Have You Ever Experienced the True Power of Prayer?

What Really Happens When Prayer Is Joined to Sacrifice

"If anyone thinks that prayers are never answered, let him offer a prayer to the Lord that some suffering be sent to save a soul." - Fulton Sheen, Treasure In Clay

Your desire to make a difference

Have you ever felt that you are powerless to make a significant change in the world? Every day, you see so much injustice, chaos and suffering. You want to do something but you feel that you neither have the money nor the influence to make a difference in other people’s lives.

Sometimes all you want to do is to help just one person in need, but even that seems so difficult. The person you’re trying to help may refuse your advice or that person may no longer see any hope for his or her situation.

What do you do when you could no longer see a way to make things better?

Never think that there is nothing you can do. Your power does not depend on your strength or your riches. Your power comes from above, and you unlock that power through prayer and sacrifice.

The power of prayer

Through prayer, you come before the very presence of God. Through sincerity of heart, your spirit is moved by faith and by love. Faith that can move even mountains. And love that can overcome all things!

And when you offer your prayer with sacrifice, your love becomes fully manifest.

It is no longer a love that is invoked only in words. It becomes a love that is proven by tears.

“And she weeping looked up to heaven, for her heart had confidence in the Lord.” — Daniel 13:35,DRB

We so often speak of the evil in the world, of the darkness of our times. We complain, we worry, we get troubled and angry. Sometimes we even feel afraid. Can things still turn out for the better?

What if they can?

And what if you can actually make a difference by offering your own life as a sacrifice? Would you?

This is not about being a hero. This isn't even about actually dying and giving up your life. But this is about being who you are supposed to be.

It is consecrating your life and letting God act powerfully through you.

“Sanctify yourself and you will sanctify society.”― St. Francis of Assisi

“We feel the world invaded by the powers of evil. Sin is very near, rising on the horizon with admirably organized human power. At physical, psychological and intellectual levels, the devil himself utilizes a power higher than ours, and normally it assures him at least apparent victories. How can we overcome him? We can only do it by supernatural means… by prayer.” 
 — Marie-Eugene of the Child Jesus, OCD, Where the Spirit Breathes

Prayer joined to sacrifice

“One must not think that a person who is suffering is not praying. He is offering up his sufferings to God, and many a time he is praying much more…” — St. Teresa of Avila

Let your prayer be joined to your sacrifice. Offer your sufferings, your heartaches and your tears. Present them all before God who never refuses to acknowledge a sincere and contrite heart.

You don’t always have to imagine some big sacrifice that God would notice and accept. He gives more value to the purity of your intentions than to the amount of outward offering you could render Him.

Many times, we forget the little sacrifices we can do. We ignore those little acts of compassion, humility and faithfulness we can perform each day.

Do we not all experience some hardships, inconveniences and troubles at the course of our normal lives?

“What is the ordinary man or woman called to suffer? Sprinkled freely through our days, will be rebuffs, humiliations, toil, unrewarded effort, unsuccessful labors, desires unfulfilled, and perhaps poverty and ill health. At one time the result of long, untiring labor will be swept away; at another, our aims and ambitions will fall lamentably short of realization.”— Francis Cassilly, A Story of Love

How vast are the opportunities given to us to suffer and to make a worthy sacrifice of love! How numerous the prayers we can offer each day joined to the many sufferings we experience in our lives.

“I often wonder that if innocent people did not suffer so much what would happen to the world? They are the ones who are interceding the whole time. Their innocence is so pleasing to God. By accepting suffering, they intercede for us.” — Mother Teresa

Let us remember that the cross we must bear as Christians is a cross of the crucified Christ. Jesus is not only a teacher or a coach that encourages us with motivational talks and inspiring stories. His testimony is His own life, and His prayer is His wholehearted offering of everything to God, the climax of which is the offering of His very life at the cross. That’s the kind of prayer that will always rise up to heaven!

“Prayer joined to sacrifice constitutes the most powerful force in human history.” — St. John Paul II

“Then the disciples came to Jesus privately, and said, ‘Why weren’t we able to cast it out?’
He said to them, ‘Because of your unbelief. For most certainly I tell you, if you have faith as a grain of mustard seed, you will tell this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you. But this kind doesn’t go out except by prayer and fasting.’”
— Matthew 17:19–21, WEB-BE

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