Monday, March 23, 2015

OPEN HEAVENS DAILY DEVOTIONAL (MONDAY 23 MARCH 2015)

Open Heavens Devotional by Pastor E.A. Adeboye
Monday March 23

KEYS TO ANSWERED PRAYER

Memorise:
O thou that hearest prayer, unto thee shall all flesh come.
Psalm 65:2

Read: Matthew 7:7-11
 7  Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you:   
8  For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened.   
9  Or what man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone?   
10  Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent?  
11  If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?

Message
If Christians can master the art and practice of prayer, this world will definitely become a better place to live in for them. Someone described prayer as a paradox. It is both simple and complex. It is the simplest form of speech that infant lips can try, and the sublime strains that reach the Majesty on high. What is prayer? John Bunyan, while in Bedford Prison, defined prayer as "a sincere, sensible, affectionate pouring out of the heart or soul to God, through Christ, in the strength and assistance of the Holy Spirit, for such things as God had promised according to the Word for the good of the Church, with submission, in faith, to the will of God." Our God is a prayer-answering God. It is God's will to answer the prayers of His children. However, He operates on principles. There are conditions which activate the answering of prayers by God. These I will refer to as keys to answered prayers. Are you a child of God? It is the desire of your Father to answer all of your prayers (John 16:23). If your prayers are not being answered, look inward. Are you employing the appropriate keys to answered prayers?

One of such keys is contrition (2 Chronicles 7:14). Contrition describes a state of feeling or showing of sorrow and remorse for a sin or shortcoming. Do you want your prayers answered? Examine your relationship with the Lord. Are there sins not confessed in your life? Psalm 66:18 says,
 "If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me:"
Approach God with humility and confess your sins, iniquities and shortcomings to Him. Repent of them and ask for forgiveness. Another key to answered prayers is whole-heartedness (Jeremiah 29:13). This has to do with your commitment and intimacy. How committed are you to the Almighty God and to His work? How intimate is your relationship with God and His Word? John 15:7 says,
 "If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you."

Do you want all your prayers answered? Be a doer of the word and not a hearer only. The next key to answered prayers is faith. Faith is one of the most important factors required for prayers to be answered (Mark 11:24). How strong is your faith? To receive anything from God, you must believe that you have received what you asked for and then you will have it. The fourth key to answered prayers is righteousness (John 9:31). Simply put, righteousness denotes acting in accordance to the divine nature and being free from the guilt of sin. A righteous person is morally upright. Such a person abstains from all appearances of evil. The last (but not the least) key to answered prayers is that you must ask in order to receive (Matthew 7:7).

Action Point:
Do you have any unanswered prayer? Apply the keys to answered prayers to it today.

Bible in a year: Hosea 11-14 & Matthew 7:1-23 ... Read after the cut:

Hosea 11-14 

Hos 11:1  When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt. 
Hos 11:2  As they called them, so they went from them: they sacrificed unto Baalim, and burned incense to graven images. 
Hos 11:3  I taught Ephraim also to go, taking them by their arms; but they knew not that I healed them. 
Hos 11:4  I drew them with cords of a man, with bands of love: and I was to them as they that take off the yoke on their jaws, and I laid meat unto them. 
Hos 11:5  He shall not return into the land of Egypt, but the Assyrian shall be his king, because they refused to return. 
Hos 11:6  And the sword shall abide on his cities, and shall consume his branches, and devour them, because of their own counsels. 
Hos 11:7  And my people are bent to backsliding from me: though they called them to the most High, none at all would exalt him. 
Hos 11:8  How shall I give thee up, Ephraim? how shall I deliver thee, Israel? how shall I make thee as Admah? how shall I set thee as Zeboim? mine heart is turned within me, my repentings are kindled together. 
Hos 11:9  I will not execute the fierceness of mine anger, I will not return to destroy Ephraim: for I am God, and not man; the Holy One in the midst of thee: and I will not enter into the city. 
Hos 11:10  They shall walk after the LORD: he shall roar like a lion: when he shall roar, then the children shall tremble from the west. 
Hos 11:11  They shall tremble as a bird out of Egypt, and as a dove out of the land of Assyria: and I will place them in their houses, saith the LORD. 
Hos 11:12  Ephraim compasseth me about with lies, and the house of Israel with deceit: but Judah yet ruleth with God, and is faithful with the saints. 



Hosea 12

Hos 12:1  Ephraim feedeth on wind, and followeth after the east wind: he daily increaseth lies and desolation; and they do make a covenant with the Assyrians, and oil is carried into Egypt. 
Hos 12:2  The LORD hath also a controversy with Judah, and will punish Jacob according to his ways; according to his doings will he recompense him. 
Hos 12:3  He took his brother by the heel in the womb, and by his strength he had power with God: 
Hos 12:4  Yea, he had power over the angel, and prevailed: he wept, and made supplication unto him: he found him in Bethel, and there he spake with us; 
Hos 12:5  Even the LORD God of hosts; the LORD is his memorial. 
Hos 12:6  Therefore turn thou to thy God: keep mercy and judgment, and wait on thy God continually. 
Hos 12:7  He is a merchant, the balances of deceit are in his hand: he loveth to oppress. 
Hos 12:8  And Ephraim said, Yet I am become rich, I have found me out substance: in all my labours they shall find none iniquity in me that were sin. 
Hos 12:9  And I that am the LORD thy God from the land of Egypt will yet make thee to dwell in tabernacles, as in the days of the solemn feast. 
Hos 12:10  I have also spoken by the prophets, and I have multiplied visions, and used similitudes, by the ministry of the prophets. 
Hos 12:11  Is there iniquity in Gilead? surely they are vanity: they sacrifice bullocks in Gilgal; yea, their altars are as heaps in the furrows of the fields. 
Hos 12:12  And Jacob fled into the country of Syria, and Israel served for a wife, and for a wife he kept sheep. 
Hos 12:13  And by a prophet the LORD brought Israel out of Egypt, and by a prophet was he preserved. 
Hos 12:14  Ephraim provoked him to anger most bitterly: therefore shall he leave his blood upon him, and his reproach shall his Lord return unto him. 



Hosea 13

Hos 13:1  When Ephraim spake trembling, he exalted himself in Israel; but when he offended in Baal, he died. 
Hos 13:2  And now they sin more and more, and have made them molten images of their silver, and idols according to their own understanding, all of it the work of the craftsmen: they say of them, Let the men that sacrifice kiss the calves. 
Hos 13:3  Therefore they shall be as the morning cloud, and as the early dew that passeth away, as the chaff that is driven with the whirlwind out of the floor, and as the smoke out of the chimney. 
Hos 13:4  Yet I am the LORD thy God from the land of Egypt, and thou shalt know no god but me: for there is no saviour beside me. 
Hos 13:5  I did know thee in the wilderness, in the land of great drought. 
Hos 13:6  According to their pasture, so were they filled; they were filled, and their heart was exalted; therefore have they forgotten me. 
Hos 13:7  Therefore I will be unto them as a lion: as a leopard by the way will I observe them: 
Hos 13:8  I will meet them as a bear that is bereaved of her whelps, and will rend the caul of their heart, and there will I devour them like a lion: the wild beast shall tear them. 
Hos 13:9  O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself; but in me is thine help. 
Hos 13:10  I will be thy king: where is any other that may save thee in all thy cities? and thy judges of whom thou saidst, Give me a king and princes? 
Hos 13:11  I gave thee a king in mine anger, and took him away in my wrath. 
Hos 13:12  The iniquity of Ephraim is bound up; his sin is hid. 
Hos 13:13  The sorrows of a travailing woman shall come upon him: he is an unwise son; for he should not stay long in the place of the breaking forth of children. 
Hos 13:14  I will ransom them from the power of the grave; I will redeem them from death: O death, I will be thy plagues; O grave, I will be thy destruction: repentance shall be hid from mine eyes. 
Hos 13:15  Though he be fruitful among his brethren, an east wind shall come, the wind of the LORD shall come up from the wilderness, and his spring shall become dry, and his fountain shall be dried up: he shall spoil the treasure of all pleasant vessels. 
Hos 13:16  Samaria shall become desolate; for she hath rebelled against her God: they shall fall by the sword: their infants shall be dashed in pieces, and their women with child shall be ripped up. 



Hosea 14

Hos 14:1  O Israel, return unto the LORD thy God; for thou hast fallen by thine iniquity. 
Hos 14:2  Take with you words, and turn to the LORD: say unto him, Take away all iniquity, and receive us graciously: so will we render the calves of our lips. 
Hos 14:3  Asshur shall not save us; we will not ride upon horses: neither will we say any more to the work of our hands, Ye are our gods: for in thee the fatherless findeth mercy. 
Hos 14:4  I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely: for mine anger is turned away from him. 
Hos 14:5  I will be as the dew unto Israel: he shall grow as the lily, and cast forth his roots as Lebanon. 
Hos 14:6  His branches shall spread, and his beauty shall be as the olive tree, and his smell as Lebanon. 
Hos 14:7  They that dwell under his shadow shall return; they shall revive as the corn, and grow as the vine: the scent thereof shall be as the wine of Lebanon. 
Hos 14:8  Ephraim shall say, What have I to do any more with idols? I have heard him, and observed him: I am like a green fir tree. From me is thy fruit found. 
Hos 14:9  Who is wise, and he shall understand these things? prudent, and he shall know them? for the ways of the LORD are right, and the just shall walk in them: but the transgressors shall fall therein. 



Matthew 7:1-23

Mat 7:1  Judge not, that ye be not judged. 
Mat 7:2  For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again. 
Mat 7:3  And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye? 
Mat 7:4  Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye; and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye? 
Mat 7:5  Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye. 
Mat 7:6  Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you. 
Mat 7:7  Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you: 
Mat 7:8  For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened. 
Mat 7:9  Or what man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone? 
Mat 7:10  Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent? 
Mat 7:11  If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him? 
Mat 7:12  Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets. 
Mat 7:13  Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: 
Mat 7:14  Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it. 
Mat 7:15  Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. 
Mat 7:16  Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? 
Mat 7:17  Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit. 
Mat 7:18  A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. 
Mat 7:19  Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire. 
Mat 7:20  Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them. 
Mat 7:21  Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. 
Mat 7:22  Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? 
Mat 7:23  And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity. 

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