The Power of Bold Prayers | Pastor Jentezen Franklin

and i'm going to go to the book of joshua chapter 6 and i want to share something with you today that i believe is a word in season for every person who is listening to me and it's not by accident i want to show you something in the word of god today and tell you a little story that i picked up from a book that i read and i want us to then put into practice what i'm going to teach here over the next few minutes in in joshua chapter 6 it's the story of jericho it's a massive city the first city that israel would encounter on their way into the promised land and verse 3 you shall march around the city all your men of war you shall go around the city once this you shall do six days and seven days shall bear seven trumpets and seven priests shall bear seven trumpets of ram's horns before the ark but the seventh day you shall march around the city seven times and the priest shall blow the trumpets it'll come to pass when they make a long blast with the realm's horns and when you hear the sound of the trumpet that all the people shall shout with a great shout then the wall of the city will fall down flat and the people shall go up every man straight before him what a powerful story in the old testament and it has a great lesson for us today that i want to emphasize i read this book and it touched me the story and it really draws a beautiful picture that i want to just get get you to see for a moment and we'll come back to the story but it's a fact and it's still taught in synagogues jewish synagogues to this day by rabbis the story of a man who has become known as the circle maker it was the first the first century bc church and a devastating drought was taking place threatening to destroy an entire generation the generation before jesus was born history records this is not a fairy tale this is a historical fact what i'm what i'm sharing with you because they have they have historians and papers and so on that they have found the world in that region of the earth israel was in the worst famine it had ever been in and people were on the verge of dying the generation before jesus was born all the prophets of course had passed away there's this dark ages as it's called in history between the old testament and the new testament there's no word from god there's no voice from the prophets there's no one there the only one that was left was an old sage by the name of honey his name was honey and he lived outside the gates or the walls of jerusalem and he he had a relationship with god he was known as a man of a powerful prayer and in desperation the leaders of the nation went to this man honey he's a figure in jewish history that is celebrated to this day and they asked him would he please pray because they realized it was in such a dire situation now that their families were going to die if they didn't get water within a matter of days and you don't really understand that unless you go to the middle east and particularly you go to israel and you understand it's a desert wilderness land and water particularly then not as much now because of amazing inventions but water then was life if you could not get water and the only bit of water they had was the sea of galilee that water feeds into and if there's no water and there's a famine then people are going to die and it was that critical so they go to this old sage and he says yes i will pray to the god of abraham isaac and jacob for rain and this is a historical fact he took his staff it's about six feet long and he put it in the sand and he began to turn like a math compass he began to turn 30 degrees 60 degrees 90 degrees 180 degrees all the way around a complete circle he made and drew in the sand with the tip of that staff he drew a circle he dropped to his knees and he threw up his hands and as the hundreds and thousands of people begin to gather around and he's in the middle of that circle he says these words with his hands raised with great authority i swear before your great name that i will not move from this circle until you have shown mercy o god upon your children the word sent a shutter down the spine of all of the people who were watching amazingly history records that as that prayer left his lips instantly and immediately rain began to sin to descend on the earth the audible grasp of thousands of people watching could be heard every head except honeys was turned heavenward as rain was parachuting out of the sky and beginning to drop on the people it was just a very moderate dropping of rain but people were had not seen it in so long that they began to celebrate and shout out loud but suddenly the voice of honey pierced through again and he lifted his voice and prayed a second time not for such a rain have i prayed but for rain that will fill every valley every sister in every cavern oh god of abraham isaac and jacob and suddenly according to the witnesses and the documentation of that event the sprinkle turned into a torrential downpour no raindrop was smaller than the size of an egg so great was the downpour of rain that the people begin to run toward the temple mound to get to the highest place because they knew next would come flash floods but once again honey lifted his voice still in the circle that he had made and he prayed one last time not for such a rain have i prayed but for the reign of your favor blessing and graciousness and just like someone turned the faucet down from a ten to a four or a five the rain evened off and suddenly it was just a beautiful downpour that went for days the earth soaked the water up and a generation was saved because one man drew a prayer circle he became known as the circle maker and he said god i'm not leaving this circle until you spare my family you spare my nation and you spare my generation it's pretty powerful when you think about it when you move in to the arena of prayer you need to understand that this story teaches us that bold prayers honor god and god honors bold prayers god does not want us to pray weak prayers god does not want us to pray get by prayers god does not want us to ask for things that we think are not that big of a deal but god likes it when you ask red seas to part god likes it when you ask for axe heads to swim on top of the jordan river as elisha did god likes it when you stand like joshua and you point to the sun and you say sun stand still and god stops the whole universe because someone prayed a bold prayer in faith that was connected to god's purpose and plan in the earth prayers are prophecies of your future and the lack of prayer means that you're not prophesying or receiving any prophecies for your future the only future that you or your family have are the prayers that you're praying for your marriage for your children for your future and the reason some people don't experience anything different is they don't understand prayer is the prophecy of your future it's all right when you pray to recognize that you're in tough times but prayer ought to sound something like this if prayer is the prophecy of my future lord is tough but i know that you're able lord i know that you're mighty lord i know that you will deliver me you just prophesied to your future i thank you god that you are my healer that you are my helper pray your faith not your fears get up out of the mud and say i know what i have believed in in whom i have believed in we need to make prayer circles and put our sons and our daughters in that prayer circle and prophesy and pray to their future lord i know my eyes are on you and god i put my son in this prayer circle and i in the name of jesus ask you to get every wrong person out i put my daughter in this prayer circle get every bad evil influence out of that circle and put every right person that's a part of your destiny into that circle and god says i dare you to draw a circle around what hell thinks he's got and watch me target what you target in prayer and pray bold prayers and god will answer god will answer i am persuaded that you're able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that i could ask or think and it doesn't matter if it's a famine it doesn't matter if it's a pandemic it doesn't matter if it's a drought god needs some people who'll do what that old prophet did and draw some prayer circles and say right in the middle of it i don't just want little mercy drops from heaven i am expecting a gully washer i am expecting an outpouring and i just want to keep saying it god is going to fill these churches to overflowing again only more than they have ever been before enjoy the space you have right now you're not going to have it long because when he brings it back it's going to come back press down shaken together running over and we won't have room enough to receive the souls that are going to get saved somebody shout and say yes lord when you pray you're predicting your future lord i thank you that you're going to do mighty things in my family and in my children's life and in my marriage god i'm predicting the future with prayer as for me and my house we will serve the lord believe on the lord jesus christ and you shall be saved and your house the trans script of your prayers will become the script of your future what is amazing in the story that i read from joshua chapter six is two and a half million people watch walked out of egyptian bondage into the desert and because of their unbelief god said i will i will not let that generation go into the promised land and for 40 years they lived in the desert until the whole generation died only two survive that original group joshua and caleb everyone else passed away and this is why this is important what that means is every person who was now 40 years old was born in the desert they had never seen a city they had never seen a brick they had never seen a wall their style of living was the bedouin lifestyle which they live out in tents with sheep and goat and they travel from from desert place to desert place you can go there to this day and when we go to israel we sh we go and show that you can even you can arrange spend in the night there if you want to and you're free to do that if you want to i don't plan on ever doing that but but but it's amazing that you can see that can you imagine 40 years of age a whole generation and they had never seen a city and then the first city that they come to is the walls of jericho so high 60 feet high up to 40 feet wide chariots could race and they would race chariots on the top around the walls of jericho people who had never seen a city who had never seen walls are looking at this city that they're supposed to take and god gives their leader the strangest commandment he says i want you to tell them for the next six days one time a day to walk around those walls and on the seventh day walk seven times what were they doing they were making prayer circles and it didn't matter how big the walls were and it didn't matter what they didn't have it didn't matter the lies and the threats and the jokes and the sneering that was coming from the top of those walls they were nobody compared to the walls that were standing there defying them but many of you are facing walls of resistance many of you are are know that your destiny is there on the other side of that wall and any engineer would tell you you need a battering ram and it'll take a miracle to knock the door down and maybe then you can take the city but god said no i have a supernatural plan and if you will surround the situation that i promised you with that i promise to you if you were surrounded with prayer then i will cause the walls i don't know if you saw it the walls will fall flat and after the seventh time of making a circle around their purpose and their destiny god saw it and god said what you circle i circle and what you focus on and you take serious and you pray bold about i pray bold about and as they marched around that city seven times at the end the trumpet blast and the people lifted their voice and shouted with a great shout and the walls fell flat i want today to boldly proclaim that it's time for the church and it's time for moms and dads and grandmothers and grandfathers and parents to begin to draw a circle in your home and in your family and put your children in that circle of prayer and put your marriage in that circle of prayer because there's some things that are not going to come down until somebody begins to pray bold prayers and becomes persistent and begins to draw spiritually a prayer circle and says i will not leave this spot i'll be back tomorrow and the next day and the next day until my son gets off drugs my daughter gets away from that thing that she's i will not i will not and i'm telling you hell's afraid of the sermon i'm preaching right now because when a husband and a wife when a mom and a dad draw circles and put your family in it put your family in god can level the walls of resistance that they may have uh when you begin to pray those kinds of targeted prayers you don't quit that you don't give up jericho was the lowest place and is the lowest place on earth is 600 feet below sea level it's the lowest place on planet earth geographically speaking and when you get in the lowest place of your life and you don't you and you're facing walls of resistance god says i want you to target that and i don't care how impossible it looks start targeting it and circling that situation in powerful bold prayers get praise and get prayer going now here's my point once you begin to draw circles in prayer that are persistent and consistent and and and you just make up your mind i'm not giving this territory up this is not a negotiable situation here something's going to change inside this circle of prayer that i'm drawing once you draw a circle then god draws a circle and when god draws circles he draws circles with angels because the bible said in psalms 32 and 7 you surround me with songs of deliverance when you begin to circle that situation of trouble and problem in prayer and you don't quit and you don't give up and you keep praying and you keep crying out god says use i will surround you with songs of deliverance god sends angels and the angels surround you and start singing about the kind of deliverance that they're going to do and be released to do by god in your situation psalms 34 and 7 says the angels of the lord encamp round about them that fear god so when you draw circles around your children they may go off to college they may go here and there but when you draw a circle around them god draws circles with angels and angels go and they circle our children and they circle our family because that's the kind of god that he is god's already surrounding you if you will begin to pray about it god's already got a song of deliverance around you and your children angels are singing about how they're going to deliver our family when you get married when i perform ceremonies of marriage we say the symbol of our relationship with one another that is to last eternity is the ring and at some point in a ceremony i will say what token of your undying love and you're an ending commitment do you offer to each other and the couple will say these rings and then one of the the groom or the bride would turn and they will receive the rings and i'll say place the ring on the finger and repeat after me the ring is a token of the undying unending commitment the ring has no beginning the ring has no ending and it is a it is a token it represents marriage is endless forsaking all others do you promise to love that person as long as you both shall live and if you're married when you slip that on and you said those words you ended up saying we do and when you put that on your finger that day you step into the sacred circle of marriage covenant a ring is a symbol of marriage covenant the ring is a circle it has no beginning and no ending just like marriage i don't care what people say god god's number one best plan okay we can't go back and undo your past if you've been through divorce and all of that thank god for mercy and grace but let me preach right now because you don't have to throw the ring away you can you can enforce the ring and say you know what what god has begun he's going to fix and he's going to help we got to get focused and we got to get god's help in this home and in this marriage the circle represents the bold statement and declaration of marriage in in engaged and intertwined in the marriage ceremony it's an emblem of permanence the ring is made precious because it's made out of precious material and it's purified by the heat of a furnace you cannot make this material into a ring unless it's been put in the fire and you cannot have a marriage that is just lovey-dovey all the time and what marriage is is it's it's it's this right here it's till death do we part the center of the circle represents the door to the unknown in richer or in poorer in sickness or in health i don't know what the future's bringing but i tell you one thing i do know i know who i'm going to be with i'm going to be with cherise i'm going to be with my family charisse is going to be with me and that's what that empty place represents it represents the unknown but you're making the vow as i put this circle on my marriage and on my hand representing that i i am saying in sickness or in health richer or poorer i till death do us part i'm in a covenant in the traditional jewish wedding it's amazing do you know how a jewish wedding goes once the bridegroom is in they get under uh something called a hoopa a hoopa is a canopy and they'll have a canopy over the top and what is amazing is when the bridegroom is standing down there with the wedding party then the bride comes in and you know what she will do she will the first thing she will do is after she walks down the aisle is she will walk around the hoopa or walk around that canopy and her soon-to-be husband three times and after she does it she'll get in her place and then he will get out notice what they're doing to make it a circle he walks around three times and then they grab each other's hand and as a couple on the seventh time they walk around together signifying that god made the earth in seven days and he's making a brand new family right here that will endure whatever comes we're in a covenant we've got a circle what i want you to understand is when we make circles of prayer this is just what i felt today that something powerful could happen if every husband and every wife for the next seven days would just join hands and just reach out and touch each other put your family inside of that circle one can put a thousand to flight but two can put ten thousand to flight and when you put and call those children's name out how powerful would it be if all of us parents over the next seven days would just spiritually draw a line in the sand and then say let's put our whole family in this circle and pray bold prayers about them pray the very opposite hells whispered to you about whoever he's got under attack and thinks he's got they're not they're not an addict they're not bound they're not defeated they're not going to end up on the ash heap of life no way devil i'm telling you me and my house are going to serve the lord i'm telling you no weapon formed against this will prosper and i'm telling you when the enemy comes in like a flood the spirit put them in that prayer circle and you have something in your life that you want to see god do i dare you to take god at his word today and symbolically i take my staff and i draw a circle in the sand and i fall to my knees and i throw up my hands and i say god you said it's not good to be alone if you don't want to be alone and you've got a plan for my future you've got the right people and the right person for my future and i'm not going to leave this circle and settle for less than your best and i want to say if there's situations on your job if you don't have a job if you need healing if you need a miracle if you need something in your family here's what we're going to do symbolically we're going to do a 360. and then we're going to raise our hands and we're going to put our greatest needs and cries of our heart inside that circle in prayer and bold prayers honor god and god honors bold prayers don't ask him in a pitiful way ask him in a bold way ask him boldly ask him boldly so right now here we go anybody fanatical enough to go with me turn it around lord i draw a circle in the sand they'll throw your hands up and begin to pray begin to pray for all prayers full prayers ask and you shall receive speak and you shall find [Music] and it shall be opened unto you [Music] i won't leave this rare circle until i see my miracle smell your head in closing now pastor i need jesus in my life i need him to step into my circle some of you need a new circle of friends god's going to give them to you that's something parents ought to pray god give them a new circle of friends wow are you ready for new people people that bring out the best not the worst there's there there's somebody under the sound of my voice this is not just a sermon this is a word from the lord and you're going to meet the person that god has destined for you to be married to and you know what you're gonna do darling you're gonna walk around them three times and then he's gonna walk around you and then y'all gonna walk around together and we're gonna shout and rejoice with you and some parents are going to shout and rejoice with you that god is faithful how many of you believe in the power that we're not a bunch of victims that we can circle things and target it and what we draw a circle around god draws a circle around i'm not going to let the enemy happen chance determine the destiny of my family i have authority in jesus name praise god so just say if you're here today pastor pray for me i need to get right with god if that's you and you're not ashamed to say it i want to embarrass you but it recognize that you're not right with god you want to be lift your hand high i want to see it all over this room high and unashamed beautiful beautiful beautiful yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes anyone else raise them high yes yes every campus the pastors are coming you just made the greatest decision of your life the moment you raise your hand god drew a circle around you and the angels in heaven are rejoicing pray this prayer everybody jesus save me cleanse me and forgive me i take you at your word i believe therefore i confess therefore i receive i am forgiven and jesus is the center of my life praise the lord to god be the glory [Music] him

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Length: 31min 45sec (1905 seconds)

Published: Sun Jul 25 2021