The War of Prayer

Summary

Episode Overview

Podcast: The Wake-Up Call
Host: John David Walt (J.D. Walt)
Episode Title: The War of Prayer
Date: August 11, 2026
Theme:
This episode centers on prayer as spiritual warfare, emphasizing its proactive, participatory, and victorious nature in the life of a believer. Drawing from Acts 2:32-35 and Psalm 110:1, J.D. Walt reflects on the meaning and agenda of prayer, urging listeners to shift from a self-centered "prayer life" to participating in Jesus’s own ongoing intercession and victory.

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Key Discussion Points

1. Setting the Stage: Consecration and Entering Into Today

• Opening Consecration Prayer: J.D. Walt leads listeners in a prayer of consecration to begin the day "walking through a different door" (03:12).
• Main Point: Entering each day prayerfully positions us for a transformed and "leveled up" experience—not necessarily easier, but “infinitely better” because we are oriented toward Jesus.

2. The Scriptural Foundation: Acts 2 and Psalm 110:1

• Scripture Reflected On: Acts 2:32-35, set during Pentecost and the church's first sermon, quoting Psalm 110:1—“The Lord says to my Lord: ‘Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet.’”
• Psalm 110:1 Noted: This is the most quoted Old Testament verse in the New Testament, highlighting its foundational role in Christian theology (06:40).
  • “These ten words form the agenda of quote ‘on earth as it is in heaven.’” (07:55)
• Enemies of Jesus Defined: “Satan, evil, sin, death, and darkness, which show up in everything from oppression to opioid addiction, from cancer to child slavery, and from poverty to pornography.” (08:30)

3. The War of Prayer: Participating in Christ’s Victory

• Prayer as Spiritual Warfare:
  • “To pray means to participate in the triumph not of good over evil, but of Jesus over the evil one.” (08:48)
  • Our prayers are mysteriously chosen by God as a means by which the battle is won.
• Jesus’s Ongoing Intercession:
  • Quoting Hebrews 7:25: “Therefore, he is able to save completely those who come to God through Him, because he always lives to intercede for them.” (09:30)
  • “Jesus’s primary vocation as he dwells among and within us is to pray. He prays without ceasing.”
• Our Vocation:
  • “Discipleship to Jesus means learning to pray in agreement with Jesus, in union with the mind of Christ. This does not come to us naturally. It must come supernaturally.” (10:20)
• Ephesians 6 and Praying Always:
  • “Pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests... always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people.” (11:47)

4. Memorable Images and Shifts in Perspective

• Footstool Image:
  • “As I wrote this, I was leaning back in a leather chair with my feet propped up on a footstool. I’m thinking about Satan and evil and sin and darkness as that footstool. This is the vision.” (12:30)
• From ‘My Prayer Life’ to ‘The Prayer Life of Jesus’:
  • “Wouldn’t that be a welcome shift—from my prayer life to the prayer life of Jesus? That’s where all this is heading.” (13:00)

5. Guided Prayer and Reflection

• Guided Prayer:
  • “I’m sorry for always beckoning you to my side. I sense you saying it’s time for me to come to your side. Show me the way beyond my own thin agenda...” (13:18)
• Reflection Questions for Listeners (13:58):
  1. What if we’ve missed the point of prayer?
  2. What is the significance of Psalm 110:1, and why do you think it appears so much in the New Testament?
  3. Is your prayer life lagging? What might it mean to join the prayer life of Jesus?

6. Walking with Jesus: Prayer in Everyday Life

• Prayer Is Not Just for the Closet:
  • “It’s actually learning to walk with him through the day. That’s why you gotta go slow. That’s what I keep reminding myself, right? Jesus moves at the speed of love. You know how fast that is? Two miles an hour. It’s walking.” (15:00)
• Pace of Power:
  • “He’s got the biggest to-do list in the cosmos. He’s not in a hurry. He’s moving at the speed of love. That’s the pace of power.”
  • The importance of being “attuned, attentive, abiding.”

7. Family Worship: Hymn and Final Insights

• Generational Worship: J.D. Walt is joined by his father (“dad”) for singing and reflection, emphasizing the community and tradition in the faith.
• On the Battle:
  • “The point is we’re in a battle, and it’s a pitched battle. And we know who’s won the battle, but it still has to be fought out.” (14:14 - dad)
  • “We know who’s won the war, but there’s a lot of battles. You win some and lose some, but we win the war.” (14:30 - dad)
• Hymn ‘A Mighty Fortress Is Our God’: Introduction and full singing of all verses, noting its power and connection to spiritual struggle—and recalling family and church traditions (16:04-18:45).
• Key Reflection:
  • “You don’t got to do something every day to get to go to heaven when you die, but you got to get up every day and do something to get heaven in you while you’re alive. That’s the big message.” (16:07)

8. Closing Insights: True Enemy and the Nature of the Fight

• Spiritual Focus:
  • “We’re not fighting against people. People are never our enemy. We’re fighting the devil. Let’s be very careful to not demonize people. Let’s demonize the devil. Let’s fight him. Let’s know Jesus has already defeated him. We’re just picking up the spoils.” (20:22)

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Notable Quotes and Memorable Moments

“To pray means to participate in the triumph not of good over evil, but of Jesus over the evil one.”
— J.D. Walt (08:48)

“Wouldn’t that be a welcome shift—from my prayer life to the prayer life of Jesus? That’s where all this is heading.”
— J.D. Walt (13:00)

“Jesus moves at the speed of love. You know how fast that is? Two miles an hour. It’s walking. This guy’s never in a hurry.”
— J.D. Walt (15:00)

“People are never our enemy. We’re fighting the devil. Let’s be very careful to not demonize people.”
— J.D. Walt (20:22)

“You don’t got to do something every day to get to go to heaven when you die, but you got to get up every day and do something to get heaven in you while you’re alive.”
— J.D. Walt (16:07)

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Timestamps of Key Segments

• 03:12 — Consecration prayer and setting the frame for the day
• 06:40 — Reading of Acts 2:32-35 and highlighting Psalm 110:1
• 08:30 — Defining the "enemies" Jesus defeats
• 09:30 — Jesus’s vocation: interceding for us (Hebrews 7:25)
• 10:20 — Discipleship as alignment with Jesus’s prayer
• 11:47 — Citing Ephesians 6:18; call to perpetual prayer
• 13:00 — Shift from a personal prayer life to Jesus’s prayer life
• 13:18 — Guided prayer for realignment with Jesus
• 13:58 — Reflection questions posed to the listener
• 15:00 — “Speed of love” metaphor and incorporating prayer into daily pace
• 16:04–18:45 — Singing "A Mighty Fortress Is Our God"
• 20:22 — Clarifying the true enemy (not people, but the devil)
• 21:05 — Closing and encouragement to “see you on the field”

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Summary Takeaways

• Prayer is fundamentally spiritual warfare: It’s far more than personal requests; it’s stepping into the cosmic victory of Christ over evil.
• Our prayers participate in Christ’s ongoing triumph: God invites us to join, not just observe, as Jesus intercedes for the world.
• Prayer shapes our pace and priorities for the day: Abiding in Christ requires slowing down, walking with him at the “speed of love.”
• Final encouragement: Remember the true enemy is never other people, but evil itself—and that the victory is already won.

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For those who missed the episode:
This practical and stirring episode reframes prayer as joining Jesus’s battle—one already won but still unfolding in our lives and world. Through scripture, personal reflection, and worship, you are invited to reconsider what prayer is, whose agenda it should follow, and how you can carry it into every step of your day.

Transcript

[A]

Good morning Sower Nation. It is Tuesday, August 11th, in the year of our Lord 2026. I'm John David Walt and this is your wake up call. We're on prayer this week. Let me give two very brief program notes. I'm continuing to try to call out to women's groups all over the world to dive into the Lewin Riley Growing Up James Bible Study. It's videos, it's a workbook. It's profound. It's going to be great. Go to cbed.com get it. Try it out this fall. It's perfect. The other thing is we're going to be doing Romans this, this, this fall on the wake up call. The marathon, a super marathon all the way through Romans. Most significant letter in the history of the world. And I've written the book has been published by HarperCollins, by Zondervan. And you talk about a super deal. We're opening up the buy one so one, which means you get one of these books. I'm going to send you another one for the friend that you're going to invite to join us on the wake up call. I'll give it to you, you give it to them. Start praying. Who is that? Enough on that. Sorry to even interrupt early this morning, but I just want to get that word in. This is serious stuff we're doing here, friends. That's why every single day we start with consecration. Okay? Wake up, sleeper. Rise from the dead and Christ will shine on you. Jesus, I belong to you. I lift up my heart to you. I set my mind on you. I fix my eyes on you. I offer my body to you as a living sacrifice. Jesus, we belong to you. And we're praying in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen. Guys, if you prayed that prayer with me, that means we just walked through a different door into today. We walked into the door through the door of Jesus. And that makes that means today is going to be leveled up in every single way. I'm not saying it'd be easier. I'm just saying it's going to be infinitely better. So today's entry is entitled the War of Prayer. Our text is Acts, chapter 2, verses 32 to 35. Now, this text comes right in the midst of the day of Pentecost and Peter's message, his sermon, the first sermon of the church. So hear now the word of the Lord. God has raised this Jesus to life and we are all witnesses of it. Exalted to the right hand of God. He has received from The Father, the promised Holy Spirit, and has poured out what you now see and hear. For David did not ascend to heaven, and yet he said the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet. It's the word of the Lord. Now consider this. Yesterday landed us in Acts, Chapter 1 and the Ascension of of Jesus. Today we come to Pentecost and the church's first sermon. Didn't we say this series on prayer that I'm writing in this book would begin with the Old Testament? I'm like, well, thanks for remembering that. We're going to get there. But the fascinating thing about today's text is that it contains the New Testament's most quoted verse from the Old Testament. Here it is. The Lord says to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet. That's Psalm 110. 1. This verse, it appears at least six different times in the New Testament. Most quoted verse from the Old Testament in the New Testament, yesterday's text gave us the starting place for prayer Jesus, right here, right now. Today's text gives us prayer's agenda and final destination. Until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet. These ten words form the agenda of quote on earth as it is in heaven. Matthew 6:10. The enemies of Jesus are Satan, evil, sin, death and darkness, which show up in everything from oppression to opioid addiction, from cancer to child slavery, and from poverty to, to pornography. To pray means to participate in the triumph not of good over evil, but of Jesus over the evil one. Somehow, and in some mysterious way, God chooses to win the battle through the participation of our prayers. Jesus primary vocation, as he sits at the right hand of God, is to pray. Hear this from Hebrews, chapter 7, verse 25. Therefore, he is able to save completely those who come to God through Him, because he always lives to intercede for them. In fact, Jesus primary vocation as he dwells among and within us, is to pray. He prays without ceasing. Now it would stand to reason that as we abide in him, we too pray without ceasing. And this is not primarily because we are praying, but because he is praying right. He's in us. Discipleship to Jesus means learning to pray in agreement with Jesus, in union with the mind of Christ. This does not come to us naturally. It must come supernaturally. Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet. Prayer means many things to many people. But biblically speaking, prayer means war, prayer means advance, prayer means recovering what has been lost and taking back what has been stolen. Remember how in Ephesians how Paul closed his teaching on warfare in the spirit. Here's his words. And pray in the spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the lord's people. Ephesians 6:18. As I wrote this, I was leaning back in a leather chair with my feet propped up on a footstool. I'm thinking about Satan and evil and sin and darkness as that footstool. This is the vision. The way is made by the prayers of Jesus. The way is made by our participation with Jesus in that work. Wouldn't that be a welcome shift from my prayer life to the prayer life of Jesus? That's where all this is heading. How about we pray now? Lord Jesus, you are right here, right now, and you will win the battle. I'm sorry for always beckoning you to my side. I sent you saying it's time for me to come to your side. Show me the way beyond my own thin agenda that I might enter into your prayer life and step into the real battle where all you do is win. Right here, Jesus. Right now, Jesus. Amen. The journal prompts today. Got three of them. What if we've missed the point of prayer? What if most of what we have learned about prayer is. Is more shaped by culturally transmitted folk religion than the revealed word of God? That's a tough one. And number two, what is the significance of Psalm 110, verse one? And why do you think it appears so much in the New Testament? Right. The Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand while I make your enemy, until I make your enemies a footstool for your. Feet. Feet. Last question. Is your prayer life lagging? I know what that feels like. That's when I got to wake up, get back oriented with, like, what's going on here? What's this really about? Is this just about me sort of hollering out my needs to God? Or am I actually coming into alignment with Jesus Christ and learning to speak like God thinks, speaks and thinks with his mind? What might it mean to join the prayer life of Jesus? A lot more I want to say today, but we gotta sing and we gotta hit the fields. We gotta get out there and do this work. You know, praying is something you can do all the time. You're praying right now. We're meeting with Jesus right now, but we shift gears and we Take our praying, our embodied presencing of Jesus Christ in us. We're just moving through the world. We're talking to him. We're listening to him. He's giving us a sense of prompts. He's guiding our steps. That's what he means when he says, abide in me and I will abide in you. You know, it's not just sort of leaving it behind in the prayer closet. It's actually learning to walk with him through the day. That's why you gotta go slow. That's what I keep reminding myself, right? Jesus moves at the speed of love. You know how fast that is? 2 miles an hour. It's walking. This guy's never in a hurry. He's the most significant. He's the most important person in the world. He's got the biggest to do list in the cosmos. He's not in a hurry. He's moving at the speed of love. That's the pace of power. Two miles an hour. You got time to respond. You're not just constantly reacting. You're like attuned, attentive, abiding. That's what we're doing today. All right, Dads. Dad's going to come join us. We're singing today. All right, everyone, we're back. We're in our. We're in the midst of our miniseries on prayer, and dad is here to help us to sing unto the Lord today. And dad, in today's entry, we're. We're talking about. I called it the war of prayer and how there's the most quoted verse from the Old Testament in the New Testament is this. The lord is Psalm 110. 1. The Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool underneath your feet. That's quoted over and over and over in the New Testament.

[B]

Was that Jesus?

[A]

Jesus said it, yes. Now, the point is we're in a battle, and it's a pitched battle. And we know who's won the battle, but it still has to be fought out.

[B]

Right?

[A]

We know who's won the war, but there's a lot of battles. And even though you win some and you lose some, we win the war. Jesus won the war. He will be the champion. He is the champion, but we're still working it out. We have to play our part. And so today, that's why we put on the full armor of God. We talked about that a lot back in Ephesians in the spring.

[B]

What Was that number? 167.

[A]

We're going to sing now, the last one. Oh, let's don't. Let's don't worry about that. Oh, four, four, four. I think it's one. 6 11. 611 is what we sang the other day. Dad likes to keep a running tab of what we've sung, so.

[B]

That doesn't sound like the number.

[A]

That was it.

[C]

That was the one.

[A]

I promise you. I want to be a Christian. I think. I think it was. But we got to go to a new song today. What are we singing? Tell them.

[B]

Okay, we're going to sing. A mighty fortress is our God.

[A]

What's our number?

[B]

35.

[A]

35. This is one of the big hymns. This is written by Martin Luther, who himself was in a pitched battle. They tried to kill him for his whole life after he woke up, essentially, he woke up to the great doctrine of salvation by grace through faith. You can't earn it. You can't. You don't deserve it. You can't strive your way there. You got to receive it, and you

[B]

got to receive it every day.

[A]

Just. You just got to wake up, wake up, sleep, or rise from the dead. You got to receive that resurrection power. That's not. You don't got to do something every day to get to go to heaven when you die, but you got to get up every day and do something to get heaven in you while you're alive. That's the big message, which is. And again, you just have to receive it and move with it. Now we're gonna sing all four verses. This song tells a big story. I want you to try to hear it as we sing it. But this is one of Peepaw's favorite songs right here. I always remember us singing it at his funeral. It was very powerful. I never heard the church sing as loud as I heard him on that day.

[B]

That's great. That's great. I'm proud of our church.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

Almighty fortresses Our God failing our helper ye Amid the flood of mortal ills prevailing for still our ancient Boston to work us woe Craft and power are great and armed with cruel hate on earth is not his equal did we in our arms ache and striving worth weightless name we're not the right hand on our side the land of God's own choosing Dost ask who that may be? Christ Jesus it is he Lord jealous His name from age to age the same and he just win the battle and though this world with death was filled should threaten to undo us we will not fear for God at will his truth will rio through us the Prince of darkness grim we tremble. As for him, his rights to know his doom is sure. One little word shall fail ye Last verse. That word above all earthly house. By death the spirit and the gifts are ours. Through him who win abide. The body they may kill. God's truth abided still his kingdom is forever.

[A]

The Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool underneath your feet. This is the battle.

[B]

That's. That's strong. That's strong words.

[A]

Strong. That's. That's strong. And Jesus is strong. And he must win the battle. We're fighting on the winning team. And you know what? One more thing. We're not fighting against people. People are never our enemy. We're fighting the devil. Okay? We're fighting the devil. Let's be very careful to not demonize people. Let's demonize the devil. Let's fight him. Let's know Jesus has already defeated him. We're just picking up the spoils. All right? It's time to let him go, dad. For The Awakening. I'm J.D.

[C]

walt.

[B]

And I'm David. Walt.

[C]

We'll see you on the field. See you on the field, Sam.