Proclamation Prayer

Proclamation prayer is a from of authority prayer. In proclamation prayer, we use the authority of Jesus Christ to make pronouncements over a person or group or event or situation, commanding that it will come into alignment with God's perfect will for it. There is great power in authority prayer because we are not just making requests to God, we are actively working with Him to enforce His will in a given situation.

The key to success in any type of authority prayer is to be like Jesus, who said, "the Son can do nothing of Himself, but [He does] what He sees the Father do; for whatever the Father does, the Son also does in like manner" (John 5:19). In short, we can only use God's authority to do what God is doing.

That means we have to know what God is doing in a given situation in order to use authority prayer for it. So how do we find out what God is doing? The answer is both simple. We let God show us what He is doing and we learn to recognize His voice.

Here are a few simple guidelines in determining what He is doing. First, we need to know (and consult) our Bible. The Bible is important because it shows us how God is likely to act in many different situations. It lets us know how He feels about things, and it also serves as a guide or road map in judging/evaluating what we think we hear God speak to us. We know that He will never speak a prayer direction to us that conflicts with what He has already said in His written word.

In addition to the reading our Bible, we should seek to walk close to God and to develop a personal and intimate relationship with Him. This involves things like making a commitment to obey Him, daily prayer, spending time with Him, worship, etc. The closer we walk to God, the better we get to know Him, and the the easier it is to hear His voice and to see what He is doing.

There is one more way to find out what God is doing. That is through the discernment of those who we trust as spiritual leaders. If we have a godly leader who has a proven track record in hearing God's voice, we can trust their direction in prayer assignments.

Authority prayer is extremely powerful when we use it in accord with God's will. But authority prayer is not effective when we try to use it to accomplish anything outside of God's will and agenda. I.e., we can't decide that we want something that lays outside of God's will for us, then try to use God's authority or power to get what we want. Authority prayer only works when we are in line with God's will; when we are doing what God is doing. To put it another way, you can't use God's authority and power to do something that goes against God's plans.

For instance, let's say you have a sick relative and you really want to see the person healed. You might try authority prayer to command the sickness to leave them, or you might command their body to be healed. That works most of the time, because most of the time it is not God's will for people to be sick. But what if that person has completed God's earthly assignment for them and it is there time to "go home" to Heaven and their great reward. In that case, your prayer is not going to work. Sickness will not have to obey your commands because you are issuing them outside of God's will.

Hebrews 9:27 says, "it is appointed for men to die." If sickness tries to take them before their God-appointed time, then you can successfully use God's authority to command that sickness to leave them. But that same command won't work when God says that it is time for them to come home to Heaven.

Does that make sense? If not, look at what Ecclesiastes 3:1-3 says: "To everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under Heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck what is planted; a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up..." God has appointed several times and seasons in a person's life. We cannot use God's authority to violate God's timing in a person's life.

But on the other hand, the devil (who is the enemy of our souls) is constantly at work to mess up God's plan and timing for people's lives. According to John 10:10, the devil wants "to steal, and to kill, and to destroy." He wants to wreck havoc in a person's live, doing all he can to separate them from God's perfect will for their lives. That is one of the main reasons that the Lord has given us His authority--to use against the devils' plans to spoil God's plans.

Jesus said in Matthew 28:18, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me." Jesus gave His disciples that same authority in Matthew 10:1. In that specific instance, they were to use it "to drive out evil spirits and to heal every disease and sickness." I.e., they were to use the authority of God to undo the works that the devil did to violate God's will.

That is the same thing Jesus did, over and over again, when He walked on this earth. He saw what the Father was doing in a person's life and He saw how the devil was opposing that. Then He used His authority to undo the devil's perversion of God's will in people's lives. Acts 10:38 puts it this way: "God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power, who went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him."

Jesus was passionate about seeing what the Father was doing, and then doing it with Him in His power and authority. He loved doing it, and He gave us the ability to do the same thing. He gave His authority us us after He rose from the dead and just before He ascended back into Heaven. The bible records this in Acts 1:7-8: "It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by His own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be My witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth."

In short, when Jesus left the earth, He gave us His authority so we could keep doing what He had been doing. When Jesus walked this earth, He used His authority to do the Father's will. Now He has given us that same authority, so that we can keep doing what He did. If you think about it, that makes perfect sense, because we are His body here on earth. Through us, He is still doing the Father's business; He is still destroying the works of the devil that violate God's will. Jesus accomplishes this through us--He gave us His authority and He expects us to use it the same way that He did.

That is the foundation and basis of all authority prayer.

Now, let's get back to proclamation prayer, which is one form of authority prayer. Proclamation allows us to use Christ's authority to do the Father's will. Proclamation prayer is where we declare God's will over a given person, group, or situation; we use the authority that He has given us to enforce God's will through our spoken proclamation. This works because we are doing what the Father is doing, and because we are using the authority that Jesus gave us to do it.

There are two different forms of proclamation prayer: Prophetic and non-prophetic. Prophetic declarations are uttered through the gift of prophesy at the Holy Spirit's leading. Non-prophetic proclamations are where God uses something other that prophesy to show us what to declare. The only difference between the two types of proclamation prayer is how we figure out what it is that we are going to proclaim.

This teaching series will give you several non-prophetic proclamations. How did we determine what to proclaim? Well, the Lord can use many different things to give us proclamation prayers. He may have us discern it through Bible study and prayer, or by the Holy Spirit's leading. Or He may lead us to resurrect a declaration that someone originally gave as a prophetic utterance, and instruct us to use it as a part of our prayer.

I wish I could "capture" the prophetic and inject it into everyone's veins so that every single intercessor could pray prophetic proclamations. But the Holy Spirit has not chosen to distribute that particular gift to every believer, so not everyone is able to prophesy or to pray prophetic proclamations.

I should probably explain what prophesy is--it is a gift from God where you hear from Him and then speak forth His words at His command. If you are a prophetic intercessor, then you might open your mouth at His command and He might fill it with what He wants you to proclaim.

But don't fret if you are not a prophetic intercessor, because the Holy Spirit can still lead you to pray powerful proclamation prayers. He will just use something other than prophesy to show you what He wants you to proclaim. In fact, the main emphasis of this teaching series will be to provide you with a set of non-prophetic proclamation tools that you can adapt and use in your prayer life.

The proclamation prayers in this teaching were "developed" in a number of ways. Some were originally given as a prophetic utterance, and were recorded so that others could proclaim them as well. (After they are recorded and used by others, I don't consider them as "prophetic" proclamations. That is because God did not speak them directly to you, He spoke them to someone else, and you are reading/repeating what they told you that God said to them.) But they are still proclamations of God's will and they still carry great spiritual authority and power.

Some of the non-prophetic proclamations in this series were developed by selecting portions of Scripture that proclaim God's will (and His truth) over the lies that the enemy uses to deceive us and to bring us into captivity and bondage. Others were developed by using many things to discern God's will: studying His written word, the Holy Spirit's leading, and the spiritual discernment of others.

These prophetic proclamations all accomplish the same thing--we determine what God's will is and then we speak forth a declaration or proclamation of His will over whatever is opposing it. In all cases, we use the authority of Jesus Christ to accomplish God's will.

This teaching series will provide seven different proclamation prayers. Some of them will be proclamations over our own lives and the rest will be prayed on behalf of others. The prayers will cover:

Lesson 3 - Gaining Victory Over Oppression In Our Own Lives.
Lesson 4 - Proclaiming Our Commitment To Jesus' Lordship.
Lesson 5 - Proclamation Prayer For Financial Breakthrough.
Lessons 6 & 7 - Proclamation Prayer Over Our Families And Loved Ones
Lesson 8 - Proclamation Prayer Over Our City
Lesson 9 - Proclamation Prayer For The Prophetic Person
Lesson 10 - Proclamation Prayer For The Internet

But before we dive into the proclamation prayers, I want to give you a couple of examples of how proclamation prayers are done and the powerful effect they can have. We will look at those examples in Lesson 2.