Lord God says: Come from the four winds, O Spirit, and breathe upon these slain bodies, that they may live again.” 10 So I spoke to the winds as he commanded me, and the bodies began breathing; they lived and stood up—a very great army.  (Ezekiel 37:4-10, TLB)

In the same way Jesus spoke to the wind and the waves and told them to, "Be still!" (See my previous blog post for more about storms!) We are to speak to life's situations and command them to line up with the word of God.  What does God's word say about your situation?  Speak it over that situation and believe for God to do what his word says.  

There is also something supernaturally faith-building and encouraging that happens when we hear ourselves speak faith over a situation.  The fact is, how we speak about something affects how we think about it.  And how we think about it affects how we feel about it.  Your whole perspective can change when you align your words with God's.

If praying out loud is not already your habit, I want to encourage you to start praying out loud as much as possible. 

Proverbs 18:21 "The tongue has the power of life and death"

Psalms 71:8 "My mouth is filled with your praise, declaring your splendor all day long."

Matthew 21:21 "Jesus replied, “Truly I tell you, if you have faith and do not doubt, not only can you do what was done to the fig tree, but also you can say to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea,’ and it will be done.”

God Bless You,

Lisa