How has your prayer life been developing over these past weeks? Are you growing in the awareness of God's presence around you as you put a priority on praying? Have you experienced breakthroughs in areas of your life that you had been stymied by? I hope you are keeping track of the things that you are trusting God to do. Over time you will be amazed by how many answers you have received from the Lord. Keep telling me your stories of spiritual discovery through your refocused pursuit of God.

Last Sunday I spoke to you about the payoff of persevering in prayer. The Lord rewards those who go to him trusting his word and expecting him to do even greater things than you are asking him for. Answers will be given, insights will be revealed and doors of opportunity for kingdom service will be opened by persisting in prayer.

I want you to prepare for this Sunday's message about how the Holy Spirit in us helps us to persevere in our praying. There are a few Scriptures that I will take a look at that talk about praying in the Spirit. Over the next few days take some time to read these passages and think about their implications for your prayer life:

Ephesians 6:18
Jude 20
1 Corinthians 14:14,15
Romans 8:26,27

Let me give you some things to consider that may help you in your preparation. Praying in the Spirit is when you surrender yourself to the Holy Spirit and invite him to assume a special role of praying through you to God. You are still praying but you do so at a deeper level, in the realm of the unseen world. Your prayers increase in supernatural power evidenced by promised-based faith and aggressive confrontation of spiritual strongholds. The Holy Spirit can pray through you in your learned languages, in languages (tongues) that you have never learned and through groans that have no words at all.

Praying in the Spirit will sharpen your spiritual sensitivities so that you will learn to hear and recognize the voice of the Spirit, discover and follow the leading of the Spirit and expand your spiritual insight to see what the Spirit sees. All of these God-given abilities assist you to pray with greater confidence because they line up with God's will and purposes.

As an added bonus, this Sunday we will be meeting for Deep Roots in the evening. This is a great time to get together to meet with God in worship and prayer. It's another great opportunity to spend time in God's presence and believe him to do amazing things to bring glory to his name and expand the work of his kingdom. I look forward to seeing you in just a few days and experiencing all that God has in store for us.

Blessings,

Pastor Del