Ever wonder why your/our prayers are not being answered? I’m talking about the ‘this one comes out by prayer and fasting’ kind of prayer; the prayer which kicks down the gates of hell to set another captive free kind of prayer (Matt 16:18-19). Prayers that unbind is what I’m talking about!

“I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now (John 16:12).”

Would you agree that sometimes the most obvious things we need to learn, quite possibly, are right there in front of our face, and yet we don’t see them?

Maybe this is a hint to one of the missing ingredients in our personal prayer life. Perhaps there is something essential that we’ve never thought of and it has been right there the whole time.

Jesus saith unto them, “Have ye understood all these things?” They say unto him, “Yea, Lord.” Then said He unto them, “Therefore, every scribe which is instructed unto the kingdom of heaven is like unto a man that is a householder, which bringeth forth out of his treasure things new and old.” –Matt. 13:51-52

It is the glory of The Creator to conceal a matter but the glory of Kings to search out a matter. -Proverbs 25:1

Allow me to drop some nuggets I’ve found recently.

When the disciples asked The Master, “Lord teach us to pray,” it wasn’t like they didn’t know how to pray or that they never heard of prayer before. They all knew about prayer. Yet, they asked Him to teach them to pray. Obviously, He was either doing something different or saying something different from the norm, something they hadn’t seen or heard before.

What did Jesus say? “Our Father who art in heaven.” Have you looked up the word “heaven” in the Hebrew? It’s the word ‘shamayim,’ which means, “The wind, or breath, of someone or something; its character.”

Let everything that has breath, praise the Lord. -Psalm150

What is the first gift The Creator imparted to man?

And The Creator Elohim formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul. – Gen 2:7

You can live without food for a while. Water? Same. House? Wal-Mart? Internet? Try not breathing for just 60 seconds.

The very fact that I breathe means that, the Breath of Life originally breathed in to Adam in Genesis 2 is still going! The Creator didn’t have to take a second breath or inhale again and again.

If we are to offer up our first fruits to Him as gratitude, is it possible that we are not offering up our breathing as we pray? I’ve heard it said in my past, control your breathing and you’ll control your life. What happens when you get excited or angry or emotional, we move into what’s called high breathing, gasps.

Have you ever looked up the word, “spirit” in Hebrew? “Ruwach” is the word. It means, “wind or breath.” Winds follows a prescribed path each season to arrive at a specific destination.

Follow some verses with Spirit in them:

The spirit of a man will sustain his infirmity; but a wounded spirit who can bear? – Pro 18:14

He that has no rule over his own spirit is like a city that is broken down, and without walls. – Pro 25:28

Turn you at my reproof: behold, I will pour out my spirit unto you, I will make known my words unto you. – Pro 1:23

A wholesome tongue is a tree of life: but perverseness therein is a breach in the spirit. – Pro 15:4

Remember when the sons of Thunder wanted to nuke Samaria because they didn’t want to receive The Master? What did The Master say? You don’t know what manner of spirit you are of (Luke 9:55).

Why did Jesus breathe on the disciples in John 20:22?

And when He had said this, He breathed on them, and saith unto them, “Receive ye the Holy Spirit.”

Remember, as the deer what? Pants… for the water brooks, so my soul pants for you Oh Creator! I’d say that’s intense breathing!

So, watch your breathing in the coming days as you pray, it may be the missing ingredient.