This Prayer Is Taking Too Long

Why Do Your Have More Faith in The Devil Than God?

Introduction to the 30 Thousand Foot Prayer – Part 3

My prayer is taking too long to be answered. If you’ve never felt this way before, you’ve never prayed for something extreme or out of your control. Most (51% or better) will have prayers that go unanswered. So why is it taking so long if God is an “on-time-God?” There’s no way that the devil is more punctual with his job than the almighty, all-knowing, all-present God at what He does.

The Prayer (for the Big stuff) That Took Too Long
Have you not prayed a prayer that took too long? Longer to get answered than what you desired or the answer never came?
Two seasons had passed before anything happened after Nehemiah prayed. Nehemiah is the person whose story we will follow to demonstrate what happens when we pray a thirty-thousand-foot prayer. How long has it been since you’ve prayed that big prayer that hasn’t been answered? Stick with us and see what happens in the life of Nehemiah; we’ll get to that later in the series of messages to follow.

If you haven’t felt this way, you’ve never prayed a God-sized prayer. In this case you’re leaving the “big” stuff on the tables or in the storehouses of Heaven. One of my daily habits to get beyond small prayers is to ask God to help me be able to handle the small stuff by myself. I don’t want to waste His time with that; let me ask Him for the BIG stuff. You know the stuff I’m unable to handle on my own. That’s when real prayer starts, getting in a position where you need Him. Don’t give up too soon on the BIG stuff; it’s what God does best.

Let’s face reality; prayer is not a normal practice.
I know you may think that’s a weird even crazy statement to make. So let me explain. This statement means it’s not something that normal people do, pray that is. In fact the common, those you think pray everyday, often forget to pray or at least to pray first. I don’t expect an average, ordinary, normal person to include God in their life’s quests. It’s not what they do. As soon as one begins to pray, they leave the realm of normal. Don’t fall prey to remaining normal; it’s not okay for normal people to get down on their knees.

“If your prayer wasn’t answered, you didn’t pray it.” – Holly Wagner

What does this quote tell us? You’ve not prayed if it’s not answered. You may have thought you prayed, but it’s almost impossible to do something you don’t know how to do without learning how to do it. The same goes with prayer. If getting an answer is apart of praying, then you’re going to have to find out how to pray in order to get an answer. Sounds like we have a lot of learning or relearning to do if we expect to get thirty-thousand-foot prayer results.

Why Does It Take So Long?

There are some things that stand in the way.
You have to know this. Common thinking makes prayer an earthly natural process, but what you need to know is that prayer is what moves what’s natural into the spiritual. Not to be too deep using the word “spiritual”, let’s put that aside for a moment. Prayer takes normal things and places them into God’s realm. A little better?

Twenty-one days had passed and nothing happened when Daniel prayed. Daniel’s a Bible character for those of you who may not know it. This is the same Daniel that you heard was in the lion’s den and came out unharmed. He questioned the holdup as we do and the answer he received in response to his prayer holdup was that there are some heavenly oppositions that had to be addressed. Prayer doesn’t work on natural terms nor does it operate on your terms.

There’s some alignments that must occur.
Take a look at how Christine Caine puts it.

“Maybe you feel you have prayed and prayed and yet the heavens are like brass. Perhaps you feel that God is ignoring you, that He hasn’t heard your prayer.

NO, God is not ignoring you! He never ignores His children. The fact is, we have no idea what God is doing on our behalf in the heavenlies.

Think of it like this: we may ask God for one thing, but He has to rearrange ten thousand other things in order for our one thing to come to pass.

God is working on your behalf behind the scenes. Your answer is on its way!” – First Things First with Christine

You have no idea what it takes, what has to move, what needs to be rearranged in order for your prayer request to be answered.

God’s purpose is first.
You can make many plans, but the LORD’s purpose will prevail. – bible.com/116/pro.19.21.nlt

While you’re making plans, you must always keep in mind that it’s God’s purpose that will prevail. So while you’re praying and getting upset with God, you need to take the time to get to know what His purpose is in this situation. I’d love to get into that now but more on that later. It’s not your purpose that’s going to prevail. That’s what normal people believe. It’s called selfish thinking. I want what I want and that’s not how prayer works because prayer is a God-thing. Any time a person tries to take a God-thing and make it a human-thing (natural) they are a normal person. Prayer is not for normal people. Prayer is for the person who wishes to speak with God and there’s nothing normal about that.

Your faith in the devil is greater than your faith in God.
You might not think of it this way, but when you doubt that God can, it only means you have faith in what the devil produces.

If you believe your child can’t beat that drug addiction, then you have faith in the devil’s trap for your child.

If you believe your marriage can’t be salvaged, then you have faith that the devil is able to destroy what God has put together.

If you believe your finances can’t be improved or you can’t get out of debt, you have faith that the devil can withhold God’s supply to meet your needs.

If you believe that you can’t complete your degree, you have faith that the devil can keep you from being all that you can be.

How dare you have more faith in the devil than you do in God? Oh, what am I thinking…that’s what normal people do! They believe that cancer has the final say not God’s power over death and the grave. It’s your faith that’s allowing you to believe that the devil is more punctual than our God. It’s a matter of who you believe is at work more in your life. Is God working more or is the devil at work more?

You have to admit that last part was over the top, but it’s good. I wanted it to be over the top because that’s what God is. His ways exceed what we think and His plan for us is much better. He is ready, able, and already doing a whole lot more than what you think the devil is doing.

I told you to bring someone else along with you for this one. It’s not too late. Share this content. I guarantee you’ve never heard it like this before. I can’t wait to share what’s coming next week.

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