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INTRODUCTION A force is anything that is able to make a big change in a person, object, or an environment. In physics, a force is a quantity that denotes the ability to push, pull, twist, accelerates, attack, control, or constrains a body. Speaking as a Christian, I believe the force of prayer is one of the vital and powerful spiritual tools, given to man by God to make a big change in his generation. It is a powerful tool used by believers to push, pull, twist, attack, control, and constrains the devil into surrendering to the authority of man and the Lordship of God. Prayer as a force can be used to move mountains in faith by the power in the name and the blood of Jesus Christ, through the help of the Holy Spirit. According to the bible, whenever a believer made his/her request known unto God through prayer concerning anything or any given situation /condition, God hears. Thou shalt make thy prayer unto him, and he shall hear thee, and thou shalt pay thy vows. Job 22:27. Every religious body has their own diverse believes about prayer; however one thing that is very common across various religious groups is that, prayer can be made individually (in public or in private), and prayer can also be made collectively or communally. Prayer can be made in words (using languages) or complete silence (meditation). When the use of language is involved in prayers, it could take the form of praise, worship, thanksgiving, singing; to the Christians: speaking in other tongues, reading aloud from the Holy Scripture (declaration), confession etc. Prayer can be made shouting aloud or with a low tone. In Christendom, prayer could be of various types: petition, worship, supplication, thanksgiving, confession, adoration etc. Christians believes that when they pray, the prayer is directed to God Almighty, the maker of all things, and the prayer must go through Jesus Christ, whom they believe is the son of the living God. Various religious bodies have their motives of praying, but the ones common to all is: to make request known, to worship, to seek for protection and guidance, to confess faults, to request for assistance; to express one’s love, affection and loyalty to whatever or whoever one believes in. To the occultist and those who engaged in traditions believes; prayer is made to deities, to spirits, to the dead and most especially to Satan the devil himself. Prayer is made to appease these deities and the kingdom of darkness. This type of appeasing sometimes involves, shedding of blood, both that of human and animals in sacrifices. What makes the prayer of Christians different from that of the traditionalist and the occultist is that, Christians don’t in any way appease the devil; they confront the devil in prayers. Christian prayer; most especially when they engages the devil in spiritual warfare does not involve in any way the appeasing of the demons, the gods or Satan; rather they engage those principalities in spiritual battles. Christians believes that, they are higher than the devil and all his demons in hierarchy and in authority; hence they confront the devil when they pray and not appease him. Their strength is drawn from several passages of the Bible (Christian Holy Book); assuring them that nothing shall by any means hurt them when they engage the devil in spiritual warfare.“Greater is he that is in them, than the devil and all his demons in the world.” Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. James 4:7. Behold, I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy: and nothing shall by any means hurt you. Luke 10:19. That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Philippians 2:10-11. And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils;  they shall speak with new tongues; They shall take up serpents;  and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them;  they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover. Mark 16:17-18. Christians are advised to always be at alert, and not to be ignorant of the devices of the devil. They are to fight and destroy the power of darkness in spiritual warfare, using the bible recommended spiritual defensive weapons.Ephesians 6. Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour: 1 Peter 5:8. Every religious belief has its various forms of prayer postures and rituals. Some of such are discussed below. The Muslim practice what is known as, SALAT. The SALAT or SALAH (a prayer section which is an alternative form of SALAT) is physical, mental and spiritual act of worship observed five times daily, at various times. It is one of the five pillars of Islam. It is expected that SALAT be performed in a ritually clean environment, the cloth that is worn when doing this prayer and the place where SALAT is being held must be clean. Worshipers (both men and women) are expected to cover their bodies with clothing that are not too tight; the cloth must be considerably loose fittings garments. Before SALAT is observed or conducted, a devoted Muslim must perform a ritual ablution (WUDU). The ablution is performed using water; however, when water is not available sand will suffice. Sand can also be used in place of water for the reason such as illness on the part of the worshiper or worshipper(s). According to the instruction in the Quran concerning prayers, a devoted Muslim is advised to do this ritual ablution (WUDU) before prayer: •	Wash your face and your hands as far as the elbow •	Wipe your head and your feet to the ankles •	If you are under an obligation to perform a total ablution, then wash (yourselves), and if you are sick or on a journey, or you have touched a woman and you cannot find water, wipe your face and your hands with pure earth (sand). Allah does not desire to put on you any difficulty, but he wishes to make you pure, so as to shower his favour upon you. As it can be seen from the instructions above, WUDU is performed by Muslims; by washing the hands, mouth, nose, arm, face, hairs, ears, feet, three times each in that order. However, it is not obligatory to wash the hair three times, once is sufficient, but it is mandatory that men should wash their beard and moustache when washing their face. A MUEZZIN is a person that does the ADHAN, an Islamic call to prayer. The call to prayer is done for the five obligatory prayers from a tower called a MINARET. A second call to prayer is made immediately before praying, this second call to prayer known as IQAMA is made to notify the assembled Muslims in the prayer area to line up for the beginning of the prayer. Prayer is then made according to the set down principles and laws of the Islamic religion, observing all the various form of Islamic prayer postures. Depending on the prayer type; prayer is done by standing, bowing (with the fore head and the nose touching the ground), prostrating, and the prayer is concluded while sitting on the ground. During this posture, worshipper reads or chant certain verse and phrase while using the MISBAHA or TESBIH bead (chaplet or rosary). This is done according to the principles guiding Islamic prayers. It is a norm that Muslims should pray facing QIBLA, also transliterated as: QIBLAH, QIBLEH, KIBLAH, KIBLE, and KIBLA. It is fixed as the direction of KAABA (A sacred building) in the HEJAZI city of MECCA. Muslims believes that once prayer is carried out properly by following all the prayer rituals and postures, Allah will answer them. (Source: Wikipedia) The Catholics Christians often sings their prayers and burn incense. To them prayer is seen as sacred and should not be done anyhow. They also make the sign of the cross, and make use of rosary while praying. The Pentecostal Christians-like many other Christians-speak in an unknown tongue when they pray; sometimes they dance and move around in aggression but with much concentration. The Hindus chant mantra (the hymn portion of the Vedas, any passage of these used as prayers). The mantra is a phrase repeated to assist concentration during meditation. They repeat this slogan with high level of concentration. A Veda is a large body of text originating in ancient India; they form the oldest layer of the oldest sacred text of Hinduisms. The Jewish prayer involves swaying back and forth, and bowing. As recorded in the bible, the worshippers of Baal often cut themselves with knives, so that blood can gush out of their bodies when they are praying. The Baal is a supreme male deity whose worship was characterised by the sexual acts of its followers, during periodic rituals that come with occasional human sacrifice and frequent temple prostitution; worshipped as far back 1400Bce. And they took the bullock which was given them, and they dressed it, and called on the name of Baal from morning even until noon, saying, O Baal, hear us. But there was no voice, nor any that answered. And they leaped upon the altar which was made. And it came to pass at noon, that Elijah mocked them, and said, Cry aloud: for he is a god;  either he is talking, or he is pursuing, or he is in a journey, or peradventure he sleepeth, and must be awaked. And they cried aloud, and cut themselves after their manner with knives and lancets, till the blood gushed out upon them. And it came to pass, when midday was past, and they prophesied until the time of the offering of the evening sacrifice, that there was neither voice, nor any to answer, nor any that regarded. 1 Kings 18:26-29. As stated earlier on, most often, across these various religious bodies, prayer can be made individually (privately) or it can be made corporately in the midst or presence of fellow worshippers. Whatever form or however form prayer is made, prayer is a powerful force given to mankind to communicate with his maker or whatever he believes in. Whenever prayer is made, answer to prayer is expected. There are many ways prayer can be answered. It may be through, assurance of hearing audible voice (directly or through dreams and vision), revelation, prophesy, strange feelings, or through instant miracles.

Across the various religious bodies, things that accompanied prayer rituals are, anointing oil, burning of incense, burning of candles; these days’ people use coconut to pray, handkerchiefs, sand, stones, water, chaplet, etc. All the religious groups pray according to their various believes.

It is noteworthy that, there are prayers made to suit specific occasions. The kind of prayer that is suitable while blessing a meal, is not the kind one will pray when one is about to sleep. Also the kind of prayer needed during the naming ceremony of a new born baby will not be suitable during burial ceremonies. To the Christians, the kind of prayer they pray when worshiping God is not the kind they will pray during spiritual warfare with the devil. Prayer should be made to suit the occasion or situation at hand.

This simple, well researched and insightful book highlights some of the vital/ essentials things a praying Christian need to know about prayer. It is an easy to read book. It is a book for all denominations: Catholics, Pentecostals, Methodists, Baptists, Anglicans etc.

We defined, what prayer is and how prayer is made, prayer models, types of prayers, prayers transition, various forms of Christian’s prayer postures, hindrances to prayers, why do we need to pray and not keeping a closed mouth, how the powerful force of prayer brought deliverance to some people in the Bible etc.