The tongue has the power of life and death, and those who love it will eat its fruit. Proverbs 18:21
We are continuing to look at the power we have to impart life through our words. We can do so primarily because we have been given the authority of Christ to establish God’s will on the earth and we do so by directing heaven’s resources with our words. God’s original intent was to rule earth through his servants to whom he had given dominion over the earth. That dominion was lost through the sin of Adam but regained through the cross of Christ. In Christ, we have been given authority to take back from Satan what was stolen. We will do that through our words expressed in prayers, declarations, and commands. For the most part, it is how we will establish God’s kingdom on earth. God’s kingdom is a kingdom of health, life, freedom, and blessing and our words have the power and authority to release those things on the earth.
Most of us understand the dynamic of prayer. When we pray, we simply ask God to set things in motion in the spiritual realm to create an effect in the natural realm. Our prayers may be long and specific or short and general. We may ask God to give favor to a person for a specific job he or she is pursuing or we may ask God to heal a specific hurt or disease. We may pray for safety for a person we care about as they travel or ask God to anoint a teacher as he or she steps to the podium. We may also pray for God to open a specific person’s heart to the gospel.
When we pray these things, we either anticipate angels moving invisibly to influence people or situations or we anticipate the Holy Spirit operating in someone’s heart. By faith, we expect God to respond to our words uttered in prayer and activate power in the spiritual realm. These kinds of prayers constitute blessings or positive outcomes in the life of the person we prayed for. As representatives of the Father on earth and ambassadors of Christ, we have heavenly authority to direct the power of heaven toward an earthly situation when we ask according to the Father’s will. When we ask things that are revealed in his word and consistent with his will, we are acting within the parameters of our assignment. When we have a scripture to stand on and declare that scripture in our prayer then the word of God has also gone out from our mouth to fulfill his purposes – on earth as in heaven.
We often think of prayer as a time when we get alone with God and enter into a time of worship, thanksgiving, and requests. But a prayer can also be as simple as a phrase like “Bless you.” If we have the authority of Christ to direct the attention of heaven, then short blessings as well as declarations over people and situations can move the Lord to establish positive outcomes in the lives of people and over situations. He responds to the authority he has given us. What we often carelessly say as a sentiment, truly has the power to direct blessings if we have faith for that.
A prayer based on the written word of God and his promises can be powerful, but a prayer based on a rhema from God can be even more powerful. A rhema is a fresh word from God for a specific situation and if he has told you what to pray for or how to pray for something specifically, you can pray with exceptional faith. Paul tells us that faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God (Rom.10:17). The “word” referred to in that particular passage is rhema ( a fresh, spoken word from God) rather than logos (the written word). When we ask God how he wants us to us to pray in a certain situation or what he wants us to speak or declare over someone and we hear him, we can be absolutely certain that our prayer will be answered and as our prayers are answered in powerful ways, our faith will grow in exceptional ways. When we ask God what he wants us to say or declare we are partnering with him and he has effectively put his word in our mouth. Too often, we fail to remember that God has chosen to do much of his work through us and much will be done based on our words.
Elijah received a rhema word from God after a three and half year drought in Israel during the reign of Ahab, the wicked king. The Lord said to Elijah, “Go and present yourself to Ahab, and I will send rain on the land” (1 Kings 18:1). Following a confrontation between Elijah and the prophets of Baal on Mt. Carmel, Elijah said to Ahab, “Go, eat and drink, for there is a sound of heavy rain” (1 Kings 18:41). Elijah then climbed back to the top of Mt. Carmel and began to pray for the rain God had just promised. Was that a lack of faith or something else? Perhaps, he was also declaring over the drought what God has just spoken to him. Even after a promise and a revelation that rain was at hand, it seemed that God waited on the prayers or declarations of Elijah to activate the promise. It’s as if God stored the promise in heaven, but the words of his servant pulled the promise down to earth.
John Wesley said that God does nothing until his saints pray. That may be an overstatement but it is not a great overstatement. God honors our dominion over the earth and so leaves much of what he will do in our hands. That is more responsibility than many of us want but it is also an honor and a privilege. Think how much more God would do on the earth if every Christian believed that his prayers and declarations were required before God would move and so every believer was diligent in prayer and declarations. If only a small percentage of believers understand the power they release through their words, then God is only doing a small percentage of what he is willing and desiring to do in the earth. When we believe our words don’t matter, then Satan has won a great victory.
More in Part 3
