SERMON SPOTLIGHT * 1/1/23
Where there is prayer, there is power because when we pray, the power of God is unleashed. Below is an outline summary of the sermon for your further study and deeper reflection.
TEXT: James 5:13-18
TITLE: A Passion For Prayer
PREACHER: Derek Overstreet
BIG IDEA: A prayerful church is a powerful church.
POINTS:
1. Prayer is Powerful
2. Prayer is Effective
SERMON EXCERPTS:
”As we begin the new year together, my goal is not to tell you HOW you should pray, WHEN you should pray, or WHAT you should pray for. My PRAYER as we begin the new year is that God would rekindle and refresh a fresh passion, perhaps for some a new passion, to be a person and a people of prayer. Whether your prayer life is robust as ever, on life-support, or non-existent, God wants to stir our hearts to more sweet communion with Him.”
“Everything in this text is connected to prayer. James is trying to persuade his readers that faith-filled prayer is always the truest and most powerful response in life.”
“The truth is, we are too weak not to pray. We are too needy not to pray. We are too busy not to pray. Whatever else we do, prayer is always the best response for a believer.”
“Let’s be honest, there is a mystery when it comes to prayer. Prayer is not magic. Prayer is useless apart from God’s power. It’s God who delivers. It's God who heals. It's God who is working all things according to His perfect purposes. The God of boundless and endless resources does not stand in need of our prayers. Yet, Scripture stresses repeatedly that the release and experience of God’s effective power comes through humble, faith-filled, God-centered prayer.”
“When we depend on God through prayer, we get what God can do! We get the God who can do more than we can ask or imagine. We get the God of infinite mercy, and grace, and power who avails Himself to us in the most intimate, all-caring, all-powerful way.”
“In times of unanswered prayer we should not grow doubtful of or weary in prayer but continue to pray as we trust in the mercy of God and His promises that in Christ he will never forsake us and His mercies are new every day and His grace is always sufficient for every situation.”
“We should continue to pray knowing the God we pray to has made it clear His ways are not our ways (Isaiah 55:8). This means he may not answer our prayers the way we would like or in our timing.”
“This promise that our prayers are powerful and effective is for everyone who believes in Christ. What qualifies you as righteous is not what you do or how you do it. It’s who you know.”
“That’s the promise of Hebrews 4:16. We can draw near to God through prayer assured we will always find mercy and grace from God because we come in the name of Jesus who is our eternal high priest who has secure this promise and privilege of prayer for us.”
ADDITIONAL SCRIPTURE:
Acts 4 - Under strict orders not to evangelize, the early church gathered to pray for boldness and they were immediately filled with the Spirit and continued to do the will of God which was to boldly preach the gospel under threat.
2 Chronicles 7 - The Lord said when my people humble themselves and pray, then I will work in their midst.
James 1:5 - Take something as practical as wisdom
When it seems as though we face so many unanswered prayers, we are in good company: 2 Samuel 12, 2 Corinthians 12, Luke 22
There is always mystery involved, but James gives us reasons for unanswered prayer:
Absence of faith— James 1:5-8
Prayer not in accord with God’s will—James 4:3
Absence of humility— James 4:6
God has a better plan—The life of Joseph
QUOTES:
Charles Spurgeon - “My own soul’s conviction is that prayer is the grandest power in the entire universe, that it has a more omnipotent force than electricity, attraction, gravitation, or any other of those secret forces which men have called by name, but which they do not understand.”
Robert Murray McCheyne - “O believing brethren! What an instrument is this which God hath put into your hands! Prayer moves Him that moves the universe.”
Charles Spurgeon - “Because God is the living God, He can hear; because He is a loving God, He will hear; because He is our covenant God, He has bound Himself to hear.”
J.A. Motyer - “That is part of the wonder of the way of prayer. Those who by grace have been given the status of righteousness in God’s sight have been brought into the realm where effective prayer operates and have been given the right to exercise a ministry of prayer.”
APPLICATION:
1. Create time to pray your way
2. Resolve to put a few words of prayer between you and whatever you do
3. Replace I will pray for you this week with Let me pray with you right now
4. Plan to pray with your church
Pre-service prayer 9:30
5th Sunday Prayer/Worship nights a priority (Jan 29)
Attend CG with a heart ready to pray
5. Grow your understanding of prayer—Blog series, A Passion for Prayer