Listening to What God Says During Your Prayer Time

I've been working with a scripture, John 10:9 DLNT, where Jesus says, “I am the door. If anyone enters through Me, he will be saved. And he will go in and go out, and he will find pasture."

I've focused on the word ‘door’, giving you other scriptures to recognize that the door is really the door of your heart, not just the literal door of a house or a room, but the room of what is in your heart. Do you believe this is where Jesus resides? When you receive Him as your personal savior, in the awakening of that, are you abiding with Him? Is He abiding with you? Or, for example, when you pray for something, are you essentially praying as if He's out there hoping He hears you, or are you praying as if you're speaking to yourself?

Then, saying to yourself, "But wait a second, He's right here with me now."  He's in this room because God goes with me wherever I am. He is omnipresent, and he's omniscient, so where is He not? How often, though, when you listen to people pray or have a conversation with God, does it come across more as if... Let's say you're talking to somebody at a table, you're talking to your spouse, and they may be looking at you, but the way you're talking, it's as if they're not really in the room. It's coming across more as, "Oh, I hope someday that we do this. Oh, I can't wait for him or her to come visit." 

You look at them strangely, saying out loud to them, "But I'm right here." Or have you ever talked to somebody, and looked in their eyes, and you can tell they're not hearing a word that you're saying? You want to stop talking, or say something crazy like, "I think I'll go jump off the bridge,” and they respond, "Oh, that's nice," confirming they did not really hear you.

Often, we don't have listening, speaking, or communication skills because of our society, social media, the internet, and email. We've lost an awful lot of that. We don't realize the importance and value of one-on-one conversation, and we also lose it in our conversations with God.

This is the conversation Jesus shares in John 10:9 when He says, "I am the door. I'm the door to your heart." Be open. Let your heart be vulnerable before me. You don't need to hold anything back. I am not surprised. There's nothing you can hide from me because I am right there with you, and I want to fellowship with you.

But not just in fellowship, as "Hey friend, how are you doing? Nice day. Let's talk about the weather." He already knows the weather. He wants to talk about your burdens, but He also wants to laugh with you. So that, as I said in my previous videos of this series, my mission work of reclaiming the lands that the enemy had stolen on the Native American grounds of Arizona and Utah this past summer. The awakening of it was that it's just God and me. My niece was with me, but we would often walk on our own. There were many times when I would sit in silence, just me and God. 

I would be having conversations with Him, and He would be having conversations with me. I would hear Him say, "Look over there. I've got a little purple flower over there I want you to see, it's waiting for you to acknowledge it." Or "Look over to your right, and you'll see this beautiful stone in the midst of another stone that you would have missed. You would've walked by it really easily." 

You see, when we see those things in nature, there is a divine calling on our life in that moment to be the divine presence all of creation is waiting to see with urgency (Romans 8:19). Oftentimes, we must get away in nature to calm our spirit to be the manifestation of the sons/daughters of God. We love the woods, streams, soothing rivers, or maybe the roar of ocean waves. but that's how it should be with humanity. 

If you're in a crowd and there's so much noise going on, there should be a place where you become the light of the world among the crowd. And that your light is shining so brightly and beautifully in a radiance of glory because Christ is in you. The remaining noise isn't present, and everyone else is safe.

So that's where we get to this word ‘door’ connected to being saved. Saved is past tense, so it's an already done deal. The word ‘saved’ in Greek is the word ‘sozo.’ It comes from the Strong 5982g. It means Jesus is your deliverer from your past. But He has also preserved you for your future. Included in the past and future is the present, that He is also your healer, desiring to make you whole. Sozo means to be saved, healed, and delivered.

Now, what part of that ‘sozo’ do you want? Do you want to be delivered from the enemy, and now you're on your own? Or do you also want to be healed of whatever your emotional, your soul issue, your relationship issues, or your body issues are dealing with? Do you want to be healed and totally delivered? See, all of that's available.

What about being whole? How whole do you want to be? Do you want to be like a baby? Do you want to be whole again, like you were maybe 18? Whole, like you were at 40? What does wholeness look like?

Many of us are waiting to go to heaven for our glorified bodies because we believe we will get new bodies. However, we often limit what that looks like by using imagery of having certain possessions or qualities. We ask ourselves, 'When was my peak time?' Usually, it's when we are 20, 25, or 30 that we feel and look our best. That period of life often becomes the image we hold of our glorified heavenly body. But what we don't realize is that our glorified heavenly body is part of one body called Christ. 

That's what Paul tells us in his letters to the Corinthians. In that one body called Christ, we are many members. Now, think of conversations the cells in your body are having. Your blood cells, muscle cells, nerve cells, skin cells, and your organ cells – they are all talking to each other in a language exclusive to them.

They're not speaking English, but a language of the body. In doing so, they're trying their best to be fully functional for the fullness of the body. Our glorified body is to be in full function for the body of Christ, not for Audrey. Not for you in the flesh. That's what being whole means. So that when we use this word SOZO, meaning saved, delivered, healed, preserved, and whole, entire in the essence of you are a new creation in Christ. 

The old man is gone, and all things are new. Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 5 that you are that new creation today. That new creation that has the heavenly realm in you is not about your physical body’s attractiveness. No, it is about Christ and His glorification being manifested in and through you. The hunger, the thirst, and the desire for Christ in you to have that flowing for creation, to be the gardener of the earth, to keep it, and to nurture it, and to bring healing to the hurt.

See, we're supposed to be doing the greater works for the kingdom of God than what Jesus did. That means we are supposed to be not only healing people and saving people, but we're supposed to be raising the dead. In Matthew 10, Jesus sent out His disciples on an assignment to share the good news of the Gospel. He told them that when they go out to the lost sheep of the house of Israel, they were to share with the people that the kingdom of heaven is at hand.

The interesting thing about this situation is that Jesus had not yet gone to the cross. He had not died, gone to the grave, or been raised from the dead. There was no resurrection here. Yet He's giving authority before the cross to His disciples for this to be their assignment. They were to share that the kingdom of heaven was now on the earth. 

Is that what we're hearing from the body of Christ? The Five-Fold ministry, the evangelists, apostles, prophets, teachers, and pastors, that the kingdom of God is at hand, and it's at hand today.

In Matthew 10:8 MSG, “Jesus sent his twelve harvest hands out with this charge: 'Don’t begin by traveling to some far-off place to convert unbelievers. And don’t try to be dramatic by tackling some public enemy. Go to the lost, confused people right here in the neighborhood. Tell them that the kingdom is here. Bring health to the sick. Raise the dead. Touch the untouchables. Kick out the demons. You have been treated generously, so live generously.”

That's what my assignment was. I didn't bring anything with me, nor did I ask anyone to donate to my mission trip to sow seeds or anything like that. I don't do that in my videos or on my website because God provides. And when God provides, you end up blessing the person who's blessing you. Not because I must ask for it, but because God will provide if He's given me the assignment, and He'll do the same for you. He does it at your workplace. He does it when you buy groceries. He does it when you go for a walk. I play pickleball regularly, and He often uses me with this assignment on the courts. He did it during my cancer treatments, at every doctor’s visit, and at every radiation and chemotherapy session.

Each time, He would always say that the kingdom of God is at hand, and I was on an assignment to have those around me blessed with His presence. 

You are on an assignment today. He is the door of your heart to come in and out. In doing so, the glory of the Lord will shine forth on this earth. The world is already filled with the glory of God. It is in His DNA, found in His name. In His Kind, He created in His thoughts before the creation of the world. “Blessed be His glorious name forever! And let the whole earth be filled with His glory. Amen and Amen” (Psalm 72:19 NKJV). 

Look for the hidden treasures of Christ within people. The Holy Spirit will help you discern the intent of the heart. Look for the essence of the Spirit of God hidden in His name in their identity: Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, faithfulness, goodness, and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23). With any of these essences, the Holy Spirit in you can spark the Holy Spirit in them, transforming them with the renewing of their hearts, activating Jesus Christ to move and have His presence known in them.

This is our assignment. We often share the message, “They just need Jesus,” but when they don’t see Jesus in us, we must ask ourselves why. Maybe it is our hearts that need to be more like the works Jesus did while walking on the earth before the cross. Jesus did not judge because the Father did not judge (John 5:22). Jesus only did what He saw the Father do. It was the religion at the time that was bringing judgment to the people. Our job is to bless others with the ministry of reconciliation (2 Corinthians 5:18). 

Our hands were meant to have the healing touch of the Father’s love and blessings to the world around us. Our thoughts become the action we send out, the assignment Jesus spoke of for us to love our enemies (Matthew 5:44). The Lord will give you a veil covering of that same love in three folds: The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. This amazing love and blessings are the fullness of glory veiled over you, protecting you as you walk through walls. 

I'm talking about walls of emotions, walls of rejection, walls of insecurity, walls that dominate and control who you think you are. Love will help you to walk right through that. That's what he was telling the disciples in Matthew 10. Don't worry about it if they don't receive you because it's the Holy Spirit's job to quicken their hearts, not yours. 

Your job is to release the kingdom of righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost within you. The Holy Ghost is what they need to see. How do they learn if they cannot see? You are the door. You are the blessed one, and you have an assignment to go out and bring the good news of the Gospel that the kingdom of God is at hand; it is now. 

Not a gospel of a sinner saved by grace, but a gospel that says who the Son has set free is free indeed, and that's you...bone of His bone, and flesh of His flesh to do the Father’s business on the earth. Jesus showed us what that assignment is. Now it is up to us to open the door of our heart to release the Kingdom of God to the world -Righteousness, Peace, and Joy in the Holy Ghost, unveiling the Father’s Love. 

“As He is, so are we today in this world,” (1 John 4:17 NIV).