“YOUR WILL BE DONE ON EARTH AS IT IS IN HEAVEN”: THE POWER OF PRAYER

Today we go deeper on the ‘Power of Prayer’. We will look at prayer in the context of Kingdom Authority and Stewardship. 

Reading 

Colossians 1:13 (AMPC) [The Father] has delivered and drawn us to Himself out of the control and the dominion of darkness and has transferred us into the kingdom of the Son of His love,

Matthew 6:10 (KJV) Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.

In Colossians Paul uses the word “transfer” (from the Greek methistēmi) which implies more than just a change of heart; it describes a complete change of jurisdiction, identity, and citizenship. That is what happened when you and I believed.  Through salvation, we have been transferred from the dominion and tyranny of the dark world of evil to citizenship of the Kingdom of Heaven. This is a settled spiritual reality. This verse uses the imagery where a conqueror won a war and physically moved an entire population to a new territory to give them a new life under a new king (e.g. the exile from Israel to Babylon). The word for “power” in “power of darkness” is exousia, which means that the power from which we are translated is delegated as opposed to the “Kingdom” (basileia) of Light which speaks of a rightful sovereignty.

In Mathew 6, the Lord provides a model for prayer for Kingdom citizens, that’s who we are. In the specific verse, He presents prayer as an appeal for a specific action to take place, an act of “calling down” the reality of the Kingdom of Light into the physical realm. Prayer is not asking God to change His mind but rather asking for His “jurisdiction” to be manifested. Thus, prayer is not just a mechanism for just asking or begging but a powerful declaration and proclamation by which a persons transferred or to the Kingdom of Light, steward and direct the power and authority for the “will” of that Kingdom to displace the “power of darkness” in their immediate environment. Let us remember that at the helm of that Kingdom is Our Father in heaven, the sovereign ruler of heaven and earth!

Lord, grant me the revelation and knowledge of the power of prayer; teach me to pray more effectively each day. 

Melphon Mayaka