Without Jesus, I would be dead because it is in Him that I live and move and have my being. Re Acts 17:28
Think about it! Just as a baby lives and moves and has its being inside the womb of its Mother.
Without daily prayer, and communion with Christ and without abiding in Him and He in us, we are as dead Christians. So why do we wonder that our prayers are not answered. Why do we not understand why there is no power in our lives or in our prayers when we do pray. Some of us claim to have been saved for 30 years or more, yet we have never won even one soul.
Some of us complain that God never answers our prayers. "God doesn't hear me when I pray." Yet we completely overlook a very simple verse in John chapter 15 verse 16. "Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, THAT you should go and bring forth fruit, and THAT your fruit should remain: THAT whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in My Name, He may give it you." In the mood and tense used here, in the English, the word "that" clearly is used to express "Purpose".
So the suggestion here is that the words of Christ indicate that if we do not produce fruit we have no reason to expect our prayers to be answered. And we know what the fruit of the Spirit is.
This verse seems also to suggest that, at least, one of the reasons God "elected" us was for the expressed purpose of bearing fruit; that is winning others to Christ, and that the reason we are to be obedient to our calling is multifaceted, but for sure, we are to win others SO THAT our prayers will be answered.
Think about it! Just as a baby lives and moves and has its being inside the womb of its Mother.
Without daily prayer, and communion with Christ and without abiding in Him and He in us, we are as dead Christians. So why do we wonder that our prayers are not answered. Why do we not understand why there is no power in our lives or in our prayers when we do pray. Some of us claim to have been saved for 30 years or more, yet we have never won even one soul.
Some of us complain that God never answers our prayers. "God doesn't hear me when I pray." Yet we completely overlook a very simple verse in John chapter 15 verse 16. "Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, THAT you should go and bring forth fruit, and THAT your fruit should remain: THAT whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in My Name, He may give it you." In the mood and tense used here, in the English, the word "that" clearly is used to express "Purpose".
So the suggestion here is that the words of Christ indicate that if we do not produce fruit we have no reason to expect our prayers to be answered. And we know what the fruit of the Spirit is.
This verse seems also to suggest that, at least, one of the reasons God "elected" us was for the expressed purpose of bearing fruit; that is winning others to Christ, and that the reason we are to be obedient to our calling is multifaceted, but for sure, we are to win others SO THAT our prayers will be answered.
