I have been reading the book by Andrew Murray, “The Prayer Filled Life.” Andrew Murray wrote this book in response to a pastors conference where they, as pastors, were asking themselves the question of why they saw so much complacency and weakness in the spiritual life of their churches. Their conclusion was a lack of power, sincerity and consistently in their prayer life as pastors, and the prayer life of the church.
God’s purpose for prayer is to encourage faith in His children, so that we will learn to depend on the greatness and omnipotence of His power. To claim His truths with childlike faith. Truths like Eph 3:20 which says, “Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us,” (Ephesians 3:20-21) Oh, that we knew what a great and glorious God we have!
Too many Christians, Murray says, “do not live in the enjoyment of this abundant life that Christ is willing to give us, and this is most evident by our prayer life.” He went on to say, that through this abundant life, “We don’t have to live limited by our human imagination of what is possible. We can choose to live by what must be. God has said it, It must be true, so we need to claim it and live by it.
- As the Crucified One, Christ has conquered sin and death and is living in us as the source of victory over sin and self. We must live by what must be! Sin and self have no authority over us!
- As the Risen One, the very power God used to raise Him from the dead is available to us daily, moment by moment, to enable us to live by the power of His resurrected life. Through His power we can declare, “Thanks be to God, who always causes us to triumph in Christ.” (2 Cor 2:14) We can say with confidence, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” (Phil 4:13)
- As the Glorified One living within us, It’s not just heaven someday, but it’s the glorified life of Christ, dwelling in me today! The Lord of all, living within us. We can declare moment by moment, “We are more than conquerors through him that loved us.” (Rom 8:37)
When we begin to live by what must be, and claim these truths in prayer, they will not just be dreams or theological statements that don’t affect our lives, but they will become reality. We will come to see our God as He describes Himself in 2 Cor 9:8 “God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiency, in all things, at all times, you may abound in every good work.” We will begin to see that He is truly able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us,
May we learn to walk in an ever-increasing experience of Jesus overflowing life and find His life in us to be Abundant!
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.