Day 20: The Power That Makes Your Prayer Effective

The Holy Spirit plays a vital role in your prayer live. He is guiding you in prayer, showing you how to pray. He also gives you the power that makes your prayer effective.

In Ephesians 3:20, speaking about prayer and what God is able to do through prayer, Paul says this:

“Now to Him who is able [that is God]... to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us.”

There is no limit that we can set with our minds or our understanding as to what God can do in answer to our prayer. But the effectiveness of prayer is according to the power that works within us. It’s the power within us that makes our prayer effective.

What is that power? Well, Paul has already made it clear in Romans 8—it’s the power of the Holy Spirit.

We see this in reality. You can have two Christians. Each pray identical words, maybe for the healing of a person. One person gets everything he prays for, the other gets nothing. Now there’s no difference in their words. The difference is in the power that’s in the words. We have to acknowledge that we are totally dependent upon the Holy Spirit to guide us in prayer and to empower us in prayer.

And, we need to bear in mind what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 4:20:

“For the kingdom of God does not consist in words, but in power.”

It’s not all the words we pray. In fact, sometimes I think we pray too many words and some prayers are too long. But, it’s the power that works through those words. And we have to learn how to cultivate the Holy Spirit, how to understand the Holy Spirit, how to yield to the Holy Spirit, how to let Him guide us and empower us in our prayers.

Reflect: How satisfied am I with my own prayer life?