It has become sadly all too common that many of us pray from a position of imitation rather than intimacy. We hear someone close to God pray, declare, or act a certain way, and we imitate them, expecting the same result. Often, we see nothing happen at all. Is it imitation or intimacy behind the words we use?

A Warning From The Sons Of Sceva

“So that even handkerchiefs or aprons were brought from his body to the sick, and the diseases left them and the evil spirits went out of them. Then some of the itinerant Jewish exorcists took it upon themselves to call the name of the Lord Jesus over those who had evil spirits, saying, ‘We exorcise you by the Jesus whom Paul preaches.’ Also there were seven sons of Sceva, a Jewish chief priest, who did so. And the evil spirit answered and said, ‘Jesus I know, and Paul I know; but who are you?’ Then the man in whom the evil spirit was leaped on them, overpowered them, and prevailed against them, so that they fled out of that house naked and wounded” (Acts 19:12-16, NKJV).

Scripture is consistent on this point: if we are truly in right standing with God, He will answer our prayers, and Jesus tells us that whatever we ask in His name, we will receive. But the sons of Sceva remind us what happens when the words are right and the relationship is not: imitation borrows the name without the standing behind it, and it collapses the moment it is tested. Every prayer we pray comes from one place or the other, imitation or intimacy, whether we notice it or not.

Uprooting The Weeds

Let us sit for a moment, and uproot some weeds together. These weeds grow because of people selling ministry, courses, or methods to become anointed or to fulfil your “destiny.” It is nonsense, and it is deception, because you cannot buy your position, your anointing, or your knowledge of God. He paid for all of it on the cross; you only need to claim it.

What Does ‘In His Name’ Really Mean?

One of the biggest errors running through the church today is a misunderstanding of the phrase “in my name.” It is often taught as a formula, “in the name of Jesus, be healed,” and when the person stays sick, still bound, still caught in sin, what do we tell ourselves? Usually, that the fault lies in our feelings, in waiting for enough of them to overflow. That is not what the phrase means at all.

To act in His name, in the Jewish understanding behind it, is to be in His way: in full, intimate fellowship with the Father, as a son or daughter would be. My own daughters do not speak to me by imitating someone else’s tone or words; they speak to me from a place of love and fellowship, which is why they ask me for things, and why I take them on trips. When you speak to your Father, what position are you really coming from?

He Will Teach Us Himself

My hope is that a day will come when the body of Christ awakens, and steps into a deeper relationship with God for its own sake. He says He will teach us Himself, and the Bible makes no mention anywhere of paying for courses, internships, or weekend ministerial programmes. He teaches us because of who we already are: His sons and His daughters, not His students.

Let the sin of Simon cease within the body, leaders included. We cannot buy the anointing, and we should not be charging others for our time to preach, teach, or pray over them, however sound the training behind it looks on paper. There is room for all of this in a life spent learning to sit at the feet of Jesus rather than in a classroom paid for by the hour.

Today, pause, reflect, repent, and return to the Father, not for what can be gained from Him, but because you genuinely want to know Him. Through His grace, mercy, and compassion poured out on the cross, you now can. The choice between imitation or intimacy is yours to make again, today.

Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.