I’ve been reading a book lately by Perry Stone called Exposing Satan’s Playbook. In one of the later chapters he discusses how people become weak in their faith and prayer. He explains one of the signs of this is if someone is going through a difficult time such as sickness or financial burden that they go to others and ask them to pray for them, but they don’t pray for themselves. Often when you do this you may not get where you want to which can lead people to lose faith in God.

There can be many barriers making someone weak in their prayer. Maybe they aren’t in church as often as they should be. This can be something anyone can fall into with a difficult work schedule who may work rotating shifts and it might be impossible to go to church Sunday mornings and get encouragement from being around others. Even if you cannot make church every Sunday invest in a good devotional or even watch a live-streamed recording.

Other people might be addicted to drugs, alcohol, or simply just living in sin. Number one when you want to ask something from God in prayer you need to not only ask for forgiveness of your sins but for guidance of becoming better and not to continue your sin. Refer to Psalm 119:113 “Keep steady my steps according to your promise, and let no iniquity get domination over me.”

When going into prayer you may want to eliminate distractions as much as you can. For instance, put your phone on mute temporarily. Just your notification sound might cause you to lose focus. See Psalm 119:37 “Turn my eyes from looking at worthless things; and give my life in your ways.”.

It is also important to pray specifically and fervently. You will also not only want to pray for yourself, but also other people. Maybe someone you know lost their job or has cancer. Or simply just pray for God to give guidance to our government leaders and protect our military.

Continually working on your prayer life will help you in your walk with God in the long term. Though what you want may not be according to his plan or may not happen when you want it to. It is important to not get discouraged but continue to keep praying consistently and be open minded to what God is trying to show you.

Moses freeing the Jewish people from Pharaoh arrogant ruler is a very interesting store to read. It is also an important one to know because it shows how God will judge a nation because of the action of its Rulers. I encourage you to read the literature of Johnathan Cahn which talks about judgement in America and how there is a parallel to the Bible. But let’s take a quick glance at what happened with Moses and Pharaoh:

When Moses went to Pharaoh and asked him to release his people, he responded “no”. Little did he know this would bring judgement on him which would affect his nations land and people.

The Plagues.

1. Water Changed to Blood (Exodus 7:14-25)
   God had Moses and Aaron go to Nile River while Pharaoh was bathing. They turned the river into blood. When this happened, Pharaoh had his magicians see whether they could do this, and they could. He continued to decline releasing the people.
2. Frogs (Exodus 8:1-15)
   Seven days later Moses and Aaron went to see Pharaoh again and demanded him to release his people. He declined, then Aaron stretched out his hand and staff. Frogs then came out of the water into the land. Pharaoh declined, but wanted the frogs removed after his magicians were able to produce frogs. Moses promised Pharaoh that they would be removed the following day. Which the following day there were large piles of dead frogs over the land causing a fowl odor. He continued to decline releasing the people.
3. Gnats (Exodus 8:16-19)
   Next Moses had Aaron strike the earth with his staff and create a dust storm, causing Egypt to become gnats and covered the people and animals. This time the magicians could not repeat this plague, they even admitted this was the work of God. Pharaoh still refused to release his people.
4. Flies (Exodus 8:20-32)
   Next flies poured into the homes but did not affect the Jewish people. Moses demanded that Pharaoh released his people, which he did agree to if Moses prayed for the flies to leave. Moses then left and prayed, the flies were gone. But sadly, Pharaoh changed his mind and did not release his people.
5. Livestock- Power of Apis (Exodus 9:1-7)
   Apis was known as the bull god of Egypt with a living personification to Ptah (aka the creator god). Moses predicted that Pharaoh would see a difference between the Hebrew and Egyptian people. Next the living animals died in Egypt, while none died amount the Jews. This still did not result in Pharaoh releasing the people.
6. Boils (Exodus 9:8-12)
   God had Moses grab soot from the furnace and toss it into the air. This resulted in everyone in Egypt breaking out in boils, even the animals! This even affected the magicians. Pharaoh was still stuck in his old ways.
7. Hail (Exodus 9:13-25)
   Moses requested again to Pharaoh to release the people and if he did not God would cause the worst hailstorm against Egypt. Moses raised his hand and hail came down from the sky on Egypt, but none on the Goshen land. This destroyed the crops along Pharaoh’s land. But to no surprise Pharaoh refused to release his people.
8. Locusts (Exodus 10:1-20)
   Moses then threatened Pharaoh that locusts would come and destroy all the green in the land. He still refused. The locusts came and destroyed as promised. At this point Moses has a very high reputation. Pharaoh then began to acknowledge his sin and asked to pray to remove the locusts. Moses and Aaron prayed with Pharaoh, then quickly Pharaoh went back to his old ways and still refused to release the people.
9. Darkness (Exodus 10:21-29)
   This was direct to Ra or Re the sun god of Egypt in confrontation. Moses stretched his hands out and this led to darkness over the land of Egypt but no darkness in the land of Goshen. Egypt was darkened for three days. Pharaoh began to make and agreement and then backed out.  After this plague he told Moses to leave him alone and never to come again. Moses responded along the lines of “As you say I will never appear before you again”.
10. Passover and Angel of Death (Exodus 11 & 12)
    There was so much devastation from the nine plagues. God instructed the man of every household to prepare a lamb, along with hoe to eat it and make bread with no yeast. Everyone was instructed to eat and prepare for the journey ahead. This meal became the start of the Jewish Passover Holiday we celebrate today.  The final plague would be the Angel of Darkness which would kill every first born and animal. This awakened Pharaoh overnight, there was no house without anyone dead in Egypt. Finally, Pharaoh agreed to release the people with their livestock.  He also asked for them to pray for a blessing upon himself.

This shows how God can call judgement on the land. Think of the events that have happened over the course of American history along with the result of our immoral leaders. God is very powerful and can do great harm on a nation and its people. This also gives a brief history of the holiday of Passover, which fits because Passover starts this year on March 30, 2018 and ends on April 7, 2018. Please like and share this blog post with others.

God Bless!