Mike Bickle emphasizes the vital role of daily prayer in connecting with God and transforming the world. He explains that prayer is not just a routine but a profound privilege that energizes our spirit and aligns us with God's heart. Bickle encourages believers to commit to regular prayer times, develop prayer lists, and maintain a right view of God to deepen their relationship with Him. He highlights that intercession is essential for releasing God's power and that prayer should be a dialogue with God, integrating scripture into our conversations with Him. Ultimately, Bickle calls for a deeper understanding of God's heart to sustain a vibrant prayer life.

I ask you, by the power of your Holy Spirit, to come and speak to us now by the, by the Holy Spirit. Come and touch our hearts by your Word. In Jesus' name, Amen. One of the sacred charge commitments, of the seven commitments, was to spend two hours every day in the Word and Prayer. And the Word and Prayer go hand-in-hand because the Word enables us to pray more, and the more we pray, the more we enjoy the Word. And then to read the book of Revelation once a week as forerunners for a three-year period of time. That was a specific commitment. Now the reason we identified praying daily as a significant commitment to be prepared as forerunners, because prayer causes our spirit to be energized like nothing else does. It releases blessing on our circumstances, and God uses it to change the world, I mean to really change human history, as people experience salvation and deliverance related to how much other people pray. Paragraph C, what is prayer? Very simply, prayer is talking to God. We all know that. It's very simple, but to go to the heights of that which God has made available in prayer, it's very costly. Now it's not costly to touch it in an introductory level, but it is costly to go to the heights because the greater power and the greater release of His presence requires a greater connectedness to God. Now prayer is the greatest privilege. Now I know that, you know, we're supposed to say that, but if you take a step back, it is amazing, and the greatness of the privilege that it is before God. That God would release revelation of His heart and His resources based on us talking to Him. He says, I have many things in my heart to release. I have much resource, much power, and I'm gonna do it related to how much you talk to me. So it's a great privilege. It's a fierce struggle because all the powers of darkness want to shut this thing down. There's a great struggle because the enemy sees the potential of prayer reaching a certain level of maturity. Again, the introductory experiences of prayer are not costly, but to go to the heights of that which is available, it is, and it's an awesome miracle. Prayer is that God the Holy Spirit would help us in our weakness, that the third person of the Trinity would move in human weakness so that our connectedness to God would go to the next level. It is a supernatural work of God for prayer to proceed, even this talking to God dimension, but when it goes to the higher levels of divine potential and what's in God's heart, it is a miracle of great magnitude. Paragraph D. Why does God want us to pray? In one sentence, it connects us with His heart. It connects us with His heart in deep partnership. He says, I'm gonna release my resource related to how connected we are because I'll withhold my resource to starve you out of my blessing, I mean to starve you out of your prayerlessness because you want my blessing, so I will withhold it. And as you become desperate to pray, you cry out and then we connect. The withholding of blessing because of prayerlessness is really God's desire for connectedness with us. He goes, I could give you everything now, but you would end up with everything but connection to me. What I want most is connection to you. Paragraph E. Therefore, God has made as one of His foundational premises of His kingdom that He requires that we ask. In James chapter 4 verse 2, the simple premise, you have not because you ask not. You do not have because you don't ask. It's that simple. Most of God's promises of blessing, they are not guarantees. His promises of blessing, many of them, some of them are, but many of them are invitations. They're not guarantees. He says this is within reach if you want it. Even in your weakness and brokenness, it's within your reach in the grace of God. But you will experience it in partnership with my heart related to holy, believing, persevering prayer. Now those are three specific words. Holy, believing, persevering prayer. Holy, He wants an abandonment in our heart. He wants us to believe His Word, and He wants us to stay with it, not to give up. He wants us to persevere. And the reason these are three requirements of prayer, because God wants us to connect to His heart. That's the whole point. Because through holy, believing, and persevering, we connect the most. Paragraph F, one of the foundational principles of the kingdom, I'm just saying it again, is that we ask for everything. Whether the increase of the good or the decrease of the bad, God says I give it to you based on asking. Philippians 4 verse 6, in everything by prayer, make your requests known to God. By everything. The increase of the good, the decrease of the bad. I will release it to you, related to you asking, because I want the connectedness with your heart. Now prayer doesn't gain us, does not earn us God's favor. Prayer is the, just the outcome of relationship with Him. It's the outward manifestation of humans in relationship with Him on the earth. Paragraph G. Now God withholds blessing, as I said earlier, until we ask, because He's starving us out of prayerlessness. Because the pressure of prayerlessness, I mean the pressure of God withholding His blessing, finally the guy goes, I can't take it anymore. I'll break down and start talking to God. And God says, there we go. And again, it's not because God is trying to prove His power, like hey I have the power to withhold it, watch this. You'll do it my way or the highway. He's not trying to prove His power by withholding blessing. He's, it's a manifestation of His jealousy for relationship. He goes, if I withhold the blessing, you'll talk to me. If you talk to me, you'll be blessed beyond measure in my, in relationship to me. And Isaiah 30, verse 18, one of my favorite verses on prayer. The New American Standard, it says this, the Lord will wait that He may be gracious. He will be very gracious at the sound of your cry. When He hears the cry, He'll answer. So it, this, Isaiah describes God as waiting. Now we think that we're waiting. God, we're waiting for you to answer. God's saying, I'm waiting for you to ask with perseverance. The Lord's waiting. He wants to be gracious. He will be very gracious after He hears you. Not one time as He hears a sustained cry from your heart. He says, I really will answer you. Paragraph H, we actually have to ask, specifically offer our request. It says, in everything by prayer, make your requests known. It's not enough to think about the need. Because we can think about our need with frustration and desperation and not connect to God. And many people think about their need. I mean believers, they love Jesus, they think about their need, but they don't actually go the next step and ask in a persevering way. Because when we ask, we have to talk to God. We got to, we have to speak in His presence to Him. Asking, actually verbalizing the request, is very different than thinking the request. He said, I want you to make requests. I want you to ask it. It's more than think on it. Now when we verbalize the request, the good news, it helps you control your thought life. I mean, our normal way, all human beings, is for our thoughts to just be randomly bouncing around the earth. But when you actually verbalize it, even at a real low volume, I mean you can whisper it, your mind can't go one direction while your words go another direction. Your mind will always follow your words. Even a whisper, it will help you control your thoughts. Says in Hosea chapter 14, verse 2, Hosea said, when you go to the Lord, when you return, take words with you. When you return to the Lord, say things to Him. Don't just sit there quietly thinking nice things. Take words with you when you return back to the Lord with all your heart. Top of page 2. Now we're gonna look at a couple practical issues. Three practical issues in developing a consistent prayer life. And I'm not trying to sound like a hotshot, but I've had a consistent prayer life for over 30 years. And I'm only saying that to say this next point. I said these three things 30 years ago. I learned it from someone else. I've been preaching for 30 years, and a lot of people kind of go, maybe, maybe yes, maybe no. Well, I'm gonna say 30 years later, I am sure these three things are absolutely necessary for 99% of you. There's that one guy that doesn't need them, but if you think you're that guy, you're probably not. I have never met the guy that doesn't need these three things, but I'm sure he exists somewhere. Three things to strengthen your prayer life. Very practical. Number one, schedule regular prayer times. I was about 20, well I said 30, it's 35 years ago. I was 18, I'm 54. That was a long time ago. So 35 years ago, I was in college. They told me you got to schedule prayer time. I didn't know, you know, I didn't have, that's legalism. I didn't even think about that. I just did it because my leaders told me it'd be better. And people go, that's legalism. I'll tell you this, if you'll schedule your prayer time in the next 10 years, you'll pray 10 times as much as if you don't, if you don't schedule your prayer time. Put it on the calendar. I've had it on the calendar on a daily basis for 35 years. It's critical to do this. Don't say, well maybe, I've preached this for years and people 10 and 15 years later still resist doing that. They love Jesus and they still don't have a prayer life. And they're binding Satan and wondering what the mystery is. Put it on your schedule. Number two, very simple. Again, I was encouraged to do this when I was a teenager. And I just did it. I look back 35 years later, I am so glad. Develop a prayer list. I have several prayer lists. With a prayer list. More times than not, I'll go into my prayer time and my brain is blank. I think, okay, I know I know Bible verses, but I can't think of one right now. Oh God, I love you. See, it's my prayer time. I know there's things that I'm supposed to be, I can't remember one. I look at my prayer list, I go, oh, of course, of course. I remember that. I've been praying that for years. No, it's amazing how a prayer list will give you focus. Now I'm gonna tell you a little bit how to do that. And then the third thing, critical. I didn't know this back at 35 years ago, but I stumbled into it a few years later. Well, you have to have a right view of God. If your view of God is that God is mostly mad at you and angry, then your your prayer life isn't gonna go good. So paragraph A, a schedule establishes when you pray. A prayer list gives us to focus on what to pray. And a right view of God. The father heart of God. The bridegroom revelation of Jesus causes you to want to pray. So you got all three. You got when, you got the desire, the want to, and you know what to do when you actually sit down and you pray. Again, I know paragraph B, many people love Jesus as much as any of us in this room. And it's years later, they still don't have a consistent prayer life. And they're mystified by it. It is not a mystery of how to do this. It really is simple. Now, I deviate from my prayer list anytime I want to. I don't keep my prayer list or my schedule a hundred percent. I keep it, maybe, I don't really know this, if this is a true number, but about eighty-five percent over the years I've kept my prayer times. And my prayer list, I deviate any time I feel any wind of inspiration, I just deviate from it. My goal isn't to get through the prayer list. My prayer list is kind of, is a support to me when I don't have a direction to pray. And it is critical through the years. And I've prayed many hours for lots of years and I still go through a prayer list. And we have those prayer lists for you, by the way. You've got them on the internet and I've got them mentioned in the notes, how to get them. They're all on the internet tonight and they're putting some on tomorrow because of some of the dynamics of getting them all on the same place on the internet. They said they'll take a little bit more time to get them done. Okay, now, paragraph C. In developing a prayer list, I want you to understand this. When you develop your own prayer list, because you're gonna take mine, some of you, and you're gonna change it. Because that's the, that's the cool part about it being electronic. You can download it, change it. Use what you want, get rid of what you don't want. Let it kind of jumpstart you. But in developing a prayer list, paragraph C, there are three basic prayer themes that exist. And almost every prayer, I don't, maybe everyone, I can't remember one that doesn't fit in this, but almost every prayer, if not everyone, fits in one of these three themes. And when I figured that out some years ago, it made, it made it easier to think through my prayer list. All prayers, or nearly all, are a prayer for gifts, fruit, or wisdom. You're either praying for gifts, the power of God, or the favor of God to break in. The gifts of the Spirit. For the power dimension, the favored dimension of God to break into your life, or the life of somebody else that you're praying for. Or, you pray for fruit. You want character formed in you, or character formed in others. Or, you want wisdom. You want insight into what God's thinking, His mind. So as you develop a prayer list, all of your requests will be one of those three. That kind of gives you a kind of a grid to work with as you develop a prayer list. Now there's three, paragraph D, prayer focuses that I use when I develop my prayer list. And you want these three to have a major part of your prayer, your overall prayer life. Because no one prayer list covers all these. I have several different prayer lists. Number one, prayer focus, intimacy. Obviously, intimacy with God. This is the part of my prayer life, your prayer life, where we give our love to Jesus. We speak to Him tenderly. We tell Him we love Him. We wait in our presence with adoration. Included in this would be our worship times. That's part of your prayer life. You just you've just been praying for an hour. Meditation on the Word is a part of your devotional prayer time. You're giving your heart to the Lord. Your prayer, your what I call, pray reading the Word. Your Bible's open, but you're actually having dialogue with Jesus as you read the Bible. You're asking Him, we'll take it just a minute on this in a few minutes, how to pray read the Word. And then we have notes on the internet for that as well. Or it's in fellowshipping with the Holy Spirit, where instead of addressing our attention to God on the throne, we're addressing our attention to God who dwells in us, the indwelling spirit. We actually talk to God, the third person. He dwells in our spirit. So the first prayer focus has an intimacy dimension to it. When I'm in the intimacy flow, I'm not necessarily praying for the breakthrough of God in the city, the nation, whatever. It's a connection of my heart to God's heart in a very focused way. Then there's petition, personal petition. It's where you're asking God for circumstances, for the money, for the breakthrough of direction. It's where you're asking for your ministry to go, for the Lord to anoint you. It's your personal petition for your own life. And that's a very important thing. That's not selfish. That's right to do that. And then the third prayer focus is intercession. That's intercession in just the most basic sense, means you're praying for someone else, another person, or a city, or a strategic focus of something that's happening in the nation. Paragraph E. I encourage you to have three prayer lists. Your personal prayer life for your own heart, your intimacy connection. I have that prayer list on the internet. It's called, it's ten prayers to strengthen our inner man or our connection with the Lord. That's what I mean by connect, strengthen our inner man. And I use the acronym fellowship. There's ten letters in the word fellowship and I use a different thing like F is for the fear of the Lord. We pray and I got, I have verses there and E and right on through. And you could take, and I know lots of folks that have been using this for some time, and they just, because they have the acronym fellowship memorized, they don't always have their prayer list in front of them, but they go through it. I try to do it at every prayer meeting. I don't do it at every one, but I try to, to go through that list and talk to God about my heart. Paragraph two, I have a prayer list for other people, for cities, for individuals, ministries. We pray for YWAM, pray a lot for Egypt, for Israel. Those are real personal focuses the Lord has given me personally. They're on my list for different specific individuals. People in the marketplace. There's several guys that I'm connected to in the marketplace that I pray for in a real consistent basis. And when me and my wife gather together, we go through this list and we pray for people together. And then there's prayers intercession, prayer for others as well, strategic issues in society. The Lord has really stirred Lou Engle with great insight and great zeal for strategic issues. Now Lou does the other ones as well, but some people God has put a special anointing and he has anointing for strategic issues in a nation or nations. Paragraph F, I have a number of suggestions of downloads you could get from the internet. They get the 10 prayers for your personal life. Prayers the strength of the inner man or get the list of apostolic prayers, the prayers of the Apostles. Or I have another acronym of five letters, trust. And I use that when I fellowship with the Holy Spirit, when I talk to the Holy Spirit living in my spirit. I talk to him and I go down that acronym trust. And I have some other ones there as well. Let's look at the top of page three. Now we're not, I have more notes that I'm going to cover here on this, even though I don't have it adequate. We have whole courses on this point. It's critical to have a right view of God. If you have a scheduled prayer time, you have good prayer lists. And by the way, the prayer lists grow and develop and you change over time. Some of the things on your prayer list from a year ago, you just take it off. And other things you add. And so the prayer list is growing and changing over time. But if you have your schedule and you have your prayer list, but you have a wrong view of God, if you're, if you feel condemned and you think God is mad at you all the time, you're not going to want to sit down and talk to him. You may fear him, but you won't open your spirit to him and enjoy his presence. You can't enjoy the company of someone that's mad at you. You could talk to someone mad at you, but you can't enjoy their company. You can't enjoy the relationship. So the right view of God, the Father heart of God, the tenderness of the Father and the passionate desire of Jesus the bridegroom are just two highlights. Paragraph B, encountering the Father heart is foundational. There again, there's seminars, there's books, there's all kinds of material in the body of Christ on the Father heart of God. I'm just saying the tenderness of the Father, paragraph C, the Spirit in us is crying, the Holy Spirit is in us, crying out to the Father through us, Abba. Abba of course means Papa. It's a, it's a term of, of endearment, but very respectful term, but one that has a dimension of intimacy in it. Papa. Some say Daddy, but Papa I think is the best one. Where your spirit is open and you, you feel the confidence of His tender care and you feel His strength and His power and you're not afraid to be in His presence. That doesn't mean we don't fear the Lord. That's not what I'm talking about. But you feel welcomed by His kindness and the sufficiency of His salvation to come into His presence. When we have the Papa, the Abba cry in our spirit, when we have a connection with the Father, it empowers us to endure difficulty. It empowers us to reject the accusation of the devil. The devil wants to accuse us and tell us we're just worthless and there is no future. There is no reason even trying. And the Spirit, when we come before the Father, the Father says, oh yes, I have a plan for you. I'm tender towards you. I have it all figured out. Come in my presence. I am Abba. Now this is a very needed revelation in the body of Christ today. And in the prayer movement is the Father, Heart of God. Paragraph E, the next one is the bridal identity. The end time, paragraph E, the end time prayer movement will flow from the church in a bridal identity, which means it will come from a billion people across the earth seeing, understanding Jesus as a bridegroom God and then seeing themselves as a cherished bride, as cherished and dear to Him. They see themselves as cherished before one that has great desire for them. Now the bridegroom message is a call to intimacy with God, just like the Father, Heart message. Now I just want to say this. It's important to say this. Some people get into the bridegroom message, Jesus is not your boyfriend. I've had, I've literally had people talk like this. You know, I'm going on date night with Jesus. They get the candles, like if you like the candles, that's cool. Candles are fine. But this is not date night with your boyfriend. This is not what we're talking about. We're talking about the sovereign God, Jesus Christ, but He has deep desire for you. He cherishes you and He's committed to you and He's connected with desire beyond anything you could imagine. And when that touches you, it really changes you and moves you. Paragraph F. As the sons of God, and men and women are both the sons of God, as sons of God we experience God's throne, His power. As the bride of Christ, we experience His heart, His emotions. So men are the bride of Christ and the women are sons of God. I mean it's, it transcends gender. Every believer in this room, you are the sons of God, you have access to God's throne, His power. You can pray and the sick can be healed. Demons will move because you have access to the Father's throne. As the bride, you have access to His heart, to God's heart, to His emotions. Paragraph B. I just list a few emotions that are related to the bridegroom message because it's the revelation of Jesus's emotions. And when you, we touch His emotions, we desire to be in prayer much more. If, if what we think mostly is prayer is a, empower us to do a work project, like we are the army and we have to do the Great Commission and Jesus is a great general and those are all true. We are an army, He is a general. But much more than that. It's much more than He's saying, hey I got work for you guys to do. I don't really want to connect with you. If I lose a few of you, well, I'm sorry. I didn't really mean to lose you. He's called us to something far more than a work project. To be workers in a project. You know, evangelize the world. That is critical, essential as we can imagine. But Jesus is saying, it's because it touches my heart. I want you to do it with me. I love you and I love them. I want them to receive what I've given you. It's about love. It's a big love drama. And when we touch His heart, it really touches our heart. Prayer is very different when it's not just a grocery list, but it's an encounter with a person. And I have some different emotions. It's tender mercy. The fact that He enjoys us, even in our weakness. He's gentle with us, even in our weakness. He has a heart of gladness. I wrote a book called, After God's Own Heart. And I went through a number of God's emotions and gave a chapter or two to each one of them. And again, we have different notes on the internet on that. But I tell you, you want to study the emotions of God. The Father heart and the Bridegroom message. It will dynamically change your prayer life. Paragraph H, Isaiah 62, verse 4 to 6. It was in November 1995. I had a dream one morning, very powerful prophetic dream. And in the dream the Lord spoke to me. I was in this large auditorium, the audible voice of the Lord of the dream. He said, call the people Hephzibah. And I called them Hephzibah. And the power of God touched them. So I woke up and I read Isaiah 62. And the scripture, the Lord saying, you shall be called. Isaiah 62, 4. You shall be called Hephzibah. Which means God likes you. He delights in you. He likes being with you. And in this dream, and this dream could apply to millions of people. It wasn't specific to me. God is raising up men and women, singers, preachers, intercessors, all of the earth, millions that will call the people the ones that God delights in. And the Lord told me in this dream, tell the people I like them. I delight in them. Verse 5. And I rejoice over them like a bridegroom rejoices over a bride. My heart is touched by them. Again, the bridegroom, there's no sensuality dimension to this. This is about Jesus's fiery desire for His people, His delight. Verse 6, the very next verse, God says, I've put watchmen that or intercessors on the wall and they'll cry night and day. Now here's the point I'm making. A lot of folks try to do night and day prayer. They want to do verse 6. They want to have sustained prayer. They want to do night and day prayer, but they do it disconnected from verse 4 and 5. It is hard to sustain night and day prayer if all you have is a work project to gain ground in the work project. But if we are connected to His heart, we know He delights in us and He wants to delight in the people we reach. He wants them in the relationship where His delight is manifest over them. It changes the whole way that we approach a prayer room. It's critical for years. I went to regular daily prayer meetings without this understanding. I only had the work project, war mentality and it is work and it still is war. But lovers will always outwork workers, always. And folks that, people whose hearts are touched with love, they are more courageous than the warriors are. A man or woman in love will work harder and they are more daring and courageous in their devotion to Jesus if their hearts are aflame with love. Okay, let's go top of page 4. Now we're going to move. We got the new paradigm of God and of course there's much more to say about the Father, Heart and the Bridegroom. But I just want you, as you're developing your prayer life, you're saying this is red alert. I have to grow in understanding of the Father, Heart and the Bridegroom. I have to. Or the prayer room will be just a, it will get boring and lethargic. It will be a work project and I've not seen people stay with it for, I've seen people stay with it for a couple years. But rarely do people stay with prayer for a decade if they don't have a deep heart connect with God's heart. I've seen a lot of people fiery about prayer for two and three years. But not many for ten years and not many for twenty or thirty years and the issue is if they're connected at the heart level to the Father and the Bridegroom. That's what I believe the, the, one of the deciding issues, the distinctions. Okay, top of page 4, Roman numeral 4. Now God has chosen, paragraph 8, intercession, now we know this, as an essential way to release His government. When I mean His government, I mean His power. He releases His government on the earth or His power through intercession. Now we know that. The most remarkable thing about intercession is in Hebrews 7, 25, Jesus lives forever to make intercession. Can you imagine a million years from now Jesus will still be interceding. Intercession isn't something He did while He was on the earth and then it was over after the resurrection. He will live before the Father to make intercession for billions and billions of years because intercession, which means telling God what He tells us to tell Him. That's what it means to us in the most fundamental sense. Telling God what He tells us to tell Him. That will be the means in which God will release His power, not only this age, but forever and forever and forever. And what we need is a revelation on the majesty and the mystery of intercession. Paragraph B, the mystery of intercession. It's mysterious. We simply tell Him what He tells us to tell Him and power is released. That is so remarkable to me. I mean if I was God I would think I would come up with something far more sophisticated. I don't know what I would have come up with, but we don't have to worry about that. It is profoundly simple in its weakness, in its simplicity, its accessibility to every single believer can tell God what He tells them to tell Him. It's mysterious in its simplicity. Paragraph C, but then there's a majesty to it. It is the central means of which God uses to release His power in the created order forever. There is a majesty because of the amount of power God releases through it, but even more than that, the fact that Jesus participates in this, the fact that He participates forever makes intercession majestic by virtue that this is the way He is used in the power of God. Now He is fully God, but He chooses within the fellowship of the Trinity to come before the Father and speak to the Father, the Father's will to Him as the way of which the Father's will is released. Now I have here in paragraph C, Jesus operated in this Genesis, in Genesis 1 when He created the heavens and the earth, He operated in the intercessory principle. Roman, I mean paragraph 1 under C, here's how it worked in Genesis 1. The Father had a plan in His mind, His heart. He wanted to create the heavens and the earth. The plan was in His mind, but the earth wasn't created. He only had the plan. It says, or the earth was formless and void. Let's say it that way. The Spirit was moving on the earth, but it was dark and the earth was formless and void. The Spirit was present. So the Spirit, let me just make up a conversation that didn't exist, but it's like the Spirit could have said, Father, I have all the power. I can make light. I have the power to make light out of dark. I can do it. No problem. I am God. I am present. I'm here. So the Father willed it. It was His plan. The Spirit was present, but still the earth was formless and void and dark. And then the second person, the Trinity comes in. When He speaks to God, His plans, the Spirit has permission and release to release it into the natural order. So it's the Father's plan. The Spirit's hovering in power, but until the Son of God speaks it, the power is not released. All three of them are equally God. Now Jesus has this role forever, but He, by virtue of our connection to Him as His bride, He's saying, you're with me and you're gonna operate in the same power forever. I mean in the Millennial Kingdom, in a million years in the new heaven and new earth, you will still be speaking God's Word to God, and the Spirit will move only after you speak it. The Spirit was present, hovering, until Jesus said each one of those things in Genesis 1, those specific things, the Spirit could have done all of them in one time. He had the power. The Father already okayed it. It's like the check was already signed, but it needs a co-signature. The Father already said, I approve the check, but until Jesus says it, it's not signed with the second signature. And in this age, because we're connected to Jesus, we're in the same relationship of intercession. The Father says, if you will say it, the Spirit will release it. If you don't say it, it won't be released. Now it's more than saying it once. It's holy, persevering, believing prayer. Holy, persevering, believing prayer. It's lives that are connected to God. I'm talking about the deepest level, because I mean, prayer is effective a little bit, even to the one-day-old believer. It's working. But there is, there are levels of maturity and prayer and power that are beyond anything any of us have seen. Paragraph D. Jesus is going to, I mean, is governing the entire created order in partnership with His people through intercession. The governmental center of the universe is the prayer ministry. The house of prayer, using that in the biggest sense of the prayers in heaven, the prayers on the earth, all the prayers under the guidance of the Holy Spirit that converge at the throne of God. Let's use the term house of prayer in the biggest sense. The governmental center of the earth, of all the created order, is the house of prayer. It's people in unity with Jesus, under the Spirit's inspiration, telling God what God tells them to tell them. And the power is released. Paragraph E. Now we know the passage well in Luke 18, verse 7 and 8. Shall not God bring about justice to the people that cry night and day? The most effective, those that are most effective in the works of justice, they do it in context to day and night prayer. Not that every ministry can have a 24-7 prayer ministry. That's not what I'm saying. But ministries connected together between them, there's a whole lot more prayer than what they might be able to do just with their own people in one given setting. But I'll say this, the most effective works of justice that happen in the earth will happen connected to night and day prayer. And again, I'm not talking about people starting a mission base like this. That's not necessary unless God tells them to. I tell people, they go, we want to start one of these. I say, well only do it at gunpoint. If the Lord absolutely tells you, you can have a 24-hour prayer chain and have X amount of prayer means a day, you don't have to do 24-7 for it to work, all in one location. But if God tells you to, then go for it. Now the reason that God releases, I mean connects the works of justice to night and day prayer, it's paragraph F. When we do the night and day prayer, we are praying to contend with the power behind the injustice. Because the injustice that's happening in the earth, in whatever city you pick, significant dimensions of that injustice are empowered by demons. Humanitarian work cannot break the power that's behind the injustice. Humanitarian work is good in itself, but it's not nearly good enough to get what Jesus once done. And there's a lot of Christians, they have thrown aside the prayer part and they do the works of justice as though the injustice had no demon behind it. Beloved, the work of justice by itself is good, but it will never be sufficient to get the job done. Jesus connected the night and day cry for justice with the works of justice. Because for two reasons. He knew that we needed to contend for power to deal with the force behind the injustice, which is demonic. And Paul said we don't wrestle with flesh and blood. We wrestle with demons. And as good as it is to feed somebody, there's demons behind some of the problems. They don't go away because of an act of kindness. Demons go away when the name of Jesus is spoken and when people agree with God on the earth in prayer. So we don't choose them. We mix them together. We combine them. But there's another reason why God put the works of justice connected with night and day prayer. And that's in paragraph G. It's the intimacy, the heart connect with the worker of justice. The guy or the gal that's doing the work of justice, they will burn out and they will be wiped out if they're not connected to Jesus at the heart level. They can sustain it for three years. They may sustain it for five years without a heart connect. But Jesus said, I want you for decades. So you need to have the prayer dimension to connect with me at the heart level and you need the prayer dimension to connect on the contending with the power, demonic powers behind the injustice that's being done. Jesus is the only social reformer who ever connected justice with night and day prayer. And it's critical that the two are joined, are never separated. We do it, which church has been doing for a long time. You end up, you do meet some needs, but you never get to the core issues of the of the power realm and the kingdom of darkness and the workers get burnt out at a three to five year cycle in a really big way. Because they can't sustain without the connection. They're being re-energized by connecting with Jesus's heart. Okay, let's go to top of page five. Here's, when we tell God what He tells us to tell Him, here's what happens. It internalizes the Word in our spirit. When I tell God or you tell God, again, we tell Him what He tells us to tell Him. Lord, release light and truth in this city. What it does every single time in a very small way, but it's, it happens every time we speak God's Word back to God, it marks our spirit in a small way. I compare it to a computer programmer who's rewriting lines of code for a new program and, and, or to change a program. And maybe there's a million lines of code or ten million. I mean, who knows? My point is, every single prayer meeting, whether you're alone or with someone else, every single time you, you say to God, what God says to say to Him, release your love, release your glory, release the spirit of wisdom and revelation. It's like rewriting a line of code on your inner man. Well, how many lines do we need written? I don't know. It's just an analogy. Maybe it's millions. I don't know. But I know one thing. God transforms us while we're laboring in intercession for the breakthrough of power. He actually changes us on the inside in the process. We become more tenderized. And the reason this works, paragraph J, because Jesus said it, His words are spirited life. He said, my words are spirited life, which means if we say His words back to God, they're spirited life. They have a, a, a property, if you will, of impartation. They have a quality of impartation. We're saying His words back to God and they're marking us with impartation every time. Even though it's a small increment, if you will, it's still marking us. Every single prayer meeting marks us. That's why when people are praying, you know, the guy's up on the microphone saying, Lord, release your power. You're in row 10. Just whisper it. I try to, I don't do it every time, but I, I, many prayer meetings, some I do, some I don't, depending on if I'm really caught in the word in something. But I'll try it about every third or fourth phrase when a guy on the microphone says, release your glory. I just repeat it, release your glory. Lord, show your love. I just have, I say about half the phrase, show your love. The guy on the microphone is doing all the work. I'm just repeating about every third phrase. Because I know it will mark my spirit if I stay with it. Okay? When we intercede, it unites our heart to the people and the places. You cannot pray for a person or a ministry that you won't eventually love with, with your heart in a deep way. You pick any city of the earth. You pray for it. Over a period of time, you will start loving that city. It gets in you. That's just how it works. So God unites us through intercession. It's a brilliant strategy. And I have a number of things that intercession does on the notes. I'm not going to go through that. But intercession transforms us while confronting the power of darkness, while partnering with Jesus to release a greater power on the same work of justice. I mean, a work of justice is to help the person that's sick with care and food. I mean, we give a medical care, we give a money and food. You know what's even better? Healing! Cast the cancer out of them. And then give them a sandwich. We need works of justice that have power dimension to them. So we've got to keep the two together. That's my point and the reason. Because Jesus did. Top of page six. Coming to an end here. Now one of the greatest ways that you will be energized in your prayer life, intercessory prayer or your intimacy or petition, any of the three different prayer focuses I mentioned, whether any of those three, the meditation on the Word will substantially bolster, it will bolster your spiritual vigor in prayer. When my desire for prayer goes down, I know what to do. I know what the vitamin is. I know what the adrenaline shot, if you will, reading the Word. When your interest in prayer goes down, spend more time in the Word. I don't mean Bible study. I like Bible study. I'm a Bible study guy. I believe in Bible study so much, we have a Bible school. I believe in it. And I'm an energetic student of the Bible. I have been for years. But study is not enough. When I read the Bible, sometimes I just pure study, but mostly, even when I'm studying, I sneak some of this in there. I, I talk to Jesus through what I'm reading. I turn it into a dialogue. That's critical. Paragraph B, John 5, 39. Jesus said, you search the scriptures, in other words, you have Bible study, because you think that through Bible study, through learning Bible data, you will have life. He goes, no. You don't get Bible data does not give you life, does not bring the presence of God to your heart. Bible data is important, but it doesn't bring life. It doesn't bring the anointing, the presence to your heart. He said, here's what you do. Understand that the Bible talks about me. It testifies to me. It talks about me, what my heart's like. Verse 40, Jesus is talking to the Pharisees. He goes, you're not willing, here's the phrase, to come to me, to have life, to have the presence. When we study the Bible, we need to come to Jesus. Meaning, when I'm reading a verse that says, God loves me, I need to stop and not just say, God loves me and underline it. I need to say, thank you that you love me. And Jesus goes, yeah, you're talking to me. I do love you. Thank you that you love me. Wow. Say it. Actually say it to Him. God says, I'll provide all your needs. You stop. Not, you don't email somebody. Oh, I got a good verse. Well, that's good too. Do that. But talk to the man himself, fully God, fully man. Say to Jesus, you're gonna provide for me. Thank you. And then I say, thank you. And then I ask, I do one more thing. I say, now reveal it to me more. Reveal it to me. And I pause and I pray in the Spirit for a minute. Then I say, thank you again. And I say, reveal it to me more. And I'll cap at that verse for a minute or two or 10 or 20 minutes or longer or shorter, whatever. I don't have any time frame. My point is, I stop and talk to the man behind the Bible, Jesus Christ. So the Bible was meant to give you conversational material with God. It's critical that you read the Bible and talk to God while you're reading it. Don't read it for an hour, then talk to him. That's good. I mean, still talk to him after the hour. But talk to him during the hour. That's critical. It will absolutely revolutionize your prayer life. So in my prayer, my prayer time is boring. And it's been boring many times over the years. Then it gets exciting. Then it's got boring. Then it got exciting. It almost is always related to the amount of fuel I have in the tank. And that is my dialogue with God from the written Word. I'm going to tell you a secret after these years. Read the Bible and talk to God. You'll start getting excited about prayer. Your desire will go up. Particularly if you have a right paradigm of God. Okay, paragraph C. When I read the Bible, I have two broad categories of truth. Now this is the broadest sense, most general. There are verses that exhort me to believe something. God loves you. God will provide for you. God will forgive you. Those are things you're supposed to believe. But there's other verses that they exhort us to obey. Bridle your tongue. Use your time right. Use your money in a way that honors me. Those are obedience passages. So there's a lot of belief passages and a lot of obey passages. And some of them overlap. My goal isn't to be too technical. My goal is to give you a framework of how to talk to God in the Bible. Paragraph D. When I'm in a belief passage, whether the Scripture says God loves you or God will provide for you, God will direct you, God will forgive you, I do two things. I've already told you just a minute ago. I thank Him. I actually stop and talk to Him. Thank you that you forgave me. And then I ask, reveal it more. Reveal it more to me. How your forgiveness has touched your heart. So I thank and I ask for greater revelation. Paragraph B, I mean paragraph E. On the other kind of passages, the obedience one, bridle your tongue. Obey God with your time. Obey God with your money. Obey God with your thought life. Obey God with your bodily passions. What I do is I stop and I commit myself to obey. I say, Lord I set my, I resolve to obey you with my speech. I stop and actually talk to Him for just a few seconds even, or 30-40 seconds. Jesus, you said obey you with your time and money and all these areas. I take whatever is in that one verse that I'm reading. I'm just going through chapter by chapter through the Bible. I stop and I tell Him, I resolve to obey. I commit myself to obey. And then I ask for help and I go, would you help me to obey in this? Beloved, you can have a running dialogue throughout wherever you're at in the Bible, a running dialogue with God. The Bible study must turn to conversation. Then it will ignite the fires of prayer in your spirit. And whether it's intimacy prayer, personal petition prayer, or intercession, you have, your heart is tender and your heart is energized for your prayer time. Because really meditating is really prayer too. It's the easiest kind of prayer, it really is. I started this over 30 years ago and I'm saying that to say this, when I started I didn't like the Bible at all. I remember this. I loved Jesus. I really loved Jesus. When I was 18 years old, I was at the university. I loved Jesus. I hated prayer. I hated Bible study and I hated fasting. I didn't mind witnessing. I did witnessing but I didn't like those other things. I loved to go to meetings though. I loved to go to meetings. And so God's speaking to me. I'm 18 years old through my leaders. You got to pray, you got to fast, and you got to read the Bible. I said, ah! If you would have told me I was 18 years old, I would be leading an IHOP. I would have said, you got the wrong guy and that would be more bitter than death. That would have been a prison if you'd have told me that and I would have believed you when I was 18. I didn't like the Bible, didn't like prayer. I mean, I liked the Bible in the general sense where I'd kiss the Bible but I didn't like reading it. I liked telling people how cool the Bible was but I didn't like reading it myself. And I started, here was the key, I started talking to God. I didn't understand, I mean, any of it. You know, it all seemed so confusing. I told the Lord once, if you would make the Bible clear, we would read it a lot more. We'd read it a lot more. I said, I know it's too late. You've already published it but if you would have made that thing clear, we would have read it a whole lot more. It's just an idea. Now I look back and he winked at me and years later I go, oh there's so many levels and layers. He goes, oh little guy, you're seeing what I was doing. That's gonna keep us interested for billions of years. You know you'll read the same Bible a million years from now? There are so many layers to it, a million years from now you will read the Bible and it will excite you. I didn't know all that when I was giving God my advice. But if you talk to God, if you, like I read a verse, don't understand, verse 3, 4, no, 5, no, 6, ah, one phrase in verse 7, I get that. Love God. Okay, I didn't get anything before and after but I get that verse. I would stop and say, I commit my heart to love you. Will you help me love you? Now I could hang out on that verse for a couple minutes. I mean, it was like a really cool spot in my Bible study. The next verse, nothing, nothing, nothing, what? Nothing, nothing, you know, obey me. Oh, okay, I can do that. And eventually I fell in love with the Bible. Now you know me as a Bible teacher, so you go, oh you always love the Bible. Oh, I'm telling you, I was in a ministry with some guys and they met, this is the truth, they met when I was about 17 years old, they met us at a discipleship house every single day. And here's what their prayer, they prayed for maybe 10 minutes a day together. And they prayed, Lord, they did this for about a year. Two of my best friends, they said, Lord, we're so concerned for Mike Bickle. No, they really did. They said, because he doesn't love the Bible and prayer, would you give him desire for Bible and prayer? They were so concerned, they fasted for me because I hated Bible and I hated prayer time. And so now when they come through IHOP, they still live in Kansas City, they go, we labored for this thing way back when. But it's true though, it's funny, but it's true. But the key change in my heart, the key change, the place where it changed, when I began to read the Bible and I didn't understand verse 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, I understood a phrase in verse 6, I didn't understand the next five verses, but then another phrase, I turned the phrase into dialogue. That was the key. Amen and amen. I give you some other notes there, you can just read them on your own, but we've gone plenty long. Let's go ahead and stand.