Our Footsteps: Persistent Prayer

Wednesday, January 14, 2009

Persistent Prayer

“Ask and it shall be given to you…” - Matthew 7:7

Dr. John MacArthur states, “Persistent prayer is the prayer that moves mountains, because it is truly believing prayer.” So I wonder, do we keep going to God for our concerns because we don’t believe he’d answer?! Of course not. We see his track record. We see how he answers our prayers of fervency. And we run back to the well that never goes dry. MacArthur continues: “When the church is impotent, as so much of it is today, it is because so many Christians are impotent. And Christians are impotent because they are not persistent in praying for what God wants, believing he will provide it".

A.W. Tozer in ‘The Gaze of the Soul’ chapter in his classic work, The Pursuit of God says: “the man seeking mercy looks straight at the God of mercy and never takes his eyes away from Him till He grants mercy”. Wow! We need to thrust ourselves into the presence of God with the force of persistent and fervent prayer – asking, seeking, knocking – until we have experienced all the blessings he has waiting for us. But really this is not for us ultimately – we surge into the presence of God so that HE is the one that receives every bit of the glory that he so richly deserves. God’s glory should be the underlying motivating force in all that we do, including our persistent praying.

Mark

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I Believe...

1). I believe that there is one God. I believe God consists of three persons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
2). I believe that God is holy, righteous, loving, and just.
3). I believe that mankind is separated from God by sin; that sin entered the world through Adam and death through sin.
4). I believe that, because of sin, man is condemned. Because of God’s utter hatred for sin, there is an eternal conscious punishment in hell for all those who do not come to God on His terms, dealing with their sin.
5). I believe that confessing our sins and confessing Jesus Christ as Lord is the only way to properly deal with the sin that has infected everyone. Jesus Christ paid our sin debt on the cross; reconciliation by substitution. There is nothing we can do to add to the finished work of Christ.
6). I believe in the security of the believer, that once he is truly born-again, there is nothing that would cause him to lose his salvation.
7). I believe that upon the death of a true believer in Christ, that he is ushered immediately into the presence of the Lord, where he will live in everlasting joy in Heaven, experiencing eternal fellowship with God.
8). I believe in believer’s baptism by immersion. I don’t believe baptism is necessary for salvation, but it is a beautiful outward profession of an inward possession.
9). I believe in a literal 6-day creation where God created the heavens and the earth and then rested on the seventh day.
10). I believe that the words written in the Bible are truth. I believe that the Bible is inerrant in its parts and in its whole. I believe that the 66 books that make up the canon of scripture make the Bible complete and that God inspired the words written therein. The things that were written down in the Bible are sufficient for every need we have. Not only is God’s Word sufficient, but it is far superior to any other method of handling the problems that man faces, since He has given us all things pertaining to life and godliness.