The Power of Praying with Faith

by Dr. Frederick K.C. Price

The prayer of faith, also known as petition prayer, is the prayer that most people think of when they use the term prayer. Petition prayer is between you and God. It is you asking God for a particular outcome, whether it's a job, money, a lifetime mate, or whatever. The key verse for the prayer of faith is Mark 11:24, where Jesus says: "Therefore I say to you, whatever things you ask when you pray, believe that you receive them, and you will have them."

The rule to consider here is when you pray-not after you pray...not when you feel something...not when you see something. When you pray (the moment that you pray) you must believe that you receive what you asked for.

This is a difficult concept for some people. God is a present tense God. He doesn't operate in the past or in the future, but in the now. Whenever you pray, at that moment you are in the present. At that precise time, you must believe that you receive what you are praying for. Hebrews 11:1 "Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." Your faith is substance-it is something real, something tangible. It is the evidence of things you cannot see.

Think of a court of law. The jury was not at the scene of a crime, but the attorney introduces a photo of the crime scene that shows blood. That photo takes the place of the "thing" itself, the crime scene. The evidence is proof of something the juror cannot see but knows nonetheless. Your faith is proof of something that you have received...but can't yet see. The Amplified Bible says it this way: "Now faith is the assurance (the confirmation, the title deed) of the things [we] hope for, being the proof of things [we] do not see and the conviction of their reality [faith perceiving as real fact what is not revealed to the senses]."

Notice that Mark 11:24 does not say when you will actually see the result of your prayer. It does not tell you how long it will take for that prayer result to appear, and this is where many Christians get hung up. God lives in one eternal now. There is no past or present for Him. But in the natural world, due to a number of factors, it may take time for the answer to manifest itself. As an example, when you make a stock market transaction and tell your broker to sell $100 of stock, he sells it right then. But you do not possess the actual money until he sends it to you through the mail or transmits it electronically to your account. Even then, you will likely get a check, and that check does you no good until you endorse it and put it in your account. We do not have a problem understanding these processes that we have to go through in the natural world. We know they are required to bring something you have into a reality you can use.

Part of the faith required to make a prayer transaction, to activate your faith request, is that you can only pray one time for something-because if you believe you have already receive it, why would you ask for it again? Imagine I'm standing in front of you, and I say, "Please give me your Bible."

You reach down, pull out your Bible, and hand it to me. Then I say, "Please give me your Bible."

What? You would rightly say, "Are you crazy? I just gave you my Bible." If you have asked God for something once, you must have faith enough to believe that He heard you and that He has answered your prayer. That's what Jesus meant when He said, "Believe that you receive them" (referring to the things you prayer for).

God answers prayers, and He will answer your specific prayer in line with His Word, but it is your faith that brings that answer out of the spiritual world and into the physical world. How many times in Scripture does Jesus say to someone, "According to your faith...," or "Daughter, you faith has made you whole"? He referred to people's faith constantly, and even though it was His power that healed them, He always credited their faith with being the catalyst. In fact, when Jesus went to His hometown, we are told: "Now He did not do many mighty works there because of their unbelief" (Matt. 13:58). Well, I have a question for you: Did Jesus suddenly lose His power on that visit to Nazareth? No! His power never changed. What changed? It was the people's level of faith mixed with His power.

There is a simple spiritual explanation for this. God will not do something against your will. God will not violate free will. If you don't have faith to do something, He won't violate your will. When the blind men came to Jesus and asked that He restore their sight, He asked them, "Do you believe that I am able to do this?" (Matt. 9:28). They said, "Yes," and He said, "According to your faith let it be to you" (v. 29). The Bible actually indicates that they received their sight. Just as the air you breathe is already there-but you must inhale it, so your healing is already here to be taken by faith.