Praying From The Heavenly Realm — Prophet Stephen Atria

According to Ugandan Apostle, Stephen Atria, there is a way that prayer can be prayed without being intercepted by the enemy as was the case with Daniel when he prayed and the spirit prince of Persia held up his prayer in the heavenly realm for 21 days (Daniel 10:12- 13)

¹² Then he said, “Don’t be afraid, Daniel. Since the first day you began to pray for understanding and to humble yourself before your God, your request has been heard in heaven. I have come in answer to your prayer. ¹³ But for twenty-one days the spirit prince of the kingdom of Persia blocked my way. Then Michael, one of the archangels, came to help me, and I left him there with the spirit prince of the kingdom of Persia.

After seeking God, this was one of the things that God revealed to Apostle Atria and taught him how to pray from the heavenly realm instead of praying from earth to heaven. In other words, praying in the spirit and not just in the flesh.

God told the apostle that he was like a news reporter, whose duty was informing heaven about what was happening on earth. But while informing heaven his prayer can be fought by principalities (Daniel 10) in the spiritual realm. So God told him he needed to know how to pray from heaven to earth. God took him to the scripture that says “We are seated in heavenly places” (Ephesians 2:6).

 ^“For He raised us from the dead along with Christ and seated us with Him in the heavenly realms because we are united with Christ Jesus.”

And Revelation 3:21

“Those who are victorious will sit with me on my throne, just as I was victorious and sat with my Father on his throne.”

What this means is that there is a throne upon which Jesus sits and allows us to sit with Him. So when you pray from that realm to the earth then your prayer cannot be touched by any principalities or powers lurking in the heavenlies.

After realizing this, the apostle asked God how would he be able to pray from heaven to earth. God told him that on earth we are bound by time, in heaven it is eternity — time does not exist. So everything in the heavenly realm is infinity. He should, therefore, pray from the realm of infinity/eternity rather than being constrained by time.

Another thing he was told by God to do was to hear Jesus pray and pray that prayer. Because if you are seated with Jesus you will be hearing His prayer and all you will be doing is repeating what Jesus is saying. The Bible says Jesus is seated at the right hand of the Father interceding for us (Romans 8:34). So praying from the heavenly realm means that you should understand what Jesus is interceding for. Then you pray that prayer that Jesus is praying because no power can stop the prayer of Jesus!

When we pray in the flesh, demons can fight our prayers since they are originating from the earth. But the prayer originating from Jesus cannot be fought.

The question being asked here now is, ‘How can you hear Jesus’ prayer?’, God said you need your spiritual ears and eyes to be opened. (1 Corinthians 2:9-12)

 ⁹ That is what the Scriptures mean when they say;

“No eye has seen, no ear has heard,
    and no mind has imagined
what God has prepared
    for those who love him.”

¹⁰ But it was to us that God revealed these things by his Spirit. For his Spirit searches out everything and shows us God’s deep secrets. ¹¹ No one can know a person’s thoughts except that person’s own spirit, and no one can know God’s thoughts except God’s own Spirit. ¹² And we have received God’s Spirit (not the world’s spirit), so we can know the wonderful things God has freely given us.”

The Holy Spirit stands as the transmitter to decode what Jesus is saying. He converts it into burdens. That is why we will feel like praying but we don’t know what it is all about. What The Holy Spirit wants us to pray for first comes as a burden in our spirits, when we get into prayer and encounter the Holy Spirit He then translates that burden into actual words. Then we suddenly realize that this is what I need to pray about. We will see a vision or an expression in your spirit about what we should pray for. Then our prayer will be on target.

 

So in essence, we do not pray our own prayers. We ought to pray the Lord’s prayers. And that is the prayer we pray from heaven to earth. The Lord’s prayer (Matthew 6:9-13) is a skeleton to what and how we should pray… ‘your will be done on earth as it is in heaven’.

The next question here is how do we know what is God’s will on earth? By praying Jesus’ prayer and praying the will of the Father. Jesus said “I and my father are one”, so if you pray Jesus’ prayer then you are doing God’s will on earth as it is in heaven.

“So Jesus explained, “I tell you the truth, the Son can do nothing by himself. He does only what he sees the Father doing. Whatever the Father does, the Son also does.“

So if you are praying for your country, ask God, ‘What are you doing in my  country?’ ‘What are your plans for this country?’  Then you don’t just pray any and any prayer… you pray “the Lord’s prayer”, that will of God that Jesus is saying. In doing this you get to know what is on the heart of the Lord. Then you can pray it.

The truth of the matter now is that our prayers are too confusing because everyone is praying their own thing. For example, some are praying that their country’s leader gets out of power, others are praying that they want him to stay in power, others are praying for him to die, and still, others that he will lead for another term. Yet nothing is happening and it seems your prayer for your country is not happening. In fact, things seem to get even worse. Why? Because people do not know God’s will for that country. You are praying in the flesh and not God’s will. When you seek God and ask Him to reveal the will of the country to you, you will now be praying and it becomes ‘let thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.’ There is a divine purpose for everything, everyone, and every country that has been created. He didn’t just put your country on the map because it looks good there. He placed it there for His own divine purpose.

There is nothing that will happen on earth that has not been sanctioned in heaven

There are still some people who are expecting to hear God’s audible voice before making a move. God does not always do that, what He uses is imagination, thoughts, visions, dreams, and His Word.

Job 33:14 says “For God does speak- now one way, now another- though no one perceives it”.

A believer’s imagination is a sanctified imagination. God places his intentions on our imaginations. That’s why we have them. Sometimes after you have prayed you may feel you have not heard anything but there is a dominant thought occupying your mind. Maybe you start thinking about somebody that just suddenly pops into your mind. Ask yourself if there is something going on with them. Then ask God, ‘Lord, what do you want to say about this person?’. Silently listen to where the Spirit is leading you then begin to pray for this person. As you begin to pray thoughts begin to outline themselves concerning this person.

Sometimes you can pray intensely and after you pray you have no feedback. But a song comes into your spirit — maybe even a song that never existed before, but it comes spontaneously and you are singing in the shower, in the vehicle on your way to work, etc. That is something coming from the realm of the spirit. Focus on what it is saying.

We are agents and ambassadors of heaven and we will be given instruction and assignments from heaven ever so often. That is why it is important to be sensitive in the spirit. If spiritual sensitivity is something you lack, go before God and ask Him to give this to you.

Sometimes you may find yourself getting angry and irritated easily and you don’t know why. That is the time to go back to God and say ‘God is this my emotion or are you passing your emotions on me? What are you irritated about?’ Then God may begin to show you something in the scripture about His people. Then you see what He is saying and you pray it.

This does not mean that God does not speak audibly at times. Audible voices you may hear once in a while but your imagination is a place where He can speak freely. Thus the reason we are advised to keep our minds stayed on him.

“Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee: because he trusteth in thee. ” (Isaiah 26:3).

Thoughts from the spirit are the channel by which God communicates with you. God is a Spirit (Romans 4:24), therefore He speaks first to your Spirit, then your Spirit translates it to your thoughts.

God is not limited and so He will speak through dreams, visions, thoughts, His word, song — you can hear God in everything.

It is very important too that as Born Again Believers we seek to have encounters with God through encounter prayers. Encounter prayers are those prayed nonstop for hours (or as long as it takes) until you get a breakthrough for what you have been praying about, and where the Holy Spirit is in charge. Despite the time spent in this type of prayer, you do not get burdensome or tired, but you come out feeling refreshed and charged. Where you experience a new dimension of God and where He reveals another aspect of Himself to you.