44th National Prayer Conference (Aba 2020)

LET US BE STRONG FOR OUR CITIES:   BARR.  EMEKA NWANKPA          

This topic opens our eyes to cities, their foundations, our duties, responsibilities and training as Intercessors ( Hebrew 2:12).

Cities are inhabitants of People, animals, resources and these things were built by Men, Kings and Leaders.

Habakkuk 2:12 tells us that certain people laid city foundations with bloodshed, occultism, idolatry and established them in iniquities. On this basis, we should note that whatever was laid in the foundation of any city is what affects the city’s growth and or are hindrance to fulfilling God’s purpose.

Cities have character, spiritually, financially, physically and these are mentioned in some scriptures such as Nahum 3:1-5 and 2 Kings 17:24-28.

As Intercessors, we should learn how to relate between God and our cities to influence and contribute to their destiny since it is part of our responsibility.

As intercessors we need basic training or education in the down listed areas in order to function well and not intercede amiss.

• Basic training in spiritual warfare, and on how to derive concrete information on spiritual history of cities to help us  Intercede and war for our cities with tangible results (Num. 13:16-18). We must be strong spiritually to deal with a city spiritually.
• We should know as intercessors that God speaks to cities through prophets or elders, so we need to be spiritually attentive to know what God is saying concerning a city (Isaiah 1:21-23; Luke 10:13).
• As Intercessors, when taking a city, we need to deal with the spiritual rulers and pray for the physical rulers (Deut. 3:1-5).
• Have knowledge of the deeds of the wicked and pray against their activities but not the persons. The wicked are inhabitants of the city but work wickedly because of the presence of wickedness in their spirits  that  intercession   might dismantle their deeds (2 Kings 17:32-33). 

   

• We need to train Intercessors to go around the city to investigate quietly about the happenings of a city and perform background checks to know how to channel your prayers (Ezekiel 8:5-18).
• There are specific angels God has given responsibilities to over particular cities. When Intercessors begin to pray, systematically and tactically these angels begin to work with them and when they go on patrols, punctuality is vital for walking with them otherwise; you will go without their escort (Ezekiel 9:1-11).
• God brings charges against cities for their crimes and misconducts. As Intercessors we need to find out these charges. (Isaiah33:22; Ezekiel 22:1-16).
•  Cities can be under a curse. They might not necessarily be cursed by God but by Missionaries or from the way they treated such men of God. It is the duty of Intercessors to find out if a city is cursed or not (Joshua 6:16 and 26; Gen 19:24-25)
• God Judges cities  and so He instructs us to intercede  for cities against His wrath; intercessors must therefore  obey  Gods mandate( Jeremiah 29:4-7; Gen 19:24-25).
• There are men who give evil counsels and device devices that ruin cities. It is the responsibility of Intercessors to ask God to reveal such men and other satanic agents who use sorcery and demonic powers to resist and blind the eyes of people from the gospel in order to prophesy against them appropriately  (Ezekiel 11:1-3; Acts 13:6-12).
• There are also spiritual horns in cities, responsible for scattering the people; strategies must be derived from God to use for such cities and follow diligently instructions received. (Zach 1:18-21).
• We must also ask the Lord what forces are against the Church in the cities and also if there are Jezebels who minister as prophetesses in the Body of Christ (Rev. 2:20; Rev. 2: 12-13).
• Read more about how to pray for our cities in Jeremiah 29:4-7; Nehemiah 9; Ezra 9; and Daniel 9, knowledge is power.

NEHEMIAH’S STRENGTH FOR HIS PEOPLE AND FOR THE CITY OF HIS GOD:

DR STEVE OGAN

This Sermon reveals to us how repentance can rekindle the flame of redemption of our Souls that has the ability of changing destinies of people in the Cities and the Country.

Emphasizing on the benefits of repentance, Dr. Steve Ogan used two books of the bible for a case study, starting from the book of Ruth because it begins with the setting of a Family.

In the social ranking, family comes first. Instilling of morals, good conduct and righteousness begins f there. Emphasis was made on the disadvantages of wrong decisions taken by families who go where God has not said they should go thereby leaving the house of prayer to the house of worldliness woe and sorrow.

Elimelech and Naomi his wife with their sons at the time of famine relocated from Israel to Moab and the consequences were grave- the lost of sons and husband, leaving only Naomi and the daughters –in- law. But God is merciful when we retrace our steps.

As Naomi and Ruth returned to Israel, God laid the foundation of redemption for the World in the person of Boaz (The Kinsman redeemer) who redeemed Ruth and paved way for the generations from which Jesus (The Ultimate Kinsman Redeemer) was born.

Boaz’s name was mentioned 20 times in the book of Ruth. The Israelites who played roles in the drama of the life of Naomi and Ruth were also mentioned 20 times.  The number 20 in Hebrew is strongly affiliated with redemption.

The Second case study is the book of Nehemiah. This book opens our eyes and hearts to seasons, times and decades that we are in. We can draw inspiration from Nehemiah on how to be strong for our people and the City of our God and our Nation in times like this (Nehemiah 1:1-3).

Dr. Steve Ogan made emphasis on the Mandate and what must be done to fulfil it and said “If we must fulfil the mandate of this season, we must be tenacious, resilient, and active as opposed to being weak in order to fulfil the agenda of the time”.

The following inspired and fueled the strength of Nehemiah and kept him on course towards fulfilling the mandate:

• The Strength of Prophecy: We must be attentive in the Spirit to receive the idea or mandate for the city, for our lives and the people, this is what sustains the ability to soar on course.
• Strength of Prayer: The prayer of Nehemiah built a holy lamentation in his soul, which was revealed through his countenance that the King saw and later gave rise to a letter that paved way to rebuild the city.
  Prayer is what strengthens the prophecy we have received.
• Strength of position (Nehemiah 2:4-5): As servant leaders, we must learn to apply the principles of heaven on earth, because heaven still rules over the affairs of men.
• Strength of Purity: We must live a pure and holy life to be able to fulfil Gods mandate.

Strength of Perception: As a man thinks in his heart so is he. We must purify our thoughts; we must be delivered from negative thinking.

LET US BE STRONG FOR OUR PEOPLE AND THE CITY OF OUR GOD :

BARR. EMEKA NWANKPA

This is a continuation to the bible study on the cities; and God has set us in charge of security in the cities and positioned us to watch if enemies are coming so we alert the people of any danger.

(Isaiah 62: 1-6) warns us of the dangers of negligence of duty and responsibility conferred on us over our cities and people in them. God is still recruiting people into this work; we must therefore stop playing church and religion.

 God responds to the desire of the watchman, we therefore must change the character and situation of our cities.

  Intercessors are to respond to the following conditions in our cities:

1. The raging in the spirit realm in our Cities and Communities (Psalms 2:1). The contentions and conspiracy against the Church and God.  We believers are to understand it, arise and take a stand with God, find out what rebellion is in each city, see what the people are saying and deal with it accordingly. We need to train our Cities out of wickedness into righteousness.
2. There is a rebellion against God by Kings, Presidents and rulers who are coming together to take counsel of conspiracy against the laws and principles of living laid down in his word.
3. The Kings of the World are legalizing almost anything, because they are caught in the web of careless living and they don’t know how to follow God’s rules. Acts 4:23-27 illustrates and shows us acts of rebellion by the people, kings and cities of the earth against God. We as watchmen must take the stand and not allow things fall apart, we must be strong for our people and cities of Our God.
4.  Kings and rulers of the earth took a position of breaking the bands asunder and casting away the cords of God and His people from them(Psalms 2:3). God has positioned His people; He made us to sit with Christ far above principalities and powers at his right hand. We must live out these responsibilities as watchmen. Jeremiah 1:9-10 and Exodus 7:1-3 reveal who Intercessors are in relation to kings and rulers; we have been set to pull down and build, to uproot and plant and have been made gods to them.
5. Acts 19:8-11 tells us about the prayers, project, teaching and training dimensions in Ephesus. When we seriously begin to pray for our cities, there will be spiritual confrontations. It is important to engage in constructive, intensive and systematic teaching and training to build spiritual capacity for the brethren. (Acts 19 :1-20;  Eph.  6: 12- 18).
6. As intercessors we are encouraged to train the brethren, work and pray towards embarking on prayer Journeys. We must learn and study our good and bad past experiences so that we become strong bible students; have hearts full of scriptures, so that in life, circumstances and difficult seasons the word would automatically are pump out of us.

May God depend on us as Watchmen in our time! AMEN.

RELEASING OUR CITIES –

DR. KOLE AKINBOBOYE

In this session, we were exposed to the need to know God, in order to help our cities; it is a matter of just not knowing about Him but to know Him as He is and have a strong firm and solid relationship with Him. Daniel 11:32 further enjoined us from corrupting ourselves by flatteries of men, if we truly want to release our cities from spiritual bondage or captivity. We were also encouraged to have   fellowship with one another as no man is totally dependent on himself.

 Using Isaiah 35: 3-8 Dr. Akinboboye points out vital ways of helping to release our cities:

  helping our relationship as well as networking

1. Isaiah 35:3 mentioned “Strengthen the weak hands”. When we hear about the word “hands” being used in the bible it entails “enterprise” or “work” and “warfare”.  We must be able to do our work wellno matter the area or sphere of life we are contributing from (Psalms 18:34). We can never develop strength without exercise. We must train to be strong in warfare and be able to destroy.
2. The second aspect of Isaiah 35:3 also talks about “confirm the feeble knees””. To be strong enough to help or release our cities, we must learn to confirm our feeble knees in prayers. Knees talk about prayers and Intercession. What happens to most Intercessors is that they begin to faint in the place of prayers if they are not getting desired results. (Luke 18:1) Men always ought to pray and not faint. This is called the Intercessors dilemma or paradox.  1 King 19:4 and Psalm 34; are examples of Children of God who had this dilemma. In Psalm 34 David asked questions of his expectations from God. Elijah did the same in 1 Kings when discouragement set in.
3. There is a need for us to open our eyes. This is a year when God is giving us a vision that we would be able to see clearly. The blind man was taken outside the city to be healed; could there have been something hindering his healing there? (Luke 8)  
4. The ears of the deaf shall be unstopped for instructions and guidance. (Isaiah 35:5): Intercessors are like Prophets, God will speak to us clearly and we will hear clearly to give guidance and direction to others.
5. Then shall the lame man leap like a deer; any lameness and in- capabilities in our feet will be healed. Whatever paralysis that is hindering us from doing what we should do, let the Lord heal.
6. Our tongue is  for singing  out  in joy and  worship(Isaiah 35: 6), for the time to rejoice has come and not time for mourning (Nehemiah 8: 9-10). God will teach us to praise and worship Him as tools of warfare that affects Heaven. We must learn to worship.
7. Isaiah 35:8 speaks of highway,  a highway of holiness, where the unclean will not thread, but angelic traffic  that will lead us in the release of our cities.
   For us to be strong for our Cities and the people, we need to network one with another. The concept of “two” in the bible cannot be over emphasized; (for where two shall agree as touchinganything that they shall ask, it shall be done). (Matt 18:18-19) while Luke 10:1 tells us Jesus sent them out two by two. Ecclesiastes  4 9-12 says two are better than one; for they have a better reward for their labour. There is immense strength in fellowship and warfare is for an army and it is corporate (Eph 6:12; Joel 13:9; 1 Chronicles 19:12). There is great need for us to help each other and to wake up the mighty men. We work together to survive, and an army is led by a general (I Corinthians 12:14-26; Eph. 4; 1 Corinthians  9:19-23; Obadiah  1:17; Gen 18:11-20). Networking and fellowship as humans are vital for strength; David’s life was threatened at war and Abishai came to his aid and dealt with the opponent. Building a house is a network; we are one body but many members.
8. Various Kings of cities like king of Tyrus in Ezekiel 28:2-19 is referred to as the prince of Tyrus, who sits in the place of god in the mist of the sea and not God. They liaise with demons, the King of Egypt that rules the city from the river (Ezekiel 29:3).  The spirit of un-regenerated human beings no matter how highly placed, fraternize with demons and for us to pray for the salvation of people in the cities, we must deal with such control of the people.( Luke 11: 1-28)
9. We cannot save Nigeria all at once but city by city ( Deuteronomy 7: 22) then implement the 7 Mountains of Society; some of us may be struggling with cursed cities Like Jericho that was cursed by Joshua in 1 Kings 16:34 and healed by Elisha in  2 Kings 2: 19-22.

If we are going to be people whom God will use as agents of restoration for our Cities, we need to become new vessels; that will transform cities and not just deliver them as Elisha transformed the water from its source. We need to ask God for the redemptive purpose of the city, then ask God to confirm our words (Isaiah 44:25-26).

May God make us agents of transformation for our Cities!

SEEING OUR CITIES THROUGH THE EYES OF GOD –

ENGR. NTIENSE UBON – ISRAEL

As God’s people we are encouraged and admonished that we need to answer the question.  “What do you see?” What we see is very important; we need to see from God’s perspective as Zechariah did in Zechariah 4:1-5. In Jeremiah, the Lord told the prophet that he saw correctly (Jeremiah 1: 12). Our cities must be seen through the eyes of God.

 Haggai 2:3 speaks of a generation that did not see the former glory of the Temple as a result they rejoiced at a lesser glory. We need therefore to pray for God’s glory to come down as in the former days. A worship environment must be created around us by exalting the name of God.  We must pray for God to open our eyes afresh to see our cities the way He sees it, (Haggai 2; Isaiah 6:1). Heaven’s perspective and of a holy God is always that the Earth is full of His glory. As we see our cities in communism to God we realize how much we have to do.

 The news in heaven is who will I send, who will go for Me? God is still searching for whom to send. God’s calling is more important than judging the wicked.

Issues of Strategy on warfare

 The first thing to do is to weigh the emphasis and strength of the enemy.

 Strategy is from the Greek word ‘strategia’ that speaks of a high level plan with which to achieve one or more goals. It is also a comprehensive way to try to pursue political ends including the threat or actual use of force both are achieved with a strategic plan.  

 As Intercessors, let us all go back to God and review whether we even have strategies at all in our cities or we do things as the need arises .It is the lack of strategy that makes some of our victories unsustainable because strategies have an in-built long term goal; without  which  nothing can be sustained. Let there be no misunderstanding. We were not strategic or have a drawn out plan to go back to and look critically after some years and see where amendments need to be made on the blue print. The example of Alice Bailey’s 10 point strategy and a system to destroy a society, which were craftily worked out and put into law.

A strategy in place was followed, even when at times it did not succeed, they went back to work and re-strategize and wait for an opportunity to reintroduce the plan, until success is achieved.

 We must ask God how to plan for years to come, a document to always look at and assess, accept failure or success, make amends and move on.    

Matt 16, Psalm 2 and Matt 18 talks about raising disciples, teaching them and helping them to observe and do the commandments and will of God.

The body must work in partnership; together people are taught to work to effect change in people, in discipline and walking in righteousness.

Psalms 74: 9 speaks of “How long?” This is an important understanding for strategy. The scriptures below gives us different view of how long? ( Zechariah 1:12-13; Isaiah 40, Isaiah 6:9-10; Habakkuk 1: 5; Rev 6:9-11; Heb. 5: 1)

In conclusion, we need to upgrade our intercession and Priesthood and really stand with God in some responsibility to God and the Land. Allow God to upgrade your priesthood in things pertaining to God. Be effective and do a permanent work in a place that the enemy cannot easily undo.   

PICTURE GALLERY