Garden of the Heart Ministries - Prodigal Teachings

*Prodigal Teachings*

Praying your Prodigals Back Home Bearing Fruit Praying for the Prodigal Spouse Binding and Loosing Understanding a Prodigals Heart Back to Teachings	Praying for the Prodigal Spouse Has your spouse strayed from God? There are verses in the Bible that declare that unsaved loved ones receive special attention by God because of the presence of a believer within the family. “For the unbelieving husband has been sanctified through his wife, and the unbelieving wife has been sanctified through her believing husband” (1Corinthians 7:14 NIV). Matthew 19:5 says, “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.” You and your spouse are one flesh. When your spouse sins he gives Satan ground to work in his life. But because in God’s eyes you are one flesh, you can use the word of God to pray for your spouse just as if you were praying for yourself. Satan's legal ground is bypassed by this truth! Halleluiah! Even though your spouse may be resistant to the things of God, as you pray the word of God, you are you are agreeing with God even when they do not want God to work in their life. For example, think of something that you would pray for yourself like Ezekiel 36:25-27, which states: “Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleanness; and from all your idols will I cleanse you. A new heart will I give you and a new spirit will I put within you, and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you shall heed My ordinances and do them.” (Ezek 36:25-27 AMP) You can pray it this way for yourself: Father, I thank you that your word says that You will give me a new heart and put a new spirit within me. You will take away my stony heart and give me a heart of flesh. You will put Your Spirit within me and cause me to walk in Your statutes, and heed your ordinances and do them. You can pray this scripture promise for yourself in confidence knowing that God will answer, because He says that if you ask anything according to His will He hears you and you have those requests. “This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. And if we know that he hears us-whatever we ask-we know that we have what we asked of him.” (1John 5:14-15 NIV) Praying God’s promises from His word is praying according to His will. So you know when you pray like this He will answer in His time. In this same way you can pray for your spouse with the same confidence that you prayed for yourself, because in God’s eyes you are one flesh. Isn’t this exciting? There is hope! Now that you know this you can begin standing on God’s word for your spouse today. There is a whole storehouse of promises in the Bible. We have personalized some of these scripture promises for you to pray and you can find them here As you pray them you are planting the seed of God’s word into their lives. And when you thank God for it believing, you are watering those seeds with your faith. You may not see results immediately, but always remember that God is at work deep within their hearts. Start declaring the truth of God’s word for your spouse, believing that it has already been accomplished in his or her life. In the heavenlies it has been done, even though you may not see the results for some time. As you water the seed with your confident faith knowing that God’s word is being accomplished in your spouse’s life, that seed starts to swell with the moisture of the Holy Spirit just like a natural seed absorbs moisture and swells when you water it. When it swells, pressure builds and the seed gets ready to burst open with life. This is all unseen to the gardener who planted the seed. Even so when you are watering your spiritual seed, things may even look and feel like they’re getting worse instead of better. This is a time to press in even more diligently, calling those things that be not as though they were (Romans 4:17). Unfortunately, many people see this pressure as failure and give up. They dig up the seed with unbelief just when the promise is ready to come forth. Follow the example of Abraham who was told by God that his wife would bear a son even though she was barren. He never gave up even when Sarah turned 90 years old. God was faithful to His word and Isaac was born, and Abraham became the father of many nations. “No unbelief or distrust made him waver (doubtingly question) concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong and was empowered by faith as he gave praise and glory to God, fully satisfied and assured that God was able and mighty to keep His word and to do what He had promised.” (Romans 4:20-21 AMP) Nothing is impossible with God! Plant the seed in prayer and water it with your faith as you give praise and glory to God, being fully satisfied and assured that God is able and mighty to keep His word and to do what He has promised. We are sure that God will move on the behalf of your loved ones in His time and we would love to hear your testimony. Please email us