Mike Walsh

I have a distinct memory as a 5-year-old boy asking God what the difference is between heaven and hell. I remember not being surprised that he answered me in a way that only a 5-year-old could understand and he gave me a real assurance that he was there! 

It does great things to a 5-year-old to find out that God is really real and that he wants to have fellowship with his creation. I was satisfied with his answer, I understood clearly that I wanted to go to heaven when I die. God gives us this wonderful thing called prayer! It is a lifeline for us!  Prayer is a wonderful privilege. God has opened the door to his throne room and invited us to enter his presence with our petitions and to have a living relationship with himself.  

In Acts 12, we see the story of increasing persecution of the early church and that King Herod had taken Peter and put him in jail with the plan to kill him after the Passover. Herod had killed James (the brother of John) and some were very happy about it, so he felt empowered. The early church was living in a time of great fear and concern. They gathered together to pray for Peter that God would do a miracle. It was going to take a miracle; they had 16 soldiers guarding Peter in the jail, his hands and feet were in chains and they had guards at the door leading into the jail. 

Acts 12:5 says, “Peter was therefore kept in prison, but constant prayer was offered to God for him by the church.”  

His friends and brothers and sisters in Christ offered continual, focused, fervent prayer for Peter! Acts 12 tells of the account of how an angel appeared in Peter’s cell, unlocked his hands and feet, led him out of the jail and into the street where he was able to go his way. He went to the house where his friends were praying for him, but when he knocked on the door, they didn’t believe that it was possible for it to be Peter, since he was locked up tight in prison. They didn’t even believe that God could do the very thing that they were asking of him. 

How often do we as God’s people do that very thing in that we pray for a miracle, but when it comes right down to it, we don’t really believe that God can or will do what we’re asking him. James 5:16b says, “The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.” If this is true, and we are his people who are called righteous because of Jesus’ blood. We need to take God at his word and storm heaven for those who need his help and healing and simply believe that he is the God who answers prayer. I just wanted to remind us that God is here for us continually, just waiting for us to ask.

In I John 5:14-15 it says, “Now this is the confidence that we have in him, that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. And if we know that he hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of him.” NKJV

(Mike Walsh is the Pastor at Glad Tidings Assembly of God.)