Laura’s Comments (group member since Sep 25, 2014)

Laura’s comments from the Intercession & Prophetic Questions & Answers group.

A daily prayer time (conventional prayer, you know... quiet place, focused communion with the Father, a give and take of communication) is what helps me to be in the place of abiding or fellowship. If I'm 'in' then I'm usually talking to God all through the day, thanking Him for what He does for me and praying for those whom I pass by when God drops some insight about them into my mind. I don't mean that I'm constantly in conventional prayer, but that I'm just quickly speaking to the Father as I go through the day, just as if, I guess, He were standing there next to me. And just as simply and without fanfare, He might respond.

I thought that this was going to be pretty easy to explain, but it turns out that it's not! (: Hope that this answers your question.

How I clear the way to abiding on the practical level is the basics; confessing sin as soon as I'm aware of it and listening to the Spirit to help me avoid sinning before it happens. Sin for me these days seems to come at me from the spiritual angle, like judgmental thoughts, a critical spirit, and pride.

It's harder to explain on the spiritual plane, though, Lee Ann. I 'reach' into myself and feel for the Presence of the Lord there where it lives when I am connected to Him. It is a place of overwhelming joy, peace, the spirit of praise and the willingness to obey that is there when I am in fellowship.

If it's not there, then I have to go search through the basics and see where I got out of joint, you know, where sin got in.

Maybe they are actually both the same, because sin anywhere removes the possibility of finding the place of peace and joy. The peace and joy are God's, and the confession and obedience are what puts me in the place that I can experience it.

I've found that as long as I'm abiding, God may speak to me at any time.

Great post from FF, Lee Ann! I love the idea of healing across interdenominational lines.

I haven't read that book, Emily, but it looks really good! Thanks for sharing.

I also pray for the nation. My secondary 'wide angle' prayer focus is for healing the divisions in the church.

I think that this is interesting that we are all three independently praying for the nation! Doesn't it make you wonder how many intercessors there are out there in prayer for America?

Hi Lee,

I like your idea of this being one of the 'now and not yet' situations. What I find exciting about this is the freedom and victory that we can have 'now', even though our physical presence with Christ is 'not yet'.

Gregory, I believe that this is an experience that transcends the imaginary boundaries of church denominations and is experienced by the big C Church, whoever and wherever they are. Therefore, the "corporate entity of what Christianity should be" is currently being lived out by those who are abiding in the presence of God. Or, to put it another way, those who are living out of the presence of God are the Church.

This is pretty deep water, but do you think it means that we are hidden in Christ and live out of that place where His personality and attributes flow through us?

You know, "I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one" (John 17:23).

With me, it's as if a spiritual burden has lifted, almost like a weight is off my chest or shoulders, except it's inside. Sorry, it's hard to put into words. It's like a pressure on my spirit, and when my prayer, um... stint?... is over, it lifts and I know that whatever my prayers were supposed to do, has been done.

I know, me too! Remembering it encourages me now when I pray because you don't always know why you are impelled to pray, but God is moving things, sometimes even on the other side of the world.

I think what you must be looking for is what travailing prayer is to me in general. Usually real, heavy, travailing prayer only lasts part of a day for me. I think that that six hour stint was my longest. I've had it last as little as three or four minutes.

I've been called to pray for some people for years, but only certain much shorter times of that was what I would consider travailing prayer.

Travailing prayer usually feels like a weight, or a pressure, to me. I feel heavy with the need to pray. I might cry out, "Oh, God, Oooooooh, God!" so I guess that is like groaning, but I've never experienced actual groaning yet. Sometimes I burst into tears and sob for the person for whom I'm praying.

Sometimes for days or weeks after the actual time of travailing prayer I feel a milder need to pray again, sort of a 'touch up' prayer to protect the person and help them continue walking in their victory.

If I know the person well, I'll sometimes ask something like, "What was going on on Thursday?", but I usually keep it between God and I because sometimes I get personal insights into the one I'm praying for and it's not the Spirit's moment to mention it.

What it is like for you?

That's what I thought you meant. I'm not very ooky-spooky, either, (: but it can be surprising how strong the need to pray is.

When both my son-in-law and daughter were in the Navy I had a frightening dream/vision that woke me out of a sound sleep in the middle of the night. I saw my son-in-law standing on the deck of his ship and a horrible, long, tube-shaped thing descending toward him. It was an elongated cylinder with a skull on the front end. The skull's jaw was ajar and hanging at a crooked angle, grotesquely open (I can still see it in my mind). It had a woman's long flowing brown hair streaming back and it was laughing wildly.

I woke up, breathless and crushed with the need to pray. I prayed for, I don't know how long, maybe a half an hour, when the pressure lifted and I was able to go back to sleep.

The evening of that next day my daughter told me that my son-in-law had been manning the gun on the deck of his ship in the Persian Gulf when one of our submarines tried to dive underneath his ship. The pilot misgauged the depth and hit the hull of my son-in-law's ship. Both ships were able to make it to harbor, but had to be dry-docked for for repairs. This happened at the same time as I had been woken to pray.

Could you explain exactly what you mean by 'travailing prayer', Leeann?

It lasted for about six hours. After that, as suddenly as the burden descended, it lifted. I could even feel it lift, it was almost a physical weight. I knew that the matter that I had been praying over had been settled and I was free to return to normal.

I remember one time when I was at work and I got hit with a heavy prayer burden. I kept finding myself praying out loud without meaning to, and was so overwhelmed by the need to pray that I almost couldn't focus on where I actually was.