The thing that makes him stand out was, he was unwilling to stay in a place of pain. He was unwilling to stay in a place of sorrow. He was unwilling to stay in a place of negativity and defeat. The Bible says he was more honourable than all those around him, because he rose up and he dared to believe that God could take the adversity of his past, the failures and the pain and the grief, and do something in his life that would make him stand out and be distinctive. Now do you believe - that's what made him distinctive of course, was not only that he believed in his heart and rose up in faith, but he actually got what he asked for. It says God gave him what he asked for, so God must have liked his prayer.
I pray that this year, this will be the prayer on everyone's heart, and here's the prayer he prayed. He called on the God of Israel, oh, bless me indeed. God bless me abundantly. Every area of my life, I want to see Your manifest presence and blessing. Oh God, that You would enlarge my territory, increase my influence, give me influence that goes well beyond what I've ever had, multiply the extent of my territory. Oh God, that You would keep me from evil, Your hand would be with me, You would keep me from evil.
I want to just go through and pick several things in there, and this is the bit I like, he said: God granted him what he asked. God granted him what he asked, and I pray that this year that you will have things you'll ask God, and that not only will you ask God, that you'll break through in your prayer, and by the end of the year you'll be able to say and testify very boldly: hey, God gave me what I asked for this year! God gave me what I asked for. Jesus said: that's how you glorify God, by answered prayer. God is glorified when you have breakthroughs in prayer, and you see heaven come into the earth. That brings great honour to God. If we're going to bring honour to God, we need to see His supernatural provision come into the earth. See, this man here, he says God gave him something. He got hold of God, and God gave him something that he never had before.
I wonder if at the end of this year you will have things in your life you've never had before, because you dared to believe and rise up in prayer, aye? What a great thing. Have you got some things to pray for? We've got a season of prayer and fasting come up. I encourage you, before you even get into the three weeks of prayer and fasting, that you take time to identify what is it this year I want to believe God to break through in. Let me just give you a few things that he said, because obviously God liked his prayer. I want to share with you five things about this prayer. The first thing is, it's incredibly personal. Notice what he said, look, it seemed selfish didn't it? Oh bless ME, enlarge MY territory, Your hand with ME, keep ME from evil. Notice 'me' turns up four times there. Now you could say what an extremely selfish man, he's just praying for himself. No, in fact actually it's completely the opposite.
I have found an interesting thing, that when people have rejection in their heart, when we don't see ourselves as God sees us, when we don't agree with what God says - you're a son of the living God, you're a child of the living God - then our heart gets filled with unbelief, and we don't rise up. We can pray for the world. It's easy to pray for the world, you don't need faith to do that. You can pray for someone else to get blessed. It's a little bit easier to pray for someone else to get blessed, than to actually dare to believe in your heart, God desires to bless you personally. I believe many people do not pray, because in their heart they're so gripped with rejection and low esteem, they are filled with unbelief, and don't dare to believe God wants to bless you. Let's say it: God wants to bless me. In this year, God wants to bless me - so what are you going to believe for? It's personal see, it's very personal.