Man of God...The Power of Selfless Prayer

Man of God...The Power of Selfless Prayer, 1 John 3:16

Patricia Ann, originally posted on Saturday, August 02, 2014

When asked which is the greatest commandment, Jesus replied,

"Thou shalt love the Lord  thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it. Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets." [Matt 22:37-40]

God can, will, and must be loved totally -- or not at all, for Love is total. It is not broken, partial or incomplete.
If it were, it would not be Love.  Love is. And in that presence there is nothing else. Any pretense to love that is not

all-inclusive is but an empty idol; at best a vague shadow, at worst a plastic counterfeit of the real thing (fromwww.miracles.org.nz)

I am truly blessed that a couple of weeks ago God allowed me to be part of a miracle. 
I pray as I give this testimony that God will touch the hearts of people who are skeptical of His great works through us and those who will doubt the validity of the story that I share.
I have been patiently waiting for our Father in Heaven to tell me it is time to share His glory and His love with all who are

led to read this.
1 John 3:16 (ESV) 16 By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives

for the brothers.

I could feel my blood pressure raising in my body. My heart was beating way too fast!
I felt like someone was pushing down on my chest and no matter how I turned to get comfortable, that pressure in my chest would return within a minute. 
I tried to relax hoping it would go away,  but this weird feeling I had in my body, would not leave.
I knew I had been light headed for the previous few days, but contributed it to the hot weather outside.
My blood  pressure proved to be elevated and raising... possibly to a dangerous level... to the level of a stroke. 
I decided to lay on the sofa for a little while, but could not get comfortable. 
Then, I decided to lay on my bed and hoped I could just fall asleep and feel better in the morning. 
My cousin walked me into my room and sat on the bed next to me. He put his fingers on my carotid artery and could feel the intense pressure in my veins. 
He was worried.  I could tell. 

As my breathing became fast and labored, still with the pressure of a hand pushing on my chest, I suddenly became aware that this must be a spiritual attack. 
I remember feeling very tired and faint when I looked up at  my cousin and weakly told him that this was a spiritual attack. 
I didn't know if he would believe me, as I asked him to, "please pray this thing off of me." 
And what happened next was amazing! 
My cousin selflessly went into a prayer for me.
I don't know how long it lasted, but as he prayed, he still had his fingers on my neck, feeling the pressure in my veins.

I remember looking up at him several times and seeing his eyes closed.  He was still praying.
 
Then suddenly, my breathing changed. 
I was stomach breathing now... slow, long breaths.  Huh...huh...huh...huh...huh. My pulse began to slow and as my cousin opened his eyes, he said to me, "You are feeling better, aren't you?" 
 
And as I said, "Yes," I saw a spirit light leave my body and shoot straight up to the ceiling! 
I experienced such freedom and relief in my body at that moment in time that I began laughing.  
That evil attack that was on me had been forced to leave... prayed away by the powerful prayer of an honest man of God!
My cousin shared with me that he prayed that if necessary that he would take that attack unto himself. 
I wish there were some way to describe the intensity of the love in the room during this experience.  I have searched my heart and there are no words that describe it.  As I continue to feel it today, all I can do is praise God for the fact that "Love is" just as "He is". God freely gives and receives love and when we are in relationship with Him, He allows us to do the same, selflessly. It surely surpasses all human understanding.
Wow! The power of selfless prayer... of a man of God. 
A selfless prayer is a prayer full of love. It is full of the love of God, shared... putting oneself in place of another in an effort to come to the rescue of that brother or sister in Christ. 

Ever since that night, my blood pressure and pulse rate have been normal.  
 
This is only part of the story, however. 
The reason that I was under spiritual attack was because God called me for many months, to travel from my home to pray for another cousin, Cathy,  who had been a victim of several strokes and other illnesses.
Many negative things happened to me before I left for my destination several states away.  It was as if a force was trying to keep me from moving forward, something holding me back from doing what God was calling me to do. 
As I moved forward with His plan, it seemed like I would never get to my destination. I arrived with the thought that I was just going to pray for my relative and everything would be great.

I was totally unaware of what would happen when I arrived, but I should have known that doing God's work would not be quite as easy as praying a simple prayer. I arrived at her home and immediately felt like I had been punched in the stomach.  I had planned to stay there for several days, but I had a great sense of a dark presence.  My discernment was telling me that all of Cathy's illness and strokes had come from this dark presence that I felt. I felt that if I stayed in that home, I would also have a stroke. 
I stayed at my cousin, Al's home and spent several days in prayer.  I was unsure of what I should do.  I knew I had upset the people I love, my cousins,  by leaving their home and telling them what I felt.
I was humbled before our Lord wondering what to do next. 
On the third day, I was in tears, talking with God about this situation. I felt like I had failed to do what He called me

to do. I felt helpless. 
I fell to my knees in prayer for Cathy. 
I prayed hard against the darkness. I prayed for Cathy to be set free from any more attacks on her body. I prayed for the evil to lift off of her. I prayed for her healing and for her home to be free of the darkness that I felt there. I cried out to God with my whole heart. I got up off of the floor knowing that God had heard my prayer.
I felt a sense of peace that He was taking care of the situation. 

It was later that same night that I experienced the spiritual attack on my own body. The darkness that had once plagued Cathy was placed on me. I had the symptoms of an impending stroke.  I know now how Cathy must have felt as her body was attacked. Did God allow me to feel what she had gone through?
God had faith in me that I would discern the evil attack and He had faith in Al that he would pray it away.
How awesome our God is!!

As He has given me the discernment between good and evil, He has also shown me how to use the gift.  And He

placed me in the hands of a great man of God, His faithful servant, to trust that this was a spiritual attack and to selflessly pray it away.
It is through our faith in our Lord, that His glory shines through in this miracle. 
If Al and I had not truly believed in His word, or lacked faith that our prayers would be heard, I may have ended up in a hospital with a stroke. 
I don't know why it happened the way that it did. I don't know why the evil came onto me. But I do know that God showed us that we do have the ability to cast away evil just as Scripture tells us. My cousin and I had the discernment, the faith and the love to send evil away in Jesus' precious name.

I feel forever blessed, humbled and thankful to our Father in Heaven for His good works and for allowing my cousin and I to bring glory, honor, and praise to His wonderful name.

My prayer for today is that we never underestimate the power of our Creator or His great love for each of us as

His children. May we seek to believe all that He has shown us that we can do through Him with just the faith of a tiny mustard seed.

When I entered Cathy's home again, I was met with the presence of joy, peace and love. She is doing great! 
I believe that God's plan is to prosper us and not to harm us, to give us hope and a future. 
How blessed we are to experience His plan in action.
With God... all things are possible!
 
Praise God for He is always good and forever faithful to us. 
Blessings to all in Jesus' precious name, Amen.  

1 John 4:18 (NKJV)
There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves torment. But he who fears has not been made perfect in love.
John 14:11-13, Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in Me, or else believe on account of the works themselves. “Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in Me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than

these will He do, because I am going to the Father. Whatever you ask in My name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.
Matthew 17:19-20 (ESV)
Then the disciples came to Jesus privately and said, “Why could we not cast it out?” He said to them, “Because of your little faith. For truly, I say to you, if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you.”
John 15:13, Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.

To God Be The Glory

 1 John 3:16, Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. 17 But whoso hath this world's good, and seeth his brother have need, and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him?