Is any one among you afflicted, ill-treated, suffering evil? He should pray" (James 5:13 AMP).

The Greek word translated afflicted doesn't mean the result of sickness and disease. It means "troubled." If you're in trouble, you need to pray. That's what the Word says. Notice it didn't say your pastor needs to pray for you or your friends need to pray for you. It says you need to pray.

Too often we try to find a quick fix to our problems by asking everyone else to pray for us. There's nothing wrong, of course, with having others pray for you, but you'll never get your life to a place of permanent victory until you begin to pray yourself.

Our church, Brookland Baptist is a very large church with almost 6000 members. How did the church grow to be so large? According to Pastor Jackson, the key is prayer. Not just his prayers, but the prayers of his people. Praying is a way of life in our church. We have a special design prayer room where you can go everyday and pray alone if you so desire. .

Pastor Jackson always put much emphasis on prayer. He always say that when church members are in trouble, when they have marriage problems or problems in their personal life, before anything else is done, those church members are told to pray.

We need to quit training our people to run around asking others to pray for them and train them instead to do their own praying.

You see, if I pray for God to solve one problem for you, you may enjoy success for a while, but then another problem will come along because you'll still be making the same old mistakes that got you in trouble the first time. But if you buckle down and do that praying for yourself, if you discipline yourself to start searching out the things of the Spirit, you'll get permanent answers. You'll learn how to make adjustments in your life that will keep those problems from cropping up again.

If you have made Jesus your Lord, you have access to the throne of Almighty God. He has every solution to every problem you'll ever have, and He's just waiting for you to come to Him so He can give you the answer. It may take some private time alone with Him for you to hear it, but He will never disappoint you.

Don't depend on others to do your praying for you. Go personally to the throne of God today.

Scripture Reading: Psalm 5
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Loretta Coleman
"The Queen"
803-238-2196