The Lord needs genuine men of prayer, those whose desires are fully blended into God’s desires and whose thoughts are fully one with God’s thoughts; such persons utter effective prayers for God’s will to be done on earth, thus expressing God’s desire and intention.
It is one thing to pray, and we have many things to pray for, but it is something else for us to pray according to God’s will, even pray out God’s will, so that He would do what He wants to do.
For us to pray what is in God’s heart we first need to open to Him and allow Him to infuse us with Himself, with His thoughts, and with His intentions.
For this to happen, we need to quiet our soul and calm it; our soul needs to be like a weaned child with its mother.
Our soul, however, is all over the place; even when we come to God in prayer, we have our own thoughts, desires, needs, opinions, and intentions, and it is not easy for us to open and unload everything that’s of ourselves to receive what is of the Lord.
How can the Lord speak to us and reveal to us what’s on His heart for right now and what He wants to do right at this moment, if we do not quiet and calm our soul, and we’re not seeking Him with a pure heart?
The five brothers in Acts 13 did this; they came to the Lord to just minister to Him; they didn’t have any particular burden to do this or that, neither did they have a list of items to pray for – they just came to minister to the Lord, and the Holy Spirit had a way to speak and commission some of them to do something.
The Lord wants to do something in His Body and through the church, but who are those who just minister to the Lord?
Where are those who open to the Lord with no other goal but to listen to His voice, receive His thoughts and desires, and have their desires fully blended with God’s desires?
Abraham was such a one; in Gen. 18 the Lord visited him and told him concerning His desire to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah, and Abraham responded by interceding for his brother (his nephew, Lot, who was one of God’s people).
As long as we are open to the Lord and are like an open vessel to receive His dispensing and minister to Him, He has a way to imprint His desires into us and infuse us with His thoughts.
When we do this in a corporate way, when we together seek Him and pray over His word, He will have a way to commission us to do something, or He will simply direct our prayer toward what He wants to do so that in His Body He will do what He wants to do.
A Genuine Man of Prayer allows God to Mingle His Desires with his and Imprint His thoughts into him
What is a genuine man of prayer?
We may say that such a person is one who spends much time before the Lord and ministers to Him in prayer; even more, a genuine man of prayer is one whose desires are fully blended into God’s desires and whose thoughts are fully one with God’s thoughts.
A genuine man of prayer is a man in whom God’s thoughts are imprinted, a man of revelation whose heart is a duplication of God’s heart.
It is not the quantity of prayers or the time spent in prayer that makes one a genuine man of prayer; it is the degree to which we open to the Lord and allow His thoughts to be imprinted into our thoughts and His desires to be mingled with our desires.
We may spend much time in prayer with God and become strong in prayer, but we still pray on our own, pray for our own things, and we initiate the prayers, not allowing God to speak to us. Oh Lord!
We see a very good example of a genuine man of prayer in the Old Testament with Samuel; even from his young age, he received the Lord’s speaking and allowed God to imprint His thoughts into him and mingle His desire with his desire.
In 1 Sam. 2:35 and 3:21 we see that Jehovah continued to appear in Shiloh, for He revealed Himself to Samuel in Shiloh by the word of Jehovah.
Samuel allowed the words of Jehovah to abide in him, and this made his heart a duplication of God’s heart.
The result is that Samuel told the children of Israel, Moreover as for me, Far be it from me that I would sin against Jehovah by ceasing to pray for you; but I will instruct you in the good and right way (1 Sam. 12:23).
He was a genuine man of prayer, and he considered it a sin not to pray for God’s people or express God’s desire and thoughts to His people.
Similarly, when we come to the Lord in prayer, we need to allow the Spirit to mingle our desires with His desires and lead our thoughts into His thoughts.
We need to allow the Lord to imprint His desires and thoughts into us, so that what we pray would not be our thoughts and desires but His thoughts and desires.
The prayers that a genuine man of prayer utters to God will be His inward desires and His thoughts, and such prayers are precious, weighty, and valuable to Him; such prayers will cause Satan to suffer loss and will advance the kingdom of God on earth (see Rom. 8:26-27; Phil. 4:6; Col. 4:2, 12; Mark 9:28-29; Eph. 6:10-20).
There’s no formula for us to do this; there’s no step one, step two, etc, and there is no method – we simply need to ask the Lord to mingle His desires with ours, lead our thoughts into His, and imprint His desires and thoughts into us.
Lord Jesus, mingle our desires with Your desires. Lead our thoughts into Your thoughts. Imprint Your desire and Your thoughts into us. We come to You in prayer, Lord, and we just allow You to mingle Your desires with our desires and make our heart a duplication of Your heart. We aspire to be a genuine man of prayer, one whose desires are fully blended into God’s desires and whose thoughts are fully one with God’s thoughts. Make us those in whom God’s desires are imprinted and who pray God’s will back to God for Him to fulfill what He wants to fulfill!
Effective Prayers are the Expression of God’s Desire and Intention and are the Issue of our Abiding in the Lord
The Bible has a few verses that show us that if we pray in a certain way, that is, if we utter effective prayers, God will do them unconditionally.
One such portions is in John 15:4-7, in particular in v. 7; if we abide in the Lord and allow His words to abide in us, we can ask whatever we will, and it will be done for us.
Wow, ask whatever we will, and He will do it! This is an effective prayer!
Effective prayers for God’s will to be done on earth are the expression of God’s desire and intention, and they are the issue of our abiding in the Lord and of His words abiding in us.
First, we need to abide in the Lord, second, we need to allow His words to abide in us; then, whatever we ask, He will do for us.
When we abide in the Lord and allow His words to abide in us, the issue is that we will pray effective prayers, for it is not just us who is praying what we desire, but He prays in us and with us to fulfill His heart’s desire – so He will surely fulfill such prayers.
Effective prayers are not the expression of our personal desires, needs, and wants; rather, they are the expression of God’s desire and intention, and they are the issue of our abiding in the Lord and His words abiding in us.
Prayer is God’s heart’s desire passing through us and returning to God; the desire in our prayers doesn’t originate with us but rather, it originates with God and is an expression of what God desires (Eph. 1:5, 11).
We need to abide in the Lord and be in His word in a prayerful way so that His words may abide in us; as we do this, God’s desire and intention are anointed into us through the Spirit to become our desire and intention.
When we internalize God’s words and allow them to dwell in us richly, when we pray and read, read and pray God’s words, allowing them to infuse God’s mind, thoughts, and desires into us, God’s desire and intention become ours, and we express them in prayer to Him.
When the Spirit infuses us and mingles us with God’s mind and heart, His desire and intention get into us, they get imprinted on us, we are anointed with the Spirit, and these becomes ours; then, what we express this in prayer, we will echo it back to Him – a mingled desire and intention.
Our prayer, therefore, is God’s desire and intention coming out from God, passing through us, and going back to God (1 John 2:20, 27; 5:14-15).
This is what effectual prayers are, as seen in 1 John 5:14-15 – if we pray according to God’s will, we know He will do it, and we know we have the result of what we prayed for.
Too many prayers have been uttered not according to God’s will but according to our desire and preference, according to our need and want!
But when we bring our desires and thoughts to God, when we open to Him and allow Him to imprint His desires and thoughts into us, what we utter in prayer will be our desires and thoughts which have been mingled with God.
We will not merely say, Lord, may Your name be sanctified and Your kingdom come! as if these were some sentences we memorized, but we allow God’s thoughts and desires to be expressed through us!
May we be those who offer effective prayers by affording God’s Spirit the opportunity to imprint His desires and thoughts into us to mingle them with us, so that we may utter His thoughts, desires, and intentions, for Him to do what He wants to do!
Prayer is God notifying us what His will is and us praying His will back to Him; God’s will is the starting point – He makes His will known to us, our will becomes one with His will, there’s a harmony of wills, and we will God’s will in prayer.
Such prayers are effectual prayers, and those who utter such prayers are genuine men of prayer!
Lord, we want to be genuine men of prayer uttering effective prayers for God’s will to be done on earth and for His kingdom to come. We open to You, Lord, and we allow You to anoint Your desire and intention into us through the Spirit so that these would become our desire and intention. May our prayers be the uttering and echoing of Your will back to You so that You may do what You intend to do. May Your heart’s desire saturate us, pass through us, and return to God in our prayer for You to have a full way on earth through the church’s cooperation in prayer!
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by Mark Raabe for this week, and portions from, Collected Works of Watchman Nee, vol. 38, ch. 59, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The Will of God (2020 spring ITERO), week 3, Praying for God’s Will to Be Done on Earth.
- Hymns on this topic:
– Pray to fellowship with Jesus, / In the spirit seek His face; / Ask and listen in His presence, / Waiting in the secret place. (Hymns #784)
– May our prayers expression give / To Thy Spirit’s mind alone; / Praying not by our desire, / But according to Thine own. (Hymns #772)
– Praying to express the Lord, / Ever looking unto Him / As a mirror to reflect / All His glory from within. / Praying to express the Lord, / Learning not to pray by self, / Praying wholly with the Lord, / Praying only by Himself. (Hymns #785)
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