Whatsoever Ye Will

Good morning! I am working ahead on these devotionals as I prepare to speak at a retreat this weekend. I’d love, love your prayers for me, as well as Brenda Hollenbach, who is also speaking at a different retreat this weekend. Would you pray that we would speak boldly as we ought through the power of the Spirit, that He would finish the prep work that we need to accomplish, and that we would rest in His doing it all through us? We are well aware, thanks to this devotional, that apart from Him, we can bear no fruit. We rest in what He wants to do in and through us this weekend.

Please note, if you are reading these only on the blog or Facebook, we will not be posting devotionals on this Saturday or Sunday. I will post the ones we missed on Monday, and continue the normal posting Monday as well. Last Friday's post  contains the link to the devotional so you can read on your own those two days. 
 
The devotional today is entitled Whatsoever Ye Will and is from John 17:7
 
If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask what ever you wish, and it shall be done for you. John 15:7
 
Here are the highlights:
The whole place of the branch in the vine is one of unceasing prayer. Without intermission it is ever calling: “ O my vine, send the sap I need to bear Thy fruit.” And its prayers are never unanswered: it asks what it needs, what it will, and it is done.//The healthy life of the believer in Christ is equally one of unceasing prayer. Consciously or unconsciously, he lives in continual dependence.//
 
The promise is given in direct connection with fruit bearing. Limit it to yourself, and your own needs, and you rob it of its power; you rob yourself of the power of appropriating it.
 
The promise is given in direct connection with the coming of the Spirit. //  To avail ourselves of the unlimited prayer promises, we must be men and women who are filled with the Spirit, and wholly given up to the work and glory of Jesus. // Let us realize that we can only fulfill our calling to bear much fruit by praying much. // Get the heart burdened with the need of souls, and the command to save them, and the power will come to claim the promise.
 
Let us claim it as one of the revelations of our wonderful life in the Vine. He tells us that if we ask in His name, in virtue of our union with Him, whatsoever it be, it will be done to us. Souls are perishing because there is too little prayer. God’s children are feeble because there is too little prayer. We bear so little fruit because there is so little prayer.
 
To be a branch means not only bearing fruit on earth, but power in prayer to bring down blessing from heaven. Abiding fully means praying much.
 
Ask what ye will. O my Lord, why is it that our hearts are so little able to accept these words in their divine simplicity? Oh give me to see that we need nothing less than this promise to overcome the powers of the world and Satan! Teach us to pray in the faith of this Thy promise.
 
Abba teach us to pray. We want to believe the promise that if we abide in You and Your words abide in us, we truly can ask whatever we wish, and it shall be done for us. Lord teach us to remember the pruning You do in us is for fruit to bear, for much fruit to bear through us. Continue to teach us to be still and be only the branch. Teach us to cease striving in trying to bear fruit. Abba awaken our hunger for You. Jesus You are the Bread of Life, and our Living Water. Awaken our hunger for you, give us eyes to see our desperate need of You. You promise that when we hunger and thirst for righteousness, we are satisfied. O God, so many of us walk around unsatisfied. We do not know how to be still, we do not know how to cease striving, we do not know how to simply be a branch. Today Lord, lift our eyes to be fixed on You, reveal to us moments of time we have to be still before You. Unveil Your word to us again as we seek You in the Word You have given to us. We would rest, we would abide, we would pray... teach us again to pray O God, humble our hearts and convince us of our utter need of You, again and again, until we believe it. You are our Living Hope, and Your words and promises are Life for us. Thank You Abba, in Jesus' name, amen.