Believe Your Prayers
Faith is essential to prayer, and prayer is faith in action, bringing the Kingdom to pass and sharing God's freedom.
Peter Taylor Forsyth emphasizes the power of prayer, quoting Matthew 21:22 to encourage believers to ask in prayer with faith and expect to receive. He highlights that faith is crucial in prayer, surpassing scientific or philosophical considerations, and that prayer is not just a necessity of faith but faith in action. Forsyth explains that through prayer, the soul connects intimately with God, allowing for the harmonization of opposing elements and the alignment of human will with God's Kingdom, stressing the importance of prayer in bringing about God's Will and Kingdom.
Text
"And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive"
(Matt. 21:22).
Do not allow your practice in prayer to be arrested by scientific or philosophic considerations as to how answer is possible. That is a valuable subject for discussion, but it is not entitled to control our practice. Faith is at least as essential to the soul as science, and it has a foundation more independent. And prayer is not only a necessity of faith, it is faith itself in action.
Criticism of prayer dissolves in the experience of it. When the soul is at close quarters with God it becomes enlarged enough to hold together in harmony things that oppose, and to have room for harmonious contraries. For instance: God, of course, is always working for His Will and Kingdom. But man is bound to pray for its coming, while it is coming all the time. Christ laid stress on prayer as a necessary means of bringing the Kingdom to pass. And it cannot come without our praying. Why? Because its coming is the prayerful frame of soul. So again with God's freedom. It is absolute. But it reckons on ours. Our prayer does not force His hand; it answers His freedom in kind. We are never so active and free as in prayer to an absolutely free God. We share His freedom when we are 'in Christ.'
Sermon Outline
- The Importance of Faith in Prayer
- Prayer is Faith in Action
- The Relationship Between God's Freedom and Our Prayer
- God's freedom is absolute
- Our prayer answers God's freedom in kind
- We share God's freedom when we are 'in Christ'
Key Quotes
“And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive” — Peter Taylor Forsyth
“Faith is at least as essential to the soul as science, and it has a foundation more independent” — Peter Taylor Forsyth
“We share His freedom when we are 'in Christ'” — Peter Taylor Forsyth
Application Points
- Prayer is not just a necessity, but faith itself, and it is essential to bringing the Kingdom to pass.
- When we pray, we are not forcing God's hand, but answering His freedom in kind.
- Being 'in Christ' means sharing God's freedom and being able to pray effectively.