WEBVTT

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So in this session we're going to be talking about making a prayer list,

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which is one of the most practical, helpful ways to keep your prayer life going.

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You've got this 15 minute time frame that you've blocked out,

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that you're not missing as an appointment with God, this sacred appointment.

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And now you're like, okay, I'm doing this biblical meditation thing,

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and that lasted like three minutes, now what do I do for the next 12 minutes?

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And that can be overwhelming, and sometimes our minds wander,

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and then we feel like, man, this isn't really helping anyone,

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this isn't really doing anything in my life.

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So I'm going to give you some practical tips on how you can make a prayer list

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that will help you to focus your time.

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Now that you have this good foundation to grow in friendship with God through prayer,

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let's talk about adding some petition and intercession to our prayer time.

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Remember last time we talked about the three types of prayer,

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and we're mostly focused on devotional prayer.

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So now we're adding petition.

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Well, what is petition? Petition is praying for yourself,

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and we're adding intercession.

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What is intercession? It's intervening on someone else's behalf

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as an extension of Christ's ministry on the cross.

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In fact, what's really cool for you to know is that Jesus himself is an intercessor.

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He's called the great intercessor, and in Hebrews 7.25,

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it says that he is able to save to the uttermost,

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and that's so fun to say, he saves to the uttermost

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those who come to God through him,

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since he always lives to make intercession for him.

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Do you hear that? Jesus lives to make intercession for you.

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That's why he's able to save you to the uttermost.

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So when you intercede, you're just partnering with what Jesus is already doing.

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I'm just trying to get a glimpse of what he's already asking the Father for,

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and I'm just echoing his prayers and asking the Father

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and asking the Holy Spirit to help me in these areas.

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When you intercede, I want to give you a few practical tips to get you started,

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because when you're stepping in as a representative of Christ

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and intervening between someone else and the kingdom of darkness,

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that can feel really intimidating.

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So here's some practical tips to help you as you're just starting out at intercession.

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The main thing I want everyone to remember when they're doing intercession

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is we should spend way more time praying for things

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than we do praying against things, right?

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Sometimes we can get wrapped up in what the enemy's doing,

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and we're binding all of these things and all of these spirits,

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but a more effective way to pray is actually asking God to release his kingdom

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instead of praying for the eviction of the kingdom of darkness.

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I'm just praying for God to move in,

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and he's going to crowd out all of the enemy's workings

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and the enemy's plans by doing that.

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Let's say you're praying for someone who's experiencing a lot of fear in their life,

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and it's debilitating.

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Well, instead of coming against fear or the spirit of fear

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or however you would pray against fear or the things they're afraid of,

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instead, pray for God to give them courage, right?

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Or you know that in 1 John, it says,

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So maybe you pray that scripture over them.

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God, would you release your perfect love over them?

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Instead of fear, I'm coming against you in the name of Jesus.

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There's nothing wrong with doing that,

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but sometimes it can wear us out.

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It can make us really heavy,

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and then when we come out of our prayer time, we're not joyful.

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Remember, prayer is supposed to be enjoyable.

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Imagine getting up in the middle of the night,

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and you are going to go to the bathroom,

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and instead of turning on the light switch

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so you can see where you're going,

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you start rebuking the darkness out of your house.

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It doesn't really make sense, does it?

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If you just turn on the light switch,

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there's no contention between the darkness and between the light.

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The darkness just flees because the light is released into your room,

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and now you can get up and go to the bathroom in peace, which is great.

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See, God's given us authority over the darkness,

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so there's nothing wrong with rebuking it when it gets in the way,

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but I'm not going around searching for it

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in the people that I'm praying for or even in my own life.

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I'm searching for friendship with God,

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and when the enemy tries to get in the way of that,

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I just want to know enough to aim, point the trigger, and keep moving forward.

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I just have way more faith in the power of God

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than I do in the power of darkness,

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so I'm going to release the power of God

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and know that it's going to do the work for me.

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Think about the fact even God tells us to bless our enemies

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instead of trying to deliver them from demonic spirits that are influencing them.

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Lord, deliver that person from the spirit of stupidity.

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You know, they've been really getting on my nerves.

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No, God, I bless them.

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I ask you to minister to their hearts.

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He asks us to pray that way because it actually changes their life effectively.

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It's not just a principle for our own heart.

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It actually does change our enemies by releasing God's kingdom to them.

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Another quick point for you is pray scripture. Scripture is God-breathed.

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That's what 2nd Timothy says. And I have way more confidence in God's language and thoughts and prayers than I do in my own.

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Right? My language is... you're hearing it right now. It's not that eloquent.

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Sometimes I don't really know what to say. Sometimes I fumble over my words, but the Lord's language is powerful.

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He knows exactly what we should pray.

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So I always try to pray His words more than I pray just the things that are on my heart.

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So most of the time I just plagiarize the Holy Spirit and it works really well.

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And I'm not ashamed of that and you shouldn't be ashamed of that either.

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So in this series, I'm gonna give you some of my favorite scriptures to pray and you can try that for yourself on your own time.

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Another quick tip for developing your prayer life in intercession is pray in tongues.

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Praying in tongues is called in the Bible praying in the Spirit.

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There's a lot of different verses talking about praying in the Spirit and it's talking about using the gift of tongues

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because it's literally the Holy Spirit praying the perfect will of God through your mouth, right?

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Look at Romans 8 26.

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The Spirit also helps us in our weaknesses for we do not know what we should pray for as we ought,

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but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.

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Like He does it for us.

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Now He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is because He makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God.

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So Jesus is an intercessor. So is the Holy Spirit.

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So when I'm praying in my prayer language, when I'm praying in tongues,

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the Holy Spirit is praying through me the perfect will of God, which is incredible.

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So if that's something that's new for you, if you don't know what to pray,

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you can't find a good scripture to pray, you can pray in tongues.

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We're gonna spend some time talking about that in a later session.

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So if that's new for you, just put it on the back burner for now and don't worry about it.

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Just pray scripture. But if you do know how to pray in tongues, start doing it every day.

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Like I want to challenge you to do it for five minutes a day and then in a couple weeks add five minutes to that

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or add two minutes to that. Don't overwhelm yourself.

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But praying in tongues will transform your life and we'll talk about more why later on.

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So let's let's talk about making a prayer list. Now that we have these kind of basic tips of how we should pray,

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let's talk about what we should pray, who we should pray for, and how do we come

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come across doing these things in an organized fashion.

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So this is a really practical way to optimize your prayer time and I keep my list on my notes app

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or my reminders app on my phone depending on what kind of prayer request is it, but you can also do it in your journal.

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That's a great way. What's important is that you bring this list with you to your prayer time.

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So like if you're doing your prayer time outside somewhere, don't forget your prayer list because then you're gonna get there and you're gonna be like,

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shoot, what do I pray now? So bring your prayer list with you. You can use your phone. There's nothing wrong with that.

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You can use a tablet. There's nothing wrong with that. You could use your journal or even the back of your Bible.

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There's some space. However, you want to do it.

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Keep in mind that this list is not supposed to restrict you from praying the same things over and over and over again.

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It's actually to help you when you're tired or distracted. Like I have the shortest,

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I have the attention span of a goldfish, right?

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So I really need help from the Holy Spirit and I need practical ways to help me stay focused in my prayer time so that it's actually

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enjoyable and effective. So it's just here for you to look down at the list and you can just pick something on the list.

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Oh, I'm gonna pray for that person or I'm gonna pray this scripture. I'm gonna pray these things.

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There's gonna be three lists in your prayer list. The first list is gonna be petition prayers for yourself.

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So I found that praying for myself is a great starting point before I pray for others.

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Now some of you have maybe never prayed for yourself or intentionally prayed for yourself.

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I want to encourage you to start doing that.

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You've got this devotional prayer time down. Start adding prayers for yourself and you can even do that in your devotional time.

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We talked a little bit about that. So I'm gonna commit to obey and I'm gonna choose to believe, right?

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Those are the two ways that I'm gonna respond to prayer.

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And I love to put on this list the scriptures that I did from the biblical meditation time.

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So the read it, write it, say it, sing it, pray it, play it. Those things that I'm, those scriptures are gonna go into my

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personal prayer list and I'm gonna begin routinely praying those scriptures over my own life and over my own heart.

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And as I do that, that language is gonna get to know me, right?

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You might know that scripture, but does that scripture know you? Like is it a part of your heart and the way that you pray?

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That's a great starting place

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where you can respond to scripture for your own personal life.

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The next list that you're gonna make is intercession for others and this list is gonna be a little bit more practical.

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I don't put as much detail as I do on the first list,

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which I'm gonna like write out scriptures and even certain

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rephrasings of the scriptures if I feel inspired to pray a certain way. But list two,

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I'm gonna steal a lot of the same material from list one. I'm just

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changing who I'm praying for.

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Instead of praying for myself,

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I'm gonna pray for my mom,

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or I'm gonna pray for my pastor,

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or I'm gonna pray for somebody that I'm discipling,

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or I'm gonna pray for my neighbor

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that I'm having a really hard time getting along with,

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which is a really good idea to do

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if that's what's happening to you.

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So this list is just the names of people,

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ministries, or cities and regions

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that I've committed to pray for,

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and then also their prayer needs.

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So if there's a specific thing

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they're asking me to pray for,

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and I say, yes, I will pray for you every week,

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or I'll pray for you every day,

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I'm gonna write down what they want me to pray for,

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which is logical.

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I love how many times Paul actually said

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that he was making mention of people.

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He'd say, I make mention of you in my prayers.

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It's all throughout his epistles.

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So sometimes all I do is just mention someone to the Lord.

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You know, I'll just go down my list,

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and maybe I'll just say, God, would you bless my mom?

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God, would you bless my sister?

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God, would you bless this person?

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And when one of them is highlighted to me,

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or I feel a tug on my heart,

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maybe I'll spend a little more time,

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and I'll take a scripture from my first list

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and begin to pray that over that person

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in the same way that I prayed it for myself.

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So those small prayers are really useful.

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Don't neglect the power of 10-second, 15-second prayers.

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Even outside of your prayer time

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in your normal day-to-day life,

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those prayers are incredibly powerful,

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especially if they're rooted in scripture.

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And then there's a third list that I put in

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that's like intercession for justice issues.

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Now, this is something that I wouldn't necessarily

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encourage you to spend a lot of time doing,

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because this can get weighty.

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This can get heavy.

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On this list, I'm putting down things that are wrong

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in the world, or in my city, or in my family,

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or my region that I know the Lord wants to make right.

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These are things like the ending of abortion,

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the ending of human trafficking,

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hunger crisis, the border crisis,

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the government, war and genocide, those types of things.

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And you have to be careful praying for these things.

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And I actually only pray for these things with other people.

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I never pray this list in my own personal prayer time,

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but I still keep it in my prayer list,

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unless the Lord specifically tells me to.

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Like sometimes He'll wake me up at a certain time

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and say, hey, I want you to pray for this issue.

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And out of obedience, I'm gonna do that

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because I know He's gonna give me the grace to do that.

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But sometimes people get wrapped up in these justice issues

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and they just become really sad and burdened people.

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And they get sick and it weighs them down.

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And prayer is supposed to be enjoyable.

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He's gonna give us joy in the house of prayer,

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not heavy burdens.

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So remember Matthew 11, 28, Jesus said,

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come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden,

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and I will give you rest.

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Take my yoke upon you and learn from me

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in the place of prayer,

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for I am gentle and lowly in heart,

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and you will find rest for your souls.

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For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.

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So if we're not feeling rested, we're not feeling joy,

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we're not feeling our burdens lifting

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when we're going into the place of prayer,

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we're probably spending too much time in intercession

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and not enough time in devotion and petition.

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So I wanna encourage you, start with those things,

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but start making a list that can help you

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because you're doing 15 minutes a day right now.

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So you're gonna get through your first five minutes

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and you're gonna struggle to know,

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oh, what am I gonna pray?

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You're gonna want this list to help you.

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So again, I wanna encourage you,

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have fun in this place of prayer

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and I'll see you in the next session.