I’m so excited to have the chance to review the first book I finished off my list of books I was excited about that were still releasing in the late part of 2016. Check out some of the other books that made the list, as I have a few of these already that I am working through in order to get a review up before the end of the year!
Title: Kingdom Prayer: Touching Heaven to Change Earth
Author: Tony Evans
Published by: Moody Publishers (October 4, 2016)
240 Pages
Blurb: If you want to know the temperature of your spiritual life, look at the thermostat setting on your prayer life.
Prayer is the most misunderstood and neglected aspect of the Christian life. It has been estimated that most Christians pray three to five minutes a day. Compare that to the time many spend complaining, and you’ll gain insight into the spiritual and emotional condition of our day.
Yet God has constructed the world in such a way that there is much He won’t do in a Christian’s life apart from prayer. Prayer, when combined with faith, can accomplish great things.
In this practical and comprehensive overview of prayer, Tony Evans covers a variety of topics, including:
- Principles of productive prayer
- The power of prayer and praise
- Fasting and prayer
- Prayer and God’s purposes
Tony’s expositions of various passages on prayer will help you realize its critical importance and encourage you to make it a dominant mark of your life.
My Take: A wonderful read about one of the most important areas of a Christian’s life: prayer. But at the same time, this is also one of the most difficult areas to excel in continuously. We have moments where we feel the presence of God and prayers flow from us, getting answered. Yet there are times where we feel so removed from God and get frustrated by the lack of answers to our prayers. If you’ve ever felt discouraged about your prayer life, or wanted to learn to how supercharge your prayer connection, this book is definitely a must-read.
There are many excellent areas that this book covers, each of them pertaining in some way toward activating or maintaining an effective prayer life: fasting, abiding in Christ, steeping yourself in God’s word, knowing God’s will, connection to the Holy Spirit, and many other topics and subtopics. Each of them are written in a clear and convincing manner, expressing how those areas work to unlock the full effect of Kingdom Prayer.
There was mention, early on, about prayer being more likely to be answered if it aligns to God’s Promises. And I had hoped, for the rest of the book, that a chapter would arise that would list some of the more beneficial promises that we could pray. But upon reaching the end and reflecting a little, I think this choice of his was intentional. Sure, he could guide us to where we could find these promises and get us on the superhighway to praying those in our lives. But that is missing the point. It’d be like surgically removing a bunch of weight but continuing to live the same life: you might see immediate results but, without a change in your daily life, you will eventually end up right back where you started. Instead, he focuses on the critical concepts of abiding in God and steeping yourself in the Word, both of which will eventually allow you to unlock those promises.
I cannot recommend this book strongly enough. Prayer is an important thing for every Christian, and an area of our lives that we need to unlock to its full potential. A few thousand men and women, praying powerful prayers that align with God’s will, can change a nation and, perhaps, the world for the glory of God. It won’t be quick or easy. It will require some active work on our parts to get to the point where our prayers can be that impactful. But this book helps to outline the key areas to accomplishing these things, and should be a book you will not only want to read, but also keep close at hand so you can refer back to it and reread important passages again and again.
**I received a copy of this book from Moody Publishers in exchange for an honest review.
Author David Wiley 