Relational Prayer

Pray the Word in 2009

Real Life, Real Purpose, Real Joy!
"I have come that they may have life and have it to the full"  John 10:10

Pray with expectancy in 2009; pray God's Word.

Relational Prayer

Our Divine Advocate

by Ruth Bauman Wight

We have responded to the gracious invitation to come into the presence of God, our Father.  We have been honest in our confession and confident of our forgiveness through Jesus Christ.  Now we come with our hearts full, wanting to express ourselves in prayer.

Where do we begin?  How do we channel our tumbling thoughts, deep longings and heavy concerns?  Are we only able to pray when our thoughts and expressions are coherent and orderly?  What if we cannot articulate the burdens on our hearts and can only sit speechless in His presence?  Does God hear?  Does God care?

How reassuring to know that, not only God the Father, but also the Lord Jesus and the Holy Spirit are intimately involved and interested in our prayers.  They are standing by compassionately, willing and able to assist as we struggle to express what is on our hearts.

We are told that the Lord Jesus is able to identify with every trial and temptation that we are encountering.  In his human body, He lived on earth with all its perplexities and challenges.  He knows what it is to be tired, to be misunderstood, to suffer and to be rejected.  He is able to understand deeply what we are presently experiencing.

Hebrews 4:15 reassures us.

"For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are - yet without sin."

Not content to merely identify with us, He stands on our behalf before His Father with our name and circumstances on His lips.  He lovingly discusses us, lifting us up before the Father and presenting our case.  What an advocate He is for us.  Even when we sleep, He continues to intercede with our well being on his heart.

We can rest in the fact that His intercession is effective and eternal.

"... because Jesus lives forever, he has a permanent priesthood.  Therefore He is able to save completely those who come to God through him, because he always lives to intercede for them."  (Hebrews 7:24,25)

There are times when we are too weak or too perplexed to pray.  We do not know how or what to pray.  We can only groan.  Even then, we are not ignored.  This is when the Holy Spirit undertakes on our behalf to interpret our cries and line them up with the Father's will.

He takes our groans and intertwines then with his own.

"The Spirit helps us in our weakness.  We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express.  And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit because the Spirit intercedes for the saints in accordance with God's will."  (Romans 8:26,27)

We need not approach the throne fearing that we are inadequate, tongue tied and feeble.  We just come in our need, resting in the fact that we are surrounded by a gracious Trinity and gladly responding to this invitation.

"Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need."  (Hebrews 4:16)