Look at the below story from the Word of God to understand how a collective unbelief would affect a collective faith:
(Mark 5:22-24)
And, behold, there cometh one of the rulers of the synagogue, Jairus by name; and when he saw him, he fell at his feet, And besought him greatly, saying, My little daughter lieth at the point of death: I pray thee, come and lay thy hands on her, that she may be healed; and she shall live. And Jesus went with him; and much people followed him, and thronged him.
When Jairus in the above passage of scripture asked Jesus Christ to come to his house to heal his daughter, who was at the point of death, Jesus started to journey to his house with him. However, before Jesus could arrive at the house, they heard that the daughter of Jairus was already dead. Look at the below scritpures:
(Mark 5:35)
While he yet spake, there came from the ruler of the synagogue's house certain which said, Thy daughter is dead: why troublest thou the Master any further?
However, Jesus knew He could release the power to raise the daughter of Jairus from the dead based on his faith (belief). Therefore, Jesus requested Jairus to remain in the same faith in the midst of the news of the death of his daughter.
(Mark 5:36-39)
As soon as Jesus heard the word that was spoken, he saith unto the ruler of the synagogue, Be not afraid, only believe. And he suffered no man to follow him, save Peter, and James, and John the brother of James. And he cometh to the house of the ruler of the synagogue, and seeth the tumult, and them that wept and wailed greatly. And when he was come in, he saith unto them, Why make ye this ado, and weep? the damsel is not dead, but sleepeth.
Why did Jesus say the damsel was not dead, but sleeping while she was truly dead?
When the sick daughter was dead, Jesus had to depend on the faith of the people who were with her in order to release the power to raise her from the dead. Jesus knew that it would be more difficult for the people to manifest faith if Jesus had told them that He was going to raise her from the dead by confirming the fact that she was already dead at that moment. Hence Jesus simply said she was sleeping. However, the people did not positively respond to what Jesus said. Look at the below verse:
(Mark 5:40)
And they laughed him to scorn. But when he had put them all out, he taketh the father and the mother of the damsel, and them that were with him, and entereth in where the damsel was lying.
Why did Jesus put all the people out of the house before raising the damsel from the dead?
When Jesus said to the people that the damsel was sleeping, they strongly manifested their unbelief by laughing and scorning. At this point, Jesus realized that He could not raise faith anymore from them. Therefore, Jesus decided to put the people out of the house wherein Jesus was about to realse the power to raise the damsel from the dead.
Why did Jesus take the father, mother of the damsel along with His three disciples (Peter, James, John) to the place where Jesus was about to release the power to raise the damsel from the dead?
Jesus couldn't do this miracle with zero faith. Hence, Jesus selected these persons (five in number) whom Jesus trusted that He could find faith for the power of healing to flow through the dead body of the damsel.
What would have happened if Jesus had allowed even the people in?
If Jesus had allowed them in, their unbelief would be stronger than the belief (faith) of the father and mother of the damsel and of the three disciples (Peter, James, John). Why? because collective faith fails in the face of the collective unbelief where the majority are not in agreement for the miracle.
PRAYER OF AGREEMENT
Today, a congregation in a church sometimes may pray together for different needs of the other believers. This kind of a prayer is referred to as 'PRAYER OF AGREEMENT'. The result of a prayer of agreement is very powerful as it is based on the following promise of Jesus Christ:
(Matthew 18:20)
For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.
The above promise says that when two or three are gathred together in agreement of a need, Jesus is in their midst to make sure that such need is met. However this would be possible provided all are in agreement
However, most of the time, people failed to receive the answers to these kind of prayers for the fact that the majority are not in agreement for what they pray for. However, those who are not in agreement would not reveal their disagreement to the face of the other people, but would just join the prayer as they are requested to do so.
Disagreement would be manifested by unbelief. For example, if there is a request from a pastor for the congregation to pray for the healing of a person with cancer, who is at the point of death, most of the time, the majority of the congregation would not have faith about the recovery of this sick person. However, they would just join the prayer as the request is made to the whole congregation in general. When the majority of the congregation is operating in unbelief, their unbelief would be stronger than the belief of the few who would earnestly desire for the recovery of the sick person. As a result, the devil gets the upper hand to hinder the power of healing.
Praying with one single person who would believe is better than praying with thousand people who do not seem to believe. Hence, in the above story, we see Jesus giving up the whole crowd and selecting only few (five in number) whose faith was powerful enough for Jesus to release the power as the unbelief was not available in their presence.
Today, we see people go behind other people asking them to pray for their personal needs. When they do so, they resort to 'PRAYER OF AGREEMENT' for their personal needs. But most of the time, the more the people who are joined to the prayer for the need, the more they fail to see favorable results. Why? because the majority are not in agreement for the need. Hence, you should be very careful when you plan to gather people for a prayer for your personal needs.
I believe a prayer of agreement would give better results when the need is beneficial to all the people in the prayer. In other words, a prayer of agreement is good for needs in common.
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