The Difference Between Intercessors and Prayer Warriors

 

 

I heard an excellent illustration recently, of the relationship between prayer warriors and intercessors that a friend Bruce Turnbull shared with me. He was a firefighter in the navy and they had a drill where a room was filled with JP5 fuel and set on flames. The firefighters worked in two different teams consisting of 4 men each. They stood in two rows as close together as possible. They were staggered kind of like a honeycomb or bricks in a wall. The hose and applicator are held only by the front man in each team. 

 

 

The job of the #1 hose team was, as soon as they opened the door to sweep back and forth from one side to the other, pushing the flames back from off of the fuel. A person from #2 team stood right behind the #1 team front person and had an applicator that sprayed a mist of water, that basically created a "wall" of water to keep them cool and protected. If the front person wasn't diligent and didn't go all the way to one of the sides, the fire would get through the space and set the fuel behind them on flames again and engulf them both.

 

If the person from team #2 didn't keep the front person protected with spray, then the insurmountable heat from the fire would be too much for him to stand. Because of the great heat he would lose control of his mind and cause him to be unable to do his job correctly. The reason there are 4 men in a team is because they require more than one man on a hose because the power of the hose is too much for one man to handle. If the front man tires then the second man takes over and #1 goes to the back.

 

Combined Warfare Team

 

In this illustration, the front team are the prayer warriors and the team in the back are the intercessors and together they form a combined warfare team. The clearest scriptural example of this is in the Old Testament, where Moses, Aaron and Hur are the intercessors on the mountain and Joshua and his men are the front line soldiers down in the valley.

 

Together they formed a combined warfare team and both were vitally important. We discover from this passage that when Moses lowered His arms the warriors would begin to lose and when he raised his arms they began to win. So the key to the victory was in the intercession, but on the other hand, if there are no soldiers down in the valley, there is no battle.

 

How does this apply to the church today? The intercession part of this equation is already happening in many churches. How many churches do you know, that don’t already have an intercession group? On the other hand, how many churches do you know that has a prayer warfare team? Many have equated intercession to be like a destroyer bombing the shore before the marines go in and hit the beach. In most churches then, we have the shore being bombed over and over, but no one is going in to take the beach. The church, therefore, is in a desperate need for prayer warriors to be raised up.

 

As in the example of Moses and Joshua, the teams can be both men or both women or a mixture. We see that both men and women are involved in the intercession teams that are already in place, however in many cases there is a much greater number of women. Perhaps, the prayer warfare team is the ministry for many of the men who presently haven’t found a place to plug into in the church.

 

Bruce also shared with me a revelation that God had given him, that men were created to be warriors and when they don’t have a foe outside to fight, then they begin to fight their own families and their aggressiveness is focused inward.

 

This seems to be confirmed in the scriptures, for instance Num 1:2,3 - "Take a census of all the congregation … every male, head by head from twenty years old and upward, whoever {is able to} go out to war in Israel, you and Aaron shall number them by their armies”.

 

This indicates that all men who were 20 years old and over, were expected to be soldiers and were numbered by their armies. Doesn't there need to be “call to arms”, to mobilize men into front line spiritual warfare? Think about it, wouldn’t this be the logical progression as the next step after the Promise Keepers movement. This movement helped men to get things straightened away at home, to be the kind of fathers and husbands that God had called them to be. Now that things at home are in better shape, shouldn’t the focus be for them to rise up as warriors and to battle the enemies of their family and church and community.

 

May I suggest the formation of frontline warfare teams in each church, with the purpose of seeking the Lord as to His strategy for their church and region.

 

Incense Bowls and Bowls of Iniquity

 

Bowls of Incense

 

Rev 5:8-9 And when he had taken the book , the four beasts and four and twenty elders fell down before the Lamb , each one holding a harp and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of God's people .

 

Rev 8:3-5 And another angel came and stood at the altar , holding a golden censer , and much incense was given to God , to add to the prayers of all saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne. 4 And the smoke of the incense , with the prayers of the people of God , who was with God from the angel 's hand . 5 And the angel took the censer, and filled it with fire from the altar and threw it on the earth, and there was a sound of thunder peals and lightning and an earthquake.

 

In these verses, we see that our prayers are collected heaven in a bowl of gold and incense added to them . Years ago we had the minister of redemption to come and teach in our church and he was excited, because the Lord told him in advance that he was going to Vancouver and would be able to demolish a number of high level Jezebels.

 

This actually took place and he was again excited, to go home to Boise and demolish Jezebels highest level in his hometown . Unfortunately, when he tried, the Lord told him that he could not do it in Boise yet, because there had not been enough intercession yet. The bowl of intercession for Vancouver had been filled and could be poured out, but the bowl for Boise still needed to be filled more.

 

I believe that intercessors are engaged in filling up bowls of intercession and prayer warriors are engaged in these basins will pour out of the world. I was wondering how many bowls of petitions have been filled and are awaiting prayer warriors to affect the will of God in the the world.

 

When I was meeting with the leadership of the church prophetic recently, I prayed with them and ask the Holy Spirit to the bowls of intercession that is complete in the city, what percentage have been released. They heard a number of different numbers, but all were less than 20 % which means that intercessors have been doing their job, but there is not enough prayer warriors to release them for the Kingdom of God.

 

Genesis 15:14-16

 

"But I will also judge the nation whom they serve , and then they will come out with great possessions.  And as for you, you will go to your fathers in peace and thou shalt be buried in a good old age. But in the fourth generation, they shall return here, for the iniquity of the Amorite is not yet complete."

 

Here we discover that the reason Israel went into Egypt was to wait until the bowl of evil for the Amorites was filled..." 

Pastor Trevor Macpherson

 

 

Worldshakers@hotmail.ca 10/16/2013