Prayer & Purpose | CTN Episode 10

0:00 You pray it and he can answer it. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much. God will put the prayer in your heart to pray so that he can answer it. It goes into the hearts of the people, doesn't return void, it produces results. Your presence, Lord. We love, we love, we love, we love your presence. How we don't take it for granted, Lord, your presence. Your presence. Oh, by your spirit. Oh, by your spirit.

0:56 In your presence. Because there's a lack of personal, intimate time alone with Jesus. And as leaders, you know, we have been pulling and encouraging and strengthening and preaching. And doing what God has called us to do. And we've done the best we can with what we've got. And the Holy Ghost is requiring more of his church, his body. And he's requiring them not to stand outside the tent door like the children of Israel did with Moses. When Moses will go into the presence of God and get the word of God and spend time in the presence of God. He's requiring his church and his body to begin to arise. and enter into that secret place of prayer so that he can begin

2:29 to download some things into them that heretofore he hasn't been able to. I believe that there is a revival of a prayer movement. I believe that God wants to touch people fresh and anew. I believe that in a sense, the church as a whole is bored with religion as usual. That we've created our own form of having church. And any leader in here, and I know all of you, we all want a move of God. We all want what God wants. We all desire what God desires. real thing, the real deal. We want God. We don't want anything else.

3:30 But it's going to take a fresh movement. It's going to take God arising within his church, Zechariah 12, 10, with the spirit of grace and supplication. But we've got to pray that people have a desire first to pray. It's the craziest thing I've ever heard in my life. I don't know about you, but I've never heard myself say it until about a month ago. And we had a prophetic prayer call, and that's what the Holy Ghost said. He said, take the lid off. I was like, what are you talking about? Were you on that prayer call? Incredible prayer call. He said, take the lid off. I said, what do you mean by that? What? What is this thing that I feel on the inside of me? See, I'm a prayer leader. So it can be kind of annoying sometimes. You can be seated.

4:19 It can be kind of annoying sometimes. You can keep playing, Angel. It can be kind of annoying sometimes because you feel the heartbeat of God and you sense what he wants to do. And then on the other hand, the flip side, you sense what the church is experiencing. And it's trying to discern. How do you put that together? How do you have the mind of God? And how do you reach, speak accurately and not presumptuously? Are you listening to what I'm saying right now? And the Holy Ghost said to me about a month ago, he said, we need a revival of the prayer movement. I said, really? Are you kidding me right now?

5:02 He said, it's like Hosea 10, 10 something. Break up the foul ground. It's time to seek the Lord. The Lord spoke to me one day. He said, Marty, many of my people desire to be intimate with me. They desire to spend time with me. They desire to have a vibrant prayer life, but they just don't know where to begin. They just don't know how to start. So I wrote this book with that in mind. Encountering God through prayer. Simple strategies to develop a powerful prayer life. I take the reader from the very basics. Begin where you are. Begin with 15 minutes. Find a quiet place in your house. Go into a closet if you have to. Shut the door. Just begin where you are. And I teach the reader about the heart of the Father. Because if you don't know who God is, you're not going to understand his character and his nature, and you'll be afraid of him.

6:11 So I go into the heart of the Father. Who is the Father? What's his character? What's his nature? And then I take the reader all the way up into what I call contemplative prayer. So if you would like a wonderful resource on how to begin your prayer life. I encourage you to get this book, Encountering God Through Prayer. Go to my website at margieflaurent .org. Google it. He said it's time to seek the Lord. Till what? Till he comes and rains righteousness upon us. But he's not going to come raining on anybody unless we start praying. Come on. Listen to me.

7:04 We want the rain in the time of the latter rain. Lord, send the rain in the time of the latter rain. We desire in a dry and thirsty land where no water is. But you know, God's people, he said, if my people would stir themselves up, Isaiah 64, 7, and take a hold of me, I could do what I desire to do. But I can't respond unless my people are hungry. If my people aren't hungry, I can't respond. Now we have a remnant of people that are hungry for God. We have a remnant. Thank God for the remnant. We got a lot of stuff going on just like everybody else. But we have decided that we are going to follow Jesus all the way.

7:53 And that means laying down your life. That means self -sacrifice. That means giving up some of your time and giving it to Jesus. It is time to seek the Lord. Till what? Till he comes and rains righteousness upon us. And then I'll tell you what happens. Then the leaders, you know, what happens to the leaders is they start to feel the burden of the people. Then they feel the warfare from the enemy. And then they start to get discouraged. Don't tell me that's not happening because I can tell you straight up it's happening. You don't want your leader to get discouraged. Let me tell you something, church, who's listening to this on the Internet. I'm going to tell you straight up. You do not want your leader to get discouraged. You got a discouraged leader and you got a problem. And I am a traveling minister and I travel and all. different circles I'm thankful I'm not just stuck to one circle because not every circle not one circle has it all hello see I'm not gonna lie to you I'm gonna tell you the truth not one circle has it all and I travel in a lot of circles and it's really fun Because you could be all things to all men, that you can win them, and then you could give them something that you have. They can give you

9:24 something that I need. Because there's different circles, listen, that have different measures of the anointing. And when we all start walking together in unity, God said, I'm going to really start commanding my blessing. And when my people get out of pride, then I'll really start commanding my blessing. See, I know I don't have it all. See, I'll tell you straight up. With me? I know where I fail. I know I got a thorn that sticks by me really close. And my weaknesses and that thorn help keep me in a place of humility. Because I am daily dependent on God. I know who I am.

10:11 And I know about the thorn that I got following me around. And I know who God is. then I wish sometimes it would just, all of it stop. And then, you know, we could be this perfect vessel, you know, meet for the master's use, you know, the whole scripture, which we want to be. But you know that in our weaknesses, he is made strong. In our weaknesses, we rely on his grace. And he says, my grace is sufficient for you. My strength is made perfect in your weakness. Just rely on me and nothing else. Because I am working to work in my people that have said yes to me that if it were told them, it would be like a dream.

10:52 But I travel a lot of different circles. And I can tell you straight up, some of the most amazing leaders that I know, I'm thinking of one in particular. Breaks your heart. My heart breaks for them. I sit there like this. You know how many times I've been on the phone like this? Talking to another leader. Crying. Sobbing. The most amazing leader. One of the most that I know. And you know who they are. It's a couple. they're both he's an apostle she's a prophet powerful tag team preacher husband and wife on the phone with her like this and you know them i know them you know you know them When you spend a lot of time with them on the phone and just preaching, you know, leaders are the most precious people, in my opinion, on the face of this earth because nobody knows what they do behind closed doors except Jesus Christ himself and their spouse, if their spouse is in tune with them. Like this.

12:14 Crying. Sobbing. Now, at first she didn't want to call me. And I'm like, call me. I'm going to pray for you. Told me the whole story. This incredible warfare, incredible discouragement, built an amazing church, and she's like, thinks her and her husband are failures. Love you, honey. She thinks her and her husband are a failure. I'm sitting there, really? There's two sets of history books. History books on this earth and history books in heaven. What is God recording about our lives? And I had to remind her, you've got to live in the light of eternity. And when you live in the light of eternity, you'll keep enduring hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. You won't be moved by what you see. You won't be moved by what you hear. You will only be moved on one thing, and that's the vision that's in your heart and what did God say for you to do, and that's all that matters. I said to Paul, I don't even care. I'm going to keep doing what God has called me to do. I don't care

13:46 what it is. I don't care if it's one people, 50 people, 500 people. None of it matters. What matters is your obedience to God. And one day, we will all stand before God, every single one of us, and we will give an account for our lives. They're probably going to play that at my funeral because I say it so often, and everybody will be cheering. rick joyner said something very interesting and i quoted him in my book focus he said he said you know we look across you know we look at churches they got these mega churches and people go wow they're successful and then we've got these faithful obedient Pastors who stick with the flock and they've got the same 25, 50, 75, 100 people. And we think, oh, that guy over there? Hey, yo! He's got a church of 10 ,000. What a successful man. Could you tell me how to build a church? And then they have seminars. How to build a church. Rick Joyner says, he says, that small church over there, they have greater spiritual authority than that large church over there. It's not about numbers.

15:18 It's about spiritual authority and it's about your obedience to God. If you are in the right place at the right time and God has told you to do what you're doing, you just keep doing it. It's not easy. Tell me about it. You just got to keep doing it. Be steadfast, unmovable. always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing your labors are not in vain. One day you're going to stand before God and you're going to be like, all these people are going to come up to you and say, you mentored me, you trained me, you did all these things, and you don't even know what you did. Those of you that pray, you've prayed, Ellen, you've prayed about things and for things, you don't even know everything that you've accomplished in the spirit realm. See, because we see through a glass darkly. We don't see everything. We are in this world. We are not of the world. So when we pray, we don't realize that our prayers are working. We're just looking at the outward appearance and we're going, man, that guy's getting worse. Good, he's getting better. There's a flip side to the spirit realm.

16:35 The spirit and the natural. You've got to flip it. It's more real than the natural. So when you pray, you're not only developing intimacy with God, right? You're also, you're changing things. My prayers avail much. Say that. My prayers avail much. You're changing things. I'm so over it. I've never been so over it like I am now. I am so over living for this world. I'll be honest, well, we're going to be anyway. We redid my couple rooms in my house. It's like, whatever. It used to excite me a little bit. You know, especially when you got a new family and all that. I get it. But, you know, the workers were in my house, and you know what I didn't like about it? It interrupted my time with God. I hate that. All these distractions. And, you know, they're in my room, and they're putting new cabinets in, and they're doing all this stuff. It was two days. I didn't even care. and look at it. Jesus.

18:11 I said to the Lord, I finally went upstairs. All right, I'm going to go see what they've done. I opened the door. It's beautiful. All modern. Some of the latest stuff. I'm like, really? Now I've got to press a button to turn my shower on? I hope I can figure it out. You know, it's this thing. Then you hit the button and it gives the temperature. I don't know what degree my shower is. Can I have my old shower? You are going to cross over into a new dimension. God is opening up the eyes of your understanding and giving you a spirit of wisdom and revelation and the knowledge of him. There is an anointing in here, and this anointing in this room is bringing you to another dimension. There are new dimensions in God. There is one degree of glory to another degree of glory to another degree of glory. You are going into another dimension. You're not going to know what's happening in this moment.

19:18 Mark my words, as you walk your days out and the days ahead, you're going to see that you've gone into another dimension. You're more conscious of the spirit realm than you are of this natural earthly realm. You're going into another dimension. That's why you're frustrated. You are frustrated, my dear, because you're going into another dimension and you've got the flesh or the human side and then you've got the spirit and it's warring against what God's desiring to bring you into this next phase and place of your life. Don't be concerned. Don't even think, consider it strange. It's actually pretty normal. Even Bill Johnson says it. When I heard Bill Johnson say it, I was so happy and excited that even he feels that way. He said it's really hard sometimes to manage both worlds.

20:07 We're in the world. We're not of the world. We're going into another dimension. And I'm going to tell you, by the Holy Ghost, there's some people that are going to be left behind. Not that they're not going to make it to heaven. But God's not going to anoint them with fresh oil. And I have a word for you, by the way. We'll get to that later. God's not going to anoint them with fresh oil. He's just going to leave them where they are, stuck in the mud. You sound really mean and like a hard preacher. I think we need a little bit of, come on already. It's not about you. It's not about the self -life. It's not about prophesy to me. What about being soldiers of Jesus Christ and advancing the kingdom? So, walked into the room. It was really beautiful. You know, I wonder sometimes, am I all right? Do you ever do that? You know, when you have God in you, and you have a vision in you, and you have a call in your life, and you feel people, and you feel the heart of God, it just, it just, it's hard to, you know, how do you explain that? It just becomes more real. And I came downstairs, went to the kitchen sink, turned on the faucet.

21:43 You know how you know when God speaks to you, you remember exactly what you were doing? I said to God, what's wrong with me? Am I just ungrateful? Unthankful? Unappreciative? And you know what he said to me? As clear as a man speaks to a friend. He said, what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his soul?

22:27 Live. in the light of eternity. Remember who you are. Your real father is God. Your real home is heaven. We are only traveling through this world as temporary aliens? Are we aliens? body is our earth suit the outward man is perishing yet the inward man is being renewed day by day by day by day live by what you see With the eyes of your spirit. Jeremiah, what do you see? These eyes tell one story. And these eyes tell another story. That's why you get frustrated. You just

23:59 get frustrated. And I'm going to tell you how it works, Garth. Sometimes you already see things way ahead of time, and you want to be there. And God's saying it's not time yet. So then there's that transition time where you've got to stay in the here and now, but still have your eyes set on what's above in the future. That is very hard for a leader to do. Because we get all... We get all... I don't know what the word is. Yeah, yeah, exactly. No, but I hear you. Not only that, but if you... too much in the future that's not time yet you'll quit you'll stop and you'll get discouraged and then you won't be like the apostle paul that said i've run the race i have finished my course and there's laid up for me a crown blah blah blah and so on and so forth brother kennedy hagan said one time he said some people live and die never enter into the first phase of their ministry let's enter into the second the third and the fourth let's do it all I have another friend who had

25:43 an amazing church, her and her husband. And they had a great church. Let me tell you something. They were ahead of their times. They were prophesied. Actually, we all were in the early 80s. Remember the early 80s? We were prophesying and moving in the spirit and singing in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs and flowing in that river of prophetic. They had the flags. They had it all going. They had it all. Dance. They had an amazing ministry. You know what happened? The devil got into their minds. It's to me. It's here a little, there a little. Little bit of discouragement here, little bit of discouragement there. That's why you got to live from the inside out. What is your heart telling you? I get it.

26:43 I go, no. And if you pray in tongues a lot, you'll really be strong. You'll really live from the inside out. You know why? Because your inner man is built up. Your inner being. has gained the ascendancy. People get weak because they don't pray in tongues. Well, it's so simple to pray in tongues. It goes like this. You can play with your hair. You can look at your watch. Put the toothbrush in your mouth. You could be in the car. You could be with William. You could be praying in tongues. No matter where you are, you could pray in tongues. And you're edifying yourself. You're building yourself up on your most holy faith. You're praying in the Holy Ghost.

27:42 And your inner man takes charge. Stupid flesh. What is the flesh? Mind, will, emotions. Who was it that said thought processes? One of you guys, or maybe I just heard it from somebody else. I don't know. It's all your thoughts that are not always your thoughts. Some of it's the devil. And you know what he does? He goes in and he goes, he takes that little weakness you have in your soul, and he just, he shoots a fiery dart. And together, that fiery dart and that weakness in your soul, which we all have, takes a hold, and then it becomes a stronghold. Thank you so much for tuning in to today's podcast.

28:27 It has been such a joy sharing this time with you. For more inspiration and resources on today's topic, please visit our website at margiefloran .org.