Chapter 4 United Prayer Gets Results – Praying To Get Results

And being let go, THEY WENT TO THEIR OWN COMPANY, and reported all that the chief priests and elders had said unto them.

And when they heard that, they lifted up their voice to God with one accord, and said, Lord, thou art God, which hast made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all that in them is…

And now, Lord, behold their threatenings: and grant unto thy servants, that with all boldness they may speak thy word, By stretching forth thine hand to heal; and that signs and wonders may be done by the name of thy holy child Jesus.

—Acts 4:23,24,29,30

It’s good to be among friends when you’re in trouble. It’s good to be with people who know how to pray. Peter and John found this to be true.
One day, as Peter and John passed through the Gate Beautiful on their way to the Temple, they saw a man who sat there daily to beg alms. Peter told the man, “Look on us.” The beggar looked up, expecting to receive some coins. Peter said, “. . . Silver and gold have I none; but such as I have give I thee: In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up
and walk” (Acts 3:6).

Peter took the beggar by the hand and lifted him up. The man began to walk and went into the Temple “. . . walking and leaping, and praising God.” Peter and John were arrested, threatened, and commanded to preach and teach no more in the Name of Jesus.
We read in Acts 4:23-30 what happened when they were released. “And being let go, they went to their own company, and reported all that the chief priests and elders had said unto them….”

It was good to be among friends who knew how to pray!

If this company of believers had been like some people in churches today, they would have appointed a committee to make some kind of deal whereby they could get along together. After all, these chief priests and elders were religious people, too.

Although they didn’t accept Jesus as Messiah, they believed in the same God, in prayer, and in going to the Temple.

But this company of believers didn’t appoint any committee; they didn’t make any deals. They “lifted up their voice to God with one accord.” There’s power in united prayer.

Coming from different church backgrounds, sometimes we’re used to doing things a certain way. Sometimes we think the way we’ve always done them is the way they ought to be done. I was raised in a Southern Baptist church and was not accustomed to hearing people pray out loud in united prayer.

Usually in our church, an individual led in prayer, but we never lifted our voices as a congregation.

My grandmother, however, had been saved many years before in an old-fashioned Methodist Campmeeting, so she was accustomed to hearing people pray out loud.

Later, when some Full Gospel people came to our town and put up a tent, my grandmother went to their meetings. She told me I should go, too. I already had been saved and healed, although I never had heard the name “Full Gospel” before.

I stopped by one night and stood outside the tent listening to the message. The next week I went by and went inside the tent for the whole service. After the minister had preached, he came back through the crowd, shaking hands with people and asking if they were Christians. Practically everyone he talked to went to the altar. He asked me if I were a Christian. I told him I was a minister. He told me to go to the altar and pray because it wouldn’t hurt me. Then he went on.

We didn’t do things that way in our church. For a moment, I felt a bit insulted. I never had heard of prayer hurting anybody, so I went down and prayed. But I was bothered because they did all their praying out loud and I did mine quietly.

A church was built from this revival, and I went to the services because they stimulated my faith. But when I would go down to the altar to pray, I would move far away from the others. One time I ventured to tell them God wasn’t hard of hearing. They replied He wasn’t nervous, either!

As I got to thinking, I remembered that these people knew about divine healing and my church didn’t. And they were right about divine healing. They might know some other things I didn’t know.

I decided to read through the Book of Acts and underline with red pencil everywhere two or more prayed in a group. I was going to see how they did it back then.

As I read through Acts underlining these Scriptures, I couldn’t find a single place where there was a group and one person was called on to lead in prayer. I also couldn’t find sentence prayers or anything like that. I found the Bible said they lifted their voices. They all prayed at once, and they all prayed out loud!

The next time I went to the Full Gospel services, I got right in the middle of them when they prayed.

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