Are you going to scream or pray?

Today my husband and I went to a new doctor. Its always
a bit challenging having to change to a new one, if you
have a lot of problems. We went for my husbands sake,
his doctor just recently retired.

We had been sitting there talking about 5 minutes,
and I interrupted my husband after he just told the doctor
he had 6 heart attacks since 1996. I told the Doctor
that the first three were cardiac arrests, and all
happened within an hour. The doctor's mouth fell open,
he was utterly astonished at the event, and he
said do you have any idea how fortunate you are to be
alive? I said oh yes ... we know ... it was a miracle.
You see it is almost unheard of for someone to survive
three cardiac arrests in a row.

95 percent of the people who have "one" cardiac
arrest die immediately. Yet my husband lived through
three.

The doctor was talking and said something about it
not being John's time to die. I said no.. it was God.
God intervened. He paused and said yes prayer makes
a difference all the way around.

The day my husband had those cardiac arrests
my whole family was gathered in the hospital.
My husband had already said good-bye to my son.
The counselor and a doctor were standing by
me preparing me to let go of my husband. Oh,
I felt like I was losing my mind. So sudden, so violent,
how could I cope with this! I felt an overwhelming urge
to lose control and just scream. I was so close to the
edge. Then I heard the Lord speak to my spirit.

He said Millie, you can scream or you can pray.
You can give up, or you can believe everything you
have ever been taught about me and intercede for your
husband.

So my family and I held hands and I prayed fervently
over my husband. We prayed against the spirit of death,
against all powers of darkness, death and forces coming
against my husband. We rebuked death, and we pled the blood
of Jesus over my husband. We asked that God intervene
and restore his life. And after we quit praying, one of
the two cardiologists who had been in the room trying
to revive him ran out and said "He's alive, He's back!"
The doctor was utterly amazed. He said we were not
able to stabilize him, we thought he was gone.

They had been believing he was dying, I was interceeding
for Him to keep on living.

But... God was in control. Man, truly controls little.

I hear many people say, oh well you can always pray.
And people give these half hearted prayers "Just in case"
God might be listening or have anything to do with
changing a situation. As if prayer was a last resort
instead of the powerful practise it truly is!

This is not the only time I have prayed and seen someone
come back from death. God is still on the throne my friends.
He is still a miracle working God today. He has not changed.
His miracles have not stopped. Perhaps our fervent
interceding in prayer has.

I had one church member in a chat room told me it
was arrogant to intercede. That God's will would be done.
We should just accept what is happening and let God deal with it.

But the Bible says otherwise:
The earnest (heartfelt, continued, fervent) prayer
of a righteous man makes tremendous power
available -- dynamic in it's working.
James 5:16 amplified version.

Think about all the times in the Bible that people
fervently prayed. Elijah prayed it would not
rain and it didn't rain for 3 years and 6 months.
Then he prayed it would rain and it did.
There was a time that he prayed at Mt Carmel
that God would send fire down from heaven,
and God did! Elijah Knew how to intercede,
and believe without wavering.

To pray fervently one must:

First make sure your heart is clean before God:

James 5:16 says confess your sins and faults to
one another, your slips, your false steps, your offenses,
and pray also for one another that you may be healed
and restored. Sin seperates us from God, we cannot
pray effectively with unconfessed sin in our life.

The Bible is built around the prayers of people who
interceded to God for their situations and their
countries, the people they loved, for the sick, the infirm
and the lost. We hear story after story about it.

God has not changed!

Is your God too small?
Is your faith too weak?
Have you given up?
Are you discouraged?
Are you walking a life of faith or a life of fear?

Remember:
For we walk by faith (that is, we regulate our lives and
conduct ourselves by our conviction or belief
respecting man's relationship to God and divine
things, with trust and holy fervor: thus we walk)
by faith not by sight or appearance.
2 Corinthians 5:7

We trust, we believe, we hold on to, cling to that
trust in God until God intervenes. Elijah did.

God has not changed!

But without faith it is impossbile to please and be
satisfactory to God. For whoever would come near
to God must (necessarily) believe that God exists
and that He is the Rewarder of those who earnestly
and diligently seek Him out.
Hebrews 11:6

Now faith is the assurance (the confirmation,
the title-deed) of things (we) hope for, being
the proof of things we do not see and the conviction
of their reality -- faith perceiving as real fact what is not
yet revealed to the senses.
Hebrews 11:1.

Faith is taking God at his word, praying fervently for
His help and intervening in your need, and then
trusting absolutely in Him alone.

So, my dearest friend,
Are you going to scream or pray?

Love always
millie


Ps. This is powerful information. Print it out
and read it several times. The verses are
rich with knowledge. Take hold of them,
and make it your calling to be a intercessor
pleading over the needs you hear about.
God needs his people to get busy and do
his work, not sit back and watch others do it.

************************************

How to make your prayer life effective
by Millie Plastaras 1/8/2007

Pray specifically:

Pray exactly what you want to see happen
to what person, or in what situation.
Talk to God conversationally, often.

Make your prayer life a priority:

Half hearted prayers are a sign of a lack of faith.
The Bible says without faith, it is impossible to please
God. Faith is believing the answer is on the way
Because of God's great power and ability, not because
of anything we can do.

Pray fervently and urgently:

Take time to intercede for the needs you know of.
Be earnest, be emotional, be focused, and make
it scriptural. Pray not only for the will of God,
but pray for what you would like to see in the situation
and ask for God's mercy and grace and intervention.

Look for answers to your prayer:

James says faith is not double minded, it must
be focused. It is not wavering in our belief in the transforming
and miracle working power of an Almighty God who
created the universe.

Pray until you feel a release:

Do not give up. Pray often, pray fervently, pray
scripturally, and seek intervention of God in all
situations. Seek His will above all, seek His
knowledge, His word, His wisdom, Seek His face.

Rest in Him:

You have given it to Him. Allow Him to work.
Each time you think of the situation, turn it into
a prayer. Pray each time you think of it ... and then,
just trust. Not in what you think of God, or what
your knowledge is, but of God's great power
and creative ability to change and transform any
situation or person.



Pray scripturally:

Find verses that suit your situation. Insert the person's
name you are interceding for into these verses. Speak
these verses out loud in your prayers. God loves to hear
the prayers of his people.


***************************************


"Challenging The Lord's Prayer"



I cannot say OUR if I live only for myself.

I Cannot say FATHER if I do not endeavor each day to act like His child.

I cannot say WHO ART IN HEAVEN if I am laying up no treasure there.

I cannot say HALLOWED BE THY NAME if I am not striving for holiness.

I cannot say THY KINGDOM COME if I am not doing all in my power to hasten that wonderful event.

I cannot say THY WILL BE DONE if I am disobedient to His word.

I cannot say ON EARTH AS IT IS IN HEAVEN if I will not serve Him here and now.

I cannot say GIVE US THIS DAY OUR DAILY BREAD if I am dishonest or seeking things by subterfuge.

I cannot say FORGIVE US OUR TRESPASSES if I harbor a grudge against anyone.

I cannot say LEAD US NOT INTO TEMPTATION if I deliberately place myself in its path.

I cannot say DELIVER US FROM EVIL if I do not put on the whole armor of God.

I cannot say THINE IS THE KINGDOM if I do not give the King the loyalty due him from a faithful subject.

I cannot say THE POWER if I fear what others may do.

I cannot say THE GLORY if I am seeking honor only for myself.

I cannot say FOREVER if the horizon of my life is bounded by the things of today.

Author Unknown