God Changed My Perspective On Prayer + Knowledge

Two weeks ago, God got my attention…again.

My mom goes on a prayer walk almost every day—usually before I’m even up. So two weeks ago, I decided to give it a try. I felt like I needed something from God, but wasn’t quite sure what it was. 

I just walked around my family’s property one morning and prayed, beginning with repentance. After asking the Lord to reveal to me if there were any things in my life that shouldn’t be there, things came to mind that I hadn’t even realized I was doing.

Once I confessed and repented, I turned to worship and began to praise the Lord. After that, I went to the barn’s loft to pray. 

As I climbed up there, I was shocked as a flood of emotions washed over me. 

That beautiful loft. 

Not because of what it looked like, but because of what happened to me in that exact place a little less than three years ago…I met God. 

So, as those things came back to my remembrance, I began to praise the Lord in songs and prayer. I remembered in vivid pictures what took place that day a few years ago: how I cried out to God, wanting more of Him and desiring to live in His will for my life. How I finally surrendered every part of my life to Him in a moment of complete trust. How He met me there and poured His Spirit out on me and my life from that day forth. 

As I sat there contemplating and praying a couple weeks ago, the Lord really spoke to me. He reminded me of things we’d done in that very loft, and how I’d pray for people and miracles would happen. 

But somewhere along the way, I’d lost that. 

God didn’t take it from me—the enemy did. 

Because knowing all the right Scriptures and listening to hours worth of teaching and reading theological books means nothing. 

Knowing God’s voice means everything.  

Little by little, I’d forgotten how to pray, as my child-like faith in the Holy Spirit’s continual guidance of me turned into pride because of everything that I knew. 

I began to rely on my knowledge of God’s Word instead of God Himself. 

Man, I was so convicted. I’ve seen my prayers work, and there have been times when the Lord showed me very specifically that I needed to pray for certain people at certain times. There have even been times where I’ve prayed for people who were sick or in a lot of pain and they were healed almost instantly. 

Once, I laid hands on someone who threw out her back when moving something heavy and I rebuked the pain + prayed for her. Immediately, all of the pain left and she was back to moving things around right away. 

I don’t say this at all in a prideful way, because it’s not my own power—it’s God’s.

There’s nothing wrong with knowing lots of Scriptures, hearing teachings + sermons, and reading theological books. It becomes wrong when you solely rely on or prioritize other people or things over God. 

When you rely on your knowledge or experience to get you through anything, it can very quickly become religious. 

Why? 

Because that’s where people start to lean on themselves instead of God, and all they do becomes man made instead of Spirit lead. 

Everything goes back to being led by God’s Spirit. We need to be able to recognize His voice when He’s trying to guide us, because we’ll all get to a point at one time or another where our knowledge will fail us.

But God never will. 

It’s so important to be in continual relationship with the Lord. This is something that He’s really been reminding me of lately. We need to get to a place where we trust Him so completely, turn to Him in every situation, and are constantly walking with Him. 

When we are in complete unity with God—without religion or sin holding us back—that’s where we see breakthrough. 

I encourage you to set aside a chunk of time today to give to only God. Pray. Repent of anything in your life that may be offensive to God and seek His face + His will for you today. 

Then, get quiet and listen. Does He urge you to pray for someone or about something? Ask Him to show you what to pray specifically. Do you feel like you should worship Him? No one says you have to sing any one song or tune—whatever comes to mind, sing that to Him. 

God will meet you where you are when you come to Him with a pure heart. He’s not holding back on you—He’s waiting for you.