Altars 2026 | Joyce Mattera - Legitimate Prayer

Hey folks, John Tyson here. As you know earlier this year, we gathered here in New York City for our annual Ultis Conference. And what we've heard over the last few days, the stories of what God's done has been incredible. We had leaders preach, word shaping, hunger inducing, scripture infused sermons. And we want to be able to make these sermons as widely available to as many people as possible so that they'll be a blessing to you and your church. Alongside that, we recorded some deeper conversations with the people who taught and some other key voices around the themes of prayer and revival going deeper into their stories. And these conversations are going to be available through the Awakened Network and you can find out more at AwakenNetwork.com. And we're excited to announce tickets for Ultis 2027 are available now. We're back here in New York. Last year they sold out quickly so if you want to be with us, get your tickets today. I hope these talks and gathering together will be a blessing to you and your church. See you at Ultis. legitimate prayer needs to be praying in the Holy Spirit. Praying in the Holy Spirit does not mean a lot of hype. Praying in the Holy Spirit means having a sensitivity to God's Spirit and praying thus. So legitimate prayer comes from when we are truly humbly seeking God and His kingdom wanting to know Him and His ways, laying down our lives, our desires, our agenda so we could truly know as we pray what God wants, not what we want, what God is up to. We need to get to the place where what God wants is what we want and prayer brings us to that place. We get there through prayer from a surrendered life. We stay there through consistent prayer from a surrendered life. We need to wait on God, know what He wants to do, what He's looking to do, what His Word says, what is a Holy Spirit putting on our hearts because He blesses what's of Himself. Ephesians 6, 18 says and pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers are requests. First Timothy 2, 11, 2 says I urge you that petitions, prayers, intercessions and thanksgiving be made on all people. So we see this different forms of prayer and what are the prayers that most people pray? They are the personal prayers of supplication. Pras for themselves, prayers for close friends, prayers for loved one, even prayers for pets. I was in a corporate meeting once and it was really frustrating because it was supposed to be a corporate prayer meeting and just anyone can get up and someone got up to the mic and it's just praying for his name as pet and that's fine. Go to your neighbor's house, pray for his pet but this is not what we're doing in a corporate prayer meeting. So and I also find that a lot of this personal supplication isn't even needed, you know why? Because Scripture tells us not to be anxious for our lives because Scripture tells us that if God's going to feed the animals and the birds and clothe the fields, how much was He going to take care of us? Be not anxious. Some of our prayers just stands from our own anxiety and lack of trust and faith. Thanksgiving is intertwined in all our prayers and a common prayer but it's not all we do. Sometimes it's just the prayers. Even the ones we teach our kids is just recited now, they may not asleep, you know, or the prayer at a meal and even from a young age we need to teach our children how to pray and to do that well, that doesn't mean a two hour prayer meeting before they go to bed. But the highest form of prayer is intercession. Intercession is prayer that's directed and energized by the Holy Spirit for others. You cannot intercede for yourself. Intercession by nature is for others. So it begins to eliminate you out of the mix but that's a good thing. That's a good thing. In fact that's where we need to get. And so I'm going to share a couple of minutes on what intercession is and does and I want to quote one of my mentors who is Joy Dawson who listening to our teach really helped me and got me started on my road to prayer. I remember after listening to so much I was I would pray just a little bit or whenever. And I remember coming home from church and like all right I have to become a person a prayer and just lock myself in my room and like you know five minutes and then I'm like all right what do I do? How do I pray you know it just felt like I had no clue but it was developed over years to the point of you know I just kept doing it I kept doing it I kept doing it until I began to really tap in it was like I tell people it felt like you know a chord just plugging into an outlet when you connect with the Holy Spirit and you stop praying in the Holy Spirit it's just a totally different thing and you get there when you really want to get there. So one of her quotes that that really helped me was that you can be stripped of everything except the sound mind and be used of God mightily in this ministry. So you know it's it's it's often a behind the scenes ministry but I'm telling you I think there's going to be people that were intercessors that are going to mean the front lines of rewards when we get to heaven. It's the most important ministry most effective means of winning souls seeing God move bring in transformation it also brings the greatest blessing in our lives because nothing can bring us nearer to God and lead us deeper in his love than becoming an intercessor because we become recipients of God's mind and heart. You cannot legitimately intercede for others in the Holy Spirit unless you have a surrendered life and if you have a surrendered life and become this person that is hearing from God you cannot remain biased. Bigoted prejudice people never have been in the place of intercession. They may pray from their minds and their flesh but have never truly been in in the Holy Spirit intercession and felt God's heart. Intercession causes us to see and feel how God does for others and causes us to begin to know what it is that God is wanting and trying to do and the Holy Spirit reveals to us how God thinks and feels towards the object of our prayer. He also reveals to us what he is looking to do. It's people that are in that place of intercession that can hear from God and know what it is that we should even be praying for. It's impossible to have the thoughts of God shared with you and have your heart stay the same. If he showed us all what was on his heart we probably could not even bear it but if we lack a world vision a vision for our city and for others and we haven't been in the place of intercession because that's where God reveals to us his secrets, his deep thoughts and when we begin interceding often God will use us to be a part of the answer because we have his heart for it. It's his agenda not ours. Intercession is the most unpopular service on ministry because most of it is done secretly. It is unpopular because of the state of our hearts and our impure motives because we're not seen. Matthew 5, Jesus said, "When you pray don't be like the hypocrites for they love to pray standing in the synagogues on the street. One is to be seen of others." So much ministry, if we really look at it, we don't even know all hearts. Only God really knows the depth of a heart and thank God he uses us even when things in our heart are not right because if we all know, if he just only uses those with a completely pure heart they would be very little getting done. But we need to understand this and so we look for the accolades of others whereas when you're an intercessor you don't get that but it says your father sees what's done and secret will be ward you. Intercession is the most neglected service and this really provoked me when I began to pray. Isaiah 6,3,5, he said, "I looked and there was no one to help. I was astonished. There was no one to uphold. God is astonished because there's no one interceding." Isaiah 647 says, "No one calls on your name or strives to lay hold of you." Isaiah 59,16 said, "He saw that there was no man and wondering that there was no one to intercede." It says, "He marveled that there was no one to stand in the gap, no one to intercede. God marveling at no one to intercede. God wondering is like him saying, I thought I made it clear that I don't work outside of this yet no one is doing it." Ezekiel 22,30, he said, "I looked for someone among them who would build up the wall and stand before me in the gap on behalf of the land so I would not have to destroy it but I found no one. So I will pour out my wrath on them and consume them with my fiery anger, bringing down on their own heads all they have done." It's a clansolot. So he's basically saying, "If there was someone that prayed, I wouldn't have had to do that." To see how important this is, that we as his people understand this ministry that we are all called to. God's love is yearning to find an intercess that will stop him from bringing his wrath on people. And to do so much more, we all see things that disturb us on a daily basis. basis. And when we do, we really have to go to heart. We really have to learn to pray because it can lead us to anger. It can lead us to bad attitudes. But what are we doing about it? I'm not talking about protesting or speaking out, posting on social media, but will we stir ourselves and take a hold of God? It is right for our spirits to be provoked from things wrong. This should bring us to a place of prayer, to call on God, to do something about it. And it's in that place that we will be held in check for our attitudes. I am held in check for my attitudes all the time in that place. Intercession is costly. It involves sacrifice of time and Google legitimate things like fellowship, your media time, things you may want to do just to chill. And God wants the ministry of intercession to be a way of life for us. Not just when we feel like it or when the spirit moves us. I had a friend once that told me I pray when I feel like to pray. I said, "Then I don't think you pray that often." Let me tell you something. If I prayed when I felt like it, I would not be praying much. I have times that pray myself. I have times that I'm on prayer calls with others. And especially my early morning prayer call, I do not feel like it. And you know what? No matter how many times after the prayer call, I'm like, that was great. I'm so glad I was on. You know, my day goes great. Then the next morning, I do not feel like it. I will myself all over again. So we can't go by how we feel even when we know what the outcomes are. We have to designate regular time, set regular schedules, and have spontaneous as well outside of the regular schedules. And in addition to that, this time, the Holy Spirit will just move and alert us to things to a specific need at the moment. But they can only do that if we're somebody that he can get a hold of and get our attention. So we set patterns, we set schedules both individually and together. I have several that I have set. I have my personal time. And throughout my life, I've just found different ways to do it, different places to do it. You know, depending on where we lived, who was in the house. I remember we had an apartment with our first apartment with a few of our kids. I would just go to the basement and pray. Then when we moved, I would go outside to pray. In fact, I went out usually early in the morning. It's like six in the morning before I have to help get the kids ready for school and I'm out. Damn, this deserted road by the park praying. And I get confronted by somebody who stops in a car and thinks I'm one of the local prostitutes because the prostitutes in my community didn't dress like prostitutes. And I'm like, just go away. And I'm looking, who else is here? Nobody's on the road. So, you know, I'm thinking real fast. What am I going to do? So I look over and see garbage with a with a Western oil bottle. I'm like, okay, I'm just going to have to, you know, threaten this guy. So I run over while he's not leaving me alone. Grab the bottle. Run towards the club. But as I grab the bottle, I realize it's plastic. I'm like, well, I am just bluffing this the whole way and hope it works. It did. So this is some of my fun interesting. I won't tell you about my husband's. He's had some really interesting prayer walks in the park near us. So, but you said times, you said places, whatever works for you. Besides personal time, we have family set times of prayer. That has changed as our kids grew different schedules. I have personal prayer times, which are with friends with other people that are now really my main source. So every morning, I have a prayer call. I told you about that. Every Saturday morning, I have a prayer call with some of the women leaders in our church. And from both of our campuses, and we just pray together for how a church for the next service. It's just amazing. It's a routine. We just do it. Everybody knows to get on the call. And you know, God sees that. He sees consistency. And it's important to him. And we need to learn to be consistent. It's not something we try out for a while. And if something happens that we have to adjust it to adjust it, but don't abandon it. Intercession is the thing most feared by Satan. Some of his subtlest attacks are against people in this ministry. Often the plan is just being to distract us. Therefore, we need to be committed to this and prioritize it no matter how busy life gets. I love this. Intercession lifts us out of interversion, introspection, and self-pity. There's never a true intercessor who is unhealthily introverted. And it pulls you away from competitiveness and jealousy with others. Joe 42 says God turned his captivity when he prayed for his friends. That's when God changed everything. When we intercede for the people who are against us, he keeps bitterness. I'm forgiveness out of our hearts. Pulls us out of self-centeredness when we are interceding because it's not just for us. It's for others. And I love that. I don't know about you. I really like it and pulled out self-centeredness. It's really not a fun place to be. Sometimes I just feel miserable, pining about whatever. And then I get into a place of intercession. There's so many important things that God is trying to do. There's so many things I can be involved in with God and pray for. And it's not just all about me. And I'm just a little dot on the spectrum. So intercession involves standing in two gaps between God and man, between Satan and man, between God and the world, between Satanic forces and the world. Ephesians 6, 12 speaks of the levels of authority in spiritual warfare. He says, "Our struggles are not against flesh and blood, but against rulers, against authorities, against powers of this dark world, against the spiritual forces of evil and the heavenly realms." So there are levels of demonic authority. I love teaching. In a lot of our retreats, I've just taught whole series on spiritual warfare, spiritual authority. Teach people how to pray effectively in spiritual warfare because we've seen it all in our church when people call on the devil, green eyed monster and using the F-bomb on him and everything. Or, you know, just not knowing how to address demonic forces. And asking, you know, "God, please make the devil go away." That doesn't work either, by the way. So there's a level of authority we have in our prayers over forces of wickedness and there are different levels of them. So there are just, I call the demons that bother us the cockroaches. They're like just at the bottom of the totem pole. You know, but there is spiritual authority in high places, over cities, over regions, over people groups. And those take concerted effort of prayer and intercession, persistent because it just doesn't fall because you have one time of prayer. We need to do that as churches, not just alone, but we can do that on our own as well. So there are genders that were battling in prayer. And then God will give us strategy as we pray. We've seen this in the community. We started our church. You know, we saw the spiritual strongholds in our community. One of them was witchcraft. Another was there was poverty and there was just so many things. But that witchcraft, that was pretty intense. I mean, there was the, in a community of more than 30,000 people in a one mile radius. There was the local botanica where everybody went to and I just think nine out of 10 people were practicing witchcraft. So this is new to us. You know, we didn't get trained in this when the church became from what Tom called a pastor because we just started church one in the morning. Tell us what to do. But then we learned. We just learned. And we saw, but we, so we would deal with people one on one. We'd pray. We'd see them free. But we began to come against the whole atmosphere and the strongholds in that community. And within a few years, that botanical was shut down. The person that was supposed to take it over from a Zunko got saved. And we saw a tremendous change in that community. So we had other areas that we, we prayed for. We began to pray for the churches not just our own. Their success was our success. Their values was our failures. We have to see it that way. We have to see it that way because we are the church is not just us. And so together we are stronger. And so when we see even another, we, I had one friend who had a church and I, Kej just thought it was great when another church was, was failing because it was an opportunity for him to get more people in his church. Folks, we can never, never, never have that kind of an attitude. So we were invested in other churches in our community and in our city. It was sincere and we were able, because of that, to gather passes. to gather congregations, together in prayer, and to see greater change and greater power of God. You know, God will work. The more there is that unity, the more powerful God can work. And the best way to have it is in prayer, because it's really hard. How many of you know that you can't easily pray with someone and stay angry at them? >> [inaudible] >> So if I'm angry with my husband, then we just need to pray. So we pray a lot. [ Laughter ] But praying brings a unity and a bond that nothing else can. So it breaks down division like nothing else can. During intercession, we are physically strengthened and spiritually focused. The Holy Spirit energizes your physical body when you intercede. The Bible says that weight on the Lord will renew their strength. And this is so true. So don't ever let time stop you from praying. I encourage you not to let -- waiting till late at night to pray be your habit, but try to make morning times of prayer change my life. When I began to pray in the morning, when before we had started the church, before I was married, and I was going out to work. That little bit of prayer time, sometimes it was 15 minutes to change my day. Change my entire day. And I was sensitive to God even on my job. Because of it, there was people I began to witness to share the gospel with. So God worked healings in their families that were in the hospital just because I began to spend that time in the morning and prayer. Most of our church prayer time is at night. And there's times I'm just like, "I didn't want to go. I just wanted to go home, flick on the TV, just go to bed early." But the amazing thing was when I get in that prayer meeting and we begin to pray, it's like, wow. I just like how all this energy and strength and it was from the Holy Spirit. That's what happens when you pray. So don't ever let tiredness stop you. Learn to keep to schedules no matter what. Hand in hand with the study of God's Word. There's no great way for us to become the men and women of that God wants us to be. We can all be spiritual giants through the ministry of intercession. Look at the great men of the Bible, Moses, Nehemiah, Elijah, Daniel. They were all intercessors. And one of the things about them, when they prayed, I love this part, when they prayed repentance, when they prayed, they never prayed me. They prayed we, for everything. They prayed we. They always understood the corporateness. It was never about them. It was about the nation of Israel, with us it's about the church. So they were repenting even when they hadn't even sinned. The ministry of intercession is for everyone. It should be a normal part of every Christian's life. It should be taught to our children while they're young. As a family, you get a world's vision. Prayer and intercession should be a priority in our churches and the lifestyle of every believer. And God will not work without it. It doesn't matter who you are, what your ministry is, you are called to be an intercessor. So I think it's only for people that, who have a calling to that. And that's some people care about one another and others. It is because they are yielding to the Holy Spirit more than others, not because they are called more than others. All those that are greatly used by God have their beginnings and continue to spend much time alone with God, much time in prayer. So let's not ever think that we are called to a work and someone else is called to intercede. How do you become and remain an intercessor one? Stop praying. These men had become intercessors as a part of their everyday normal life. I love this in Acts 10-1. Peter filled the empty time while he was waiting for dinner by going to the roof to pray and guess what? That's when God brought that vision of going to the Gentiles. He was just filling in some time. They didn't have all the things we have that we used to fill in our time, TV, playing a video game, scrolling, scrolling. I really have to control myself with the scrolling. There's so many things that can distract us, but Peter used that time. And because of that, God was able to show him what his assignment was. A person is only as powerful in the ministry as the intercession in prayer life, individually and collectively. God will use you to be a part of the answers because you have his heart and he has your attention. Very often, God makes a call on people's lives while they're in intercession. There's no dictates to God. We leave behind our personal thoughts, our burdens, our agendas, what we think should be. It's got to be spirit controlled. It's impossible without being cleansed and surrendered. There's too much loose talk about being spirit-filled. Spirit-filled are controlled. It's only a measure that we are fulfilling the conditions. Not depending on any one experience. It depends on whether at the moment we are yielded in will and known sin is confessed and repented of. You know, as one of the first things I do when I go to pray alone is just immediately confess any sins. That's why I love that we have, at our church, we have communion every Sunday. It always brings me back to that place where I realize the reason why I have access to God, not on my own. And it also helps me to repent of any current sins and to forgive others who have sinned against me. If we are not under the control of the Holy Spirit he will not be able to empower us. And if we are continuously powerless in prayer then we are not fulfilling these conditions. God is not legalistic. If you are praying the right thing without the right terminology, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. When we were young, when I was, you know, God saved in the Jesus movement, we were all hippies. And I remember we used to pray in our own language. We used to have prophetic words for each other in our own language and the elders of our church complained to our pastor. God doesn't talk that way. It wasn't a person or anything. It was just, you know, and his answer, I loved it to them was God will talk in whatever way they understand. And God understands in whatever way we talk. So it's in the heart, you know, it's not just the refined prayer, but it's the prayer that's in our heart. We can be more powerful in prayer than in any other thing. We can reach millions through prayer more than any other way. All this should cause us to take more time in our prayer time. And if there's anything in our life that isn't interfering with that, we need to deal with it. We need to learn to wait on God, to worship God for a suspend time meditating on His Word. And this I love, look at Moses. And this was really on my heart when I was preparing for this because I believe that there's people that God wants to call out to really press in to this prayer life, to this life of intercession, and to realize the difference you can make. You know, sometimes the problem seems so big and we think it's just me praying, but listen to this. In Psalm 10623, I love it. It says, therefore God said He would destroy them, had not Moses His chosen, stood in the breach before Him to turn away His wrath from destroying them. And you can see Moses' prayer next to this 32. And I love His prayer because He's kind of like, He's not just praying, He's negotiating with God, but He was someone that had got to tension. And we need to learn to become people that get got to tension because of the time we spend with Him. And because of that, He stopped the hand of God from destroying the whole nation of Israel. And this is what our prayers can do. If we just get a glimpse of that, it should bring us to that place, to want to be that kind of person. And we don't loom into giants of prayer overnight. A runner doesn't learn to run the first time. And God also tests us that we don't go by faith or feelings, but we need to keep going back and keep going back and the more you go back to the place of prayer, God will increase the longing to pray and release the power of the Spirit to pray. We learn to pray by praying. And I'm going to share, and I just want to say, when I'm praying, sometimes when I'm on my morning prayer calls, it just really amazes me because we're praying. And there's times we're praying. And we intercede a lot for our city, for our nation, and for different things. And I've learned how to pray where, you know, we really need to learn how to pray, not politically, not politically correct, but we need to learn how to pray from the heart of God. And when we do that, it's, there's no left or right. It's right and wrong. And no matter what side of the political field you may be on, there's wrong and right. And so we need to learn how to pray. But some of those times I'm praying and I'm like there. And like I can, I'm just right before God. I know He's listening to me. I know He's hearing me. I know His attention is on our prayers. And it just, it blows my mind. It amazes me. I know that my prayers are making a difference. And we need to all get to that place. I'm just going to, the last part of this, I want to close in our automatic responsibilities in prayer. Who do we direct our intercession towards? We have to have a target. We must know where we're going. But I'm just randomly. pray, if we don't have direction then we go nowhere. So the Scriptures gives us a lot of understanding of this but first Timothy 2 says I urge that first of all petitions present to session thanks to giving me made of all people that doesn't mean we just pray for the world. I love it when people don't, especially kids do that, I pray for everyone in the world to get saved but it's got to go a little farther than that. But first he tells us and he gets a little specific first pray for kings and all those in authority that we may live peacefully and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness. This is good and pleases God our Savior who wants all people to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth. So first responsibility that he says here is to pray for leaders and high officials because for God to get the maximum he has always worked through leadership, got appointed, got anointed leadership, leaders we have to pray for national leaders, civic leaders, Christian leaders, I pray for all of them. We don't pray for the ones just that we like. We don't just pray for the president that we like that's in office. We pray for the president that we don't like that's in office all the more. So it shows us the divine order when he has this pray like this for the maximum moving of God. So we need to know this for our city, for our nation and I pray for Christian leaders for those that speak into the body of Christ for pastors who lead and guide whole flocks of people. God will work even if there is improper leadership. It will never be the maximum but God will still work. But imagine the impact on the world of the whole church was obeying this command. Imagine the great unity, the church wouldn't be so polarized if we were doing this. There are many appointed leaderships that weren't appointed by God but appointed by men and you want to pray to the spirit of God to confirm and pray them out if that's what he puts on your heart. Pray that he will put the right person in. I've always prayed that he will replace. Sometimes we don't know, we don't know all the backstory God does. So I just pray God you see it all, you see what's exposed, you see what's not exposed. Deal with it God. Deal with it God. The more responsibility the more prayer is needed for that person. Don't be too quick to judge or criticize. We have to pray in humility. Don't pray your bias or let others pray their bias and spew out their hatred in a prayer meeting. I've had to bring correction to that many times. This is where Godly character and Holy Spirit led prayers are important. Sometimes the more of an inner circle I'm working with I can be a little more free to pray some specifics but a very careful and larger groups. So we pray for our leaders. To we pray for our church, our church leaders are congregation. We pray all the time for our church. That's my Saturday morning prayer meeting is just for that. We're praying always for our church. There needs to be an undergird of intercession and the more people you can pull into that, the better. It gets people on board when they're praying with you. I know there's people that would have left our church had they not been praying together. We had not been praying together because it changes our minds and our heart. Intercede for other churches and other ministries. Every time I pray for my church, thank God for every church in this city as well. Three, pray for those that are on the front line of ministry, especially those in evangelistic ministries. These are all our obligations. Paul said, pray for me that wherever I speak, words may be given to me that I will be feel that I will feel lessly make known the mystery of the gospel for which I am an ambassador in change. Pray that I may declare it feel as I should. So we need to pray for those that are out there. Four, pray for the lost souls that God brings into our path, the individuals, whether in friendship or work. And then those that we lead to Christ, the young converts, we are responsible to pray for them. Five, pray for those in our immediate family, Christian and non-Christian. I did this from the time I got saved. Every one of my family members, I led to the Lord. Every one of them. I was the first. I was the only. I went one by one to my brothers, to my sisters, to my parents, to my grandparents, to aunts, to uncles. I wouldn't stop. I just kept going farther out the chain. And now I have nephews and nieces all serving God. Because I led my sister to the Lord. I led who she married to the Lord. Church, it continues in a generational pattern wherever we're at. We need to pray for them. And that puts us in check in how we treat them. Okay, so we need to seek, so our neighbors and our community, the people on our street were responsible to pray for them. You know, I love this. In New York City, this is so easy. I mean, we're just so congested. How many people are on one city block, one building? We have such opportunity, such opportunity, such opportunity folks. I love it. So we made a habit with our kids to pray for our neighbors. And sometimes we talk in a specific one and guess what? They came to Christ. Some of them went into ministry in our church. Some of them got married in our churches and other parts of the city. But we brought them the Christ. Some of them brought their families to Christ because we specifically took this series. We did pray our walks, but you know, my kids make sure we did it very discreetly. And we did. I respected that. So we didn't go wave and flags and banging tambourines around the block, but we did walk around our block and we pray, we just may believe like we love in conversations with each other. It doesn't all have to be loud. It doesn't all have to be boisterous. It doesn't. So number seven, pray for our city and our nation. And less for nothing less than the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. God is looking for people with whom he can conceive a burden for nation. A baby is born with one little pain. It has to be trivial and prayer. It can't just be one prayer meeting. It can't be just one time. And sometimes in our prayer meetings, you know, the burdens doesn't lift and we don't stop. We just have some of our church prayer meetings and then like we finish and everybody was rejoicing but it still felt grieving. Sometimes we have to grieve that out, pray that through. Eight, I love this. Pray for those who despiteful use us and our enemies. Don't you love that one? And when you do it, God will change your heart. It's just amazing. We did these things. We had a lady in our first apartment that like was a lunatic. And she did crazy things that we couldn't even have anyone over. And we just prayed for her. We baked a cake. She was shocked. We led them the Christ and they started coming to our Bible studies. Number nine, pray for the unreached nations and people groups. This is so important. There are places, nations where there is almost no gospel witness at all. And the reason why we have that responsibility is because there is the least amount of Christians in those nations to make it their automatic responsibility to pray. And sometimes we don't even know how many Christians. But how, you know, so there's atheistic nations, communists nations, Buddhists nations, Muslim nations. However, I love this. We live in New York City. God has brought the nations to us. This is great for us. But as a church taken the opportunity, like we need to take the opportunity. We have an amazing opportunity. I'll never remember, forget, after 9/11, how my, the attacks on the World Trade Tows, how my husband went into the mosque and just ministered with the people in there. And there was this corner of Delhi and this woman that I go in there and talk with. And she began to ask me to pray for her. And I was able to pray for her. She was in a very abusive marriage. And she was able to leave that marriage and start her own business. It was just wonderful. So, again, you know, we need to see the opportunity we have. Ten pray for Christians who are persecuted. Because we don't hear enough of this. We don't see it on mainstream media. But it's happening. And we need to know. We need to pray and be aware of it because it says, be with those in prison as if you were in prison. Rejoice with those who rejoice. So all of this is not meant to overwhelm us but to challenge us and direct us. It's like jogging little by little. You get stronger and can go farther. The more you pray, the more you want to pray, the more God will release the ability through you. The less you pray, the less you want to pray. And the less God will release the ability through you. List are good as reminders, write things down. Some people work with lists. Some people work with just more spontaneous but having those categories and automatic responsibilities that you're aware of, be led by the Holy Spirit, start a routine personally, start a routine with your family or friends, depending on your situation, every situation. And my situation has changed throughout life. I mean, I've been through it all, and I always tell people, younger than me, it doesn't matter how far you get, I'm always ahead. 'Cause it's your moving up soul, my. So there's a whole lot you can learn. So, pray within your church, under the accountability of your pastor, and pastors and leaders, and, you know, let's see, that's why we're just supporting this, because this is about prayer, and this is just the beginning, and we are just touching the surface. And what we want may not be what God wants, but you find that out when you're praying. Well, we may wanna see in our city, may not be the plan of God, but whatever the plan of God is, it will be good. We just need to get on board with what he's doing. And the more we are in prayer, the more we will tap into that. God bless you. (audience applauding) - Yeah, thank you so much, Joyce. Whenever I hear you talk about prayer, I'm just so strengthened and so inspired. Like, I literally just feel like I just wanted to pray right now. So, I'm gonna just take a moment and ask a few questions, and then I would love for Joyce to just pray for us, and just bless us to just like with just a fresh feeling of the Holy Spirit and whatever else she feels to pray for us today. But one of the phrases that you say a lot is praying in the Holy Spirit. And I was just wondering if you could talk a little bit more about that. You talk about such union with God in your prayer, and such yielding to him and knowing his heart and his mind, and I don't know if anyone in the room is like, yeah, if I just like got to know God that intimately, prayer would feel so much more fun. I'm, how do we cultivate that, praying in the Holy Spirit? - Yeah, so it's a matter of having a surrendered life for one, laying down our life, you know, for him and his kingdom, seeking for us as kingdom and his righteousness, that's gotta be number one, and when that's in place, it's more prevalent that we will pray that way. In the Holy Spirit, it doesn't mean praying in tongues, although praying in tongues is great. That's how I pray in tongues a lot, just to get a sense of God or just to get in his presence. There was some people in our church that they never, that's all they prayed in tongues. "Monger and corporate prayer meetings," I said. I said, "Leave the tongues behind for privately, "praying in English so we can all agree with you." But it's just praying in the Spirit, it's just tapping into the heart of God. It's just, it's allowing the Holy Spirit, it's like, it's just that sense. Like I said, it's like, it's like tuning in on a radio wave, you know, you're just getting static, and then all of a sudden you're tuning, and you're hearing it, and that's what it's like, and you learn that through experience, when you know you're tapping in right to what is the heart of God, and it just happens when you continually pray. - I love that. I also, you said a phrase, you wanna be someone that God can get a hold of, and you said that when you're talking about having regular schedule times of prayer, and then spontaneous times of prayer, and you kind of have to have the regular schedule times of prayer to be a person that does spontaneous prayer, right? Like cultivating that life of attention to God through just scheduling it, doesn't mean you never move it, or you never adjust it, but you don't abandon it, and I love that. If someone is like, just has a regular life with ministry, family, whatever they're doing, these are like church leaders in the room mostly. What would be, yeah, and I don't know, if anyone's just feeling like conviction, every time I hear Joyce talk about prayer, I'm like, God, make me a person of prayer again, you know? Yeah, just like in all humility, like what do we do to schedule those times? Where would you, you've given me such practical advice in my life of like, this is what you need to do, Ashley, and it's honestly surprised me, but what would you say is like a step one for scheduling prayer to make ourselves available to God? - Yeah, so first we have to have the desire to do it. If you don't have this desire, it's not gonna happen. Once you have the desire, then you need to have the determination to make it happen, to discipline, to set something in place. And even if you miss something or mess up, you just get right back to it. At least you, you know, God's not gonna, you know, say you failed, forget about you, but just get right back to it. And yeah, and then, you know, you just stick with the discipline and change it when you have to. It's amazing how God can even work in those set times. I'm not coming expecting, like, you know, thunder claps, but sometimes I get the thunder claps, you know. There's been times we just had a regular time to pray with our kids. We made it brief so that they would not hate prayer, but I remember, and we made it suitable for them. But I remember one time we were just doing our regular routine and all of a sudden the Spirit of God came on us and we just started prophesying over all our kids. But that would not have been able to happen had we not been in that place. But yeah, we don't just go in that place and expecting something to happen, you know. So it's the, they give and take. Then there's the times you just, if you're walking in that sensitivity, you know, God may put something on your heart, I've learned to do that. And I've learned just to use every opportunity. My husband and I have made a commitment. Sometimes we fail and we forget, but every time someone will visit us, we wouldn't let them leave without praying for them. So, you know, we just did it out of habit. One time this minister was there and we just prayed for him and all of a sudden the Holy Spirit came on us and showed us that he was gonna have a near death experience but he wasn't gonna die. God was gonna continue to use him and lo and behold, we didn't even know him that well. The next time I went to a conference, his wife was out, I found out that he had a heart attack and he should have died, you know. So like, you know, and I knew he had that word that we had given him, but that was just 'cause we did a routine thing. So God moves in the ordinary. - Yeah. - Ooh, I love that. All right, last question. Man, I am so just like fired up by your testimonies, the botanica that closed and then your entire family being led to the Lord. And I think what like moves me so much about those stories in your life is that you have faith and that you, it just sounds like throughout your whole life with Jesus, you have had such faith. And you have seen God answer your prayers. I remember reading Derek Prince saying, I like to pray 'cause my prayers get answered. And I just remember being like, oh gosh, I almost feel like I got disliked both out of that. Like, it's okay even if God never answers your prayers 'cause you're just like changing be a better person or something and it's like, but God actually wants us to have faith that he's gonna answer us. And so what would you say, what would you say to hearts that maybe have been disappointed or, yeah, have been praying for a long time for something or, yeah, what would you say to just like, encourage us to have that faith again? - Yeah, well, it's faith and tenacity and not giving up the, you know, I've had a few things I prayed for. I've fasted so much for, my husband and my faith is so much I said, God, we've fasted enough for like the entire city. I'm not joking. And I said, if somebody else in the church has fasted just one day, I said they get their presence and what? Why? And I struggled with my faith over that. I struggled with my trust with God. And, but he taught me a lot out of it and I had to continue to believe God. And it was a battle, I had to continue to have faith. I was not gonna let go, I was not gonna not believe God so I'm standing, would stand in faith. So we have to trust God. That scripture that, you know, I always quote where Jesus said about that woman that was with the persistent prayer with the judge, persistent, she just kept going, she never quit. And he didn't give her the answer right away. And Jesus said, if he was wicked, how much more will you have only father bring justice? And so we need to just not give up. He said, but when the Son of Man comes to earth, will he find faith? 'Cause we quit too easy. - All right, well, I would just love for Joyce to pray for us. Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you for teaching us today. Let's just get in a posture of just receiving from God and then I'd love for you to just bless us. - Thank you Jesus. Thank you Father. Thank you God. Father, we thank you Lord. We thank you God that you taught us to pray. You taught us how to pray. You taught us God right way of praying, wrong way of praying. Jesus, you demonstrated prayer. You went out early to pray. You were the Son of God. You went out early. You prayed over major things. You prayed through every struggle. We thank you that you left us a pattern in a way you demonstrated by your life. And God, we know that how important this is and we know how this keeps us connected to you, like nothing else, and keeps us connected to each other, like nothing else. So God, I just pray right now. God, I just would just move over everyone here and everybody that they represent. God, their families, their churches, their communities, God we pray that there would be such a, God, just a determination, such a, God, a desire, God, such a motivation that you would instill in us God to pray and not give up to pray to know God how our prayers make a difference to not think that we cannot do it, to not think that we are insignificant God, that you will use us. Father, we pray for everything that stands in the way we pray you would help us to readjust our lives, to readjust our schedules, to readjust our ministries God accordingly, that we would be effective for you, that we would be effective for you, that God we would be building with you, God not building and asking you to bless it, God asking you what it is you would want to do and building with you, God we pray that you would teach us, that you would move us, that you would motivate us, that your Holy Spirit will fall on us, give us a spirit of travail, a spirit of intercession that will not leave and that God will continue and prevail God and will make a difference everywhere we are. We thank you, Father, for it. We thank you and everyone that's been discouraged God we pray for a spirit of encouragement and strength God for a new vision, a new enthusiasm God and new God level of faith and God we ask all of this Father in the name of your Son Jesus. Amen. Amen, amen, amen. Let's just give just a thank you to Joyce. Yes.