If you are not filled with the Spirit, ask God to fill you right
now. Put down this book, ask the Lord to fill you with His
Spirit, and then open your mouth and allow your new prayer
language to flow.

Your first prayer assignment is not for yourself. It is to pray
for all men, for kings and men in high authority (1 Timothy
2:1-4). When you respond to the call of intercession, the
Holy Spirit prays the perfect will of God through you.
Separate yourself from the things of this world. Get in your
prayer closet alone with God and commit to intercession.

Begin praying for a specific body of people: a family, a village,
a country, a state or a nation. You do not need to wait for a burden
for this. The Word says Jesus was moved with compassion
(Matthew 9:36). Compassion is not a feeling, it is a Person.
Yield to His love inside you. All the motivation you need will
come that way. The One who ever liveth to make intercession
is living in you! He’s already motivated! Yield to Him.

Isaiah 64:7 says, “And there is none that calleth upon thy
name, that stirreth up himself to take hold of thee….” The
Spirit of God will not be able to help you intercede unless you
are willing to stir yourself and take that position of intercession.
Paul told Timothy to stir up the gift that was in him
(2 Timothy 1:6). You stir it up!

Begin to pray by making yourself available to the Holy
Spirit. Again, yield to Him. Allow Him to use you to pray
for the man who does not have anyone to pray for him.
Stand in the gap for him. Start where you are and allow it
to spread to the world. You are literally fighting spiritual
warfare in their behalf. The Apostle Paul said, “For I would
that ye knew what great conflict I have for you, and for them
at Laodicea, and for as many as have not seen my face in
the flesh” (Colossians 2:1). This was the same conflict Paul
talked about in Ephesians 6 when he said we wrestle against
principalities, powers, rulers of the darkness of this world,
and spiritual wickedness in high places (Ephesians 6:12). The
family of God is not based on selfishness. It is based on love.
Intercession is the highest expression of love.

When you commit yourself to pray for those who need Jesus,
remember the Bible says you are going to have to bind Satan in
order to spoil his house (Matthew 12:29). You are confronting
all the forces of evil that have them bound. Do not stop just
because it looks like they will never receive. Your intercession
is placing pressure on Satan and his forces. Do not relent, but
persevere in prayer. It is up to them to make their own choice.
But through your intercession, they will be able to make that
choice. They will no longer be blinded by Satan.

Take these scriptures before the Holy Spirit and give Him the
opportunity to reveal them to you personally. He is the Teacher.
He can show you how they work. You can stir up the gift within
you simply by desiring to know how intercession works.
Before spiritual births take place, travail goes forth. In the
natural realm, a woman does not give birth without labor. In
the spirit, travail is the labor that brings forth the new birth.
Intercession is God’s heartbeat because it is the labor that
births the souls of this world into His family.

We noticed Isaiah 64:7 spoke of stirring oneself up. Isaiah
66:8 says, “Who hath heard such a thing? who hath seen such
things? Shall the earth be made to bring forth in one day? or
shall a nation be born at once? for as soon as Zion travailed,
she brought forth her children.” Let’s find out who Zion is and
what she does to travail, and how the children are brought in.
Hebrews 12:22-23 says, “But ye are come unto mount Zion,
and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem,
and to an innumerable company of angels, to the general
64 Intercessory Prayer
assembly and church of the firstborn, which are written in
heaven, and to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just
men made perfect.” Zion is the Church of the firstborn. Jesus
is the firstborn of many brethren (Romans 8:29). Zion is the
Church of Jesus Christ. If you are a member of the Body of
Christ, you are Zion.

In Galatians 4:19 Paul said, “My little children, of whom I
travail in birth again….” If he is travailing in birth again, he
must have travailed before to bring the children to birth.
Travail causes others to be born again. Why would the
Scriptures compare intercession to birth? Jesus said out of
the belly, the deepest interior of a man, would flow these
rivers of living water (John 7:38). So stir yourself up and start
praying in other tongues! Your spirit is praying. Keep at it.
Soon you will notice the Holy Spirit will take hold together
with you. You will begin to travail as if in labor.

You may groan out loud. You are releasing spiritual power.
The Word says, “The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous
man availeth much” (James 5:16). The Amplified Bible translation
says, “The earnest (heartfelt, continued) prayer of a
righteous man makes tremendous power available [dynamic
in its working].” This is the art of intercession. It is stirring
yourself up to take hold with the Holy Spirit to cause eternal
changes in the lives of others.

Romans 8:26 says, “Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our
infirmities….” The word helpeth is translated from three
Greek words which together mean “takes hold together with
us against.” That verse literally reads: “Likewise the Spirit
also [takes hold together with us against] our infirmities:
for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but
the Spirit itself [or Himself] maketh intercession for us with
groanings which cannot be uttered. And he that searcheth
the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit, because
he maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of
God” (verses 26-27). He is telling the Body of Christ about the
forces available through intercession. The Holy Spirit sees to
it that God’s will is carried out even in areas where we do not
know how to pray. He searches the heart and knows the mind
of the spirit of a man. In other words, you can go beyond your
own mental ability and knowledge.

God’s purpose is for us to begin to pray for one another.
Intercession gives the Holy Spirit the opportunity to bring the
fullness of God’s will to pass in the earth.

Kenneth Copeland Ministries