Fervent: A Woman's Battle Plan to Serious, Specific, and Strategic Prayer

by Priscilla Shirer

there’s an undeniable, unknowable, invisible mystery to prayer. That’s why our first reaction to it often leans toward dismissing it, downplaying it, devaluing its critical importance.

You write out your prayers so you “won’t forget” . . . won’t forget who the real enemy is won’t forget the One in whom your hope lies won’t forget your real need and dependencies are and later, won’t forget the record of how God responds

We pray because our own solutions don’t work and because prayer deploys, activates, and fortifies us against the attacks of the enemy. We pray because we’re serious about taking back the ground he has sought to take from us.

Satan is nothing but a copycat, trying desperately to convince you he’s more powerful than he actually is. Because remember: he does have limitations—boundaries he cannot cross no matter how much he desires or how hard he tries.

Passion is the fuel in the engine of your purpose.

fervent prayer keeps your true identity in focus. Reminds us of who we really are and taps into the power we really have in Christ.

As adopted daughters of the living God, if we’re not strategically praying in accordance with who our Maker and Redeemer says we are, if we aren’t calling ourselves by name according to that list from Ephesians, serving the devil notice that we know (like he knows) who we really are, we’ll always be subject to his attempts at devaluing us.

Praying for your mate shouldn’t begin when you’ve walked down the aisle. It should start now, before you’ve been on the first date or even know his first name. Pray for the man God may be positioning as your future husband.

But prayer—fervent, strategic prayer—can change things. Even unchangeable things. Even things as unchangeable as real-life scenes from your past—what you did, what you didn’t do, why you did it, why you didn’t. No, prayer doesn’t wipe them all away, doesn’t pretend they never happened. And, no, it doesn’t remove every natural, logical consequence from playing itself out.

that stuff Satan tries hanging over our head—those forgiven failings of ours are no longer reasons for shame but are now monuments to the totally amazing grace of God. I mean, just look at what He is able to forgive. Even this. Even that.

God wouldn’t tell us not to be afraid—or tell it to us so often—if He didn’t fully realize that fear, worry, anxiety, queasiness, cold feet, sweaty palms, dry mouth, and racing heartbeats are our first, natural reaction to some of the challenges of following Him, especially those (like most) that don’t come with clear, step-by-step instructions on how to handle every possible hiccup or contingency.

The thought of deliberately choosing a rhythm of rest and margin around our full slate of activities feels almost unthinkable—because it lands on people who still think the way a slave thinks. People who’ve been trained through the years not to say no.

What if you found the voice to utter that dirty little word—“no”—without shouldering the least bit of guilt or shame from it?

pressure is often a mask for idolatry.

God’s purpose in giving you Sabbath spaces amid your full, productive life is to help you be uninhibited in your devotion, service, and worship of Yahweh. Margin keeps you from marginalizing God.

Few things hold the potential to so drastically alter the landscape of your life as when you claim godly authority over the insane amount of unnecessary pressures you face.

The peace of God, preserved by the prayers of God’s people, is meant to forge us together in friendship and unite us in mission.