Don't Skip this Post

Ok, the reason for the title is that so often we see something on what I am about to talk about and we skip over it because we think we have it all figured out. I want to encourage you to read this a little deeper and see if we maybe need a little reminding.

My original title was going to be: Does God use our Prayers to do His Will?

I have the privilege of teaching a high school Bible Class for an elective course and today we were teaching on Acts 12. This is the story of how King Herod killed James, and imprisoned Peter. While Peter was in prison the church (not a building but people) were praying fervently for him. Peter was chained up, in-between 2 guards, and guards were outside of the cell as well.

Then something really cool happens... An angel wakes up Peter, his chains fall off, the cell gate opens up and he walks outside of the prison. He then comes to his senses thinking he was just seeing a vision and it was real. He was outside of the Prison and the guards were clueless to what had just happened. Wow! This is an amazing story of how God's plan cannot be stopped by people. In fact when persecution happens God steps up in bigger ways and does the impossible and more people come to faith in Christ.

Now here is the question on prayer. Would God have still done the miracle, sent His angel to free Peter if the people were not praying?

Now be careful, if you say yes, then you devalue prayer and say that the church's prayers were not necessary.

If you say no, then you devalue the sovereignty of God and saying that God can't do it unless people pray.

After talking with my students I shared my thoughts on this subject. You see prayer is a vital part of our relationship and connection with God. If we fail to emphasize prayer in our ministries and we try to do God size things without prayer we are going to fall short of what God has planned.

There are 2 things I think it important to know about God. 1) His sovereignty should never be questioned when anything happens that we don't believe is the best and 2) God chooses to use people and prayer to accomplish his will and purposes on earth. Can God at anytime do anything He wants? Yes, absolutely. But He, in His perfect Holiness has planned a world where He interacts with us, His creation. God chooses to use the prayers of His people to do His work. I don't know what would happen if the people were not praying. I don't know if they would have been disobedient to the Spirit of God what would have happened. I do believe it was in God's plan to save Peter. In John 21:18, Jesus says, "I tell you the truth, when you were younger you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go." This is a foreshadowing of Peter's Death and it refers to him being old. So in God's providence either He knew that the people would pray and God would respond or God was going to burden people's hearts and have someone pray so that Peter would be saved.

I wonder if the people in Mary's house were not praying if another group would have been and they would have received the blessing of what God did.

Regardless, of what God would have done we can focus on what He did do. God did choose to do a miracle through the prayers of His people. It is vital for us to realize that God uses prayers and as the Body of Christ we need to seek to get before the face of God and pray for our people. Don't let Satan keep you from praying. Satan wants you to get distracted during prayer, he wants you to not realize the importance of prayer, he wants you to forget about praying, he wants you to put off praying, he wants you to devalue prayer, he wants you to simply not pray at all! Don't let that happen. If you sense you are loosing a burden to pray or that you are becoming hard to the thought of prayer find someone you trust and just tell them to pray for you to get that burden back. Stop, right where you are and throw up a prayer for compassion of people and a soft heart for prayer. God will answer you!

Kevin Deming