How To Pray For Anyoneনমুনা

LOVE 

We are kicking off day one talking about how to pray for others to experience God’s love in their lives, and in turn be transformed in a way only God could orchestrate. God Himself is defined as actually being love. The thread throughout the Bible from beginning to end is one of LOVE. This type of love can only be given by God and has the potential to change EVERYTHING. The Greek word for LOVE in the New Testament is “agape.” In Strong's Hebrew and Greek dictionary, it is defined as this: "Spoken especially of good will toward others, the love of our neighbor, brotherly affection, which the Lord commands and inspires."

A love that God commands. 
A love that God inspires.

This is not a love that flees. This love ABIDES. It’s not optional if you’ve invited God into your life. It's roots are planted deep within the heart of the one who experiences it. When we pray for specific people in our lives to experience the real, ground shaking, unconditional love of God, we are asking them to experience God in His truest form. Love has the power to heal, restore, ignite, and completely reconstruct any soul or circumstance that is less than what God desires for us. Praying for others to experience this type of love given freely by the Spirit means praying with boundless potential for miracles because the experience of this kind of love is nothing short of miraculous. It is no coincidence that the first type of evidence that the Spirit is reigning in our lives is the evidence of this kind of love. Love has to be the foundation for all prayers for others, because if it is not out of love that we are interceding for others, then what we are praying is not out of God’s sincere will for them, and not for us either. 

Spend some time reading through these Scriptures today and as you pray them over your circumstances and the individuals God brings to mind, be intentional about asking God to make His love for you and for them known in your heart and invite His love in to change everything.  

Ideally each participant will go through the study and actually write down their prayers for their people, using the Scriptures pertaining to each characteristic. If you don’t have a journal already, this is the perfect way to start! You don't even have to come up with your own words. Pray the Scriptures over the people God has laid on your heart. Your friend. Your sister. Your neighbor. Your enemy. But don't forget to ask God to shine light in your own heart where you need Him to grow these things in your life as well. The aim here is to equip and encourage you to take the material and apply it to your own prayers and lives, with full confidence that God will show up and do what He does best!  Let’s do this! 

QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION: 
Is there evidence of the kind of love inspired and commanded by Christ in YOUR life? What does that kind love look like? On a scale of 1-10, how  do you think you are doing on loving people well? Are your prayers for others grounded in God’s love for them?