How to Pray (Part 1.2)

By Odon Bulamba

Romans 8:14-15, because those who are lead by the Spirit of God are Sons of God, for you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the spirit of sonship and by Him we cry Abba! Father!

With the spirit we need to shout Abba! Father so He can come. How many times do you scream to God when you have a problem? How many times, when you suffer do you go and scream to God? Maybe you will go to your boss, but God says, “woe to man who trusts in man”. Believe in God and not in man, if you have a problem in your life you have to go to God straight away, don’t go to your dad or mum because one day they will leave you or die and after that who will you go to? You must know that you have to go to God first. Remember Moses in Exodus 17. He was in a difficult situation; he had the whole of Israel to bear.

One day Israel was attacked. Moses was very old at the time, maybe over 100 hundred years but Joshua was young. Joshua said to Moses I’m going to war with my troops. So Joshua prepared the sword and shield for war. Moses said to Joshua that what he was doing was just from his flesh because it is better to prepare spiritually. Moses climbed up the mountain with Aaron. Moses started interceding and raising his hands. Today many Christians are ashamed to raise their hands and ask God for help. They have their hands in their pockets and watch others pray because they think that they are intellectual.

Read in Romans 8, it is written, “Shout Abba! Father!” Why don’t you scream and shout and raise your hands to ask for help, this is a sign of non-humility [pride]when you don’t do it. Moses knew that God wanted him to raise his hands so Moses did. Remember Moses was on top of a mountain and the people saw him raise his hands. How many times have you had to raise your hands in front of everybody and not fear the people around you?

When Moses was on the mountain Joshua was fighting a physical war. When Moses hands dropped the fighting stopped. So who was fighting? It was Moses. When we pray we have more strength spiritually than we do physically, we can transform what the world thinks is impossible, just raise your hands and cry out to your Father. “Father! I want this and that in the name of Jesus Christ”.

When you believe in Jesus don’t fight just sit down, for the battle belongs to the Lord, He will repay. How many times do you get Him to rise up His arm? How many times do you give Him something to sit on? How many times do you ask Him to sit down with you? When someone goes through a tough time we have to support him or her with prayer.

Remember Moses didn’t pray for himself but for Israel and because he prayed for Israel they had victory, with the same faith we can help others to victory. When we intercede for others we have to have faith in Jesus Christ, this is the basis for prayer. How many times a week do you listen to God’s Word so your faith can be healthy? If you are thin your faith is not healthy because you don’t listen to God’s Word and this is the source of faith. You might see a three-month-old Christian who doesn’t read the Bible, doesn’t go to church and doesn’t listen to God’s Word. And yet when they pray they want their prayer’s answered.

Remember what Jesus said to His disciples, He sent them and said, “pray for the sick, tell them the good news and perform miracles”. But one day something went wrong, they came back to Jesus and said, “Jesus, we are confused for You sent us and we were ridiculed, we prayed for someone but nothing happen?”

The first answer He gave was, “Oh you of little faith, in these cases you have to pray and fast”. How many times do you fast a year? Many Christians don’t know how to fast or don’t have any idea what fasting is. In difficult cases we have to fast. Jesus is an example: After His baptism He fasted for forty days. Everybody knows that? How many servants of God in the Bible fasted to sort out problems?

In Daniel 9:3-4 you’ll find that Daniel fasted for his people even though he was high in the government ranks; even a prime minister can fast. You can eat everyday but you will never satisfy what’s in your stomach. You can eat every minute but your stomach will ask for something else. When I was in hospital God showed me something.... I brought a chicken one day and I consumed the lot. After three hours my stomach had become my adversary. My brothers knew that I liked eating meat so they prepared a nice dish for me to eat in hospital.

When I saw the meat I knew my stomach would avenge itself. I fed my body good food but it still betrayed me. I have to feed my spiritual body also. I have to fast, pray, read and listen to God so that my faith will grow, without this you will achieve nothing. Many people pray to God but God doesn’t answer their prayers, so they become tired with God because they aren’t benefiting anything from Him. So people go to a magician to take the easy way. A magician will give you what you want and you’ll see the results. But with God be careful, this is not how it works because God can stop the magic.

If a magician comes and I have Jesus Christ in my life, he cannot do anything but flee from me. If the magician is in front of you ask him, do you know about Jesus? Only the name of Jesus will make him bend or flee. So how much do we neglect the power God has given us? I know a king who had a son. The son was a prince and had to rule the country that his father had prepared for him. The father gave his son everything that he needed but his son wanted to leave his father. When he left, his father called out to him but there was no response. When the father died he left his family and kingdom behind which was then given to another family. The whole family suffered because of the son’s disobedience. It’s the same thing with us, God is our king and we are His princes but we don’t want to play our part, and if we don’t play our part what has been given to us will be taken away.