Hearing the Rain: The Power of Faithful Prayer

(applause)
Scott McDowell: Thank you, Rebecca.
Thank you, Rebecca.
Three readings.
Romans 8.
"What then shall we say to this?
What then shall we say in response to this
if God is for us?
Who can be against us?"
And then 1 Kings 18.
"And Elijah said to Ahab,
'Go and eat and drink,
for there is the sound of a heavy rain.'
So Ahab went off to eat and drink,
but Elijah climbed to the top of Carmel,
bent down to the ground
and put his face between his knees.
Go and look toward the sea,
he told his servant, and he went and looked.
There's nothing there, he said seven times.
Elijah said, 'Go back.'
The seventh time the servant reported,
'A cloud as small as a man's hand
is rising from the sea.'"
And then James 5.
"Therefore confess your sins to each other
and pray for each other
so that you may be healed.
The prayer of a righteous man
is powerful and effective.
Elijah was a man just like us.
He prayed earnestly that it would not rain.
It did not rain on the land for three and a half years.
Again, he prayed and the heavens gave rain
and the earth produced its crops."
David Fraze: The President had an idea,
something that you could remember
his lesson that he's about to give.
And they have to vote on my level of professorship,
and he said to make it rain, so I will.
And here's what we're going to do.
We're going to divide up into three sections.
This section right here, these two, raise your hand.
You're in the back, there we go, softball, there we go.
Right here, you're section two,
go ahead and raise your hand.
And all of you are section three, raise your hand.
Now, if you've never done this, it's pretty easy.
We're going to start here.
And then when I point to your section, you join in.
And I'm going to do different sounds, you join in, okay?
And then I'm going to take them away.
Does everybody understand?
Is that clear?
It's going to be awesome, all right?
Are we good?
All right, here we go.
I'm coming over here, and I'm going to run across the stage.
Or walk fast.
Okay, here we go.
Remember, keep doing it.
Come on.
There's no laughter in the rain.
There's dust, there's all kinds of stuff.
We've done that.
(rain falling)
It's more like cricket, it's going to happen, here we go.
Who wants to be lightning?
Thunder.
Whatever, okay, here we go.
Nice job.
There you go, Mr. President.
Scott McDowell: Applause.
The prayer of a righteous person
is powerful and effective.
I still remember where I was standing,
my dear friend in the neighborhood who was a doctor,
he happened to be my doctor.
He was also the doctor of a common friend,
and he called me one night,
I was standing at the sink, kitchen window,
doing dishes, rare thing for me, but I was doing dishes.
And he said, "Scott, I'm not able to tell you anything
"because that would be violating confidentiality,
"and I don't violate confidentiality,
"but we have a mutual friend,
"and you know who our mutual friend is,
"and I just left his bedside,
"and it might be a good thing for you to pray."
And so I just remember right there, right then,
just praying, "God, you know the situation."
Lifted my friend up in prayer.
He'd been having some really difficult health issues
in the hospital, and I went on about my business,
but I remember that place.
About a day later, my doctor friend called me back,
and he said, "You know, the Bible says
"the prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective.
"He said, 'Yours must work too.'"
(audience laughs)
One person got the joke.
Yours must work too.
Our friend recovered.
He's still living to this day, productive life.
But I remember being called to prayer,
and I remember praying,
and there wasn't anything special about it
except that I just asked the God of the universe
to intervene, and He did.
I've prayed sometimes and not gotten the results I wanted.
But I know that prayer is powerful and effective.
And I particularly wanted to have David
make a little rain today,
because the story that is the backdrop
to that wonderful statement by James
is the story of Elijah that unfolds over four chapters
in 1 Kings 16 through 18, 19 in there.
And we're not gonna look at the whole thing,
but I just wanted to latch on to that one line
where Elijah's just won what has been called
the contest on Carmel.
He's defeated the 400 plus prophets of Baal,
and he gives that line to Ahab,
which if you don't even know much Scripture,
you know Ahab was a really bad guy.
And he says to Ahab, "Go eat and drink,
"for there is the sound of a heavy rain."
There is the sound of a heavy rain.
I think that's profound,
and it's interesting the divine commentary of James.
James says he was a man just like us, and he prayed.
And James calls it a prayer of faith.
And I wanna pray that way.
I wanna challenge you to pray that way,
but here's the really neat little insight
that I just discovered a few weeks ago
after Jodi Redding shared this passage with me.
He says there's a sound of a heavy rain
before he even started praying.
Because as the story unfolds,
he tells Ahab there's a sound of a heavy rain.
Then he climbs back up Mount Carmel
and prays.
He puts his head between his knees.
I guess that's a really good prayer posture, Bible guys.
And he prays.
He sends his servant out, "Is there anything?"
"Nope."
Goes back to praying.
Sends him out again, "Is there anything?"
"Nope."
Sends him out seven times.
The seventh time he comes back, he says,
"Well, there's a little cloud the size of a man's hand."
And if you'll read the story,
a huge rainstorm comes.
The three and a half year drought ends.
But what moves me is the idea
that Elijah heard the sound of the rain
before he even started praying.
Because the prayer of a righteous person
is powerful and effective.
And we get hung up on a righteous person,
and that was the point of my friend's joke to me.
But what James also says is,
Elijah wasn't a superhero.
The text literally says,
Elijah was a person just like us.
I want to challenge every person in this room
to be more prayerful.
To pray like Elijah.
And I want to ask you,
can you hear the rain?
Have a great day.