Doubt hinders prayer, how to beat doubt, doubt your doubts, ignite your faith, prayers that get answered.
Joyce Meyer, one of the world’s leading practical Bible teachers and New York Times best-selling author, shares encouragement and advice to help us enjoy our daily lives.
With a heart to share Christ and love people, Joyce’s messages help people in all walks of life to grow in their faith, learn to study the Bible, find healing from the wounds of life, get answers to life’s questions and encounter the love of God in a powerful way.
now the first thing i want to talk about
today
is doubt and how doubt
affects us in getting answer to prayer
james 1 5-8 james chapter 1 verse 5
through 8. if any of you is deficient in
wisdom
which i think is probably most of us
let him ask of the giving god
who gives to everyone that includes you
liberally that means way more than
enough
and ungrudgingly he doesn’t resent
helping us
he likes to do it without reproach
and fault finding well i could sit and
just look at this scripture for a long
time
so when i come to god even though maybe
some of the messes in my life
are of my own making they came through
my own lack of wisdom
i got myself in trouble i didn’t listen
to god to start with i didn’t follow
peace
i can still even in the midst of that i
can go to god
and ask him to help me and he won’t even
reproach me
which means shame or blame
and he doesn’t find fault with me
he just helps me now that doesn’t mean
he doesn’t teach me and train me
and correct me but one of the examples
that i’ve used many times
is if you have a child
that has not done all their chores this
week but their outside plan and the
neighborhood bully gets after them
and you hear them screaming for help
you’re not going to go check their list
of chores to see if they got all their
check marks
otherwise just too bad for them i mean
you
if the door is not open you may go
through it to get outside to help your
kid
are you hearing me amen
and that doesn’t mean that you won’t
correct them later about their chores
that doesn’t mean that you might not
even
you know tell them they can’t go outside
for a day or something
but you will not refuse
to help your children because they are
not perfect
and don’t do everything exactly the way
you want them to
so stop letting the devil steal from you
by thinking that you dare not ask god
to help you because you have not done
everything that you should do
just own it
amen
only it must be in faith that he asked
with no wavering no hesitating no
doubting for the one who wavers
hesitates and doubts is like the
billowing surge out at sea
that is blown hither and tethered and
tossed
by the wind for truly let not such a
person imagine that he’ll receive
anything he asked for from the lord for
being as he is a man of two minds
hesitating dubious irresolved he is
unstable and unreliable and uncertain
about everything he thinks feels
and decides now doubt leaves us midway
between
believing and not believing and
this says we’re not to become people of
two minds
and so the bible talks about the mind of
the spirit and the mind of the flesh
and i think we have to learn how to live
by the mind of the spirit
and that’s really like what you sense
down in here
so there are times when i can believe
something with my heart
but the enemy is going to use my mind
to try to steal my faith now are you
with me
so i am not going to stand here and tell
you that i have some nifty message that
i can
give you a little three-point sermon on
how you can
never have doubt again
because to be honest with you doubt
comes to all of us
and i’ve thought about this quite a bit
because i just really don’t like to give
people answers that i don’t think will
work
and so i’ve thought about this because
there’s times when
when i have doubts sometimes when i’m up
here preaching and maybe
you know i’m not getting the right
reaction i think i should i’ll hear the
enemy say
this is not the right message and while
i’m preaching to you i have to tell him
to shut up
and i have to go back to my own heart of
yes this is right
i prayed about this i sought god about
this and i’m not going to stand up here
and be
double-minded
it is important that we believe
all the way through to the manifestation
and i can pretty much promise you that
doubt is going to come against your mind
but that’s when you need to go back to
the mind of the spirit
and very often go back to scripture
what does the word say you see it
doesn’t matter how i feel
it doesn’t matter what i think it
doesn’t matter what people say
it doesn’t really matter even what my
circumstances are
the only thing that really matters is
what does the word
say
this is what it means to walk by the
word
so what i want to strongly recommend
is when you’re standing in faith for
something or you’ve asked god for
something and
it’s just not happening i mean let’s
just say you’re believing god for one of
your children’s salvation
and the more you pray the worse they act
well you know that’s not really uncommon
because what happens when you pray and
this may be something you’ve never
thought of
when we pray for somebody else god
begins to deal with them
and i don’t know about you but i don’t
always act real pretty when god’s
dealing with me
and so it is very possible that when you
start praying for somebody
they can act worse than they did
and then what the devil wants you to
think is well that sure isn’t working
but what you need to say and i’m saying
say because we need to use our mouth for
right stuff
in a time like that what you need to say
you can just take your doubts
and head back to hell where you came
from because
because it is god’s will that all should
be saved i have prayed
and i believe that god is working
in my behalf right now
and not only will that help the answer
come through but here’s a really good
benefit
you stay happy and excited in the
meantime
everybody’s exciting excited when
they’re expecting a breakthrough
at any moment that’s what it means to
live with hope
a positive expectation that something
good is about to happen
any moment instead of waking up and
saying i’d read the day i’d read it
we need to wake up and think i can’t
hardly wait to see what god does today
mark 11 23 and 24 says truly i tell you
whoever says to this mountain
be lifted up and thrown into the sea and
does not doubt it all in his heart
doesn’t even really say that doubt won’t
come to your mind but does not doubt it
all in his heart but believes that what
he says will take place
it will be done for him
for this reason i’m telling you whatever
you ask for in prayer believe trust and
be confident
that it is granted to you and you will
get it
now we talked about this last night i
need to believe i’ve got it before i see
it
did you hear me we need to believe we’ve
got it
before we see it and boy is that hard
for people
who are not accustomed to living like
this
how can you believe what you don’t see
well because we have two lives we’ve got
a spiritual life and we’ve got a natural
fleshly life
and the spiritual part of us cannot be
seen it operates in an unseen realm
where there are unseen yet wonderful
amazing things happening
and when god suddenly does something in
your life that doesn’t mean that that
was when he started working on it
god is already working in your behalf
[Applause]
you know it’s like little kids play
their
pretend games
have their little invisible friends well
you know what we’ve got an invisible
friend too
i love it don’t you and i talked to my
invisible friend
okay now this is such a cool scripture
second corinthians 4 13.
yet we have the same spirit of faith as
he had who wrote
i have believed and therefore have i
spoken
we too believe and therefore we speak
so what i’m saying is when doubt comes
open up your mouth
and confess what you’re believing not
the lie the devil is telling you
just because a crook knocks on your door
that doesn’t mean you have to let him in
[Applause]
amen
and then here’s another facet to doubt
if we know very much about god at all to
be honest we rarely ever doubt that god
can do something
but we doubt that he will do it for us
it’s easier sometimes to tell somebody
else what god’s going to do for them
and believe it for them than it is to
believe it for ourselves and that’s
because
we look at all of our mistakes
and i’m not saying that we live sloppy
lives and don’t care about
how we live and that you know god just
brushes over everything i’m not saying
that at all
god is merciful but i’m talking about
somebody whose heart is right toward god
and and you know i make mistakes
matter of fact i doubt that there’s a
day that goes by that i don’t make
mistakes
but i’ll tell you the truth and i’m
sorry if this upsets you but i am not
focused on what’s wrong with me
you know why because i wasted too many
years of my life
focused on what was wrong with me and
just taking an inventory of every little
thing that was wrong with me and i gave
that up
because whatever i am i am in christ and
whatever i’m not
i’m still in christ
and if i do anything good it’s because
he enabled me and if i do anything bad
then he’s the only one that can forgive
me
and i want god’s conviction i want to
know when i’m doing wrong things
i i mean i thank god when he shows me
now joyce you had a bad attitude in that
situation
thank you god i do i thank him
because i lived in darkness and
ignorance for too many years going
around mistreating people and not even
knowing i was doing it
but see the only way you can thank god
for showing you what’s wrong with you
is if you’re not condemned by it i said
the only way you can thank god for
showing you what’s wrong with you
is if you’re not condemned by it
we hope you enjoyed this teaching to get
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