Move God To Move The Church

THE BELIEVERS PRAYER

Purpose: To learn about the believers prayer. What was it about their prayer that moved God.

When a doctoral student at Princeton asked, “What is there left in the world for original dissertation research?” Albert Einstein replied, “Find out about prayer. Somebody must find out about prayer.”

Acts 4: 23 On their release, Peter and John went back to their own people and reported all that the chief priests and elders had said to them. When they heard this, they raised their voices together in prayer to God. Sovereign Lord, they said, “you made the heaven and the earth and the sea, and everything in them. You spoke by the Holy Spirit through the mouth of your servant, our father David: “Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain? The kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers gather together against the Lord and against his Anointed One. Indeed Herod and Pontius Pilate met together with the Gentiles and the people of Israel in this city to conspire against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed. They did what your power and will had decided beforehand should happen. Now, Lord, consider their threats and enable your servants to speak your word with great boldness. Stretch out your hand to heal and perform miraculous signs and wonders through the name of your holy servant Jesus. After they prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly.

PT 1: THEY ACKNOWLEDGED HIM AS SOVEREIGN LORD

Sovereign means to have supreme rank or power. Complete independence or self government. 303 times the word sovereign is used in scripture.

Psa 71:16 I will come and proclaim your mighty acts, O Sovereign LORD; I will proclaim your righteousness, yours alone.

Terrible things happen to those who do not acknowledge the sovereignty of The Almighty God as was the case of King Nebuchadnezzar. In Daniel 4:5 Daniel had been called by the King to interpret a dream he had because none of the “wise” men in his kingdom could interpret the dream. Daniels interprets it by the power of God Almighty saying:

This is the interpretation, O king, and this is the decree the Most High has issued against my lord the king: You will be driven away from people and will live away from people and will live with the wild animals; you will eat grass like cattle and be drenched with the dew of heaven. Seven times will pass by for you until you acknowledge that the Most High is sovereign over the kingdoms of men and gives them to anyone he wishes. The command to leave the stump of the tree with the roots means that your kingdom will be restored to you when you acknowledge that Heaven rules. Therefore, O king be pleased to accept my advice: Renounce your sins by doing what is right, and your wickedness by being kind to the oppressed. It may be that then your prosperity will continue.

O that the King would have listened to Daniels advice! What does the bible say? Proverbs 12: 15 The way of a fool seems right to him but a wise man listens to advice.

The King was acting like a fool and he was about to pay for it. Let’s look at the very words that came out of his mouth.

Dan 4: 28 All this happened to King Nebuchadnezzar. Twelve months later, as the king was walking on the roof of the royal palace of Babylon, he said, “Is not this the great Babylon I have built as the royal residence, by my mighty power and for the glory of my majesty?”

The words were still on his lips when a voice came from heaven, “This is what is decreed for you, King Nebuchadnezzar: Your royal authority has been taking from you. You will be driven away from people and will live with the wild animals; you will eat grass like cattle. Seven times will pass by for you until you acknowledge that the Most High is sovereign over the kingdoms of men and gives them to anyone he wished. Immediately what had been said about Nebuchadnezzar was fulfilled. He was driven away from people and ate grass like cattle. His body was drenched with the dew of heaven until his hair grew like the feathers of an eagle and his nails like the claws of a bird. At the end of that time, I Nebuchadnezzar, raised my eyes toward heaven, and my sanity was restored. Then I praised the Most High; I honored and glorified him who lives forever.

His dominion is an eternal dominion; his kingdom endures from generation to generation. All the peoples of the earth are regarded as noting. He does as he pleases with the powers of heaven and the peoples of the earth. No one can hold back his hand or say to him: “What have you done?”