Prayer Chain International
...An Interdenominational Christian Prayer Chain

How to Become a Prayer Warrior

The Power of Prayer

In spiritual warfare, the biggest source of power that we have is prayer. Throughout the ages we have forgotten how to pray effectively. All too often our prayers do not carry any real power behind them because they are diminished when our own desires and biases creep into them. Praying in power is vitally important in spiritual warfare.

How Prayer Works

In order to learn how to pray more effectively with God's power behind our prayers it is first necessary to understand how prayer actually works. When we pray for something we are in essence willing something into being in the spiritual realm. By willing something into being in the spiritual it will later manifest itself in our earthly realm. This is the reason why we typically end our prayers with the word "Amen," which essentially means, "Let it be done!"

How to Pray Effectively

Now that we understand how prayer works we can change the way that we pray in order to make our prayers more powerful and effective. Here is the single most powerful and effective prayer that anyone can pray for another person:

"Lord, I lift up this person to you and ask that you fulfill all of his or her needs according to your will. Not his or her will, but your will be done in this person's life. Amen!"

On the surface this prayer may seem too simple or too general to be effective. This is a common misconception among some Christians who believe that you must pray long and wordy prayers that ask for very specific outcomes. In actual fact, however, there is no prayer more powerful or more effective than this one. Here are the main reasons why:

• By praying for the Lord's will to be done we are enabling the Lord to invoke his own will in the spiritual realm, which carries much more power behind it.
• By not praying for a specific outcome we are not putting any limitations or restrictions on the Lord. We may think we know what is best for another person, but all too often we are unable to see the big picture. It is, therefore, much more prudent to let the Lord decide what is truly best for another person. If our desired outcome is in conflict with the Lord's will, our prayer will be a hindrance to the Lord rather than a help. This is a common reason why many prayers seemingly go unanswered. When the Lord doesn't act in accordance with what we prayed for it is often a good clue that we were not praying correctly.

Consider the following scenario:
John has been out of work for over a year and is in terrible need of finding a good job to support his family. John has an upcoming job interview and has asked us to pray for him.

At this point we have two choices on how to pray for John. The most common prayer that some Christians would offer would be something like this:

"Lord, please be with John during his job interview and help him to get a good position with this company so that he can support his family. Amen!"

By doing this we have now limited the Lord's options to either giving John this particular job or not. Little did we know that this job would not be the best choice for John in the long run. We were also unaware of the fact that the Lord already had a significantly better job in mind for John, which would have become available the very next day.

If, however, we had used the following prayer instead, we would have allowed the Lord to fulfill John's needs in a much better way:
"Lord, I lift up John to you and ask that you fulfill all of his needs according to your will. Not his will, but your will be done in his life."

Now the Lord can carry out his original plan for John, which was to get him the job at this other company the very next day.

Spiritual Awareness & Protection

Once you become an effective prayer warrior by praying in God's will you will attract the attention of the spiritual forces of evil in the spiritual realms. It is written in Ephesians 6:12:

"For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms."

You must, therefore, become spiritually aware so that you may recognize when you are under attack from the evil ones. You must also learn how to defend yourself against any such assaults.

Recognizing Spiritual Attack

Spiritual attacks can come in the form of physical assaults or emotional assaults. Recognizing these different forms of attack is very important. Here are some common physical symptoms of spiritual attack:

• Excessive yawning (especially during the day). Yawning is the result of oxygen deprivation to the brain. The evil can consume the oxygen around you causing you to yawn frequently.
• Sneezing when there is no obvious cause (allergies, pepper, etc.). Ever wonder why we say, "God bless you" when someone sneezes?
• You may get the chills for no apparent reason.
• Headaches (especially severe ones like migraines)
• You may suddenly feel aches and pains with no rational explanation for them.
• You may also feel extremely tired and drained of energy.

Here are some common symptoms of an emotional spiritual attack:

• The evil have the ability to strongly influence your thoughts. They can plant suggestions in your head to do things or say things that you wouldn't normally do. Be aware of any strange thoughts that enter your mind that you would not normally think of.
• The evil can also influence your emotions in a strong way. You may suddenly experience severe depression or extreme anger. Sometimes you will be very tense and short tempered for no good reason.

Defending Against Spiritual Attack

If you ever believe you are under attack you should always call on the Lord and ask him to help you. In addition, there are many things which you can and should do each day in order to ensure that you have sufficient protection against the spiritual forces of evil.

• You must put on the full armor of God morning and night by praying to the Lord and asking him to put the armor of God on you. Refer to Ephesians 6:10-18 for more information about the armor of God.
• You must ask for forgiveness of sins both morning and night.
• You must give your will to all three members of the Holy trinity both morning and night. You can simply say, "Lord I give my complete will to you for the next 24 hour period, not my will but your will be done in my life."
• You must read Psalm 92 both morning and night.
• Whenever in need say aloud "Praise the Lord" nine consecutive times followed by, "O my soul praise the Lord!"
• You may read the first 5 verses of the book of John as a means of forcing the evil to back off of you.
• If in great need you may read Psalm 70.