True Worship & Prayer By Sabrina Santiago

I strongly cherish and adore my upbringing in the apostolic faith. 

I cherish being dedicated unto the Lord as a baby, and raised my entire 20 years of life in church. 

I cherish my apostolic heritage of 4 generations and I’m not one bit ashamed of it at all. 

It is who I am! 

Since I was a little girl, at the age of 7, 

I truly experienced God at the altar one night at a hallelujah rally. I was young, with little understanding of anything, but what I did understand was that God’s precious gift was given to me in that very moment. 

The best feeling I’ve ever felt in my life was the sweet incredible presence of the Holy Ghost. 

So uplifting and so pure, I really cannot explain what I felt exactly, but it was amazing and ever since then, 

I grew up absolutely adoring worship, music and prayer so profoundly. 

It shifted me.

I believe that prayer and worship 

are extremely powerful! 

A few months ago my pastor spoke about worship and how many people would think that the most important part of a church service is the preaching, what he explained was so true and eye opening. The word is very important, do not get me wrong at all, but really the significant part of the service is the worship.

Worship is the most important part of our everyday lives and that is what we were created to do. Hearing and studying the word is just as important, but without our worship, our hearts would not be opened to receive any of it! 

That is why I also believe it is so serious of what type of music we listen too.

Worship is worship and whatever you are listening too, you are glorifying it. 

I know I’m a huge Disney nerd and I can get carried away with all types of movies and songs, and they’re not necessarily bad, but how is that edifying me spiritually? You know? 

Yes they’re fun little catchy toons,

but is it excessively preoccupying my 

mind and heart that I’d rather glorify it more than glorifying the one who it 

is all about? We must be careful of what we are listening to. Our spirit is vulnerable to whatever we allow before us. 

We have to think to ourselves, 

How is this edifying me spiritually?

So powerful yet so serious.

The Bible says in John 4:24(KJV)

“God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.”

This scripture is super transparent.  

God is a spirit(referring to the Holy Ghost), and those who worship him must worship Him in spirit(in the Holy Ghost) and in truth! 

Our prayers, our worship is 

a sweet smelling savor to the Lord.

He wants our true worship!

Just as powerful as worship is, 

so is prayer.

Prayer changes things, prayer breaks strongholds, prayer draws you closer to Him, prayer uplifts your spirit, prayer is powerful! 

Your prayer is a pleasant incense to the Lord! 

The Bible says in James 5:16 

“The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.”

In other words, the prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective! 

This is proof that a God fearing person’s 

requests made known unto Him are so powerful and fruitful! 

We must never stop praying!

A little insight on my mornings, 

I personally enjoy to wake up early, freshen up, make a pot of coffee, 

and run worship music while I collect 

my thoughts and shift my focus on Him previously before going into prayer. 

Once I have collected my thoughts,

then I begin praying without time limitation. 

Nobody understands but I have a love for prayer. It’s surreal, but there really is  something so powerful about talking to our father. 

The Bible says,

“O come, let us worship and bow down:

let us kneel before the Lord our maker.” Psalms 95:6 

This scripture is telling us to come unto Him with worship and kneel down before Him our God. 

When we kneel before the Lord in prayer, IT IS POWERFUL and the enemy is  terrified of it. 

The definition of bowing down before someone is to obey, to pledge allegiance, to submit unto one’s full control. 

This is so symbolic to us kneeling and yielding unto the Lord’s authority over us personally and over our lives. 

Prayer is our weapon! 

God wants us to go to Him with anything and everything; nothing you come to Him with is silly at all. Nothing! 

Nothing is too little or too big for Him, 

He just wants you to come to Him. 

He is not forceful, he is a gentleman. 

Just like a father and his son, when the son falls He picks him up, when something is wrong, the son just wants his Dad. 

It is just like us today. He picks us up when we fall, He dusts us off when we get dirty, He comforts us when we are scared, 

He holds our hand when we are walking through the storm, He holds us in our brokenness, He constantly reminds us, 

“It’s going to be alright. I am here, son.”

We are never alone! 

He is there and always will be. 

He just wants us to come to Him. 

I don’t know about you but that touches me extremely. 

To know that He is REAL and all He wants is for us to accept Him and to run to Him.

He takes care of it all.

Prayer and worship changes things!

Encouragement:

Today I really encourage you all to get away from all distractions of this everyday life and spend some time with God. 

Again, I personally do not time myself

(unless it’s before work) but I truly urge you all not to limit yourselves. 

Go somewhere alone,

Turn on some worship music, 

Think, read, just focus on Him. 

I know we are busy we have work and lots of other things, but that is when I believe us as apostolics need to make sacrifices. If you have work in the morning, get up earlier than you normally do. If you have plans in the afternoon and you’re planning to take a nap before, plan that time as your prayer opportunity! 

I believe we all have time to pray in our day. We do. 

It is not impossible, It’s that we don’t 

like to sacrifice. 

I understand and I do have times where I forget to pray myself, but I know those are the times when we want to give into our human flesh. I think we pass up many opportunities to be able to pray in our day because we give in too much into what we do allow. 

Please do not do that!

Talk to Him, let Him know everything. Thank Him for everything! 

He wants to be close to you!

He is for you not against you and, 

He loves you so much :) 

Never give up, guys! 

We are powerful, anointed apostolics! 

Song list suggestion:

Wanted- Danny Gokey

My romance- Rick Pino & Kari Jobe

So amazing- IBC

Holy- Jesus culture