Erie Canal and the Realm of Possible: Prayers from the Bible

Prayers from the Bible teach us.

Outmoded by the railroad over 100 years ago, the Erie Canal was reduced to tourism. Today, commercial freight is again using this waterway.

George Washington concluded the Erie Canal would be impossible. But New York Gov. Dewitt (pronounced: Do-It) Clinton thought otherwise and commenced the work. Critics and scorners dubbed it “Clinton’s ditch.”

The system of locks compensate for rising terrain.

In less than a decade they concluded in 1825 the waterway linking settlers and commerce. A marvel of engineering, hydrology and American know-how even today, the Erie Canal upon completion was called the Eighth Wonder of the World. It grew into a 1,000-span of canals that brought produce to markets for decades until trains outmoded them.

Gov. Dewitt (Do-It) thought he could “do it.”

Prayer is believing that impossible is possible — if you’ll just start “digging” in prayer. The experienced pray-er confounds the experts who forecast failure.

From prayers from the Bible, we learn that Elijah sparked revival over his land, Moses opened the Red Sea, David felled the mighty giant. The faith-filled filled the Bible with their heroics because they chose to put God to the test where scoffers dismissed feasibility.

As Christians, we must learn to pray prayers from the Bible and see change.

How to pray? Access resurrection power

• Pray powerful prayers
• How to pray?
• Bible prayers
• Pray more effectively
• Pray with faith

We fail to realize the power within our reach. Because we don’t realize (mentally), we don’t realize (physically in a miraculous manifestation) an answer. Prayer without faith is pretty pointless. But with faith, it has explosive power. What kind of power? Resurrection power.

Is there anything more impossible than to bring someone back from the dead? Medical science can revive someone whose heart has stopped. It can revive comatose people. But once the person is really dead, doctors are really lost as to what to do. Call the mortuary, that is all.

But God, showing His power, raised Jesus from the dead. And that’s the power we have access to.

His incomparably great power for us who believe … is the same as the mighty strength he exerted when he raised Christ from the dead Eph. 1:19-20 NIV.

Your financial need is nothing compared to death. If God could resurrect His Son, He can resurrect your finances!

Your words = your reality

Biblical authors rightly reasoned, inspired by the Spirit, that if a person’s negative words could convert into reality, a positive confession would also.

The first instance of confession-prophecy was when the Israelites complained to Moses that God had brought them out of Egypt only to die and not inherit the Promise Land. God responded: So be it; your negative confession shall be a prophecy.

As surely as I live, declares the LORD, I will do to you the very things I heard you say: In this desert your bodies will fall–every one of you twenty years old or more who was counted in the census and who has grumbled against me — Numbers 14:28-29 NIV.

But the principle works both ways. If negative words could lead to bad, positive words would also be honored by God. So in Jesus’ time, if you confessed faith in Jesus, He healed you. The proverbist said: Death and life are in the power of the tongue — Prov. 18:21 KJV.

When you pray today, make a positive confession.