As you pray, remember that the Lord is not going to answer prayer according to your concept.

He will answer far beyond anything you can imagine.

So, be sure not to limit God in prayer. I have heard people outline and describe to the Lord how the situation should be addressed. I have also heard people pray specifically about situations that they know nothing about - perhaps there has been a secondhand prayer request. How dangerous it is to just take the ball and run.

We must pray according to God's Word. He can not be put in a box, and He never does the same thing twice.

If you are praying for a job for someone, that is wonderful. If you are praying for a specific job for that person, you must have a witness of the Holy Spirit that the job is the will of God for that person. Otherwise, you must pray for for the will of God with regard to the person's job.

Soldier of The Cross, we are told to pray about specifics. I have often prayed for things I did not know the Lord would bring - a free church, certain pieces of furniture, money for a particular trip and many other things.

When it comes to the lives of others, simply be careful. Do not pray, for example, that the Lord would put someone's child in a specific college. Instead, the issue is the will of God, and the eagerness of involved parties to submit to His will.

If you have found you have participated in gossip, tread carefully. You are already on thin ice and you must confess your sin before you pray about the thing you have just heard.

Being accepted in Christian circles should never determine the direction of prayer.

God's Word is the only Standard.

The more you obey the Lord, the more natural obedience becomes.

The Lord has not merely asked for the difficult. He has asked the impossible - that is, impossible for the flesh.

The flesh can not love God with everything. The flesh can not resist telling a lie. The flesh can not abandon covetousness. The flesh can not love its neighbor more than itself.

Hallelujah, we who are His have the Indwelling Holy Spirit. There is power - supernatural power to obey the Lord.

Because we have been born into the Kingdom of His Dear Son, the Kingdom of Light, and because we are adopted sons, adopted into the Royal Race, we can obey.

We respond to The Word. We respond in prayer. We resist the enemy by simply choosing God's Word Because He Is!

Each choice that is made in agreement with God qualifies as obedience, and it sets a vector. The next choice either maintains the vector or compromises it. When the choices line up with His Word, there is momentum to the vector that allows the believer to walk in the Light as He is in the Light. The dark insecurities fall into the shadows and the vision of heaven is far more real than self-image or rejection.

Soldier of The Cross, neither to the left, nor to the right. Set your face like flint. He will cut the path.

You will stand alone before the Lord.

You will account for your actions and your words. Your works will be tested by fire. They will burn or they will stand. You will not have any reasons or excuses.

Nothing will be found to be the fault of any other person. You will stand alone before Him.

So, stand before Him now. Make your decisions according to the Word of God. You may not acquiesce to a lesser standard. You may not compromise integrity to please someone else.

You may not choose a less resistant path, just because it is asked of you or because you are passive. You may not bend in an ungodly direction to please the sinful.

No one has ever been won to Christ by the drawing down of the Christian flag.

Soldier of The Cross, keep your eye on the Goal. Make sure your day is about His Word, His Life, His Own and His agenda.

Do more than you feel you can do. Do more than you think you can do. Step out and love one who you think you could never love.

Invest in eternity.

The character of God is profoundly attractive to the Soldier of The Cross.

While our God is mighty, sovereign, omniscient, omnipresent, holy and much else, He is also loving, tender, and merciful.

The Lord is not a buddy or a chum. But He is responsive to you beyond any human concept.

He listens.

If you let Him in, He will come in to the very center of your heart and He will sit down and fellowship with you. He has said so.

Soldier, learn to enjoy God. In order to do so, it is necessary to bring His availability to the foreground of prayer.

After all, He died for you before you cared. He went after you. He revealed Himself and then He wooed you.

He is not a Gauntlet. He is the Lover of Your Soul.

Make sure you are investing in eternity.

Where have your thoughts been today? Problem solving? Worry? Regrets?

Soldier of The Cross, be a forward-looking Christian. There is no benefit from worry. There is no benefit from fear. There is no benefit from guilt.

What does God's Word say? Where should your treasure be? Where, in fact, is it?

Are there influences in your life that would distract you from The Goal?

You must talk to Him about it. Ask for a vision of eternity.

No Believer has ever been spared this attack. God's Word sheds light on all issues of life, including eternal treasure.

This must be a deliberate decision. It must be based on The Word of God. You must tell Him that you trust Him far more than you trust your own ability to interpret circumstances.

Life is less than fleeting.

Eternity is without measure.

Be willing to stand alone on the Word of God.

You must not believe something because someone else believes it. You must not believe something because of an emotional appeal. You must not believe something because it fills a void.

You must believe only because you have experienced. You know you have been touched by His Hand.

Soldier of The Cross, belief is of no value. There are children who are encouraged to believe in Santa Claus and the tooth fairy. Neither one exists.

Members of cults believe what they are told to believe. They are seduced into belief.

We who are His know that He lives, because we have been born into the Kingdom of His Dear Son. The Kingdom of Light. Belief has nothing to do with anything.

Soldier, do not persuade the mind. Introduce the lost to Jesus.

There is genuine suffering in the world.

Many are persecuted, starving or ill. Without question, the death of a loved one brings a deep grief that is painfully lonely.

For many Christians, suffering is self-induced. Elisabeth Elliot says suffering is simply having something you do not want, or wanting something you do not have.

We have a protection against a great deal of the suffering the enemy would like to inflict. The Holy Spirit has instructed us to govern our thoughts. To lead them away, captive.

When the mind begins weaving around what could have been, fantasy begins to seep in. Solid ground becomes quicksand. The stance slackens and the pace slows. Slowly, the painful process of self-examination eats away at the soul. The leading of the Lord is obscured by wishing and longing for things that can not be relived.

The days and hours are lost. Depression and weariness and wishing become haunting and there is no release without repentance and, often, corporate prayer.

Anger, resentment and jealousy do the same thing. They produce a life of fantasy. The imaginings bring feeling and the soulish believer lives as though the fantasy were real. And speech and action begin to take on the color of the paranoid thoughts that have been festering.

Again, the result is usually depression and an intense need to persuade others of the truth of the thing that is in actuality, only a paranoid fantasy.

Much suffering that is not physical, is the result of an ungodly thought life.

What has happened to you? When the initial sting has passed, there is always choice. Even in grief, the pain is sweeter when there is an agreement with God about the matter.

Soldier of The Cross, you are not expected to wear a smarmy grin and deny pain or hardship.

You are expected to let Him have His way. You are expected to allow Him to do whatever He needs to in order to bring about His own likeness in you.

You are expected to identify with His sufferings.

Take courage. Remember that He loves you enough to allow the things that have been in your life and that are there now.

No wound-licking. No whining in the mind. No fantasy conversations. No plans to even the score.

Look up and move on!

Soldier of The Cross, you must be aware of your thoughts.

The battle is in the mind, and we are instructed to regulate thoughts. We are even told what to think about - Philippians 4:8.

If there is no prayer, there is no power to be alert to the thought life. There is no recognition of the gap between where the thoughts are and where they should be.

We are to take each thought captive and lead it away. If there is no prayer, there is no vision as to how to expel thoughts that do not line up with the whole of God's Word.

Without God's Word, there is no skill in prayer. We know the Holy Spirit , but He leads according to The Word. Little skill in the word results in little power in prayer.

While the enemy can attack physically, he far prefers to flood the believer's mind with things that cause irritation, worry, fear and guilt.

God's Word is more real than the way that you feel. Line up your thoughts with His.

The one who spends private time in prayer aloud, has a bearing that reflects heaven.

It is not possible to recognize the Lord or have a radiant relationship with the Him if any of the components are missing.

It is easier to study than it is to pray. It is easier to serve than it is to pray. It is easier to go to meetings than it is to pray.

In fact, it is almost easier to give the body to be burned than it is to pray.

So, pray. Pray aloud. Tell Him what you love about Him. What you love about His people and His Word.

Sing to Him.

Interceded for others. Ask Him to do the deepest work in your heart.

Don't tell Him how to do it.

Know that He is listening and responding.

Then, studies bring a new dimension. Service becomes an expression of Rivers of Living Water. Meetings become a bathing of His feet in perfume.

Sacrifice is dwarfed, and the victim mentality is flushed away.

Pray. Pray

The Lord has no limits.

There is no lack, no defense, no weapon, no threat, no lie, that can thwart the Lord. The Rock of Ages can not be moved by human force. He is only moved by prayer.

Soldier of The Cross, we look forward to eternity. We obey the One whose Touch we have experienced and whose voice woos us.

There are many who know the content of the Bible. There are fewer who know the Author. There are even fewer who know how to pray - how to agree with God, and how to ask according to His will instead of praying according to circumstances.

Praying for drought? Praying for rain?

Present the situation to the God for whom nothing is impossible.