Prayer is a powerful thing! We have a direct line to God Almighty!! 1 John 5:14-15 reminds us of this blessed promise! 

 

1 John 5:14-15

“(14) And this is the confidence that we have toward Him, that if we ask anything according to His will He hears us. (15) And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests that we have asked of Him.”

 

What an amazing reality we have as God’s children: we can have confidence that not only does He hear and care about our requests, but He promises to answer prayers that are in His will that we bring before Him! 

 

I love how Greg Pruett, President of Pioneer Bible Translators, shares in his book Extreme Prayer, as he points out, five times before Jesus died, He promised to answer prayers in His name. [John 14:13; John 14:14; John 15:7; John 16:23-24] In the book, Greg states, “Any promise that Jesus repeated five times just before He died must be vitally important. Not only that, but the Gospel of John is characterized by its stunning economy of words. For instance, the most powerful claims for the divinity of Christ are achieved with the two simple words ‘I am.’ But this point about prayer in Jesus’ name carries such weight, unlocks such vast power, and is so counterintuitive that John records five instances when Jesus repeated it so we would not miss it.” 

 

What a great reminder for us to think about today. Prayer is a powerful thing, and praying for and in God’s will and in Jesus name is like a power that we can’t even comprehend! 

 

So as we think on this, I’d love to share with you what our church is taking part in for our Upward Soccer ministry! We’re praying that God would use this season in a mighty way, but to see that become a reality, prayer needs to be the foundation! So this past Sunday we kicked off our “10 Weeks of Prayer for Upward Soccer” Challenge. For the next ten weeks, we will be praying through specific things for our Upward Soccer ministry, and I’d invite you to join us on this journey! We want to see God work mightily in the lives of our players, families, and staff this season, but we don’t want to miss that foundational element of the ministry…prayer! 

 

So join us as we pray for 10 weeks that God would use this season in a mighty way!!

 

In Him, 

Pastor Jordan Spangler 

Romans 8:31