Why You Keep Quitting Your Prayer Life (And How to Fix It Forever)

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Transcript

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Welcome to the Success by the Book Podcast, the place where Christians who want to experience the extravagant goodness of God in all areas of their lives come from mentorship. I am your host, Dr. Inna, and I'll be unpacking the secrets I have learned from the Word of God over the last two decades. Let's dive in. You don't really struggle to pray. Your prayer life is being resisted, right? It's not that, oh, there's something wrong with me, I can't pray, because you love God, your spirit loves to pray. The issue is there is an enemy called Satan who understands that if I can just stop them from praying, things will go better for me, right? I want you to think about it. What is prayer? Prayer is you, human, you that has all the weakness and all the limitations and all of that, inviting the great big God to come into your life. That's what prayer is. And so now all of a sudden you have access to his wisdom, access to his power, access to his favor, his intervention, the angels are moving on your behalf and all of that. If you were Satan, you would stop you from praying. Right? And so you don't struggle to pray, your prayer life is being resisted. And today we are going to figure out how to overcome that resistance so we can become people who pray consistently. All right. And let me put this in context because before I learned what I'm going to show you today, I struggled to pray. And this is as a pastor's wife, this is as somebody who'd been a believer for over 10 years. And I would find myself, I prayed today, I'd kind of prayed tomorrow, the next day, not prayed the day after that. And it was one thing after the other after the other until I was like, forget about it. There must be a better way. And I found the way. So here's the deal I'm gonna give you seven strategies. Okay. So after, and you don't want to miss number seven. So this is one you want to stay all the way till the end. No, I will tell you something. I'm a stage in my life where I can see the power of consistency. I can see the power of compounding, the power of snowballing. And that is what drives me to help people build habits that they can start working on. Because in a day, it's like, yeah, it's good. In a week, it's like good. In the afternoon, yeah, kind of, you know, like in a month, yeah. But oh my goodness, if you can hold on to something and do it for years, you'll be surprised what will happen to you. Okay. So I've been a stage in my life where I literally, uh, two days ago, I we just I just celebrated 20 years of marriage. My husband and I have been married for 20 years. Okay, so we celebrated 20 years of marriage, okay. I got filled with the Holy Spirit and I started praying in tongues 26 years ago, this month, 26 years. So I want you to think about it. I've been praying in the spirit for 26 years, okay? We have had a rise and shine, a rise and shine on the 7th of April, just celebrated six years, right? And why am I giving you all these things? Because, you know, I thought our marriage was really good in year one, year, two, year, three, but after 20 years, oh my goodness, is it amazing, right? I'm I was, you know, we started Arise and Shine, started praying the spirit, started doing all those things, and it was amazing in 2020. But now, six years later, I mean, those of you who've been around that long, you can see how much God has done, you know, through a rise and shine is just nuts, like completely insane. And this is years, this is year six. What happens after you're 10? What happens after you're 15? What happens after you're 20? I'm just telling you, it's good, gooder, gooder, bester, best test, best test, right? It just keeps getting better. So consistency is a secret to the snowball. The snowball is a secret to compounding. Compounding is called the eighth wonder of the world for a reason. Okay, all right. So let's look, let's look for through some things here, okay? Now, I said I'm gonna give you seven things, okay? What do I need to do to be the person who prays consistently, who prays in the spirit consistently? And you know, the first thing, the very first thing, and thank you to everyone who's saying congratulations. That the very first thing is vision, okay? Now I want to read a scripture to you here. Is Proverbs chapter 29, verse 18. So this is the way it reads in the King James, where there's no vision, the people perish. I want you to think about this. Where there is no vision, this is the word of God. Where there's no vision, the people perish. Where there's no vision, the marriage perishes. Where there's no vision, the children perish. When there's no vision, the ministry perishes. When there's no vision, the business perishes. When there's no vision, the prayer life perishes. If there is no vision. Okay? Okay. So so that's the first place. That's the way King James puts it. But I want to show you the way um the new international version puts it. Is or maybe oh, let's do English Standard Version. English Standard Version says, where there's no prophetic vision, the people cast off restraint. What is restraint? Restraint is like discipline, right? Like discipline, consistency, following a narrow path, like all of that. When there's no vision, people just throw it away. So when you see people acting without restraints, without control, without discipline, one place you can go look is vision. Is there a vision? Because if there's no vision, it is difficult to pay the price. So if you don't know why, if you don't know why you pray, if you don't know what you're pushing for in prayer, then it's hard to keep, it's harder to keep praying. So one of the hacks, one of the secrets, one of the things you do so you can be a person who prays consistently is that you are a person of vision. Okay. All right. So let me give you an example with myself. Okay. One of my plans, one of my there, there are a number of visions I have, okay? And one of them is I want to live a long, full life. So you hear me talk about my 90th birthday often, okay? I have a vision that I'm gonna live, if Jesus tarries, I'm gonna live till 90, live till 100, whatever. Okay, but beyond that, I'm also going to live a life where at the end of my day, the report that will be given is that I was blessed in every way. So you hear me quote Genesis chapter 24, verse 1 a lot, where it says, and Abraham was now old, well advanced in age, and God had blessed him in every way. God had blessed him in all things. Okay, so I want a life where I live long and blessed in all things. And then when I go to stand before God, I'll be able to say what Jesus said. What did Jesus say? He said, Father, I glorified you on the earth by completing down to the last detail what you assigned me to do. Okay, so this is the vision. I want to live till I'm really old, as long as Jesus tarries. I want to be blessed in every way. So my life is a billboard for the kingdom of God. Like this is what God can do when he lays hold of a life. And when I stand before him, I want to say, Father, everything you told me to do, I did it. Right? Okay, so that's vision. Now, if I have that as my vision, I know I can't pull that off. Like, I'm not confused. I know I can't do that. I know I can't guarantee a long life, a life where I'm blessed in every way, a life where I complete the assignment, like complete the assignment God gave me. There's no way. There's no way. So, what do I need to do? I need to pray. I need to pray quite a bit. So that vision of what I need to accomplish now drives me to pray. Because if I'm just praying to pray, if I'm just praying to check it off that, oh, I did a good deed, I prayed. If I just pray to say, oh, I'm a good Christian, there's no way to sustain that. That is not reason enough. But if I tap into vision, the vision for my life, the vision for the assignments God is giving me, and all of that, I have to, I have to, have to, have to pray. Have to pray. Okay. So the very first thing that will allow you to be a person who prays consistently is tapping into the vision for your life. And you may say, Oh, I'm not clear on the vision for my life. That's good too. I'm not completely clear. I don't like where I am now, I didn't know I would be here, right? But what I do know is I look at what the word of God says, and I'm like, hmm, must be nice. Let's add that to what we want. So if you see the examples I gave, me talking about 90 is based on Psalm 91, where God says, I'll with long life I'll satisfy him, right? Me talking about wanting to be blessed in all areas of my life is based off of Genesis 24 and 1, where God would, you know, where it was written about Abraham that he was blessed in every way. And when I talk about fulfilling to the last detail the Islamic gave me, that's what Jesus said. So you don't have to, like, if you haven't had an appearance of God to you say, Behold, thou daughter of mine, behold, thou son of mine, this is mine will for thee. Like if you if you didn't hear some people get that, I've never gotten that, and I'm okay with it, right? And look, I search the scriptures and I look what it looks for, what is available for me as a child of God. And then there are all these nudgings and downloads that I add to it. So right now, I want you to understand like you have a portion of the vision of God for your life that you already know about because you know the word of God and their promptings He's put in your heart. I want you to honor those. Okay. So I have some clarity on the vision of God for my life. You have to understand that. And the more you hold on to that vision, the more you'll be consistent in prayer. The more you hold on to that vision, the more you realize, man, in the natural, I can't do this. This is a God thing. So I need to pray. I need to pray. You have to have that as a revelation. I need to pray. How can I live a life where at the end of my life, why while I'm still alive, I can talk to God and tell him, Lord, the thing you gave me to do, I'm done. I'm done. You'd be like Paul. Paul's like, hmm, should I stay or should I go? Should I die or should I live longer? If I live longer, it's good for you. I can teach you more. But if I die, I can go be with Christ. Can you imagine this is a conversation somebody who is alive is having for you to do that? Oh, you go and pray because you don't know how to do that by yourself. Okay? So I have some clarity. So don't go like, oh, I don't know God's plan for my life. No, no, no. You don't know everything, but you know some of it. And then what you know, that's enough. Let's go. And then you keep adding to it. Okay. So the very first thing is you gotta have you some vision. If you have vision, the vision from God is always bigger than anything you can do based off of your power, your might, your wisdom, your abilities, your experience, your expertise. So it puts you in a position where you're like, I gotta pray. Okay. All right. So that's the very first thing we do so we can become people, people who are consistent in prayer. That's number one. Number two, number two, then the second strategy that will help you be a person who prays consistently is you are somebody who obeys quickly. Okay, you obey quickly because some of the sometimes the reason why we don't pray is, especially praying in tongues. I don't, I, you know, I don't, I, I don't know if I'm getting it right. Um, I don't know if, you know, my tongues sound weird. They don't sound like Dr. Una's tongues. Um, you know, I don't know if it if it matters, I don't know if anything is doing anything. Like we have all these things that make us not pray, but this is the deal. Jesus in in the Bible, it says, pray without ceasing. Okay? And you might go like, what does that mean? Does that mean don't go to work, just pray only? We don't what it means is pray a lot. Okay, now, of course, what pray without ceasing means you're kind of hosting God's presence and prayer is woven into everything that you do, right? But the bottom line is we are called to pray quite a bit, okay. Paul, who wrote two-thirds of the New Testament, made this statement. He says, I thank my God. He was writing to a church, the church in Corinth. He says, I thank my God that I pray in tongues more than ye all. He was telling the church, I'm I'm glad I pray more in tongues more than all of yeah. Okay, so that's a lot of prayer. And so God's plan is for us to pray. And instead of arguing, complaining, wondering about it, wondering if we're getting it right, and all of that, what if we just became people who were obedient? Right? Like instead of negotiating, and do we really need to pray that much? Like, it does it take all that, like instead of doing all of that, can we just obey? And I want to give you two quick examples, right? Of people who were obedient. And in this example, it's not quite prayer, it's an attitude. Because the way you like, once you start doing this, you start doing it for everything. Okay, first example is Caleb. Okay, so this is in numbers 34. First example is Caleb, and Caleb was um Joshua's contemporary, okay? So they both served Moses, the man of God, who brought the children of Israel out of Egypt and was taking them to the promised land. Now, for context, they had been slaves, the Israelites had been slaves for 430 years. That's a long time. That's like, think about generations. Somebody lived to 100, another person lived to 100, another person lived to 100, the fourth person led to 100, another lived for 30. It's uh, it's many years. What that means is there was nobody alive who knew an Israelite who had been free. They didn't know, so they've been slaves this whole time. Okay. Now, they've been slaves this whole time, and then here comes Moses, like, oh, let's go take the promised land, right? Is there and in the promised land, this was land like land they've never had, houses like they've never had. But those people had military, they had armies, they had all of this. And here comes a bunch of slaves, and they're like, go take the land. So I want you to understand that it was scary, it's not a comfortable instruction. And the people looked at it like we're not able to take it, and you know, we're grasshoppers in our own eyes, and you know, and we're grasshoppers in their own eyes, and they're giants there, and all of this stuff. And here goes Caleb. Caleb is like, let us go up at once. Let us go up at once. We are well able to take them because God is with us. We obey at once. So God said, pray, pray. God's in the word, you see there's evidence. God wants you to pray in the spirit. You pray in the spirit. Stop arguing, stop negotiating, stop wandering, stop all of that. Obey at once. And if you're here, you don't you don't pray in the spirit, you don't pray in tongues, you you know, like and and all of that stuff. We have the team. I am so committed to this that we have a whole team that will help you explain it from the word of God, pray with you so you can get filled. You can pray in tongues as well. So send us an email, admin at dcgeorgia.org with baptism in the subject line. The team will post it again in the comments. Grab it and go get prayed for. Okay, I will obey at once. Enough with the argument, enough with the rationalizing, enough with, but you know, I didn't pray for five weeks and nothing happened. That's like saying I didn't drive with you know my my my seatbelt and nothing happened. Like, what are you talking about? Okay, so that's the second thing. Quick to obey, quick to obey, quick to obey. We obey at once. Second person who did that was Abraham, and I want you to hear this. Abraham had waited for God for years for his son. Okay, finally, he gets the son. Finally, he gets the son, he gets his son at 100, okay. And then God says, Go and sacrifice Isaac, your son. This is in Genesis 22. Your son, your whom thou lovest, on a mountain I will show you. I want you to see how ridiculous this is. So, you know, air quotes. So, first of all, God says, Go sacrifice your son. And God says, On a mountain I will show you. He even had to wait on God to know what mountain to go to to sacrifice his son. Okay, so this was his son, this was his quote-unquote only son, the son of promise. He says, Go sacrifice him. And the Bible says this. I think I need to read this one for you. Hold on, Genesis 22. I want to show you this because if he could obey for that, we need to be people that obey at once. I'm telling you. Okay, Genesis 22. It says, Now it came to pass after these things that God tested Abraham and said to him, Abraham, and he said, Here I am. Then he said, Take now your son. Number one, your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains, which I shall tell you. So God is like, go sacrifice your son, and go sacrifice on some mountain, I'll tell you about it, Moriah. And this is what the Bible says in verse 3. What a shock, he says. So Abram rose early in the morning and saddled his donkey and took two of his young men with him and Isaac his son. Hold on, God told him, Go and sacrifice your son. That is not a fun instruction. That is, I mean, that is a life-altering instruction. And in that, God is written about Abraham that he rose early the next morning to go obey. What? So Caleb obeyed at once. Abraham obeyed early in the morning. Like God told him, early in the morning, he goes to obey. Okay. Third thing. Okay, so the first is vision. The second is obey quickly. Okay, quick to obey. The third is obey in unfavorable circumstances. Unfavorable circumstances. Okay, guys, hear me when I say this, okay? We have if you're on here and you're listening to this, then it means you've been alive long enough to know that there will always be challenges in this wonderful thing called life. There will always be. There may be times when you're you're ex you experience delays, there may be times you experience disappointments, there may be times you experience um trials, there may be times, you know, like the it's like, is this even working? There are times where you may even be depressed and sad, right? But hear me when I say this. Hear me when I say this. If we can learn to obey in unfavorable circumstances, we will become unstoppable. If we can learn to obey, and why is that? Because this is the deal. God didn't promise us no challenges. He never said, when you get saved, when you make Jesus your Lord and Savior, when you get filled with the Spirit and all of that, all the challenges will go away. That's not what he said. What he said is we will win. So if you look at what the word of God says, the look at the words that the word of God uses to describe Christians, you and I. It says we are overcomers, which means there was something to overcome. It says we are conquerors, which means there is something we conquered. It says we are winners, we are victorious, which means there was a battle and we won. And so whenever you see a challenge, you must understand this is a fixed fight. And at the end of the day, I win. This is a fixed fight. And at the end of the day, I win. So when we see challenges, we don't roll over and play dead. When we see challenges, we don't stop and say, I don't know why this is not working. When we see challenges, we're like, aha, then what does that mean? It means we gotta pray. It means we gotta pray in the spirit because our victory is on the other side. I always win, I'm always victorious, I'm always an overcomer, I'm always a conqueror. So we don't roll over and play dead when challenges are. We don't stop praying when challenges come. Are you kidding? What is prayer? Prayer is heaven, is earth's license for heaven's intervention. It is by prayer we provoke, we provoke the help of God. We provoke the intervention of God. And so when challenges show up, that's the time to pray more, not to pray less. But what will Satan do? He will discourage you. Like, oh yeah, if your prayer from last week worked, why are you going through this? Almost makes it seem like we are bad Christians because we have challenges. You're not a bad Christian because you have challenges. Humans have challenges, period. It is the earthly experience. It's just that as Christians, we win. We win, we win, we win. So if we cannot pray in unfavorable circumstances, in the face of unfavorable circumstances, we are setting ourselves up not to be victorious, not to be conquerors, not to be champions, not to be like, not to be overcomers. So if I every time I have a challenge, I start praying. I can never be consistent. Why? There will always be challenges. There will always be challenges. Okay, let's name and shame this stuff, okay? How many of you right now are in the middle of a challenge? It may be a delay, it may be a disappointment, it may be a failed project. You didn't fail, but there was a failed project. Let's name and shame it. Let's normalize it. Having a challenge is not a bad thing. But winning is what we're called to do. So we don't stop. We don't stop praying because we had a challenge. No, ma'am, no, sir. Okay? We lean in, we buckle down. We pray to God for his help, for his wisdom, for his strategy from a standpoint of a victor, knowing that this challenge is here, yes, but we're still gonna win. We're still gonna win. We're still gonna win. That's why we can stay consistent and stay praying, because we know the challenge doesn't change the fact that I'm a winner. Okay? And on the other side of this challenge, I'm going to be stronger, wiser, have more favor, more open doors, win bigger. This challenge will make only make my testimony more delicious to share. Challenge but still winning. Challenge, but still winning. So we don't stop praying because we have a challenge. In fact, we buckle down when we have the challenge. Okay? I've had a two-year period in my business, right? Where we were growing, not saying we were not growing, but not as fast as I wanted to. Like I had this whole game plan of what was supposed to happen and all of that, right? But guess what happened on the other side of that? Like miracle after miracle. That's the way this stuff works. So in the face of challenges, we buckle down, we pray, we wait on God for strategy, we take action, knowing that we always win. So, do we stop praying because there's a challenge? No, ma'am, no, sir. So, and whenever you're praying, you're praying in the spirit, you're doing all your stuff, and then Satan's like, What are you doing? Like, it didn't work. If it works, you won't have these challenges. You don't let that stop you anymore because you know you're having a human experience. There will always be challenges. But challenges are like weights in the gym. Okay? They're heavy, they make you grunt, they make you sweat, but they make you stronger. And so this is why the Bible says that all things work together for good for them who love God. All things, including the challenges, the problems, the delays, the denials, all of those things. God will still, like you partner with him, he will still take it and make it work for your good. These are not disadvantages. We still win. So we don't stop praying. Okay? So we've we've talked about three strategies. So number one is vision. Number two is we are quick to obey. Number three is we obey in unfavorable circumstances. We pray in unfavorable circumstances. Okay, we pray. Okay. Number four. Number four, the fourth thing you need to do if you want to be a person who prays, especially praying in the spirit consistently, gosh, you got to shorten your recovery time. You had a time where you were praying, you were praying consistently, you're so proud of yourself. You're like, this is amazing. You're spending time in God's presence and all of this. And then you had this three-day period. Maybe you got off-routine. So maybe you traveled, or maybe you weren't feeling too well, or you know, like you had this time crunch or whatever. And then you had this two or three-day period where you didn't pray, or you didn't pray as well. You know, you didn't really pray, you know, right? And then you're like, Well, what's the point? Then these thoughts start coming. What's the point trying to be consistent? Well, we can be consistent anyway. That's how I didn't pray for the last three days and all of this stuff. And then the three days became a week, the week became two weeks, because you're like, What's the point in trying? What's the point in trying? And then after a month, you told yourself, okay, self, come on, this is ridiculous. We need to pray. And then you went back to praying, right? And so it took a month to recover. Okay, what if it took you a week? What if it took you three days? What if it took you one day? What if it took you five whole minutes? Okay, what if it took you five whole minutes? So this is the this is the deal, okay? Consistency doesn't mean perfection. Okay. If you see somebody who won an Olympic gold medal, I am sure there was some time that they were supposed to practice, they did not. If you see someone who's a pianist who performs at Carnegie Hall, I promise you there's a time this person was supposed to rehearse when they did not. It's just that it's a small, it's a small percentage, it's a small percentage of time, right? So it's not about perfection. So if something happened and you got knocked off your routine, my goodness, let it be and move on. Okay. Now let me tell you who I learned this from. And and and and this is the this is what Satan is after. And you may hear me say Satan a lot. You're like, what is she talking about? Listen. Satan fights her prayer life the most because it handles him the most. If Satan can fight you, he will win. You without God, Satan will win you all day, every day, and twice on Sunday. But you with God, he doesn't stand a chance. So what does he try to do? He tries to disconnect, he tries to disconnect you from God so he can get just you. Because if he gets just you, he will take you out. He knows, we know, everybody knows, right? Okay, so for instance, I have this this broke my heart. Okay, this was um this was the first year of Horizon Shine. So Horizon Shine is uh is a prayer call, it's a prayer and mentorship call we do every every morning at 6 a.m. I say it's the best place to be every every morning at 6 a.m. Eastern, okay? And so I had this mentee of mine who started coming on Horizon Shine, and you know, we started measuring her streak. And so she had been on for we didn't know Horizon Shine will still be going. Well, I knew it would still be going, but you know, people didn't know it would still be going that long. And so she prayed, she's like, Oh, my first week on Horizon Shine, my second week, my third week. She got to 50 days, 50 days of consistency, 50 days of praying in the spirit every day, 50 days of praying Bible-braced prayers every day, and all of this stuff. And then she decided she she decided that she wanted to use that time for her personal devotion with God. And she stopped coming till today. And I was like, oh my goodness, like, I mean, you can do your personal, like, of course, I want you to do your personal, you know, like development time, your personal prayer time with God, and all of that stuff. But there's a place for your personal time with God, and there's a place for a community of believers who are on fire. But she stopped like completely. And you know what? That was in 2020. She could have been celebrating six years of consistency, praying with God, and she's not celebrating it, and she pulled away from that, and she pulled away from church, and she pulled away from all kinds of stuff, and the grounds that she's gained, she's you know, she's let them go. Right? Like, how painful is that? And so I say this is it's it's important that you keep up with what you're doing. Okay, and I don't know if she felt, you know, I've been gone for too long, I can't find my way back. Please, please, please, please, please, please. Whenever you find that you stumbled, just get up. Think about a one-year-old who takes steps and falls. Nobody celebrates the fall, everybody celebrates the walk. The kid has enough sense to get up and keep moving. Get up! Like, get up. Okay, so let me tell you where I learned this from. I learned this from David. Okay, I'll tell you a story here. Um, David, he's my man. Okay, so David is the king, everybody goes to battle, David stays back, and David sees Bathsheba and decides, oh, he wants this person as his wife. Problem is, she was somebody else's wife. And he gets her anyway, he sleeps with her, she gets pregnant. And David's like, oopsie. Now everybody's gonna know what I did. So he arranged for the woman's husband to be killed. The husband was killed, and he took her and married her. This was so abominable in God's sights. Like, how could you do that, right? Like, if you wanted any of the women in Israel, I could have given any of them to you. Why do you go take a man, another man's wife, and you know, kill him? So, anyway, so God says the child is going to die. Okay, the child is going to die. And so that after that, the child falls sick. So here goes David. David goes, he's not eating, fasting, face on the floor, not showering, not talking to anybody, praying, like God have mercy, deliver the child, don't let the child die. Okay. And so he's doing all of these things, but ultimately the child dies. So when the child dies, his servants start whispering amongst themselves. They're like, oh my goodness, this man was fasting, he refused to eat, refused to be comforted, has had his face on the ground this entire time praying. And that's when the man, this is with the kid's sick. When he hears the child is dead, what is he going to do? So David kind of hears his people whispering, and he's like, Is the child dead? And they say yes, to my shock. Every time I read that scripture, I'm blown away. To my shock. David gets up, he goes and takes a shower, he anoints himself, right? Loops himself up real nice and all of those things, and says, Bring me food, let me eat. Huh. Interesting. So he did everything he knew to do, and the thing didn't work out the way he wanted to work, and he just got up and he kept it moving. He's the one I learned that from. His reaction time was almost neglect, like there was nothing. There's almost like no, there was no recovery time. He's just like, okay, that didn't work. Took a shower, saying, Man, get me some food, man. I've been fasting for a long time. A man needs to eat. Shorten your recovery time. So, oh, I missed out on praying. Fine. Shorten this, shorten it, shorten it. Don't spend five days saying I didn't pray. Oh, you prayed for something, it didn't work out the way you wanted. You can then be mad at God and not pray for two months. In two months, Satan is doing whatever he wants in your life because there is no vacuum. Okay, it's either God is in charge or Satan is in charge. Somebody's moving in your life, depending on who you invite, right? And so so we don't say, Oh, it didn't work, and two weeks were no, we just like short recovery time, shorten the recovery time, shorten the recovery time, be like David, shorten it. Okay, so it didn't work the way I wanted, boom, I'm back. Um, I missed two days, boom, I'm back. Like, don't we're not gonna, we don't want to celebrate the 10th year and 10th anniversary, 10th anniversary of you not praying. Like, come on, be like David, be like David. Okay, so vision quick to obey, obey even in unfavorable circumstances, shorten the recovery time. Okay, number five. Now, number five is very powerful. Number five is gather evidence of your victory from prayer, okay? Gather evidence of your victory, right, from prayer. If you don't take the time to take note of what God is doing in your life, Satan will convince you that nothing is working. Okay? When you have had times in your life when you're like, I don't know what's going on, that thing seems to be working. Maybe you see somebody else's life, you're like, everything's working for them, and all that stuff. Whenever you see yourself there, just know that you stop taking inventory of the goodness of God. Just know that that's what's happened. Now, I've told this example many times. I'm gonna, I'm gonna tell you again because um it's it's important you know this. So there was, um, this was last year, okay? So last year I got an email, and the email said that we had made the Inc. 5000 list of fastest growing companies, privately held companies in the US. We had made the Inc. 5000 list for the third year in a row. Now I want you to understand that it's only 9% of businesses that crossed a million in revenue in the US. Okay. It is less than 2% that cross um of female founded businesses that cross a million in revenue. Now we had a bill, uh a business that was doing over 2 million, right? And when you check that data for African American women, it's even lower. We made this list for the third year in a row in the magazine whole nine yards. Okay. The next morning, the very next morning, after we celebrated this monumental, you know, milestone in our business. I was sitting down going, like, I built this habit of every morning. I write three things I'm very grateful for. I start writing, start writing. It was five things, and I'm like, what else? What else happened? What else happened? And I wrote five things and I really hustled to think to pull up these five things. And then after that, God asked me a question. He said, Did you not make the Inc. 5000 list of fastest growing companies? I had forgotten. Not a week later, not two weeks later, not the next year, the next morning. The human mind, if you don't discipline in, discipline your mind into searching for the goodness of God, no matter how good He is, you will not see it. If you do not search to see the victories that you've had because you pray, because you pray in the spirit, how your life has changed, you will not see it. And so you will think that prayer does not work. You will think prayer does not work. You will be convinced you are wasting your time. But when you pray, especially when you pray in the spirit, you are never wasting your time because you are speaking words given to you by the Holy Spirit in line with the will of God to the God who wants to answer the prayer. It is the ultimate cheat code, legal cheating. It is always working, but if you don't look, you won't know. So, what is that fifth hack? Gather evidence of victory from prayer. I'm gonna give you two quick examples. Now, the pandemic hit in two it in 2020, okay? 2020. 2019, my office manager for my private practice and I, we were sitting and mapping out what to do for 2020. Okay. And then we decided that we were going to treat our private practice like an online business, and we were going to really leverage social media and we were going to leverage email marketing to grow the practice. This is unconventional for private practice, okay? And we're like, yeah, we know this is different, but this is what we're going to do. We didn't know there was a pandemic coming. But based on the downloads I got as I was waiting on God for the new year, we got all these strategies that were weird, and it's not what people do in private practice and all of this stuff. But we took it and we did it. And you know what happened? When the pandemic hit, we didn't need to change our plan. We just needed to accelerate it. Like we were thinking, oh, you know, we'll take our time and do this. We're like, oh no, we got nothing but time, let's do it now. And because of that, in 2020, our private practice did better in revenue than 2019. And in 2021, it did better than it did in 2020. In the middle of a pandemic, when private practices were dropping like flies. Why? The power of praying in the spirit. So that is my reminder. I because I've documented and because I took time to pay attention to it, it is my reminder that even when, because I wasn't praying for a pandemic, I didn't know there would be a pandemic. I had never experienced a pandemic. But because I was praying in line, praying in the spirit, even though I didn't know what I was praying for, I prayed myself out of what would be a crisis year, not even year, years. Prayed myself out of it and prayed and downloaded strategies that put me on top, even in a time like that. So now when I pray in the spirit, I'm saying it's like, well, you just pray in the spirit, you don't know what you're saying, you just you're just babbling, just mumbling. I'm like, uh-uh. I'm preparing for something that's coming that I don't know about it. And then when everybody's saying there's a casting down, I will be able to say there's a lifting up. When everybody's like, oh my goodness, this is terrible, I will be able to say this is best of times for me. When everybody's like, darkness is over the earth and gross darkness is over the people, like in Isaiah chapter 60, I will be able to say it's my time to arise and shine, for my light has come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon me, and Gentiles will come to my light, and kings will come to the brightness of my rising. Do you guys see that? Praying, especially praying in tongues, is powerful. Now you may say, Oh wow, that's amazing what God did for her, but God is doing you pray in the spirit, he's been doing that for you too. But you just need to be the person who gathers evidence, gathers evidence, right? You have to have evidence of who look at what God did because I prayed, look at what God did. Oh, this is amazing. So you cannot be convinced to stop because you know what happens when you pray. Okay? All right, I'll give you a second example. Now, you know, I am in what would be considered the education or coaching industry for now, not my private practice, a different business, on train D now. And, you know, with the with what is happening with AI, people in the coaching industry, I mean, like, because somebody can go program an AI thing to be their coach and all that is is like so strange and so weird. And so there are a lot of coaches and a lot of course creators who have gone out of business because, you know, people are just chat GPTing things. And so we have this company that we set up, and it's really for business education for physicians. Okay, we help them build six, seven, eight-figure businesses um, so they have the freedom to live life and practice medicine on their terms. We've done this for this is our seventh year, eighth year, eighth year. Okay. So we have a program called the Entre MD Business School, which will be six years, June 27th. So it's almost six years old. And God is the one who had me started in the first place. That's a story for a different day. And he's the one who gives me the strategies. Okay. So we've done what we've done for the last almost six years. Now, I've been studying, and people are talking about what to do with an education company or a coaching company so it can thrive in the time of AI. I want you to pay attention to this. And they said three things. They said, these are the three things that will make your business AI proof. Number one, um, like focus on implementation, not information. Okay, so that's the first thing. You focus on helping people implement, not giving them information because information has been commoditized. So that's number one. Number two, they said live in-person experiences. Okay, so events for the people who are part of the program because you have that human connection and all of that, AI cannot replace that. So that was the that was the second thing. The third thing was community. Like you have a community built around what it is you're doing. These are three things that the experts are saying, you know, with what is happening with AI, this is what you do to it to AI proof your business. And I want you to hear this very carefully because I got chills when I read this. For the last six years, from the beginning, we de-emphasized information and prioritized implementation. So that is why on my podcast, like the on-trained podcast, people are like, How can you give away this amount of information for free? Like, this should be behind a paywall. I'm like, no, but that's not what I do, is not so much information. Now, granted, in my programs, I have higher level frameworks and all of those things. But I'm like, I can give away a lot because I don't give people information. That's not what I do. I help them implement, I help them become. That's what I help them do. So that's the first one. The second is we have two events we host every year. We have the business makeover mastermind in March, April. We have the vision retreats, which we these are high level rated five star, you know, like events. We've had this for years. And so we have those two events. So implementation. Over information check, in-person events check, and our community, by the grace of God, we built a powerful community, so powerful, because then people are like, Oh no, Dr. Una, I don't want a group program, I just want to do one-on-one. I'm like, trust me, you do not want one-on-one with me. What you want is the complete ecosystem. You want to have the mentorship with me, and you want to have a community of people who are doing the same thing like you're doing. And people are like, No, no, no, I want one-on-one. But I was like, Don't worry about it, you'll see. And then after they experience the community, they're like, Oh, Dr. Una is amazing, but the community, the community, so the community is like one of the top things for the small. So I want you to see this, okay? Six years ago, six years ago, God knew AI was coming. God knew it will obliterate part of the coaching industry. And he's like, This is what I want you to do. Focus on implementation, do these live events, and build a powerful community. Where did that come from? Praying in the spirit. Where did that come from? Praying and praying and praying. Do you guys see what I'm talking about? So he will prepare you for what is to come now. So I could have not taken note of this victory. But because I've taken note of the victory, you cannot convince me not to pray in the spirit because I'm like, this is good. Do you guys see it? So I want you to start taking note. Like, man, I have prayed. I've prayed about this, and this is what happened. I prayed about this and this is what happened. And some of those things may have taken a week, some things took two weeks, some things took a month, some things took five months, some things took two years. It doesn't matter. The bottom line is that prayer, prayer works. It works. Okay. I said I was gonna give you guys seven. Let's see how we do this because we are number five. This is just so good. Okay, number six. Number six, okay, is study, study the benefits of praying, especially praying in tongues. Study the benefits of praying. So this is the thing faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. Faith comes by hearing, hearing by the word of God. If you're gonna have a be a person who prays in the spirit consistently, you will pray in the spirit consistently because you believe in it, you have faith in it. And if you're gonna have faith in it, you are gonna study often the benefits of praying in tongues. So for those of you on Arise and Shine, you will notice that when I say, Oh, we're gonna pray for 50 minutes, we're gonna pray in the spirit and all that, you'll find that I put up a slide with all the benefits. Why? I want you to be that your awareness of the benefits, your faith in the benefits to be at an all-time high. So you go and you pray and you know that it's working. And these are the things that happen when I pray in the spirit. Okay? Now, I'm not gonna go too deep into this because I did a whole video on five reasons why you should pray in tongues every day. The team will post that in the chat. That is the next video that you want to go watch. But I want you to lean in. Anytime you feel you're not really feeling like praying, go study on the power of praying in tongues. Your faith will be reignited and you go back to being consistent. Okay. So if you find your faith has dropped because of that, boom, reactivate it. How? Study the benefits of praying in the spirit, okay? I do that all the time. I I pray, I know the power of praying in the spirit. I pray in the spirit a lot. I study it a lot. I study it a lot. I study it a lot. Why? I want my faith at an all-time high. I don't want to pray from a place of I guess I should just pray because Dr. Una keeps saying praying. I want to pray from a standpoint of this is how I change my life. This is how I grow. This is how I activate the anointing on my life. This is how I activate my ability to hear from God. This is like all of that stuff. Okay. Okay, so that's number six. Number seven, I save the best for last. Okay. Number seven is insert yourself in communities of people who are on fire. Okay. This is a cheat code of cheat codes that I found in the book of Proverbs, and you hear me say it all the time. It's Proverbs chapter 13, verse 20. What does it say? Walk with the wise and you will become wise. End of story. Walk with people who are on fire for God and you will get lit. You will get on fire. Walk with people who are consistently praying in tongues. And guess what? You will become a person who consistently prays in tongues. This is the reason, one of the reasons why Arise and Shine exists. And if you're not a part of a rise and shine, I want to invite you to come join us. This is a community of believers who come together, they pray, they meditate on the scriptures, we pray in tongues, we show up every morning, 6 a.m. Eastern. That's our accountability, that's your jump start, that's the thing that re-ener energizes you. And when you're a community of people who are like, Yeah, I've been on a rise and shine for five years, I've been here for all six years, you're like, apparently, praying in tongues and praying in tongues always and praying in tongues often is a completely normal thing. It's a completely normal thing. Okay. So you insert yourself in circles where people, communities where people on fire praying, right? Okay. And I've had times, listen, listen, let me tell you, even as a pastor's wife, there was a day, this is many years ago, but there was a day, I was like, man, you know, I'm struggling with this whole prayer thing, right? Remember, I told you don't struggle. Your prayer life is resistant. And I was listening to someone, and the person was like, if you are leading a small group, not a church, like I was, like a small group, and you can't pray for three hours, you're not even serious, and stuff like that. I was like, well, it should be nice to just sit and pray for three hours and stuff like that. What do you think I did? I called a prayer meeting because I knew I was like, I'm not staying in my house praying by three hours for three hours. I know I'm not gonna do that. I called a prayer meeting. I told the people seven to ten, we're gonna pray, we're gonna wait on God, we're gonna do all of these things, and they didn't know they were my accountability partners, and we prayed for three hours and it was amazing. So, what did I do? I used the same hack, gather a bunch of people on fire, give some accountability, boom, let's go. And we prayed, and we prayed. So you're here and you're like, Oh, I struggle to pray. Uh-uh. Put yourself in a room full of people, right? Who are on fire. Okay. So if you're not, you if you don't join um Horizon Shine yet, this is my invitation to you. Okay, this is the link here, dcgeorgia.org forward slash prayer. Come join us, come pray every morning, six o'clock. It will rock your world. I lead it, and it is such a blessing to me. Like, I wouldn't trade it for anything in the world, for what it's done for me. It's helped me be so much more consistent with my prayer life, so much more structured with my prayer life, force me to hear from God every morning because I have to lead it. Like it's so amazing. Okay. So if you're not part of it, come join us. But that is you putting yourself in a community where consistency with prayer, when you think about it, a rise and shine has been going on every single day. We have not missed a day, every single day for six years. Six years, which means, dude, do that, just pray. That's how we roll, just pray. Okay, just pray. So put yourself in those kinds of communities, okay? It's Arise and Shine. And you guys know we also built um what we call the success by the book inner circle. We built that on Substack, where every week I'm walking you guys through what I am doing to grow and to develop and trigger quantum leaps in my life in every aspect, including prayer. So if you're not part of the inner circle, come join us. Okay, the team will post the link um as well. Come join us in the inner circle. But what is the idea behind all of these communities? Walk with the wise and become wise. Um, in the world we live in now, individualism is celebrated. Like I'm my own person, I'm self-made, I'm all of that. That's not the way of the kingdom at all. And that's not the way, period. I mean, it's just not the way, it doesn't work. The more high-quality people you surround yourself with, the richer your life becomes. And I don't mean dollars, I mean in all aspects of life, including dollars. Okay. Okay, so Arise and Shine, Inner Circle, these are both communities. They're gifts for you to turn your world right side up. So, this is what I want you to do. Okay. I want you to start implementing everything we talked about, these seven strategies, and put yourself in a position where you're consistent. And I want you to walk away with this picture where you're now a person, you pray consistently. So God's intervention, God's presence, God's grace, God's wisdom, God's favor is on your life consistently, consistently, and you go from one level of glory to another. He said in his word, Proverbs 4.18, the path of the just shines brighter and brighter, and this is your testimony. And yes, you still go through challenges because he didn't say that you're not going to have challenges, but you go through them and you win. And every challenge makes you stronger. And you start talking like people you know and admire, where you're like, I wouldn't change this challenge for anything because I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy, but I wouldn't change it because it made me who I am. That is what we have the opportunity to be. So never agree that you know you're a bad Christian, you don't really know how to pray, and you just struggle and all that stuff. No, your prayer life is being resisted, and now you have seven strategies to mow down that resistance and stay consistent in prayer. If this has helped you in any way, I would love for you to join the movement and share this episode with your friends, family, and the Christians in your world. By doing this simple thing, you could be changing the trajectory of someone's lives, their family, and their community. That makes you a world changer and they will love you forever.