It pleases God to answer your prayers. But He can only manifest Himself in the earth through the believer who is operating in faith. Faith makes prayer effective and it pleases God (Hebrews 11:6). However, there will be no strong faith without deep and intimate fellowship with the Father. This is the very heart of a successful prayer life.
Fellowship is the mother of faith because you can only put your faith and confidence in God to the extent you know Him. Just as in any relationship, spending time in fellowship with your heavenly Father is the only way to become personally acquainted with Him.
Your new birth into the family of God has given you the right to expect your prayers to be answered. You have come into a Father-child relationship. Relationship without fellowship, however, is like marriage without love. In a loveless marriage, two people are related but don’t really know each other.
If I never spent quality time fellowshipping with my son, anyone could tell him lies about me and he would believe them. The same thing applies to a husband and wife, an employer and employee, business partners, etc. Lack of fellowship causes lack of trust. If this can happen in human relationships, it can happen between you and your heavenly Father.
When I don’t know my heavenly Father, Satan can lie to me about Him—trying to convince me He is my problem, or the One making me sick to teach me something. It would be easy to believe him, but my trust (faith) in my Father causes me to refuse Satan’s lies (called doubt or unbelief). Isaiah 26:3 says, “Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee: because he trusteth in thee.”
The more you fellowship with God, the more you will know He is not your problem. He is for you and wants to use His power in your behalf. Galatians 1:3-4 says, “Grace be to you and peace from God the Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the will of God and our Father.”
The No. 1 priority in God’s heart is to spend quality time with us daily. We need to be able to hear His voice and follow the promptings of His Holy Spirit. We have the command to resist anything that does not come from Him (James 4:7). He does not want us lacking in any area of our lives. Let’s look at 1 Corinthians 1:4-9: I thank my God always on your behalf, for the grace of God which is given you by Jesus Christ; that in every thing ye are enriched by him, in all utterance, and in all knowledge; even as the testimony of Christ was confirmed in you: so that ye come behind in no gift; waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ: who shall also confirm you unto the end, that ye may be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is faithful, by whom ye were called unto the fellowship of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord.
When you heed the call to fellowship, you will find out for yourself that God is faithful. Your life will be enhanced by Him. You will not come behind in any area. When you know Him through fellowship you will operate out of your spirit, where the faith and power of God reside. Operating in mere head knowledge of the Word, or “mental assent,” will keep you from tapping in to the power of God. Mental assent simply agrees that God’s Word is true. But revelation knowledge resulting from consistent and close fellowship with God brings you to a place where you know that His promise is good. Nothing can take revelation knowledge away from you! All fear and doubt is dispelled and you will bear abundant fruit in your life.
