Mike Bickle emphasizes the significance of intercession in prayer, explaining that God desires partnership with His people to effect change in both the spiritual and natural realms. He highlights that while God has established many aspects of His eternal plan, He has also given humanity a dynamic role in determining the quality of life through prayer. Bickle encourages believers to understand that their prayers, even if they feel weak or ineffective, hold immense power and can avert disasters and bring blessings. He stresses the importance of persistence in prayer and the necessity of aligning one's heart with God's word to experience the fullness of His blessings. Ultimately, Bickle calls for a deeper revelation of intercession within the body of Christ to fully engage in God's governmental authority.

Father, we thank you for the Word of God, and we ask you to release a spirit of inspiration on the speaking and the hearing of your Word. Lord, I ask for strength in the inner man. I ask you to strengthen us with might on the inside, through the Word of God, in the name of Jesus. Amen. I want to talk about how to increase our effectiveness in prayer. Roman numeral number one is that God desires partnership with His people through intercession. And one of the most needed things in the body of Christ today is the revelation of intercession, the revelation of the power of intercession. Even at IHOP, though we're a 24-hour prayer ministry, I believe that we're really lacking on the revelation of intercession. I think that most in our midst have a foundational revelation of the value of intimacy, and that's really important. But intimacy with God is as important as it is and as high of a priority as it is to God. That's not the same thing as the value of what happens when we offer weak prayers, how things shift in the spirit, and God releases His government and His partnership in ruling the universe through intercession. And so, as I've been just thinking over the missions based on our spiritual family, it strikes me that we're really at a lack of understanding about intercession. Not intimacy, not worship so much, but what really happens when you and I speak these simple weak phrases from the Word back to God. As simple as it is, it's the way that God governs the universe in partnership with His people. Revelation 3, verse 21, Jesus is speaking. He says, to him who overcomes, I will grant this person to sit with me on my throne in the same way that I sit with my Father on His throne. God the Father is sharing His throne with His Son. And the Son is sharing His throne with the people of God, but He shares His throne with us the way that we actively engage in the authority of His throne, because to share His throne, to sit with Him on His throne, means that we operate in the authority and the power of it, and we change things by our relationship to Jesus and the power of His throne. The way that happens is through intercession. B, God has sovereignly determined the primary events in His eternal plan. God has a number of things in His eternal plan. They're already established. He's determined them, and He's going to accomplish them, no matter if people cooperate or if demons attack. There are many things that are already a done deal, however, everything in His kingdom is not a done deal. He has chosen to give us a dynamic role. I want you to catch this. God, though, has already established many things, but there's another category of activity in His kingdom, and He has chosen to give us a dynamic role in determining some of the measure of the quality of life we experience in the natural and in the spiritual world, spiritual realm. You and I can determine, not fully, but significantly, the quality of life that we experience in our natural life. Some of that can be determined through our participation with God in intercession. If we pray, the quality of life increases. If we don't pray, it decreases. And God, in His sovereignty, says there's many things that don't have to, I don't need your cooperation, but there are a number of things I will not move until you ask me to move. Now, it increases and determines the quality of our life in the natural. We can avert judgments and disasters. We can drive off sickness. We can drive off oppression and the enemy seeking to devour our finances and break our bodies and ruin relationships and destroy our homes and these kinds of things. Much of this can be averted through intercession. But without intercession, there's a measure of the devouring work of Satan that will not be stopped. And we can't say, well, God will stop it if He wants it stopped. And the Lord says, no, that's not how it works. I will stop it when I hear the sound of your voice. And it's not just our life in the natural, we can increase the quality of it, our life in the Spirit. What I mean by that, we can increase the measure of the revelation that we receive. We can increase the dimensions of dreams and visions and Holy Spirit encounters. And the way that our heart encounters God, much of that can be increased if we want it to be increased, the quality of our life can. Now this isn't just a principle that takes place in this age in time, it also takes place in eternity. Did you know that even after the second coming of Christ, He is going to govern the world through intercession? Right now, at the right hand of God the Father, Jesus releases the Father's power through intercession. And after He returns, He will lead the greatest prayer movement the world's ever seen. And He will release His government into the earth through prayer. And we will participate, we will continue in prayer and worship in the age to come as a mode of releasing God's power. That's not just something we're doing in this age. That's an eternal principle. This is how God releases His government and His kingdom. I'm going to continue in paragraph B. We determine the quality of our life based on our response to the grace of God in our partnership with Him, particularly in prayer and meekness. Paragraph C. God opens doors and God closes doors. He opens doors of blessing and He closes doors of oppression in response to prayer. We pray doors of blessing open over our lives. We don't pray doors of oppression open up and Satan rages his attack against us. Far more effective. Those doors of oppression are shut. They're minimized. They're reduced or shut. They're not always completely, we don't, I'm not saying that we'll never experience any of the attack of Satan, but it's minimized in a dynamic way because of prayer. There are blessings that God has chosen to give us. My paragraph C still. But only, only if His people rise up in prayer and ask for them. And we don't want to stumble over in our prayer life. We don't want to stumble over the time delay factor. We pray and sometimes it's months and sometimes years and sometimes decades. And it's the time delay dimension that causes some of us to conclude prayer is not effective and it's worthless because there's a time delay dimension that's often administrated by God. And there's another dimension that sometimes causes us to trip. It's the fact that God gives us the blessing incrementally in small doses at a time, not always one big downpour. And another thing that causes us to trip over a prayer, the process of prayer is the fact that we don't feel the power of it when we're praying. But our, our, uh, our effectiveness in prayer is based on the finished work of the cross, what Jesus did on the cross. And it's based on God, the father's passion for us. And it's based on his decision to govern the universe through prayer. It's not based on whether we feel the power of it or not. And so because there's a time delay, because the blessings are, are incrementally or, or in, in small bits, uh, and measures released to us. And sometimes because we don't feel the power of it, we conclude wrongly that prayer is ineffective. In James chapter four, verse two, the scripture says, you do not have because you do not ask. There are things God would give you in the spirit and in the natural, but he will not give them to you until you ask them in a persistent way. Matthew chapter 17, the scripture said, uh, Jesus is talking, uh, he's come, uh, to a situation where there's a D uh, a young man that's demonized and the apostles who were casting out devils and raising the dead and, and, uh, uh, the healing, the blind and the paralytics, tremendous miracles. But they ran into this one demonized young man and, and they couldn't get the demon out. And Jesus said, this type, he says, this is a special quality of oppression. It's a special intensity is involved. This type will only go out if they're sustained prayer and fasting. Beloved, what happens is these miracle working apostles that were raising the dead. They hit a, uh, they hit a wall. They couldn't, they couldn't see the power of God released. And Jesus said, the answer is more prayer and fasting. Now the body of Christ doesn't really like that message. We either want it to the breakthrough now or just forget it. And I tell you, there is not one prayer that we are praying that does not matter in the presence of God. Our prayers are effective, even though there's a time delayed dimension. And even though the blessing is given little by little often, not sometimes the Lord just releases one big, uh, uh, breakthrough of power in answer to prayer, but often it's incremental small doses. And Isaiah chapter 30, verse 18 and 19, very, uh, powerful passage here. It says the Lord longs to be gracious to you. The Lord longs to be gracious and therefore he waits to have compassion. He's waiting on you and me to show us compassion. He wants to be compassionate. He wants to do it, but he's waiting. Verse 19, he will surely be gracious to you at the sound of your cry. When he hears it, when he hears your prayer, then he will answer you. I mean, what an amazing passage God says, I long to be gracious. I want to release grace to you, but I'm going to wait on you. We're waiting on him. And to our great surprise, he's waiting on us. He says, I'm going to wait. I'm going to hold my compassion back until, until I hear the sound of your cry. And when I hear it, I will answer you when I hear your prayer and the sound of the cry, don't be confused by that. It's not talking about, you have to cry out loud and, and, uh, stir yourself up in, in, in a physical way and all that kind of thing, which is okay to do that. But it can be a whispered prayer. The cry is not an issue of volume here. It can be, you could be alone and you could be whispering, or you could be releasing the groan of your heart. And that's the cry that God hears. So whether we're in a large stadium and there's a hundred thousand, we're all crying out or whether you're just groaning in pain in the silence of a, of your bedroom at night, God says, when I hear the cry of your heart, I will answer it. I will be gracious to you, but not until I hear the cry of your heart. Ezekiel 22 verse 30, the Lord said, he sought for a man who would stand in the gap, a man who would stand in intercession on behalf of the land of Israel so that God would not destroy the land. And he said, I look for an intercessor because I don't want to send judgment. But if I don't have intercession, judgment is coming beloved. It really makes a difference whether we do this or we don't do this. It says in Zephaniah two, verse one, gather yourself together. He says, get yourself together. This is called solemn assemblies. And you can, you get together in fives and tens or, or like we do with at hundreds, or it can be hundreds, a hundred thousand in a stadium. He goes, get together verse two and get together. It means for prayer and fasting. It's what the, that's what the context is talking about and do it before the decree, the divine decree of judgment is issued. God says, get together in pray before I issue the decree of judgment. I release it from heaven. When God, uh, uh, issues a decree of judgment, it means he releases it from heaven. He says, get together before the Lord's fierce anger comes upon you. Verse three, seek the Lord all you make of the earth. And it may be, the Lord says, you seek me. It may be that when my judgments come across the land, you will be hidden. You will be protected. You'll be hidden in grace. I call this a pocket of mercy. God says, if you seek me, I, even when judgment is ravaging a whole countryside, if the people that seek me, I will hide them. I will protect them. Even in the midst of judgment, all around them, they will still be protected if they cry out to me. Joel chapter two, verse 12, verse 13. It says this return to the Lord for he is gracious and he relents from doing harm. It says, who knows if he will turn and relent and leave a blessing behind him. If we turn to the Lord into the context of Joel, we know it. Well, it's fasting and prayer. It says, cry out with fasting and prayer. If you turn to him, he will relent. He will change the end result. He will change what he is going to do towards the people who cry out to him. He will change the course of events. That's what relent means. He says, I was going to do one thing, but I'm going to change the course of events. I am now going to do another thing because you cried out to me. It's amazing reality. The potential of how we can affect the quality of our life in the natural, the spirit and the quality of the geographic region we live in, or even a region on the other part of the earth through prayer. It's an amazing reality. Now, when God, uh, referencing a minute ago, uh, he says that if you gather together before the decree is issued, the way of thinking about this is that in the court, in the heavenly court, God determines decrees of judgment and he determines decrees of blessing. He determines them, blessing and judgment. They are determined based on how the people are relating to him. And the decree is, is, is determined in the heavenly court, but that's not the same thing as God sending the angels and issuing the decree. That's a different that's stage two. It's like writing an email and you could send it in a second, or you can send it a year later. God, uh, he writes the email, so to speak. He decrees, he determines a decree in the heavenly court, but many times it's years later before he issues it, before he releases the angels, he dispatches the decree to the natural realm and he goes, if you gather together, even though I have established a decree, even though I have determined a decree, a negative one, if you will cry out to me before I issue it, before I release it, before I push sin, I will reverse it. I will push delete, or I will just put it on hold for now and see how things go. Beloved the, the ability of the body of Christ to determine spheres of activity in our lives, to, to stop the demonic and to release the heavenly, the angelic and the divine is a powerful reality that even at IHOP, though we are a 24 hour prayer ministry, still the revelation of the power of intercession of weak prayers is, is still, uh, in need of strengthening in our midst. I need to be stronger in my understanding of this. You need to be stronger. It's not enough just to enjoy his presence in a, in a dimension of intimacy. Although I certainly don't want to put a minimize that that is one of the highest values in the kingdom of God that I can want to do nothing but honor and, and encourage that dimension of the grace of God. But I don't want us to limit our understanding of the grace of God just to that God has called us to intercession. Paragraph D some people trust, and I put the word in quotes, they trust the sovereignty of God in a non-biblical way. And the way they do this is by trusting God to do the role or the function that he's assigned us to do. We, uh, people trust God and they go, well, if God wants it done, it will be done. And that's not, that's not always true. Yes, there are things in God's eternal plan because he wants them done. They're going to be done. We, regardless of whether we cooperate or not, but there's many things that relate to your life that God wants done, but he will not do them. If you don't cooperate with him in obedience and prayer, he will leave them undone. And many believers have a wrong, uh, trust in the sovereignty of God. It's unbiblical because they're trusting God to release his full blessing without their participation. And God says, no, I require your participation. You can't trust me to do your part. We can't do God's part and God will not do our part. He will not. It's an inappropriate view of, of trusting God to assume that if God wants it, it will happen. That is not an accurate statement. If God wants it and we cooperate in a biblical way, then it will happen. If God wants it and the people of God or the people who are not the people of God, they refused us to receive the grace of God. Then what God wants does not happen. That's part of his sovereignty, his commitment in his sovereignty. He wants partnership with human beings and beloved. Our decisions really matter. It, there's so much dignity on our choices. Our choices matter for life and death and our choices matter for time and eternity. The choices we make count and they change the quality of our life in this age and even choices now change the quality of our life in the age to come. I want to strengthen your, your heart in this, your choices today really matter and they affect the quality of your life in this age and the age to come. The idea that we're going to trust God, if God wants it now, it's true to say, you know, you, you, you hear the statement of God wants it, he'll do it. And if the person means I have obeyed the Lord, I've sought him, I've done my part in prayer and in worship and, and, and I've done the, the, the work I've done, the human responsibility part of the grace of God. If I've done my part, then it's right to say, if God wants it, it will be done. But more times than not, what people are saying is they have a very kind of ambivalent, well, I don't know. I'm not in the mood for it. If God wants it, he'll do it anyway. And the Lord's answer is that's not right. I do want it, but I'm not going to do it because you're not cooperating with me. That troubles people. People don't like that. That disturbs them because it creates pressure on their heart. They go, well, that means if I don't do things, good things won't happen. If I don't do my part, that's exactly right. Well, ouch, I don't like that. I would rather live in a bubble and just kind of think it's all going to be the same. It is not all going to be the same. It, the quality of your life is a dynamically affected and is different by your choices of prayer and obedience or your lack thereof. Even as a believer, greatly affected. And we need to know that we need to understand this. And people don't like the pressure that that puts on them. And, uh, but it's a true reality as well. I would rather live in the pressure of that and live in the truth than kind of get a whole bunch of people together and say, Hey, you know that we don't like that. Let's get rid of this prayer matters thing and let's just trust God and just rest in the spirit, which really means rest in our carnality. That's what they really mean by that. Rest in our laziness and our passivity and our spiritual compromise. No, I don't want to rest in passivity. I'm going to rest in the spirit and we don't rest in the grace of God except we're doing our part that the grace of God requires. That's how we rest in grace. That other thing is called resting in fleshliness and soulishness and compromise and in laziness and that the rest of laziness is not a rest. It releases great turmoil upon our life all in the name of rest. People can even say the word grace all over it. It doesn't make it grace. It's still a false doctrine and a wrong idea. What I care about is God's graciousness being released to the fullness in our lives. I'm zealous that the fullness of what God has for me happens and the fullness of what he has for you. It happens in your life in this age and the age to come. And I don't want to get us into some kind of comfort mode if it's not truth. I want it as comforted by truth. I want us on a pathway in this pathway of fullness. It does take resolve. It does take denying ourself. It does take some discipline. It does take some exerting of energy and that is the pathway that God is called. And the Lord Jesus said few will choose this narrow way. But if they do choose it is the way of life or you could say it another way. It's the way of the anointing of the spirit Roman numeral. I mean, uh, paragraph E there's three steps in our partnership with God. You could say this a half a dozen ways. First God initiates what he wants. He initiates it. He starts what he wants. He's, he declares it in his word. Then he stirs our heart to us. God wants to bless us or God wants to visit our nation. God wants to visit the city. God wants to anoint you. He initiates that by declaring it in his word and stirring your heart. So God is the great, uh, initiator of everything in the grace of God. But the second step is we respond in obedience and prayer. And then the third step is God answers our response by releasing more blessing that he would have withheld if we did, if he did not hear our cry. So God initiates it. Then we respond in faith, obedience. Then God answers our response. So there's three steps. Some people, they want two steps. They want God initiates and God answers. They'd say, well, God wants it. He'll do it. And Lord says, nah, there's three steps. I did initiate it. I, I get the glory for it. It was my idea and it's my power, but I'm now I, you must cooperate. And I will answer your cooperation by breaking in. And if you don't cooperate, I will withhold that blessing until I hear the sound of your cry. Let's go to paragraph. I mean, Roman and rule two, walking in the full measure of what God has for us. Mark chapter four, verse 24. The Lord has stirred my heart with this verse for 30 years. This has been one of my life verses since I was about 20 years old. I wrestled with Mark four 24 to this day. It still stirs me. I pray, preach on this three, four or five times a year for near 30 years. This passage, I just cannot, I don't want to get free of it, but I just, it grabs me. It, it, it grabs my heart. Here's what Jesus said. He goes, take heed or be careful what you buy into when he says, take heed. What you hear. He's saying, be careful what you buy into, what you believe to be true. Be careful what the standard is that you buy into. He says, here's why with the same measure that you use, it will be measured to you and to you that here, to you that receive what God's saying, more will be given to you. What he's telling them is this. He's saying, babe, be very careful that you hear the truth about these subjects. Because a lot of people would rather hear false comfort and they, uh, and then what they end up having, they have no, they're the measure of the cup they offer before God. The, the measure of the cup of blessing that they are fighting for. They're contending is so little because they have so little vision because they haven't been careful what they've heard and their vision for what God will do is very small. They're very content living unanointed. They're very content, not understanding the word. The measure of their vision for their life is very small. And the Lord saying, be very careful what you hear or be very careful what you buy into as the vision for your life. Be paid. Don't make it too small is what he's warning them. Make the vision for your life big. And when I mean the vision for your life, I'm not talking about being rich and famous. I'm not talking about a vision of I'm going to, you know, Billy Graham touched millions. I will touch hundreds of millions. I'm not talking about be careful to the size or the magnitude of your impact. That's not the vision I'm talking about right now. I'm talking about be careful with how you determine the vision of how God will touch your heart. What is the measure of what you want in God at the heart level? Because whatever measure you determine, that's, and that's the measure you walk in. That's the measure that you fight for in the spirit. God says, I will give you according to that measure. I determined years ago, I want to be a man who knows the word of God. I want to be a man that has a spirit of prayer. I want to feel his presence on my heart. Lord, that's the measuring cup. And I use Mark four 24. I go, I'm offering a big measure. I want my heart to flow like a river. I want the nearness of God. I want the authority of God on my mind and my emotions and the power of God in my words. In my hands, I want a measure that's large. My measure wasn't about the size of my impact of, you know, if it'd be thousands or millions, that's not the point. It's the, it's the quality of my experience with God at the heart level. And if you are careful how you determine the measure of what you're holding out for and what you're building your life around, beloved, we need to get a vision of where we want to go at the heart level in God. The preacher said that without, without a vision, any road will get you there. And more believers are aimless. They, they, they, they have a vision for their natural life. They want to have enough money for things to be easy and they want to have enough friends to make it work. And they want enough of the blessing of God to where it's not horrible. I'm not talking about that level vision. What is the measure of the vision that you want for your encounter and your experience in God? Be very careful that that vision is not too small. And it's one thing to pay attention to the scripture and have the right vision, but use that measure to build your lifestyle around that vision. If you've got a big measure, a big vision, build your life around it. And God says, I will give you according to the measure that you've established for your heart. And if you hear, and some of you are hearing right now, the Lord, just even as you're listening to this word, you're, you're increasing your expectation. You're increasing what you're believing for God, for your heart. If you hear more will be given to you. If you hear with a responsive heart, doesn't mean if you just hear the words, but when the scripture talks about hearing, it means with a heart response. If you hear this beloved, I want to assure you, you will be given more. If you hear this, be careful that your vision is not too small for the encounter and the experience of your heart and God's heart. I want the fullness of what God will give the human spirit in this age. King David, when he was being rebuked for his sin with Bathsheba. He grieved God. The prophet came to him. The prophet Nathan said in verse eight, it says, I gave you God's speaking through the prophet Nathan to King David and rebuke at him. He goes, I gave you the house of Israel. I gave you the whole kingdom of Judah. I gave you the whole thing. Look at this. He goes, and if that had been too little, here's the phrase I also would have given you much more, but why have you despised me to do evil? Could you imagine? I do not want to stand before God on the last day and the Lord say that phrase to me. I don't want him to say this to me, Mike, I would have given you much more if you would have asked me for it. Those would be horrifying words. I want to ask him now for it. I want to press in for it now. I don't want to stand before God in eternity and find out. He said, I had much more. I would have given you if you would have pressed into me. Now, David was a man that God was pleased with. God can delight in you and God can be pleased with you. Beloved, that's not the same thing as you experiencing the fullness of what he's ordained for you. I mean, I believe the Lord's pleased with with many, if not the vast majority of us in this room right now, the Lord delights in us. He's pleased with this. That doesn't mean the fact he's pleased with you and he delights in you and he loves you does not mean that you're entering into the fullness of your potential blessing. Many people that God delights in greatly King David, God delights in him, but he says, David, I would have given you more if you would have asked me. That verse is also, uh, uh, challenged me over the years. I said, Lord, I don't want to, I don't want to get before you and find out that you said there was much more if I would have contended for it. Paragraph a here's the reality. I'm just going to say it just as is real straightforward. If we do more, God gives more. Now, most people do not like that sentence. You think that they would, you think, Hey, if we do more of our part, I'm talking about prayer and fasting and obedience. God gives more that, but that, that reality, and it's a true principle that torments people. They go, well, when is enough? What do you mean if I could do more? I don't want to live with the idea I could have more because if I live with the idea, if I could have more, it makes a claim upon my time and my money and my energies, I would rather live with the idea that I'm nearly as far along as I'm going to go nearly. I mean, I know I'm going to grow a little bit, but I don't want to be pressured by this reality hanging over my head, knowing I could have way more if I just threw off laziness and selfishness and pressed in. I would, that torments my heart to know I could have more because when's enough. And the answer is, I don't know. There's no easy answer to how much is enough. It's an imperfect science. This thing called going hard after God. The tension remains unresolved in my life. I'm saying, Lord, I could give more. The Lord says, yes, and you'll give me more. Yes. Well, I want to give more, but how much is more than the Lord says? Just keep seeking me and you'll find out as you go. Well, Lord, I don't want to come up short, but I'm pouring out a lot, but I want everything. It's a, it's a tension that doesn't ever get fully, uh, satisfied or settled. Meaning I'm never quite sure if I'm going all the way. And somebody says, I hear this question all the time. How do we know if we're giving it our best? I go, you don't. We don't. Then we live bugged. I go, it's called being poor in spirit. Matthew chapter five, verse three, it's called blesser to those who mourn for they will be satisfied. I go, I don't know. It's, it's unresolved. I, I, well, I don't want to live under the pressure that I could go harder and get more. I'd rather just buy into the fact I'm at nearly the ceiling and just live in a little bit of a continuance of ambivalence and just stay like things are and not press this thing so hard. And most, most, uh, uh, much of the body of Christ would rather sell out and be comfortable. And then when they stand before God, I tell the Lord, shock me now. Don't shock me. Then they stand before God. God will say, I had much more than I had for you. And they said, well, I didn't know that. And the Lord, the Lord, I don't know exactly what he will say about that, but I know this. We got a whole Bible that bears witness that God wants to give us more, more in the natural and more in our spiritual experience. Paragraph B, the fact that God delights in us is not the same thing. I've already said, this is us walking in our fullness. God delights in us. There's no question, but that's not enough. I want God to delight in me. I love that. But I want to enter into everything that he's ordained for me at the heart level. I want, I want to offer the right measuring cup. I want to enter into it. Paragraph three, I mean, Roman numeral three, why did God choose to use prayer? Now the foundational premise of prayer is we say what God tells us to say. I remember when this first dawned on me some years ago, I said, oh, I get it. Remember I was in my twenties. I get it. You want me to sit in a room and tell you what you tell me to tell you all day. I get it. And then you want me to skip lunch. I go, Lord, why would somebody as gifted as me, it was supposed to be funny. Why was somebody as gifted as me? God, I could, I could win a nation for you. If you would just use me, why would somebody as gifted as me, you would have me sit in a room and just tell you what you want me to tell you to tell you. You already know it. Why do you want me to tell you? And then to skip meals on the, in the process, Lord, I think you don't understand how valuable I could be to your kingdom if you would just release me and let me go paragraph a prayer and intercession. When we tell God what he tells us to tell him, when we speak his word back to him, it causes, it causes a prayer and fasting causes us to internalize the word as we speak the ideas back to God, this is happening at this age. And this is the way it will happen. Even in the age to come. Each time we say back to God, what he declares to us, it marks our spirit. It marks us. Every time we say, Lord, release the spirit of wisdom and revelation. We're actually taking the words he gave us in Ephesians one 17. We're saying it back to God. And every time we do it, it marks our spirit, whether we discern it or not. It illumines our understanding our mind and it tenderizes our heart over time. Remember there's a time delay and God releases it incrementally. He in small bits at a time as a rule. Sometimes again, there's the big download and we don't feel the power of it as we're going along, but it's operating, it's working. Nonetheless, it marks us what B paragraph B, why does it mark us? Because God, Jesus said that his words, he goes in John six 63. He goes, the words I speak to you, they are spirit in life. And when we take the words of Jesus, beloved, these words are not neutral. The words of the Bible, they have a cup. They have an element of spirit and life. They are God's vehicle to communicate the anointing to our spirits. And we get those words that are spirit in life into our mouths, speaking them back to God, whether we feeling or not. It's marking our spirit and it's God's method of communicating life and spirit to your inner man. I just tell people, get the 40 year, I mean, the marathon pace, the 40 year vision, get on a marathon run here and do not deviate from the path. I don't care if you feel it. There's going to be a time delay dimension in this. There's going to be an incremental small doses at a time. You're going to you're going to feel and receive. You're not going to feel a lot of power while you're doing it. Say God's word back to God because their spirit and life and they will mark your spirit and tenderize your mind and they will illuminate your mind and tender tenderize your emotions, your heart. Paragraph C. As the spirit hovered over the earth. In Genesis chapter one, the spirit was hovering over the earth. And what was the spirit doing? The spirits brooding over the earth, that one translation says he's hovering. And what would happen is that Jesus would speak. The father's word, Jesus would speak, and when the God spoke, the spirit would act. Beloved, it's the same way. The spirit, so to speak, is hovering. I don't know if that's the best way to talk about in our personal relationship with him. But when we speak the words of Jesus, the spirit acts in power in the same way that he did in Genesis one. He he acts when the word of God is spoken. And here we are in intercession. We're saying the same thing that God has had in his word for for for centuries. It's God's word. We're telling God what he tells us to tell him. And when we do it, it's marking our spirit, whether we know it or not. And it's opening doors of blessing in the heavens. And it's stopping doors of oppression. And when we're praying for another city or another nation or even our own city, whatever, it's still the prayer is going to be answered in your individual life. Beloved, whatever you pray for another, it comes back up on you. You pray for the spirit of revelation to touch your brother or your sister or your friend or a ministry, that same spirit is going to come back and touch you. You cannot outrun the blessing of God in the intercession. Anything you're praying for for anyone out there, it's going to come back on you. You pray for Israel, for God to break through with power. He'll break through with power upon you. Because it's the immutable law, it's the unchangeable law of God. You cannot give even in prayer without it being returned double back to you or returned in a greater measure. I love this, I pray for Kansas City, Israel, the nations for abortion to stop, for laws to be changed, whatever, I don't even care. Just pray all over the world. And every one of those prayers, God has stored them in his accounting. And he's going to cause every prayer I've ever prayed, sitting in the, you know, on the chair over there, you're praying, and I'm just going, yes, Lord, yes, Lord, that counts. Every single one of those prayers are going to be released upon my life in this age and in the age to come, every single one of them. Beloved, do you have a revelation as to the power of what intercession is? And there may be a time delay even for the age to come, but there is not one prayer I've ever uttered over one city of the earth that will not be returned back on me in a greater measure than I dealt it out, so to speak. It's fantastic. Paragraph D, one way that we are filled with the Spirit, by the Spirit's presence, is by singing his word back to him. In Ephesians 5.18, it says this, be filled with the Spirit, and you could add the word, the language here would allow you to add the word by speaking and by singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord. What does it mean to be filled with the Spirit? It means it releases the presence of the Spirit upon your heart. Did you know that you can, you can determine, you have a role, let's say it that way, you have a contribution to being filled with the Spirit. It's not just God moves on you or he doesn't. If you will sing his word back to him, Paul says, if you do that, you will have the release of the Spirit on your heart. Now, it's not enough to sing into the air. I hear this all the time. Intercessors, they go, you know, we got all the prayers here. How many prayers in the Bible are there? There's a limited number. I'm bored with the prayers. Or I hear singers, I'm bored with the songs. I says, you're bored with the prayers and you're bored with the songs because you're praying into the air and you're singing into the air and not to God. Beloved, the same phrase, Lord, I praise you. I mean, I haven't been any more creative. It doesn't have to be any more creative than that. Lord, break through with power, the same prayer. When we sing them or say them to God, there's an interaction in our spirit with the Holy Spirit. The creativity is not what sustains us. It's the touch of the Spirit to our spirit because we're talking to God, not to the air. Now, I understand what it means just to pray in the air. Get tired. Our minds get fuzzy. We get distracted, but we still want to commit our time. And so we kind of just pray in the air. I've done that plenty of times. Doesn't hurt anything. I don't know if it helps anything, but it doesn't hurt anything for sure. The prayer needs to be to God. The song needs to be to God. Paul the apostle was never bored sitting in a prison with no music whatsoever. It's not the music that excites us. It's the connection of our spirit with God that excites us. It's not that Paul came up with different prayers. There's about 25 prayers in the New Testament. We don't need more than that. It's the statement to God that grabs our spirit. Beloved, you want to be filled with the Spirit? You can sing with your heart, sing the word back to God. Paragraph E, God's mind progressively dominates, saturates, and renews our mind. God's mind saturates and renews our mind as we simply declare God's mind back to Him. That's called His word. When we declare, when we say what God's word says back to God, I mean, we don't have to be creative. We just use it word for word. Say it right back to God. It's God's mind. It's God's word. It's synonymous. It renews and begins to dominate our minds. That's one reason why God has chosen intercession to govern the universe. Paragraph E in the middle. As a computer program is changed by rewriting many lines of code, so also our inner man is changed by many prayers that are functioning to rewrite lines of code in our own heart and mind. It's called renewing of the mind. These prayers, we sing these same songs, we say these same prayers, and the decades go. The years unfold. And beloved, it's like rewriting lines of code in our inner man, line by line. It's incremental. It's small doses at a time, but it's changing us, and God remembers it forever because our prayers are not fully answered in this age. Beloved, you are going to receive answers to prayer. You're going to be, I believe your mind is going to be over, just surprised with joy as to the amount of prayer that some of you will have in your spiritual bank account for the other side. The prayers we pray for the cities of the earth will still affect those cities in the millennial kingdom. Our prayers on Kansas City will still be alive in God's mind. A 500 years from now in the middle of the millennial kingdom, those prayers will still have impact and truth, reality. Beloved, we're involved in something so massive. It's called prayer. It's massive. F intercession is a brilliant strategy of God to, it's the most brilliant way to rule the universe. Why? Because through intercession, when we say to God, what he tells us to say him, to say to him, it draws us into intimacy with his heart. It unifies us with the other people of God. It humbles us and it transforms us all at the same time. The result of the father ruling, the result of the father ruling the universe through intercession is that the result of this plan to rule the universe through intercession is that his people are established in intimacy, community, and humility while engaged in governmental partnership with Jesus changing the earth. It's absolutely brilliant. So here I am, Lord, I have a weak mind. I have a weak heart. I easily get distracted. Lord says, no problem. You just say to me, you can sing it or say it. What I tell you just right from my word. I will rewrite the lines of code in your heart. You will internalize the word. My mind and my heart will begin to dominate yours. I will tenderize you. I will illuminate your understanding. I will join you to my heart and I will join you to the others that are doing the same thing. You will have a unity because you're joined to my heart in like way. And I will transform the world. And I will create an inheritance for you that I will answer to you through your prayers through the years for the nations and for the saints or for whoever. God's going to return all the prayers back up on you as well at this age in the age to come. It is fantastic. What a lifestyle. I love it. But beloved, we get tripped by the time delay dimension. We get tripped because we don't feel the power of it. We get tripped because we get little incremental releases in this age. And because we want the whole thing tomorrow. And the Lord says, don't worry. I'm going to pay you way better for your prayer than you imagine. You want to get paid a good salary for your prayer in the sense of the Lord answering it. The Lord would say, I will pay you double and triple for anything. I will answer those prayers. They will try. I will turn them back on your life so many more times. You will be very, very pleased with the deal I give you with the time and energy you put into intercession. Let's go to top of page three. The word abiding in us. The word abiding in us. I want to go through this just a little bit of this brief. I don't want to go much longer here. But I want you to get the idea. Then you can read more of it on your own. Paragraph a. Jesus promised that if God's words abide in us, we would have more power in prayer. He said this. If you abide in me and if my words abide in you. Ask what you want. You'll be done. Prayer will be powerful if the word of God abides in you. Now, the word of God abiding doesn't just mean we've memorized a few ideas, although I appreciate that. I appreciate memorizing a few ideas. The word abiding in us means that we are absorbed with the word of God. Doesn't mean we just kind of casually learn a few things. We are consumed with the word. It's living the word abiding. It's living. It's saturating our heart. We're feeding our spirit on the word of God and beloved. Here's the point. Our, our effectiveness in prayer is dynamically related to the measure of the word that we have in us. One thing that concerns me at IHOP is the human leader of IHOP under the Lord's leadership is how many people are willing to sing and even say prayers, but how little many of them put in feeding their spirit on the word of God. And beloved, I want to say this. I want to say it tenderly, but I want you to understand it. Not to 10 years later and say, why didn't anybody tell me this? Our, our prayers will have a certain superficiality. There'll be a certain shallowness to them if they're not girded up by the power of the word in our life and in my life over the years, when I get low on the word, my burden and even my depth in prayer goes low as well. The fuel of the spirit of prayer is called the word of God. We have a Bible school, not just so we can have Bible classes. We have a Bible school because the Bible school is the fuel for the prayer movement. You get singers and musicians and intercessors. You get them filled with the word, the spirit of God on their prayer is going to go. And they're singing. It's going to go much, much higher. And this is new to, to some, uh, worship leaders and intercessors. They just think that, you know, just that they just, uh, uh, sing and pray and, and, uh, function in that way, which is wonderful. It's a brilliant thing, but beloved, there's a dynamic relationship to the amount of the word that we have in our spirits. And all of my getting, get the word in your heart, fill your life with the word of God, fill your life with the word of God. Paragraph D, just look at some of these statements in the word. Paul, the apostle said this, he goes, you've received the word of God because it effectively works in you. The word effectively works. The word is moving and working in us. Beloved, I want to meditate and study and turn the word of the prayer. It works inside of me. It's driving darkness out. It's imparting life and grace. We want to fill ourself with the word at working inside of us. Look at the next verse in Hebrews four, verse 12. It's living. It's powerful. The word of God, it's not just a neutral ideas. It's living. It's got life in it. And as singers and musicians and intercessors, we want living, powerful intakes of the word of God touching our spirits. I want to see our, I want to see our intercessors filled with the word in there. If they're not interceding and singing, well, there's other things to do in life, but I want them to fill their minds with the word. And I tell you their experience, uh, leading worship, singing, praying on the mic, praying in the chair will be significantly enhanced when they're saturated with the word. Look what Paul said in Acts chapter 20. Paul, the apostles talking here. He says the word of his grace is able to build you up. The word of God builds you up on the inside. Look at the next passage. James 1 21. James said, lay aside all filthiness, receive with meekness, the implanted word. He means meditate on the word. Let the word take root in your heart. And here's what the word will do when it takes root in your heart. It will deliver your souls. It will, it says to save. It means to deliver. It's not talking about you'll be born again because he's talking to born again people. He will break the power of addictions. He will break the power of phobias and fears. He'll break the power of our own pride. The word of God delivers our heart and our emotions when it takes root in us. Beloved, it's powerful. The when, when the word of God takes root in us, our soul is delivered. We become tenderized. We feel God's presence. We get delivered from barrenness and from staleness and from all kinds of addictions and loss and anger and rage. We get delivered from these when the word gains entrance into our heart. Paragraph E. Acts chapter 18. This is another passage that I've carried since my youth. I remember being a young man in my 20s, early 20s or 20s, something like that. And a guy came through town and he preached on Apollos and it gripped my heart. Look at what it says. Acts 18 verse 20, 24. It says a man, a Jew named Apollos, an eloquent man. He was mighty in the scriptures. In verse 25, it says he was fervent in spirit. And this preacher was talking. I was just a young man in my early 20s. And he was saying Apollos was a man mighty in the scripture. And I said, God, I have a vision to be mighty in the scripture. I want to know the word. I don't mean just to win Bible trivia, the intellectual knowledge, although I appreciate knowledge of the word. I want to be. That's not what it means that he was mighty in the scripture. He had all the Bible trivia facts down. I'm sure he had a lot of information, but it means the word of God. He was fervent in spirit. The word of God laid hold of it. Beloved, you don't need to have a platform ministry to be mighty in the word. Your biggest ministry in this age in terms of teaching may be one on one or one on two. But I guarantee you that if you become mighty in the word, it will make an impact in this age. You will form and fashion the lives of other people. And this will carry with you to the age to come. The revelation and even our capacity for revelation in this age, it is somehow I don't understand how it works exactly, but it is it affects our life in the age to come. And so don't say, well, he was a great preacher. That's why he studied the Bible. If I had a platform, I would study beloved. You don't study because you have a platform. You study because you want to encounter God. And God may. One of the worst things that a lot of people have is they have a speaking gift. So they have a platform. So they just they just study so they can preach. They study so they can give a show of their knowledge. And they never encounter God. Beloved, we want to be mighty in the scripture because we want our spirit to touch God. And I challenge many of you that are 20 somethings right now. I remember when I was that age to to look in before the Lord and say, God, I want to be mighty in the scriptures. I want to know it. And I walked away from that. I said, I'm going to go for this thing. I determined that I was going to live my life different. I wasn't going to to work so I could rest and play. A lot of people work so they can rest and play. They they go to work so they can make money so they can go play on the weekends. And then if they do it for a few years, they can retire, hopefully early and play the rest of their life. Most people work so they can play and and do things. And I determined that I was going to do it the other way around. I was going to rest so I could work better. And what I mean by work better, I don't mean just lead ministry and meetings and all that kind of stuff. That's what I mean. I wanted to give myself to God. I said, I'm going to I'm going to rest in a way that gives me more strength to go after this thing. I don't want to put up with work so I can play. I want to do just the right amount of rest and refreshment so I can work with zeal that is uninterrupted. And I want to give myself long hours to the word of God. And I determined that many years ago. It was this verse right here. I said, I'm going to be mighty in the scripture. And I'm going to talk even about Bible knowledge, although Bible knowledge is a little bit of that. I mean, I want it to consume my heart. Why not you? Why not now? Why not here? Why not you? The apostles, they were 21, 22, 23 years old. Acts chapter six. They were continually in prayer in the word. These young apostles were continually in prayer in the word. I have sought to work on my schedule over the years. I want to give myself as much to the word of God as possible. I go home from these meetings. I'm not trying to put anything on you, but I go home from these meetings. I've done this for many years. I go home and not every time I don't do this, but certainly more times than not for the last 25 years. I go home after a preaching time and I write and I relook at the word and I spend an hour or two and I look at it again and I want to feel God in it again. And I get up early in the morning and I take the same thing and I go to the house of prayer and I want to redo it again and look at it. I'm not doing this so I can go home and play. I want to go home and rest so I can do this with all of my heart. And God's raising up men and women that have got a vision to be mighty in the scripture and mighty in prayer. Someone says, well, that sounds like legalism. Beloved, I'm not trying to earn anything. It's all free. I want to be, I want to position my cold heart before that bonfire. I want the fire of God as much as I can get in this age. Top of page four. I've gone through this so I'm not, I'm just going to point it out to you. Get an action plan. Get an action plan. For each, get a, B, a personal Bible study plan. Pray in the spirit. Do some fasting. You just read that list on your own if this message touches you. And at the bottom of it, those A, B, and C, a breakthrough for your heart. Pray for a breakthrough for your mind. Get a clear goal of what you're praying. Get a vision for a breakthrough in these different areas of your life. D, let's, let's end with that. Misty, come on up, the worship team. D, use your evenings to strengthen your spirit. This is one thing as a pastor I've watched over the years. Instead of using your, your evenings to, to diminish the strength that you had during the daytime. Many people, they use their, their evenings and they diminish their strength. And then the next day they try to recover it. The evenings are the time when most spiritual losses take place and spiritual ground is given up. Beloved, if you're, uh, uh, and, and by the way, what I'm talking about here, you don't have to sacrifice your family for this. I'm not telling people to ignore their families. I'm telling them to downsize on the amount of time they chat and play and hang out. Downsize on the amount of time they just aimlessly are just kind of goofing off and hanging out. Begin to get more purposeful about your time. Beloved, don't give three, four, five evenings. Don't give one, but don't give three, four, five evenings a week to just kind of aimless, kind of whatever comes, comes, get an action plan. And if you've got free time, go fill yourself with the word of God. And I guarantee you, you will never, ever regret doing that as the years go by. Amen. Let's stand.