Fervent Prayer

“The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails (accomplishes) much.”- James 5:16b NKJV

            Fervent 1: exhibiting or marked by great intensity of feeling: zealous.

            Here’s a question for you: Do you think God needs us to pray, or is the act of praying for our benefit? Let’s start the answer by saying this … if God needed us to pray, then that implies that He is unaware of something. God is omniscient, as in having total knowledge. No man can boast of such knowledge.  God is omnipresent, as in being present everywhere at the same time. No man can boast of such ability. Therefore, the correct answer to the question is NO; God, who is everywhere at the same time and who knows all things, does not, in fact, need us to pray. However, He requires us to pray for our benefit. If problems were solved without uttering a word, or if diseases were healed without consideration to the source of the healing, knowing the makeup of man, don’t you think he would begin to believe he was doing these things all by himself? We ask God because we need to ask God for our own encouragement and edification … so our faith can be built up. Believing in someone or something that cannot be seen is difficult enough at times. Praying to a specific unseen entity can look like you’re talking to yourself until the answer arrives. Then we can know that we had nothing to do with its arrival. We asked the unseen God to accomplish something for us and it is done. We must understand that it is done on His timetable and not our own. However, who can honestly say that the answer did not come exactly when it was needed. It is safe to say we could not have orchestrated that by ourselves. Our best efforts pale in comparison to the glory that is God.

            This is one of the distinct problems non-believers, whether atheist or agnostic, have with the existence of a supreme celestial being … the creature is not in control of creation. They want to live and let live. They want to make up their own minds. They want to answer to no one. But everyone answers to someone, no matter what they may believe.

            So pray. Ask your Heavenly Father, who shall not withhold any good thing from you. Don’t waste your time asking for frivolous things. Ask for meaningful things. You know the difference. In all cases ask for the will of God to be manifest in your life. You cannot lose with that kind of prayer, because the all-seeing, all-knowing God of heaven and earth knows what’s best for you and knows exactly when you are in need of it. Therefore, while God does not need us to pray, he requires us to pray for our own benefit. Seek the face of God continually and then praise him for the answers that are coming, whatever and whenever that might be.  Until next time, walk with the King and be a blessing! rlkeller