What is Prayer Language?
Having a prayer language is a gift to us from our Heavenly Father. It is simply the act of allowing God to pray through us from His Spirit. It is the praying of another "spiritual" language that is not of our own. It is a language that comes from Heaven. A beautiful example of when this gift came to us is in Acts chapter 2. See Acts 2:1-4. In verse 4 it says "And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance". When we break this down we can see that "other" tongues referring to that which is not our own language. Then it says as the "Spirit" meaning straight from the Holy Spirit gave them "utterance" so the definition of "utterance" is: to speak something aloud, or a vocal sound. In 1 Corinthians 12:4-11 Paul explains the different gifts of the Spirit that God gave to us. Verse 10 you find that 2 of these gifts are tongues. 1: different kinds of tongues, 2: the interpretation of tongues. This "different kinds of tongues" shows us that tongues is a gift, it is our prayer language. If you wish to do a study on this a good place to go is the chapters of Acts and 1 Corinthians.
Why should I use my Prayer Language?
In 1 Corinthians 13:1 Paul refers to his prayer language as "tongues of Angels". Further in chapter 14:2 it says "For he who speaks in tongues (or in their prayer language) does not speak to men but to God, for no one understands him; however in the spirit, he speaks mysteries". So this tells us that we are praying in the "spirit" or in a spiritual tongue and that we are communicating to God directly. It is communing with God on another level. This has many benefits. There are many scriptures about our prayer language in the bible and how beneficial it is to us.
Here are just some of the many benefits of using your prayer language.
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Using your prayer language helps you stimulate faith. Jude 20
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Using your prayer language keeps you geared to walking in love. Jude 20
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Using your prayer language gives you power to be a witness for Christ. Acts 1:8; 2:4
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Using your prayer language helps you speak to God “spirit to spirit” 1 Cor. 14:4
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Using your prayer language builds up your spirit. You are a spirit being and need to be spiritually strong. 1 Cor. 14:4
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You can use your prayer language when you need to pray for yourself or someone else when you are not sure how you should pray with your understanding. Romans 8:26-28
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Using your prayer language brings spiritual refreshing. Isaiah 28: 11-12
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Singing and praising God in our prayer language adds a different dimension to our life of worship. We can use our native language as well as our prayer language in worship. 1 Cor. 14: 15-17, Acts 2:11, Acts 10:46
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The bible says no man can tame the tongue James 3:8 but the Holy Spirit can. When we use our prayer language we keep our tongue under subjection to the Holy Spirit.
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Praying in our prayer language (enduring prayer) brings revelation from God. He begins to uncover the “mysteries”. It is a gift that brings revelation as we ask for it and use it 1 Cor. 14: 2-4, 14-15, Proverbs 18:4, 28, Proverbs 20:5
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Praying in our prayer language lines you up to discover and fulfill your ministry, your place in the Body of Christ. 1 Cor. 12:27-28, Romans 12:1-8
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You can pray in your prayer language and “draw joy from the wells of salvation” Isaiah 12:2-3
Did you know?
Did you know that praying in our prayer language has healing properties?!
Here is an interesting health discovery:
Dr. Clark Peterson of O.R.U in Tulsa, Oklahoma is a brain specialist and was doing research on the relationship between the brain and praying or speaking in tongues. Some amazing things were discovered!
Through research and testing, Dr. Peterson found that as we pray in the Spirit or worship in the Spirit (our heavenly language) that there is activity that begins in our brain and as we engage in our heavenly language, the brain releases 2 chemical secretions that are directed into our immune system giving it a 35-40% boost! This promotes healing within our bodies. Amazingly, this secretion is triggered from a part of the brain that has no other apparent activity or purpose in humans and therefore we don’t use it. It is only activated by our Spirit-led prayer and worship!
So it is clear that our Spirit and our bodies need our prayer language and we want to use it more than ever before.
Written by Karen Baumann, Vision Ministries
Additions made by Meagan Starr
